The Eden Prophecy

CHAPTER 22

Danielle’s trip through Beirut was a surreal journey, a passage through a city that had long been at war with itself. Most people knew of Beirut’s sad recent history, a place being torn apart for thirty years by civil war, invasions, and strife. What most people didn’t know was that Beirut had once been a shining beacon of prosperity and multicultural cooperation.

After World War II, the population had been divided roughly fifty-fifty between Muslims and Christians and the power had been similarly shared. For twenty-plus years it had remained that way, with a strong commercial sector, a rapidly growing economy, and a thriving tourist industry.

During those years Beirut had been a nexus for much of the Arab and Western worlds. Europeans came to its beaches and casinos almost as frequently as they went to Monaco and the south of France. Beirut was the gateway to Europe in one direction and the gateway to the Middle East in the other.

But then the sorrows came. The Muslim population grew faster than the Christian, and demands for more power by Muslim leaders were met with suspicion and resistance from Christian ones. Soon the city and the country around it were in a state of civil war, a war that would eventually draw in Syria, Israel, and the United States.

A decade of that madness left the city divided, with a Christian side, a Muslim side, and a vacant central core acting as a sort of unofficial demilitarized zone.

On each side rebuilding efforts went on; on each side those who wanted peace fought with those who wanted aggression, while the two sides faced off against each other across the vacant no-man’s-land.

But the will of the Lebanese people to thrive seemed greater than the ability of fate to keep them down. At various times in past millennia they had rebuilt after massive earthquakes, invasion, occupation, fires that had burned the city to the ground.

As Danielle rode through the city in a silver SUV, she noticed cranes sprouting from every block. Bulldozers and construction equipment clogged the streets and horns honked in frustration, marking an odd kind of progress. Beirut was filling in the wound that had cleaved it in two, and while many complaints were made about the pace, style, and final design of all the work, no one really wanted it to stop.

On the Muslim side, Danielle passed modern-looking hotels, office buildings, and other structures most in America would be shocked to find in Beirut. She made it to the shore, drove past Pigeon’s Rock, and arrived at the St.-George Yacht Club.

It was a busy place as well. Hundred-foot yachts anchored at various spots in the harbor. Farther out, eighty-foot sailboats bobbed on swells as smaller craft moved here and there.

She parked, made her way down the pier, and arrived in front of a sleek-looking motor yacht named Phoenician Builder. A guard checked her credentials and waved her on board. A second crewman led her to a shaded deck where Faisal Najir sat enjoying a late lunch.

Najir sat alone, wearing slacks and a white linen shirt open to the third button, just far enough to display a dark, hairy chest and several medallions hanging from his neck. His olive skin glowed with the sun and his wild mane of curly hair seemed to enjoy the breeze that swept over the boat. A pair of bodyguards stood a few steps behind him.

As Danielle approached, he stood and extended a hand.

“You are Danielle Laidlaw,” he said confidently.

“And you are Faisal Najir, master builder,” she replied. “A friend of Arnold Moore’s.”

“And lucky to be both,” he insisted.

He waved a hand at the empty seat. “Please.”

Danielle sat. A waiter appeared, filling her glass with water, as if they were at a restaurant. She glanced at him and then at the bodyguards.

“Can we talk privately?”

Najir nodded to the guards and they moved away, beyond hearing range.

“Did Arnold tell you why I’m here?”

“You wish to attend an auction of … how to say it: unsavory items. No, no, ‘items with unsavory backgrounds’ sounds better.”

Danielle was unsure which would turn out to be more unsavory, the items for bid or the crowd bidding on them, but that was the gist of it.

“Do you know of such an auction?” she asked.

“I do,” he replied. “You wish to bid on something or just observe?”

She nodded. “Both. Specifically anything a man named Bashir or another man named Ranga Milan might have been interested in.”

A look of discomfort registered on Najir’s face. He glanced away for a moment.

“Do you know them?” she asked.

“Not the second name. But Bashir is well-known here. He is well liked. I am friends with Arnold Moore but I will not assist in incriminating or otherwise harming Bashir.”

“It’s not something you need to worry about,” she said.

“It is something I choose to worry about,” he replied.

Danielle realized he’d taken her statement the wrong way. “Bashir is missing,” she said. “The other man I named is dead. We don’t know why, but tonight’s auction held great interest for both of them. It may have something to do with what happened to them.”

The words lingered, laid out there as bare truth for Najir to ponder. Danielle preferred to be straightforward when she could. With little time, she thought it best not to beat around the bush.

“So the Iranians finally finished him,” Najir said.

“We don’t think it was them,” she replied. “But whoever it was, they may be more dangerous than any existing regime.”

“What are we talking about?”

“A cult that wants to destroy God.”

He laughed lightly. “What does God have to fear from man?”

“Not God, specifically,” she said. “God’s children. People.”

“Which people?”

“All of us,” she said. “At least all the children of Abraham.”

Now Faisal nodded. Abraham was in a sense the patriarch of the three great Western religions: Judaism, Christianity, Islam.

“We have reason to believe they may be able to do great harm.”

Bashir put his hand on the glass in front of him as if he were about to have a drink, but he did not lift it. He seemed too deep in thought.

“Do you know why I have these bodyguards?” Najir said.

She could guess but didn’t.

“Because I told the Syrians to get the hell out of my country, demanded the Israelis stop bombing us, and warned the Iranians to never come here again.”

It was a proud statement. She sensed it was true.

“Left alone, we Lebanese will find a way to live together. But there is a price to pay for bravery.”

“I know,” she said. “I’ve seen it firsthand.”

“And been part of it, I’d guess,” he said. “Otherwise Arnold would not speak so highly of you.”

Never one to take compliments well, she wasn’t sure how to respond.

“I don’t need you to go with me,” she said. “Just get me inside. Tell me what to look for and who’ll be there. I can do the rest.”

Najir took a drink of water and then broke a corner off his bread. He dipped it in olive oil and turned back to her, his smile as warm as the Mediterranean sun. “That will look suspicious,” he said.

“Because I’m a woman?”

“No,” he said smiling. “Because they will be surprised not to see me.”

She smiled back at him. “Of course.”

“We all have temptations we find hard to resist.”

“That we do,” she said. “When’s the auction?”

“After the evening prayers, we will meet some of our brothers from the other side of the city. And then you will see what Bashir wanted to see.”