police had to be called. By the time he’d left it was too late to visit Getz or Bloom. The police at the site had asked to see paperwork authorizing the excavation, which Jake kept at home.
Returning to the flat, he’d put down his pocket effects in the usual place, and dug out copies of his permits for the Talpiot site. Then he discovered the cabinet open and the shroud bones gone. Enraged, he’d stormed off without locking up. Trying to deal with both things at once, he’d first detoured to the district police headquarters to deliver his documents, then headed straight for Blotnik.
I had arrived at the Rockefeller first, and he found me in the closet.
So.
The shroud bones were incinerated to ash.
Blotnik was dead.
Kaplan was free.
Purviance would be charged with Blotnik’s murder in Israel. Extradition later? Maybe.
And Max?
Representatives of the Hevrat Kadisha admitted, under pressure from Friedman, that they’d liberated and re- buried the Masada skeleton. Neither thumbscrews, garrotes, nor threats of prosecution could get them to disclose the location. They’d heard all that before. To them it was a matter of sacred Jewish law. Halakha. Appeals for temporary access under their watch were unyieldingly rejected.
So. Only three things remained. The original Kaplan print. The bone samples taken for DNA testing. The photos I’d shot at my Montreal lab.
Otherwise, Max was gone.
41
IT WAS NOWTHURSDAY, FOUR DAYS AFTER THE CRASH. RYAN ANDI would be returning to Montreal on the midnight flight. Before leaving Israel, we’d decided to make one last call.
I found myself again traveling the Jericho road. Ryan and I had passed Qumran, famed for its Essenes and caves and scrolls; and Ein Gedi, famed for its beaches and spas. On our left, the Dead Sea stretched cobalt-green toward Jordan. On our right, a tortured landscape of buttes and mesas.
Finally I saw it, stark red against the perfect blue sky. Herod’s citadel at the edge of the Judean desert.
Ryan made a turn. Two kilometers later we pulled into a lot and parked. Signs reassured tourists. Restaurants, shops, toilets, this way.
“Cable car or Snake Path?” I asked.
“How rough’s the climb?”
“Piece of cake.”
“Why the name?”
“The trail winds a little.” I’d been warned the trek was mean and dusty and took an hour or more. I was pumped.
“How about we cable up, then assess?”
“Wimp.” I smiled.
“It took a Roman legion seven months to reach the top.”
“They were battling an army of zealots.”
“Details, details.”
Masada is the most visited spot in Israel, but not that day.
Ryan bought tickets and we entered an empty cable car. At the top, we mounted a twisting staircase, then the ancient site sprawled before us.
I was awestruck. Romans. Zealots. Byzantines. Nazarenes? I was standing on the very same soil. Soil trod long before Europeans laid eyes on the New World.
I scanned what remained of the casement wall, shoulder high now, the old stones weathered and bleached. My eyes took in the playa within the wall’s encompass. Mojave dry, here and there a scrub vine eking out life. Purple blossoms. Amazing. Beauty in the midst of brutal desolation.
I thought of soldiers, monks, and whole families. Dedication and sacrifice. My mind wondered. How? Why?
Beside me, Ryan checked the orientation map. Above me, an Israeli flag snapped in the wind.
“The walking tour starts over there.” Ryan took my hand and led me north.
We visited the storehouses, the officers’ quarters, the northern palace in which Yadin had recovered his “family.” The Byzantine church, themikveh, the synagogue.
We passed few people. A couple speaking German. A school group protected by armed parent-guards. Fatigue-clad teens with Uzis on their backs.
Standard circuit completed, Ryan and I reversed and headed toward the southern end of the summit. No other tourist was venturing that way.
I checked the diagram in my pamphlet. The southern citadel and wall were noted. A water cistern. The great pool. Not a word about the caves.
I paused at the casement wall, awed anew by the plain of sand and rock fading into shimmering haze. By the giant, silent formations molded by eons of scouring wind.
I pointed to a square faintly visible in the moonscape below.
“See that outline?”
Ryan nodded, elbow-leaning on the railing beside me.
“That was one of the Roman camps.”
I leaned forward and craned to my left. There it was. A dark wound piercing the flesh of the cliff.
“There’s the cave.” My voice cracked.
I stared, mesmerized. Ryan knew what I was feeling. Gently tugging me back, he arm-draped my shoulders.
“Any theories on who he was?”
I raised my hands in a Who knows? gesture.
“Guesses?”
“Max was a man who died between the age of forty and sixty about two thousand years ago. He was buried with more than twenty other people in that cave down there.” I pointed over the casement wall. “A younger person’s tooth ended up in his jaw. Probably by mistake. Lucky mistake. Otherwise we might never have known of the link between the cave people and the family in Jake’s shroud tomb.”
“The one Jake believes is the Jesus family crypt.”
“Yes. So Max may very well have been a Nazarene, not a zealot.”
“Jake is damn sure that tomb belonged to the Holy Family.”
“The names match. The decorative styles of the ossuaries. The age of the shroud.” I kicked at a stone. “Jake’s convinced the James ossuary came from that tomb.”
“Are you?”
“I’m intrigued.”
“Meaning?”
I thought a moment. Whatdid I mean?
“He could be right. It’s just an overwhelming concept to grasp. Of the three great religions woven through the history of Palestine, all rely more on divine mystery and spiritual belief than on science and reason to establish their legitimacy. Historic facts have been given differing spins to make them mesh with favored orthodoxy. Inconsistent facts are denied.
“The facts Jake postulates as to the Kidron tomb could potentially undermine elements of the Christian creed. Maybe Mary didn’t remain a virgin. Maybe Jesus had siblings, even offspring. Maybe Jesus remained shrouded in his loculus after the crucifixion.”
I tipped my head at the cave below us.
“Same goes for Cave 2001 and certain elements of revered Jewish history. Maybe Masada wasn’t occupied
