The Sinai Secret

FIFTY-EIGHT

Just Outside Kibbutz Zion

An Hour Later

Prone in the sand, Lang and Jacob watched the kibbutz from a slight rise that gave them a view of most of the compound. Family by family, the inhabitants walked to the dining hall, the last arriving just as the day's last light leached from the western sky. Almost immediately the date trees began to speak, with fronds rustling in the breeze that sprang up from the ocean.

Both men waited a few more minutes until it was totally dark before standing.

"I didn't see anyone on lookout duty," Lang observed, dusting off as much sand as possible.

"This close to the wogs, they'd jolly well have some sort of sentry," Jacob said. "Most likely electronic sensors- visual, motion-detecting, or both."

"I looked pretty close when we drove by in the truck this morning. Didn't see any."

"You wouldn't. They'd be concealed, most likely in those two palm trees at the entrance."

"Easy enough to take care of. And from seeing "someone carry three lunch plates from the mess hall, it's also likely that Alicia has a couple of guards around the clock. Just like we guessed from the satellite shot."

Jacob stooped to pick up a backpack and shifted it onto his shoulders. "As we planned, you handle them. I'll handle diverting everyone else."

Lang took a last look at the lights spilling from open windows before both men started down the hill. He savored the familiar tingle of his scalp, the chill down his spine, the almost narcotic high of pending action. It was a feeling a lawyer and head of a charitable foundation did not often enjoy.

He had missed it.

Just outside the entrance they stopped. Silently, Jacob made a circling motion. Each man walked in a wide arc before returning to the point of beginning.

"You're right," Lang said. "There's something in that tree besides coconuts."

Jacob was studying the trees with the night-vision goggles. He pulled them up on his forehead. "Two small cameras on each, angled to cover anyone going or coming."

Lang squatted, bringing the outline of the kibbutz into focus against the starry sky. "And I suppose the fence is either electrified or has a trip wire."

Jacob put the goggles on again to have a look himself. "Bloody unlikely the fence is charged-too great a risk of killing someone's livestock. We can cut through it."

"That's sure to trip whatever alarm system they have."

"Right you are. Perhaps we can dig under it."

The two approached the triple strands of wire, careful to keep out of the field of view of the tree-mounted cameras.

Lang stooped to reach under the fence. "Shit! Concrete-they've poured cement under the fence. We'd need a jackhammer to dig under it." He stood and looked across the kibbutz. "But I bet their date orchard isn't inside the fence."

"So what?" Jacob asked. "We're not here to steal effing dates."

"Maybe not," Lang conceded, "but let's see."

Keeping low to prevent presenting a silhouette, they skirted the fence line as it turned a corner. Minutes later they could see the stately palm trees against the night sky. As they got closer it became clear the palms would be on their left and the fence to the right.

"Now what?" Jacob asked. "You planning to climb a tree like some sodding monkey?"

Lang was moving along the fence line. "Exactly."

"And do what, jump? Fit to fight wed be, what with broken legs."

"I don't think that's necessary if we can-"

Lang stopped so suddenly Jacob almost collided with his back in the dark.

"There!"

A number of the date palms, pushed by years of sea breeze, were leaning drunkenly toward the fence.

Lang selected one bent almost horizontal. "This should do."

"Do what?" Jacob protested. "We can't even see how far it is off the ground where it crosses the fence."

"I doubt it gets any farther off the ground than we see here. Besides, feel how soft this sand is? Makes a great landing surface."

Jacob mumbled something before inhaling noisily. "I suppose this is the only way in."

"Unless you have another idea."

Jacob shook off his backpack and tossed it over the fence. "If I can't find that in the dark, we've made a fruitless trip."

Lang held out a hand. "Need a boost up?"

"Keep yer sodding boost to yerself. I may not be as young as I used to be, but I bloody well can still climb a tree."

Two attempts later he was breathing hard. "Well, okay, then, perhaps a wee boost would be in order."

With Lang behind pushing, Jacob made the ten to twelve! vertical feet before the tree bent toward the fence. The trunk was wide enough to permit easy movement along it.

"This should do," Lang announced, swinging over the side. He hung by his arms for a moment before dropping with a barely audible thud onto the sand below. "Softer than I thought," he whispered up.

It took perhaps a full minute to locate Jacob's backpack.

"Okay," Lang said. "I'll wait for you to do your thing. Try to get to where they're holding her. We'll take one of the cars outside to get out of here once we have her."

Without a reply, Jacob disappeared into the darkness.

Using the lights from the buildings, Lang navigated to the one from which he had seen Alicia exit that morning. There were three vehicles in front, a Range Rover, Mercedes's boxy version of the same automobile, and a Toyota pickup.

Lang waited in deep shadow until he was certain no one else was in the area. Keeping the cars between him and the building, he crawled to the pickup, knelt to open the door, and popped the hood latch. Seconds later he had the distributer cap in hand, which he threw as far away as he could. He repeated the process with the Range Rover before withdrawing again to the shadows to wait.

He was never sure of how long it took, only that the explosion came much quicker than he had anticipated.

He saw a flash, an orange cloud limning the water tower as its two front legs buckled like an animal kneeling to drink. He felt a blast of hot air, and only then did he hear the sound, a noise that cracked like a roll of thunder, followed by the diluvial slosh as the toppling tank ruptured when it hit the ground, releasing thousands of gallons of water.

He watched as figures jammed the mess hall's doorway just in time to watch the pyrotechnic display of what Lang guessed had been a fuel storage facility erupting in a greasy orange-and-black firestorm.

Men were outside the mess hall now, some firing Uzis blindly toward the conflagration, believing they were under attack by their Arab neighbors. Others screamed for firefighting equipment, which, Lang guessed, would be quite useless with the loss of the water supply.

The general impression was like kicking over an anthill.

Lang positioned himself beside the door of the building in whose shadows he had been waiting.

Two men carrying Uzis, Alicia's guards, stepped outside. The noise of general pandemonium as well as the roar of the flames devouring the shed made it impossible to hear what was said, but it was obvious they were as surprised as their comrades in the mess hall.

Lang stepped into the doorway behind them so that, should anyone look this way, the two would block sight of him. The SIG Sauer was in his hand. "This way, gentlemen."

They whirled, one beginning to raise his weapon until he saw the muzzle of Lang's pistol only inches from his forehead.

This sect might well be fanatics but they weren't suicidal.

Both men slowly raised their hands, and Lang took both Uzis before returning his automatic to the holster in the small of his back.

With one machine gun under his left arm, he pulled the bolt back on the other just far enough to make sure the weapon had a shell in the chamber and was ready to fire.

He gestured inside. "If you will, gentlemen, please. After you."

What he saw stopped him cold.

He had entered what he supposed was the main room, off of which there were one or two smaller ones. It was bare except for a rough wooden table and a pair of bentwood chairs. Alicia sat in one. Next to her was a small man with the side curls and beard of the orthodox Jew, like the men Lang had seen at the kibbutz. He held one of those massive Desert Eagles to her head.

"Lang!" She gasped in surprise.

"Ah, Mr. Reilly! I've been waiting for you," the man with the pistol said in slightly accented English. "I was beginning to fear you were unable to put all the clues together and were not coming."

The Uzi relied more on rate of fire than accuracy. Trying to shoot the man with the gun to Alicia's head, he: was just as likely to hit her. Even if not, there was no guarantee the man couldn't pull the trigger before he died.

Lang put both Uzis down on the table. "Sorry to keep you waiting. You are Mr. Zwelk?"

The man nodded as he gestured to the two guards, who began a none-too-gentle search of Lang's person. "Quite correct. I must confess a small disappointment you didn't find me sooner."

Lang held up his arms as he was patted down. One man tugged the SIG Sauer free and placed it on the table. "Trust me, I came as quickly as I could."

"Lang," Alicia began, "this man-"

Zwelk silenced her with a glare. "If you want out of this alive, you would be wise to remain quiet."

"You have no intent of either of us leaving here," Lang stated.

Zwelk gave a chilly smile, nodding his head toward the flickering shadows caused by the flames outside. "I certainly have just cause if I choose not to let you live."

"But why…?" Alicia asked.

"Because Mr. Reilly is in a position to release a secret, one that could do my people great harm."

"Why don't you let your government decide that?" Lang asked.

Zwelk wrinkled his nose in disgust. "Government!" he spit. "The government is nothing but a harlot, prostituting itself for this interest and that. The government of the state of Israel was originally intended to be of the Jewish state. But what has it become? A society of material greed rather than Zionism!"

"I thought all Jews are welcome-the zealot, the conservative, as well as those who are Jewish by birth, if not particularly religious."

Zwelk curled a lip in disgust. "Not religious? Israel was to be a nation of religion!"

"Like your friends the Arabs? You would have a clerical rather than secular state?"

Agency training: Keep your opponent talking; delay as long as possible.

Zwelk snorted. "Like the ever-materialistic, antireligious United States? No, Mr. Reilly, there are those of us who have higher hopes for our nation. A nation, by the way, to which you pose a great danger. The force your institution has found could be the ultimate weapon."

"I'd guess it already is-was long before I came along. Besides, you're not referring to the powers of the Ark," Lang said. "You know that as well as I do."

Alicia's puzzled voice interrupted. "Lang, what are you two talking about?"

Zwelk paid her no attention. "Ignoring the weapon's potential? Really? He stroked his beard, a gesture that Lang guessed was more habit than conscious gesture. "Then what exactly do you think I'm talking about?"

"The Book of Jereb, those scrolls you took after you had Professor Shaffer murdered in Vienna. It wasn't what was said about the Ark; it was what was said about Moses and the Israelites. That's what you want to remain a secret."

Alicia had been turning her head as each man spoke. "What power? What Book of Jereb?"

This time it was Lang who didn't respond to her question for the moment. "How did you know the copy of Jereb had been found?"

"We knew it was buried somewhere among the medieval manuscripts at Melk. We couldn't just walk in and rummage through them. So, when the abbey decided to sort them out, create a computer index, we simply hired someone to keep a close watch. We never dreamed that man Steinburg would actually reproduce a copy of the book and send it to his cousin. By the time our man at Melk told us what had happened, it was too late."

"You kidnapped me and are threatening to kill us over some medieval manuscript?" Alicia asked incredulously.

Lang didn't break eye contact with Zwelk. "Not just any manuscript. This was a copy of a much older one, an alternative to the Book of Exodus."

"I still don't understand."

"This book, like Exodus, states that Moses was an Egyptian. It went further, telling of a king deposed because he was monotheistic-put the priests of the various gods out of work, as it were. But it went on. The Israelites were Egyptians, too, Egyptian believers in a single god, not Jews. Mr. Zwelk figured that anyone researching superconductors similar to the Ark might be lead to the Book of Jereb or come across the real story: that Egyptians, not Jews, wandered in the desert and settled in what is now Israel. He couldn't take that risk, so he had everyone connected to that research killed."

Alicia was clearly perplexed. "So, what does that have to do with

…?"

"Our friend Zwelk here wants to make sure no word of the Israelites'true origins gets out to the world at large. See, if the Israelites were not Jews, but Egyptians, Arabs-"

Zwelk interrupted. "The state of Israel cannot afford to have the legitimacy of its claim to Palestine disputed, particularly by the Muslim world. It is the land promised to my people by their God." "Not unless your people happen to be Egyptians," Lang observed.

Zwelk's face screwed into a scowl. 'And that, Mr. Reilly, is why you won't be leaving."

Alicia gave Lang a frightened look.

"Don't worry," he said. "He isn't going to-"

He stopped in midsentence.

The three men in the room had heard it, too: the distinctive thump of helicopters in flight.

"Whoever that is," Zwelk announced, "I assure you they are too late to be of help to you." He reached for Lang's SIG Sauer on the table. "They will find that you shot your lady friend here in an attempt to kidnap her from the hospitality of our community."

"Won't work, Zwelk," Lang said, mentally measuring his chances of successfully lunging across the table. "Nobody is going to believe she was here by her own will."

Zwelk stepped back, gun arm extended. "Why not? Neither of you will be alive to contradict it. In any event, I will not be here by the time whoever is in those helicopters arrives. I have known for a long time that my devotion to the purity of the Jewish religion would provoke the authorities and planned accordingly."

"Reminds me of rats and sinking ships," Lang said.

Lang took a deep breath as he watched Zwelk's trigger finger tighten.

He could only hope Jacob had known what the hell he was doing.