Buck fought to understand him. “Yes?”
“I have a car and a driver.”
“A car and driver, yes sir.”
“Are you ready to go?”
“To go?”
“To the Wall.”
“Oh, yes, sir—I mean, no, sir. I’m going to need ten minutes. Can you wait ten minutes?”
“I should have called before arriving. I was under the impression from our mutual friend that this was a matter of some urgency to you.”
Buck ran the strange-sounding English through his mind again. “A matter of urgency, yes! Just give me ten minutes! Thank you, sir!”
Buck tore off his clothes and jumped in the shower. He didn’t give the water time to heat. He lathered up and rinsed off, then dragged his razor across his face.
He didn’t take the time to find the electrical adapter for his hair dryer but just yanked a towel off the rack and attacked his long hair, feeling as if he were pulling half of it out of his scalp.
He jerked the comb through his hair and brushed his teeth. What did one wear to the Wailing Wall? He knew he wouldn’t be getting inside, but would he offend his host if he was not wearing a coat and tie? He hadn’t brought one. He hadn’t planned on dressing up even for the treaty signing the next morning.
Buck chose his usual button-up shirt, dressy jeans, ankle-high boots, and leather jacket. He dropped his MP3 recorder and camera into his smallest leather bag and ran down three flights of stairs. When he burst from the door he stopped. He had forgotten his cell and had no idea what the rabbi looked like. Would he look like Rosenzweig, or Feinberg, or neither?
Neither, it turned out. Tsion Ben-Judah, in a black suit and black felt hat, stepped from the front passenger seat of an idling white Mercedes and waved shyly. Buck hurried to him. “Dr. Ben-Judah?” he said, shaking his hand. The man was middle-aged, trim, and youthful with strong, angular features and only a hint of gray in his dark brown hair.
In his labored English, the rabbi said, “In your dialect, my first name sounds like the city, Zion. You may call me that.”
“Zion? Are you sure?”
“Sure of my own name?” The rabbi smiled. “I am sure.”
“No, I meant are you sure I can call you—”
“I know what you meant, Mr. Williams. You may call me Zion.”
To Buck, Zion didn’t sound too much different from Tsion in Dr. Ben-Judah’s accent. “Please call me Buck.”
“Buck?” The rabbi held open the front door as Buck slid in next to the driver.
“It’s a nickname.”
“All right, Buck. The driver understands no English.”
Buck turned to see the driver with his hand extended. Buck shook it and the man said something totally unintelligible. Buck merely smiled and nodded. Dr. Ben-Judah spoke to the driver in Hebrew, and they pulled away.
“Now, Buck,” the rabbi said as Buck turned in his seat to face him, “Dr. Rosenzweig said you wanted access to the Wailing Wall, which you understand is impossible. I can get you close enough to the two witnesses so that you can get their attention if you dare.”
“The two witnesses? You call them the two witnesses? That’s what my friends and I—”
Dr. Ben-Judah held up both hands and turned his head away, as if to indicate that was a question he would not answer or comment on. “The question is, do you dare?”
“I dare.”
“And you will not hold me personally responsible for anything that might happen to you.”
“Of course not, but I would like to interview you, too.”
The hands came up yet again. “I made quite clear to the press, and to Dr. Rosenzweig, that I am not granting any interviews.”
“Just some personal information, then. I won’t ask about your research, because I am sure after boiling down three years into a one-hour presentation, you’ll explain your conclusions fully tomorrow afternoon.”
“Precisely. As for personal information, I am forty-four years old. I grew up in Haifa, the son of an Orthodox rabbi. I have two doctorates, one in Jewish history and one in ancient languages. I have studied and taught my whole life and consider myself more of a scholar and historian than an educator, though my students have been most kind in their evaluations. I think and pray and read mostly in Hebrew, and I am embarrassed to speak English so poorly, especially in an egalitarian country like this. I know English grammar and syntax better than most Englishmen and certainly most Americans, present company excepted I’m sure, but I have never had the time to practice, let alone perfect, my diction. I married only six years ago and have two teenage stepchildren, a boy and a girl.
“A little over three years ago, I was commissioned by a state agency to conduct an exhaustive study of the messianic passages so the Jews would recognize Messiah when he comes. This has been the most rewarding work of my life. In the process I added Greek and Aramaic to the list of my mastered languages, which now number twenty-two. I am excited about the completion of the work and eager to share my findings with the world by television. I don’t pretend that the program will compete with anything containing sex, violence, or humor, but I expect it will be controversial nonetheless.”
“I don’t know what else to ask,” Buck admitted.
“Then we can be done with the interview and get on with the business at hand.”
“I am curious about your taking the time to do this.”
“Dr. Rosenzweig is a mentor, one of my most beloved colleagues. A friend of his is a friend of mine.”
“Thank you.”
“I admire your work. I read the articles about Dr. Rosenzweig that you have done, and many others, too. Besides, the men at the Wall intrigue me as well. Perhaps with my language proficiency we will be able to communicate with them. So far, all I have seen them do is communicate with the masses who assemble. They speak to people who threaten them, but otherwise, I know of no individual who has spoken with them.”
The Mercedes parked near some tour buses, and the driver waited as Dr. Ben-Judah and Buck mounted a set of stairs to take in the view of the Wailing Wall, the Temple Mount, and everything in between. “These are the largest crowds I have seen,” the rabbi said.
“But they are so quiet,” Buck whispered.
“The two preachers do not use microphones,” Dr. Ben-Judah explained. “People make noise at their own peril. So many want to hear what the men have to say that others threaten those who cause any distraction.”
“Do the two ever take a break?”
“Yes, they do. Occasionally one will move around the side of that little building there and lie on the ground near the fence. They will often trade off resting and speaking. The men who were consumed by fire recently actually tried to attack them there from outside the fence when they both rested. That is why no one approaches them there.”
“That might be my best opportunity,” Buck said.
“That was my thinking.”
“You will go with me?”
“Only if we make it plain we mean them no harm. They have killed at least six and have threatened many more. A friend of mine stood on this very spot the day they burned up four attackers, and he swears the fire came from their mouths.”
“Do you believe that?”
“I have no reason to doubt my friend, though he was several hundred feet away.”
“Is there a better time than another to approach, or should we just play that by ear?”
“I propose we join the crowds first.”
They descended the stairs and moved toward the Wall. Buck was impressed that the crowd seemed so reverential. Within forty or fifty feet of the preachers were Orthodox rabbis, bowing, praying, sliding written prayers into the cracks between the stones in the Wall. Occasionally one of the rabbis would turn toward the witnesses and shake his fist, crying out in Hebrew, only to be shushed by the crowd. Sometimes one of the preachers would respond directly.
As Buck and Dr. Ben-Judah reached the edge of the crowd, a rabbi at the Wall fell to h
is knees, his eyes toward heaven, and howled out a prayer in anguish.
“Silence!” shouted one of the preachers, and the rabbi wept bitterly. The preacher turned to the crowd. “He beseeches almighty God to strike us dead for blaspheming his name! But he is as the Pharisees of old! He does not recognize the one who was God and is God and shall be God now and forevermore! We come to bring witness to the Godship of Jesus Christ of Nazareth!”
With that, the crying rabbi prostrated himself and hid his face, rocking in humiliation at the wickedness of what he heard.
Dr. Ben-Judah whispered to Buck, “Would you like me to translate?”
“Translate what? The prayer of the rabbi?”
“And the response of the preacher.”
“I understood the preacher.”
Dr. Ben-Judah looked puzzled. “If I had known you were fluent in Hebrew, it would have been much easier for me to communicate with you.”
“I’m not. I didn’t understand the prayer, but the preacher spoke to the crowd in English.”
Ben-Judah shook his head. “My mistake,” he said. “Sometimes I forget what language I’m in. But there! Right now! He’s speaking in Hebrew again. He’s saying—”
“Sir, sorry to interrupt. But he is speaking in English. There is a Hebraic accent, but he is saying, ‘And now unto Him who is able to keep you from falling . . .’”
“You understand that?!”
“Of course.”
The rabbi looked shaken. “Buck,” he whispered ominously, “he is speaking in Hebrew.”
Buck turned and stared at the two witnesses. They took turns speaking, sentence by sentence. Buck understood every word in English. Ben-Judah touched him lightly and he followed the rabbi deeper into the crowd. “English?” Ben-Judah asked a Hispanic-looking man who stood with a woman and three teenagers.
“Español,” the man responded apologetically.
Dr. Ben-Judah immediately began conversing with him in Spanish. The man kept nodding and answering in the affirmative. The rabbi thanked him and moved on. He found a Norwegian and spoke to him in his native tongue, then some Asians. He grabbed Buck’s arm tight and pulled him away from the crowd and closer to the preachers. They stopped about thirty feet from the two men, separated by a fence of wrought-iron bars.
“These people are hearing the preachers in their own languages!” Ben-Judah shuddered. “Truly this is of God!”
“Are you sure?”
“No question. I hear them in Hebrew. You hear them in English. The family from Mexico knows only a little English but no Hebrew. The man from Norway knows some German and some English, but no Hebrew. He hears them in Norwegian. Oh God, oh God,” the rabbi added, and Buck knew it was out of reverence. He was afraid Ben-Judah might collapse.
“Ayeee!” A young man wearing boots, khaki slacks, and a white T-shirt came screaming through the crowd. People fell to the ground when they saw his automatic weapon. He wore a gold necklace, and his black hair and beard were unkempt. His dark eyes were ablaze as he rattled off a few rounds into the air, which cleared a path for him directly to the preachers.
He shouted something in an Eastern dialect Buck did not understand, but as he lay on the pavement peeking out from under his arms, Rabbi Ben-Judah whispered, “He says he’s on a mission from Allah.”
Buck reached into his bag and turned on the recorder as the man ran to the front of the crowd. The two witnesses stopped preaching and stood shoulder to shoulder, glaring at the gunman as he approached. He ran full speed, firing as he ran, but the preachers stood rock solid, not speaking, not moving, arms crossed over their ragged robes. When the young man got to within five feet of them, he seemed to hit an invisible wall. He recoiled and flipped over backward, his weapon clattering away. His head smacked the ground first, and he lay groaning.
Suddenly one of the preachers shouted, “You are forbidden to come nigh to the servants of the Most High God! We are under his protection until the due time, and woe to anyone who approaches without the covering of Yahweh himself.” And as he finished, the other breathed from his mouth a column of fire that incinerated the man’s clothes, consumed his flesh and organs, and in seconds left a charred skeleton smoking on the ground. The weapon melted and was fused to the cement, and the man’s molten necklace dripped gold through the cavity in his chest.
Buck lay on his stomach, his mouth agape, his hand on the back of the rabbi, who shuddered uncontrollably. In the distance families ran screaming toward their cars and buses while Israeli soldiers approached the Wall slowly, weapons at the ready.
One of the preachers spoke. “No one need fear us who comes to listen to our testimony to the living God! Many have believed and received our report. Only those who seek to do us harm shall die! Fear not!”
Buck believed him. He wasn’t sure the rabbi did. They stood and began to move away, but the eyes of the witnesses were on them. Israeli soldiers shouted at them from the edge of the plaza. “The soldiers are telling us to move away slowly,” Dr. Ben-Judah translated.
“I want to stay,” Buck said. “I want to talk to these men.”
“Did you not see what just happened?”
“Of course, but I also heard them say they meant no harm to sincere listeners.”
“But are you a sincere listener, or are you just a journalist looking for a scoop?”
“I’m both,” Buck admitted.
“God bless you,” the rabbi said. He turned and spoke in Hebrew to the two witnesses as Israeli soldiers shouted at him and Buck all the more. Buck and Ben-Judah backed away from the preachers, who now stood silent.
“I told them we would meet them at ten o’clock tonight behind the building where they occasionally rest. Will you be able to join me?”
“Like I would pass that up,” Buck said.
Rayford returned from a quiet dinner with part of his new crew to an urgent message from Chloe. It took him a few minutes to get through, wishing she had given him some indication of what was wrong. It wasn’t like her to say something was urgent unless it really was. She picked up the phone on the first ring.
“Hello?” she said. “Buck? Dad?”
“Yeah, what’s up?”
“How’s Buck?”
“I don’t know. I haven’t seen him yet.”
“Are you going to?”
“Well, sure, I suppose.”
“Do you know what hospital he’s in?”
“What?”
“You didn’t see it?”
“See what?”
“Dad, it was just on the morning news here. The two witnesses at the Wailing Wall burned some guy to death, and everybody around hit the ground. One of the last two lying there was Buck.”
“Are you sure?”
“No question.”
“Do you know for certain he was hurt?”
“No! I just assumed. He was just lying there next to a guy in a black suit whose hat had fallen off.”
“Where’s he staying?”
“At the King David. I left a message for him. They said they had his key, so he was out. What does that mean?”
“Some people leave their keys at the desk whenever they go out. It doesn’t mean anything special. I’m sure he’ll call you.”
“Isn’t there some way you can find out if he was hurt?”
“I’ll try. Let’s leave it this way: If I find out anything either way, I’ll call you. No news will be good news, at least.”
Buck’s knees felt like jelly. “Are you all right, Rabbi?”
“I’m fine,” Dr. Ben-Judah said, “but I am nearly overcome.”
“I know the feeling.”
“I want to believe those men are of God.”
“I believe they are,” Buck said.
“Do you? Are you a student of the Scriptures?”
“Only recently.”
“Come. I want to show you something.”
When they got back to the car, the rabbi’s driver stood with his door open, ashen-faced. Tsion B
en-Judah spoke reassuringly to him in Hebrew, and the man kept looking past him to Buck. Buck tried to smile.
Buck got into the front seat, and Ben-Judah quietly guided the driver to park as close as possible to the Golden Gate at the east of the Temple Mount. He invited Buck to walk with him to the gate so he could interpret the Hebrew graffiti. “See here,” he said. “It says, ‘Come Messiah.’ And here, ‘Deliver us.’ And there, ‘Come in triumph.’
“My people have longed for and prayed for and watched and waited for our Messiah for centuries. But much of Judaism, even in the Holy Land, has become secular and less biblically oriented. My research project was assigned almost as an inevitability. People have lost sight of exactly what or whom they are looking for, and many have given up.
“And to show you how deep runs the animosity between the Muslim and the Jew, look at this cemetery the Muslims have built just outside the fence here.”
“What’s the significance?”
“Jewish tradition says that in the end times, Messiah and Elijah will lead the Jews to the temple in triumph through the gate from the east. But Elijah is a priest, and walking through a graveyard would defile him, so the Muslims have put one here to make the triumphal entry impossible.”
Buck reached for his recorder and was going to ask the rabbi to repeat that tidbit of history, but he noticed it was still running. “Look at this,” Buck said. “I got the attack on my digital.”
He rewound the machine to where they heard gunfire and screaming. Then the man fell and the weapon clattered. In his mind’s eye, Buck recalled the blast of fire coming from the witness’s mouth. On the recorder it sounded like a strong gust of wind. More screaming. Then the preachers shouted loudly in a language Buck couldn’t understand.
“That’s Hebrew!” Rabbi Ben-Judah said. “Surely you hear that!”
“They spoke in Hebrew,” Buck acknowledged, “and the recorder picked it up in Hebrew. But I heard it in English as sure as I’m standing here.”
“You did say you heard them promise no harm to anyone who came only to listen to their testimony.”
“I understood every word.”
The rabbi closed his eyes. “The timing of this is very important to my presentation.”