The Columbus Affair: A Novel

CHAPTER EIGHT

ALLE LEFT THE BUILDING FEELING VIOLATED AND DIRTY. THOSE men had gone too far. Earlier, they’d discussed the performance and agreed on how to make it compelling, but no one had mentioned anything about groping her. Zachariah must have witnessed what happened from the other end of the transmission. She wondered what he thought. The idea had been to spur her father into action, to make the situation appear dire. Anything less and her father might not do what they wanted. Too much, and the threat would be meaningless.

One thing she could say.

What just happened should be sufficient.

She’d met Zachariah six months ago. He’d appeared in Seville, where she was working in the Biblioteca Columbina, among an extraordinary collection of materials from Christopher Columbus’ time. Her doctoral thesis was to be on the great explorer’s map, the one he’d used to find his way to the New World. A famed chart, it had disappeared in the 16th century, and much had been made of its fate. Some postulated that it could have been the mappa mundus, the so-called original map of the world. Others argued that it contained geographic information supposedly unknown to navigators of the 15th century. Still more thought there might have been connections to the Phoenicians, the Greeks, ancient Egyptians, or even Atlantians.

No one knew anything for sure.

The Spanish government only added to the mystery with its official pronouncement that no such chart was secreted away in its archives, yet they would not allow any independent searches to verify that fact.

On a lark she’d written an article about Columbus for Minerva, a British journal on ancient art and archaeology that she’d read for years. To her surprise they’d published it, which pointed Zachariah her way.

He was an extraordinary individual. Self-made in every way, from his modest education to his triumphs in international business and finance. He shied away from the limelight, preferring to live alone, never having married or fathered any children. He employed no publicists, no public relations firm, no cadre of assistants. He was simply a multibillionaire the world knew little about. He lived outside Vienna in a magnificent mansion, but he also owned buildings in town, including the apartment she now occupied. She’d also learned that his philanthropic efforts were extensive, his foundations donating millions to causes with Judaic connections. He spoke of Israel in solemn terms. His religion meant something to him, as it meant something to her.

He was born and raised. She’d converted five years ago, but told no one other than her grandfather, who’d been so pleased. He’d wanted his grandchildren to be Jewish, but her father had seemingly ended that hope. Unlike her mother, Alle never found solace in Christianity. Listening as a child, then as a young adult, she’d decided Judaism was what she held dear. So she quietly underwent the training and made the conversion.

The one secret between her and her mother.

And a regret.

She kept walking, navigating the maze of narrow cobbled streets. Bells echoed in the distance, signaling 8:00 P.M. She should go home and change, but she decided to pray first. Luckily, she’d come to the broadcast wearing her wool coat—Vienna’s weather remained on the chilly side—which fell below her knees and shielded her ripped clothes. Here in this ancient city, which once housed 200,000 Jews but now supported a mere 10,000, she felt a connection with the past. Ninety-three synagogues were razed by the Nazis, every scrap of their existence eradicated. Sixty-five thousand Jews were slaughtered. When she thought of such tragedies her mind always drifted to 70 CE, and what her new religion regarded as one of the greatest tragedies of all.

First came Nebuchadnezzar and the Babylonians in 586 BCE. They carried away all of Jerusalem, its officials, warriors, artisans, and thousands of captives. No one remained except the poorest of the land. The invaders destroyed Solomon’s First Temple, the holiest of places, and carted away its treasures, hacking to pieces the sacred vessels of gold. The Jews remained in exile for several generations, eventually returning to Palestine and heeding God’s command that they build a new sanctuary. Moses had been supplied a precise blueprint for its construction, including how to fashion the sacred vessels. The Second Temple was completed in 516 BCE, but was totally refurbished and enlarged by Herod beginning in 18 BCE. Herod’s Temple was what greeted the Romans when they conquered Judea in 6 CE, and it was the same temple that stood when the Jews rose in revolt sixty years later.

A revolt they won.

Joy filled Judea. The Roman yoke had finally been cast off.

But everyone knew the legions would return.

And they did.

Nero dispatched Vespasian from the north and Titus from the south, a father-and-son pair of generals. They attacked Galilee in 67 CE. Two years later Vespasian became emperor and left Titus with 80,000 men to teach the Jews a lesson.

Judea was reconquered. Then, in 70 CE, Jerusalem was laid to siege.

Fighting was fierce on both sides, and conditions within the city became horrific. Hundreds of corpses were flung over the walls daily, hunger and disease becoming powerful Roman allies. Battering rams finally breached the walls and shock troops drove the defenders back into the temple compound, where they barricaded themselves for a final stand.

But six days of pounding caused no damage to the Temple Mount.

Its massive stones held.

Attempts to scale the great wall failed. Finally, the Romans set fire to the gates and burst through.

The Jews also set fires, hoping to check the Romans’ advance, but the flames spread too quickly and burned down barriers protecting the sanctuary. The defenders were but a handful fighting against far superior numbers. They met their death willingly, some throwing themselves on Roman swords, some slaying one another, others taking their own lives by leaping into the flames.

None regarded what was happening as a destruction.

Instead, they saw their own demise as a salvation, and felt happiness at perishing along with their Second Temple.

Through the pall of smoke centurions ran amok, looting and killing. Corpses were piled around the sacred altar. Blood poured down the sanctuary steps, bodies slithering down the risers atop red rivers. Eventually, no one could walk without touching death.

Titus and his entourage managed to gain entrance to the sanctuary before it was destroyed. They had heard of its magnificence, but to stand amid the opulence was another matter. The Holy of Holies, the most sacred part of the Temple, was overlaid with gold, its inner door crafted of Corinthian brass. Suspended above the twelve steps leading to the entrance was a spreading vine of gold, replete with clusters of grapes as tall as a man. A silver-and-gold crown—not the original, but a copy of the one worn by the high priest after the return from Babylonian exile—was prominently displayed.

Then there were the sacred objects.

A golden menorah. The divine table. Silver trumpets.

All had been commissioned by God, on Mount Sinai, for Moses to create. The Romans knew that, by destroying the Second Temple and removing these treasures, the essence of Judaism would also be symbolically extinguished.

Another exile would then occur.

Not physically, though many would die or be enslaved, but certainly spiritually.

There would be no Third Temple.

And for the past 1,940 years that had been the case, Alle thought, as she entered the only Viennese synagogue the Nazis had not destroyed.

The Stadttempel sat among a block of anonymous apartment buildings, hidden away, thanks to Emperor Joseph II who decreed that only Catholic churches could face public streets. Ironically, that insult was what saved the building, as it had proven impossible for the Germans to torch it without burning the whole block to the ground.

The 19th-century sanctuary was oval-shaped, its ceiling supported by gilded beams and a ring of twelve Ionic columns—symbolic, she knew, of Jacob’s twelve sons, the progenitors of the tribes of Israel. A star-speckled, sky-blue dome loomed overhead. She’d visited here many times over the past month, the building’s shape and elegance making her feel as if she were inside a jeweled egg.

What would it mean for the Jews to have their Third Temple in Jerusalem?

Everything.

And to complete that accomplishment her adopted faith would also require its sacred vessels.

Her gaze drifted around the dimly lit sanctuary and her eyes watered.

She could still feel hands groping her body. Never had anyone touched her like that before.

She started to cry.

What would her mother have thought? She’d been a good woman, who rarely spoke ill of her ex-husband, always encouraging her daughter to forgive him.

But she never could.

What she’d just done to her father should bother her, but thoughts of what lay ahead helped with her rationalizations.

She stemmed the tears and calmed herself.

The Ark of the Covenant would never be found. The Babylonians had seen to that. The golden menorah, the divine table, and the silver trumpets? They could still exist.

The Temple treasure.

Or what was left of it.

Gone for 1,940 years.

But, depending on her father, maybe not for much longer.