“Breck and I are traveling with you as your attaches.”
“Do you think that wise, given your troubles with the Israelis?” Litti said, concern in his voice.
Feldman tried to sound reassuring. “We'll be disguised, too, Cardinal. Don't worry, no one's going to recognize us. Besides, Egyptian officials don't travel without their attaches, and I don't trust anyone else to handle this. Even our driver won't know who you and Jeza are.”
Litti was hesitant, but coming around. “Well, all right, if you think that will work…”
“When do we leave?” Feldman asked, looking forward to seeing the Messiah again.
“Saturday morning, I think,” Litti said. “I'll call and let you know as soon as I can determine exactly when and where.”
101
Ali'im Projects, West Cairo, Egypt 6:00 A.M., Saturday, April 15, 2000
At the appointed time and location, the reporters arrived in a long, dark stretch limo, complete with tinted windows, Egyptian government seals on its side and a burly, no-nonsense Arab chauffeur.
As they turned down the last row of modest white-adobe houses, they encountered the cardinal pacing the dirt road, anxiously awaiting them. Feldman was about to scold him for parading around undisguised, when he noticed the distraught look on the cardinal's flushed face.
“She's gone!” Litti yelled, rushing up to the slowing car.
Feldman was aghast. “Gone? When? Where?”
Litti held his hand over his heart, short of breath. “When I awoke, our hosts told me that Jeza had disappeared last night after I retired for the evening. She gave instructions that I not be awakened, and She just left! No one will say where, but I'm certain She's headed for Jerusalem. This is so reckless of Her!”
“Goddammit!” Hunter blurted out his disappointment. “I say we make a run for Jerusalem anyway. If she's headed there, maybe we can catch up with her on the way. It's worth a try, ‘cause if she's left Cairo, our work here is shit-canned anyway.”
It crossed Feldman's mind that this was no way to speak in front of a Catholic cardinal of the Holy See, but the reporter was too dispirited to raise the issue. “You're right,” Feldman agreed, taking a last look around the sleepy development. “Let's do it.”
Litti climbed inside and the limo sped off down the dirt road toward the Israeli border.
“Can you tell me how you found Jeza, and what's been happening with her since I last saw you?” Feldman asked as they began getting into their disguises.
Litti nodded. “You know, when I returned to my hotel after our trip to the Vatican, I thought I'd never see Jeza again. Three days of prayer passed and I heard nothing. Then, on the fourth morning, I was sitting in my room meditating and I felt this overwhelming compulsion to go to the window. I looked down on the street and was suddenly seized with vertigo. When I regained my balance, lo and behold, there was Jeza, four floors below, standing on the sidewalk, staring up at me.
“I went immediately down and, without saying a word, She led me through the streets to the outskirts of Cairo and a small encampment of Bedouins. That's who She stays with in the desert. She moves around with them and their herds, living in tents and teaching.”
“Do they even know who she is?” Feldman wondered.
“Oh my, yes,” Litti confirmed. “They have portable TVs and radios they take with them everywhere they go. They're totally devoted to Her. She's cured several of them of serious illnesses.”
Feldman nodded his understanding. After all, it was Bedouins who first discovered Jeza in the desert after her escape from the Negev disaster. In a sense, they were her first family.
“So,” Litti went on, “Jeza invited me to live and travel with her and the Bedouins, which I've done now ever since. We roam all about this region, visiting different locales where Jeza stays at the home of a local inhabitant, preaches, performs an occasional miracle and then we move on.”
“And you're still convinced that Jeza is the true Messiah?” Feldman questioned.
“Absolutely!” Litti exclaimed without hesitation. “Quite certainly She's a Messiah. Just as Jesus was. She's the only begotten Daughter of God, here on His special mission.”
Adjusting Hunter's turban to hide his blond hair, Feldman gave Litti a sideways glance. “Other than dismantling organized religion and causing untold world turmoil, just what is her mission, exactly?”
The cardinal looked disappointed. “Jon, tell me, after all you've seen, you still do not believe?”
“I don't know what to believe, Cardinal,” Feldman admitted. “I see a lot of strange occurrences with messianic overtones that could have many different explanations. Including satanic, if you're so inclined to interpret the scriptures that way.”
Litti's face saddened. “Jon, other than the last few weeks I've been blessed to know Her, you've spent more time observing Jeza than anyone else. What have you seen? What does your heart tell you?”
Feldman looked chagrined. “It's so confusing, Alphonse. I find her incredible. I love her kindness, her conviction, her strength, her beauty, her courage. These are the godly things I see in her. But then I see all the destruction and pain and suffering that are a result of her coming.”
Litti leaned back, thoughtfully. “Have you ever considered, Jon, that sometimes God's business can't always be love and kindness? God is like the good parent raising a beloved child. He must strike a balance between affection and discipline, applying both, in proper measure, as appropriate. There's as much love in the chastisement as there is in the embrace. To let bad behavior go unpunished is to ruin the child.”
“That's a rather condescending perspective,” Feldman observed.
“In comparison to the perfection of God, man
“So God means to chastise us by ending the world? That goes a little beyond corrective discipline, wouldn't you say?”
“It's true, She's warned that Armageddon is upon us. But that doesn't mean we're all going to die. Perhaps some will be taken up, body and soul, into heaven and eternal life.”
“The Rapture, huh?” Hunter identified the familiar doctrine.
“Or perhaps”-Litti remained undaunted-”Christ will come again, and together He and Jeza will separate the good from the evil and rule side by side for a thousand years of blissful heaven on earth.”
“But what about Cardinal di Concerci's charges-the signs?” Feldman questioned. “How do you explain the signs? And if Jeza isn't the Antichrist, who is?”
Litti smiled with self-assurance. “Remember Jeza's admonitions about interpreting scripture? These signs are Cardinal di Concerci's perspectives. They do not prove Jeza is the Deceiver. Who's to say what form the Antichrist will take? Or even that it's one person and not an entire group of people? Admittedly, Jeza does not fit the conventional notions of how a Messiah should look or act, but we'll only understand God's purpose once His plan is fully revealed to us, if then.”
“Surely you've asked Jeza what's going to happen?” Feldman asked.
“Yes, I've asked Her. She'll only say that the Dissolution is near and that all She has foretold will soon occur. Indeed, if She does return to Jerusalem, She'll be setting into motion the last prophecies of the Apocalypse. I have an ominous foreboding in that regard. As if we may already be in the Last Days.”
102
Mount of the Ascension, Jerusalem, Israel 9:17 P.M., Saturday, April 15, 2000
