“No.”
“Oh, no! They’ve got him?”
“He’s gone, Chloe.”
CHAPTER 13
Rayford decided to fly north as fast as he could, guessing that GC forces would assume he was heading west. “Tsion, dig through Ken’s stuff and see if he has any record of friends of his in Greece. He mentioned our putting down there or Turkey if necessary.”
Tsion and Chloe opened Ken’s flight bag. “This is painful, Rayford,” Tsion said. “This brother flew me to safety when there was a bounty on my head.”
Rayford could not speak. He and Ken had clicked so quickly that he had made an instant friend. Because of their hours together in the air, he’d spent more time with him than anyone but Buck. And being closer to Ken’s age, he felt a true kinship. He knew violence and death were the price of this period of history, but how he hated the shock and grief of the losses. If he began thinking of all the tragedy he had suffered—from missing out on the Rapture with his wife and son, to the loss of Bruce, Loretta, Donny and his wife, Amanda . . . and there were more—he would go mad.
Ken was in a better place, he told himself, and it sounded as hollow as any platitude. Yet he had to believe it was true. The loss was all his. Ken was finally free.
Rayford was bone weary. He was not supposed to be handling the flight back. Ken had reserved his hours behind the controls so he could pilot the Tribulation Force back to the States.
“What is all this?” Chloe asked suddenly. “He’s got lists and ideas and plans for businesses, and—”
“I’ll tell you later,” Rayford said. “He was quite the entrepreneur.”
“And brilliant,” Tsion said. “I never figured him for this kind of thinker. Some of this reads like a manifesto of survival for the saints.”
“No names though? Nothing that looks like a contact in Greece? I’m going to start that way, just in case. I can’t fly much farther anyway.”
“But we can’t land without a local contact, can we, Dad?”
“We shouldn’t.”
“Can Mac help?”
“He’d call me if he was free to talk. I’m sure they’ve involved him in this fiasco. Pray he’ll somehow misdirect them.”
Buck’s facial lacerations were deep but below the cheekbones, so there was little bleeding. His right thumb felt as if it had been pulled back to his wrist. He could not stop the bleeding from his left ear where the bullet that had killed Ken had sliced it nearly in half. He quickly took off his shirt and undershirt, using the latter to wipe his face and sop his ear. He put his shirt back on, hoping he wouldn’t appear so monsterlike that he would scare off anyone who might help him.
Buck crept to the airport edge of the underbrush but didn’t dare get near the fence. Though no searchlights pointed that way, the fence provided a perfect background for any watchful eye to detect movement. He sat with his back to a large bush to catch his breath. His ankles and knees were tender, as was his right elbow. He must have taken the brunt of the crash into the spiky plant on his right side. He tilted his cell phone toward the light to see his foggy reflection in the lighted dial.
Feeling a sting below the cuff, Buck pulled his pant legs up a few inches to find both shins bleeding into his socks. His muscles ached, but under the circumstances he felt fortunate. He had his phone, and he could walk.
“We might have found something,” Tsion said. In Rayford’s peripheral vision he could see the rabbi showing a phone directory page to Chloe.
“That looks Greek to me. What do you think, Dad? He’s got a number for a Lukas Miklos, nickname Laslos.”
“What city?”
“Doesn’t say.”
“Any other notations? Can you tell if it’s a friend or a business contact?”
“Try the number. It’s all we’ve got.”
“Wait,” Tsion said. “There’s a star by the name and an arrow pointing down to the word lignite. I don’t know that word.”
“I don’t either,” Rayford said. “Sounds like a mineral or something. Dial him up, Chloe. If I’m landing in Greece, I’ve got to start initial descent in a few minutes.”
Buck couldn’t remember the name of Jacov’s mother-in-law. And he never caught Stefan’s last name. He didn’t want to call Chaim; his place had to be crawling with GC. He walked in the darkness, staying in the shadows, and made a huge loop around the airport and onto the main road. There he could either hitchhike or flag a taxi. Not knowing where else to turn, he would go to the Wailing Wall. Nicolae had publicly warned Moishe and Eli to disappear from there by the end of the stadium meeting, which told Buck they would be there for sure.
“Yes, hello, ma’am,” Chloe said. “Does anyone there speak English? . . . English! . . . I’m sorry, I don’t understand you. Does anyone there—” She covered the phone. “I woke her. She sounds scared. She’s getting someone. Sounds like she’s waking him up.
“Yes! Hello? Sir? . . . Are you Mr. Miklos? . . . Do you speak English? . . . Not so good? Do you understand English? . . . Good! I am sorry to wake you, but I am a friend of Ken Ritz’s from America!” Chloe covered the phone again. “He knows him!”
Chloe asked where he lived, whether there was an airstrip in town, and if they could visit him and talk about Ken if they landed there. Within minutes, Rayford was in touch with the tower at Ptolemaïs in northern Greece.
“Macedonia,” Tsion said. “Praise God.”
“We’re not safe yet, Tsion,” Rayford said. “We’re depending on the kindness of a stranger.”
For the first time, Buck was grateful the Global Community had chosen the American dollar as its currency. He was cash rich, and that might keep eyes averted and mouths closed. Somewhere deep in his wallet, too, was his ever-useful phony identity . . . as long as he could keep from being searched and having both IDs exposed.
“Mr. Miklos was suspicious,” Chloe reported. “But once I convinced him we were friends of Ken’s, he even told me what to tell the tower. Tell them you’re Learjet Foxtrot Foxtrot Zulu. That’s the plane of one of his suppliers. He runs a mining company. He will be there to meet us.”
“This looks nothing like a Lear,” Rayford said.
“He said the tower won’t even pay attention.”
When Buck reached the road, he was surprised to see traffic still heavy. Witnesses must have still been streaming out of Jerusalem. And all the air traffic told him the airport had reopened already. He saw no roadblocks. The GC had to assume he had boarded the Gulfstream.
He moved to the side of the road leading into Jerusalem, which was much less congested than the other side. He waved his bloody undershirt at empty cabs coming from the airport, trying to show more white than red. He straightened up and tried to look sober and healthy. Buck lucked out on the fourth cab, which rumbled off the road and skidded in the gravel.
“You got money, mate?” the cabby said before unlocking the back door.
“Plenty.”
“Not many pedestrians coming this way. First I’ve seen in weeks.”
“Lost my ride,” Buck said, getting in.
“A mite cut up now, ain’t ya?”
“I’m all right. Got caught in some thorns.”
“I should say.”
“You an Aussie?”
“How’d you guess? Where to, mate?”
“The Wailing Wall.”
“Ah, you won’t get within a half mile of it tonight, sir.”
“That so?”
“Big doings. You know the story of those two—”
“Yeah, what about ’em?”
“They’re there.”
“Yeah.”
“And they’re not supposed to be, ya know.”
“I know.”
“Word is the potentate is still in Jerusalem but not near the Wall. Huge crowd there with weapons. Civilians and military. Big mess. I’m a fan of the potentate, mind ya, but offerin’ a bounty on the heads of these two wasn’t wise.”
“Think not?”
> “Well, look what you’ve got now. Somebody’s gonna kill ’em tonight and want to be made the hero. That’s both citizens and guards. Who’s to say they won’t turn the guns on each other?”
“You think those two will buy it tonight?”
“Have to. They’ve planted themselves in their usual spot, got the whole city up in arms about the bloody water and the drought, takin’ credit for it and all. Proud of it they are. They’ve killed a lot of mates who’ve tried to take ’em out, but what chance have they got now? They’ve put themselves behind that iron fence there, in a cage for target practice.”
“I say they’re still there and alive come daybreak.”
“You don’t say.”
“If they are, would you do something for me?”
“Depends.”
“If I’m right, and you’ve got to admit it’s against all odds—”
“Oh, I’ll grant ya that.”
“—you find a Bible and read the book of Revelation.”
“Oh, you’re one of them, are you?”
“Them?”
“The witnesses. I’ve taken at least three loads of ’em to the airport tonight, and every last one of ’em’s wanted to get me to join ranks. You gonna try to save me, mate?”
“I can’t save you, friend. But I’m surprised God hasn’t gotten your attention by now.”
“Oh, I can’t deny somethin’ strange is happening. But I’ve got a pretty good gig going, if you know what I mean, and I don’t guess God would look kindly on it. Lots of money on the other side of the street, ya know.”
“Worth more than your soul?”
“Just might be. But I’ll tell ya what. If those two are still there come mornin’, I’ll do what you say.”
“Got a Bible?”
“I told ya. Had three carloads of your type tonight. Got three Bibles. Wanna make it four?”
“No, but I could use one of those if you can spare it.”
“I’m a businessman, mate. I’ll sell it to ya.”
Rayford parked the jet at the end of a runway with similar-sized craft, and he and Chloe and Tsion walked cautiously into the mostly deserted terminal. A middle-aged couple eyed them warily from a dark corner. He was short and stocky with full, dark, curly hair. She was heavyset, her hair in curlers under a scarf.
After shy handshakes, Lukas Miklos said, “Ken Ritz gave you my name?”
“We found you in his address book, sir,” Rayford said.
Miklos flinched and sat back. “How do I know you knew him?”
“I’m afraid we have bad news for you.”
“Before you start with the bad news, I must know I can trust you. Tell me something about Ken that only a friend would know.”
Rayford looked at the others and spoke carefully. “Former military, flew commercially, owned his own charter company for many years. Tall, late fifties.”
“Did you know he used to fly one of my suppliers, when first I began serving energy plants?”
“No, sir. He did not mention that.”
“He never spoke to you of me?”
“Not by name. He mentioned he knew someone in Greece who might provide hospitality on our way from the States.”
“To where?”
“To Israel.”
“And you were there for what?”
“For the Meeting of the Witnesses.”
Miklos and his wife looked at each other. “Are you believers?”
Rayford nodded.
“Turn your face to the light.”
Rayford turned.
Miklos looked at him, then at his wife, then turned his face to the light and pulled the curls back from his forehead. “Now you’re not going to tell me this is Dr. Ben-Judah?”
“It is, sir.”
“Oh, oh!” Miklos said, slipping off the chair and onto his knees on the tile floor. He took Ben-Judah’s hands in his and kissed them while his wife clasped her hands before her face and rocked, her eyes closed. “I knew you looked familiar from the TV, but it’s really you!”
“Now, now,” Tsion said. “It’s nice to meet you too, but I’m afraid the news is not good about our brother Ken.”
The cabby stopped in an alley behind a nightclub, where he apparently had an arrangement. A bouncer met him. “No, he’s not a john, Stallion. And he ain’t comin’ in either. Get him a turban and a neck scarf, and I’ll pay you later.” Stallion reached in and grabbed the Aussie by the throat. “You’ll get your cut, you overgrown child,” the cabby said. “Now get the clothes and let me get outta here.”
A minute later Stallion tossed the gear through the back window of the cab and pointed threateningly at the driver. “I’ll be back,” the Aussie said. “Trust me.”
Buck pulled the rolled cap over his head and tucked the scarf under it, covering his ears and the back of his neck. If he held his head a certain way, it also covered most of his face. “Where does he get this stuff?”
“Sure you want to know?”
“Some drunk’s going to be surprised when he wakes up.”
Buck’s ear had stopped bleeding, but he still needed medical attention. “Know where I can get antibacterial and a stitch or two without a lot of questions?”
“Cash leaves a lot of questions unasked, mate.”
At three o’clock in the morning, as close as they could get to the Temple Mount, Buck paid the Aussie handsomely. “For the ride,” he said. “For the Bible. And for the clothes.”
“How about a little something for the medical services?”
Buck had paid cash at a backstreet clinic, but he guessed the lead alone was worth a few dollars.
“Thanks, mate. And I’ll keep my promise. I’ll be listening to the news. Wouldn’t surprise me if they’re dead already.”
Lukas Miklos owned a late-model luxury car and lived in an opulent home that was being repaired after the earthquake. He begged the Trib Force to stay a week, but Rayford told him they simply needed a good day’s rest and would be on their way the next evening.
“Ken didn’t know you were a believer, did he?”
Miklos shook his head as his wife apologetically returned to bed. Rayford and Tsion stood when she did, and she smiled shyly and bowed. “She runs the office,” Miklos explained. “Gets there before I do.”
He settled back in an easy chair. “Ken told me in an E-mail what had happened to him. We thought he was crazy. I knew the Carpathia regime opposed this rapture theory, and the Global Community sent me so much business, I did not want to appear to even know someone who opposed them.”
“You did a lot of business with the GC?”
“Oh, yes. And we still do. I have no guilt about using the enemy’s money. Their energy consultants buy tremendous quantities of lignite for their thermoelectric plants. Ken always said lignite grows on trees in Ptolemaïs. I wish it did! But he’s right. It is plentiful, and I am one of the major suppliers.”
“Why didn’t you tell Ken you had become his brother?”
“Why, Mr. Steele, it happened only the other day, watching Dr. Ben-Judah on TV. We have been unable to reach Ken. He probably has an e-mail message from me on his computer.”
Buck walked as close to the Temple Mount as he could get before having to sidle through the jostling crowd. No one dared get within two hundred feet of Eli and Moishe, including GC guards—especially GC guards. Many civilians were armed too, and the atmosphere crackled with tension.
Buck felt safe and nearly invisible in the darkness, though he drew anger and was shoved as he kept working his way through the crowd. Occasionally, on tiptoes, he could see Eli and Moishe bathed in glaring TV lights. Again without amplification, they could be heard throughout the area.
“Where is the king of the world?” Eli demanded. “Where is he who sits on the throne of the earth? Ye men of Israel are a generation of snakes and vipers, blaspheming the Lord your God with your animal sacrifices. You bow to the enemy of the Lord, the one who seeks to defy the living God! The Lord who de
livered his servant David out of the paw of the lion, and out of the paw of the bear, will deliver us out of the hand of this man of deceit.”
The crowd laughed, but none advanced save Buck. He stayed on the move, feeling every sting and ache and pain, but eager to be close to these men of God. As he neared the front he found the crowd less belligerent and more wary. “Be careful, man,” some said. “Watch yourself. Not too close now. They have flamethrowers behind that building.”
Buck would have found that funny and the bravado of the witnesses invigorating, but Ken’s awful death was too much with him. He instinctively wiped his face as if Ken’s blood were still there, but his hand raked across his stitches and he nearly wept.
Moishe took over the speaking. “The servant of Satan comes to us with a sword, and with a spear, and with a shield. But we come in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of his chosen, whom thou hast deceived. You shall be impotent against us until the due time!”
The crowd hissed and booed and cried out, “Kill them! Shoot them! Fire a missile at them! Bomb them!”
“O men of Israel,” Eli responded. “Do you not care for water to drink or rain for your crops? We allow the sun to bake your land and turn the water into blood for as long as we prophesy, that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel. And all this assembly shall know that the Lord saveth not with sword and spear: for the battle is the Lord’s, and he has given you into our hands.”
“Show them! Kill them! Destroy them!”
The crowd gasped and drew back as Buck reached the front and stepped ten feet closer to the fence than anyone else. He was still far from the witnesses, but after what had happened the night before, he appeared brave or foolish. The crowd fell silent.
Moishe and Eli stood side by side now, not moving, hands at their sides. They stared past Buck, appearing resolute in their challenge to Carpathia. He had given permission for anyone to kill them if they showed their faces anywhere after the meetings. And now they stood where they had appeared every day since the signing of the agreement between the Global Community and Israel.