The Moses Legacy

Chapter 70

Back in his cheap hotel room, Goliath was thinking.

Although Na’if had got away, Goliath did not feel the same sensation of failure that had haunted him these past few weeks. Instead, he felt engulfed in a strange feeling of satisfaction, bordering on elation. He had found out that they had gone to Taba and that Daniel didn’t have his mobile phone any more. That meant that he probably wouldn’t retrieve the message Goliath had left for him.

But why had he gone to Taba? There were surely no antiquities there? It was largely a tourist resort like Sharm el-Sheikh. And the Egyptian authorities were after them. Surely they wouldn’t just decide to hang out in a tourist resort?

But there were cheap hotels there, as well as expensive ones. And it was relatively out of the way. Maybe they were planning on hiding out there till the heat died down. Suddenly Goliath had another idea.

He switched on the television and surfed the channels looking for the news, in the hope of hearing anything about the wanted Englishman and Austrian woman. Eventually his eye caught a scrolling text at the bottom of the screen that read: Shots fired in high-speed boat chase between Egypt and Israel. Realizing that this might be to do with Daniel, he switched on his smartphone and logged on to the Internet in search of more news.

A few keywords later, he had the report in front of him: the incident at the Supreme Council of Antiquities, Taba, the motorboat chase, the shots… Israel.

That made perfect sense. He had been half-expecting something like that when Na’if told him they had gone to Taba. It was close to the Israeli border. Where else would they be going?

But where in Israel? There was no point going there unless he could find that out.

Then he had an idea.