guess that’s his way of saying he didn’t have a choice in the matter. He felt the gods would grow unhappy if Rome became content with what they had.’
‘Even if acquiring more was a bad thing?’
Boyd nodded. ‘But the greed doesn’t stop there. You haven’t heard anything yet.’
To avoid the impending poverty of our citizens, I have concluded that drastic measures must be taken, the scarcity of public wealth must be avoided at all cost, as a failure to maintain the excellence of the Empire would be attributed to a delinquency of leadership, a claim that would insult the accomplishments of Augustus before.
Word has arrived from the east that the latest Messiah has surfaced, a man, unlike the dozens that have come before him, he who reeks of piety and selflessness, a charmer blessed with throngs of disciples, power of persuasion, the gift of miracles. Tales of healing and resurrection emerge from the desert with the regularity of scorpions, but twice as deadly, for insects are easily squashed. Herod Antipas, ruler of Galilee, speaks of pride swelling among the slaves, rebellions against Roman authority, gathering of masses near Capernaum. Some feel that this threat should be extinguished, eliminated through force of will and power of sword, disposed of in its infancy like the sons of Bethlehem. But I am not one to concur, why kill a cow that has been presented by the gods? Milk it, and its sweet nectar can nourish for a lifetime.
Boyd paused, allowing Maria to absorb the message of the scroll’s middle section.
She said, ‘There’s no doubt that this is about Jesus. The reference to healings and resurrections, the gathering of masses in Capernaum. That’s where his ministry was located, right next to the Sea of Galilee.’
He nodded. ‘The Old Testament referred to it as the Sea of Chinnereth, but you are right. Jesus used Capernaum as a gathering place for his flock.’
‘I can’t believe this. We’re holding a document that refers to Christ in the present tense. This is so wrong! I mean, it compares him to a cow that should be milked!’
‘But to Tiberius, Jesus wasn’t God. He was a dangerous con man. Like he mentioned, dozens of men had already come forth and claimed to be the Messiah, and most of them had throngs of followers as well. So to Tiberius, Jesus was just another in a long list of frauds.’
‘I guess so, but… I don’t know. I don’t know how to feel about this.’
‘Don’t feel, my dear. That’s not your job. Your duty is to examine. Try to distance yourself from the message, especially from the part I’m about to read. If you don’t, you’ll be completely consumed by its message, because it’s worse than you can possibly imagine.’
If the hungry are promised bread, they’ll fight until their bellies are full; this much is assured by history, written by the action of men and the nature of their spirit, but a question plagues my slumber: does it matter where the feast comes from? Would a starving man turn down a meal if it is offered by his enemy? Perhaps, for fear of poison, but what if the food is presented in a manner that he’d welcome? Would the bread not be accepted with outstretched hands? I proclaim it would. Yea, the people of Judea are famished, clinging to hope and the promise of salvation, completely ignorant of Roman gods and the rightful way to live, they look for the promised one to emerge from their flock, the one who is truly their Messiah. This cannot be prevented; no war, no punishment shall remove the coming of the one from their scripture; they search for him, they pray for him, they wait for him and shall anticipate him until his arrival has been trumpeted by the masses. Why not give him to them? Let us feed their hunger with our choice of food, allowing them to feast on the coming of their savior, they can drink in their Christ and revel in his teachings, words that shall threaten us not, for we know he is merely a pawn that we have lifted to the level of Jupiter.
For such a ruse to succeed, there must be no doubt among the Jews; they must witness an act of God with their own eyes, a feat so magical, so mystifying, that future generations will sing of its splendor for eternity, ending their search for the coming Messiah once and for all, for they will think he has already come. Belief in his presence must be widespread, not birthed on the fringes of their sun-drenched land, passed from traveler to traveler in rumor alone, it shall begin in their greatest populace, spread from the heart of Jerusalem like an unstoppable plague, devouring everyone in Judea like a hungry beast. Once this occurs, once no doubt of the Christ remains, Rome shall be in a position to profit, using the Jews’ unyielding faith against them and their riches to our advantage. We will mock their beliefs in public while collecting their donations in private; we will order them to worship Roman gods, knowing they will cling to their Messiah like children to a teat, but this is what we want, for the more they worship a fake God, the weaker they shall become, and from this weakness, we shall profit, yea, we shall control their bodies and their spirits as well. For the good of all things Roman, we shall begin at once, using the Nazarene as our tool, the one I have chosen as the Jewish Messiah.
Farewell, 29th August
Boyd pushed his notebook aside after reading the passage, and braced for her response. In truth, he half expected a dozen questions about the text or a volatile shouting match where she challenged everything that he had said. But what he got was the exact opposite. Maria remained quiet, distant, the color in her cheeks completely vacant, her bloodshot eyes filled with moisture.
There was no need to clarify anything. Maria grasped the scroll’s significance on her own.
Amazingly, if the message on the scroll was accurate, then the miracle of Jesus Christ and the foundation of Christianity were based on the biggest scam of all time.
26
The office was bare except for some furniture and a few filing cabinets. No personal touches of any kind. It was the type of room that would make Nick Dial quit his job if he had to call it his own. Yet it was exactly what he expected in a Tripoli police station.
Omar Tamher walked in with photos of the autopsy and spread them across the desk. Sheepishly, Dial took out his bifocals and hooked them over his ears, somehow embarrassed that he couldn’t see well enough on his own.
‘Nick, what do you think? Any similarities to Denmark?’
Dial nodded, even though this was his first time with the pictures. ‘Jansen had the same body type as Narayan. Roughly the same height and age. Both men were in good physical condition, which tells me they weren’t chosen at random. They were picked for a reason.’
‘Why do you say that?’
‘If you were looking for an easy target, would you choose these guys? No, you’d go after someone who was older or injured. Someone you could overpower. Maybe even a female. But a young guy in good shape? Not likely. Too many things could go wrong.’
‘Anything else?’
‘These wounds are consistent with Jansen’s. Spikes were driven through the wrists and feet while he was unconscious. Too much screaming otherwise.’ He pointed to one of the autopsy photos, a close-up of Narayan’s left wrist. ‘See how the wound spreads away from the spike? The same thing happened in Denmark. The body weight is too heavy for the rods to handle. Something had to give, and it wasn’t going to be the spikes. In time the surrounding tissue starts to tear, same with the veins, tendons,
Tamher nodded. ‘The coroner said the chest wound was the fatal blow.’
Dial sorted through the pile until he found a close-up of Narayan’s rib cage. ‘Looks identical to Jansen’s. Probably done with a spear. At least that’s what the Bible tells us.’
‘And the vandalism? Any theories?’
He shrugged. ‘They didn’t paint anything in Denmark, even though there were plenty of walls nearby. That suggests that the arch was an impulse act, not a premeditated one.’
Tamher frowned. ‘They used a brush, Nick. That seems planned to me.’
‘Maybe, maybe not. The brush could’ve been in the back of their van or in the toolbox where they kept their spikes. I mean, you didn’t find any ladder marks, did you? That means they weren’t completely prepared for the painting.’
‘True, but…’
