To Chang’s mind, the one who had benefited most at Petra was Abdullah Smith. He was flying again, making regular runs in and out of the place, many of them with his old friends Mac and Albie. But he had chosen, and they had agreed, that he should continue to live in Petra. He had become expert on the computer and frequently regaled the rest of the Trib Force with his latest escapades, many of which happened right there at Petra. He had just filed a long account with Rayford and copied everyone else. He wrote in English for everyone’s benefit, and was still learning. It read:
Late yesterday after the noon we had a very special time here as Dr. Ben-Judah instructed us on living in the Spirit. That is the Holy Spirit, which I knew some about from his previous teachings, but not nearly enough.
Captain Steele, you will recall that just before you left, there had been some trouble here. Nothing too major, but people getting on each other’s nervousness and complaining to the elders about this and that. Well, do you know who straightened all that out and got people to get along better? No, not Dr. Ben-Judah, but Chaim. Yes, it’s true. He has become quite a wise leader and very belovered by everyone here. My spell checker is making belovered blink madly, but that is what he is, most certainly.
Anyway, today Dr. Ben-Judah talked about Chaim, who many here still like to call Micah. His Bible passage was Ephesians 5:18-21, which talks about being filled with the Spirit, having a song in your heart (I liked that especially), having an attitude of thankfulness, and submitting to one another. He said those were characteristics of Chaim, and from the reaction of the people, I would have to say they agreed enthusiastically.
He also referred to Galatians 5:22-23, which list the nine fruits of the Spirit. I know you know this, Captain Steele, but as my messages to you also go into my personal journal, let me list them here: love, joy, peace, patience, gentleness, goodness, faith, humility, and self-control. I don’t know about you, but many of these were not part of my nature, culture, or background. But again, they have become part of the personality of Chaim, making him a great leader here.
It was such good teaching, Captain Steele. I took many notes. Dr. Ben-Judah told everyone that if we could all learn to walk in the Spirit, we would have an easier time getting along for two and a half more years. He told us that besides the nine characteristics and the joyful, thankful, submissive heart, we will know we have the Spirit when we have the power to tell other people about Christ. He took that from Acts 1:8, where Jesus told his disciples that they would have power after the Holy Spirit came upon them and that they would be witnesses to him to the ends of the earth.
Believe it or not, we have to be witnesses even here. There are still some among us who have not chosen Christ. The trouble now is that there are rumors of miracle workers in the Negev, not far from here. Many have said they heard about this from friends outside. Some even said they read of it in Mr. Williams’s The Truth. Well, I know they could have, because it was in there, but he made it very clear that these people were fakes, pretenders. Even if they can perform some magic tricks, they were put in place by Carpathia and are not to be trusted.
But can you believe it? There are groups here who plan to venture out and hear these people! I must have the Spirit, Captain Steele, because I myself—and you know how shy I am—am preaching against this, pleading with people not to go.
Have you heard the rumors that the head of Carpathianism, the one we know to be the False Prophet, is himself challenging Dr. Ben-Judah to a televised debate? I cannot believe his foolishness! Does he not remember that it was Dr. Ben-Judah’s television message about Jesus being the Messiah that first brought him to the attention of the world? Why does he think Dr. Ben-Judah has such a big following yet today?
No thinking person would allow Leon Fortunato inside Petra, of course, and neither would any of us advise Dr. Ben-Judah to venture out to some Global Community–approved site. So if this is to happen, Tsion will probably be on camera from here, and Leon from who knows where? Frankly, I hope the GC is foolish enough to follow through with this and that they have the courage to air it live and not censored.
I continue to be thrilled to be able to serve God under his divine protection. And though it happens nearly every time I fly, I never get tired of seeing the GC threaten and warn and even try to blast us out of the sky and then waste their missiles and bullets, missing us from point-blank range. Many of them must be among those who would change their minds about God and about Nicolae Carpathia, if only it wasn’t too late for them.
Rayford always loved hearing from Smitty. There was a youth and innocence about him that had nothing to do with his age. In fact, he was still in his early thirties, but Rayford loved him like a son.
He was shutting down his computer when Chloe came knocking. She was alone. “Got a minute?” she said.
“For you, are you kidding? Where are your men?”
“Doing Kenny’s favorite thing.”
“Wrestling on the floor,” Rayford said.
“Exactly. I’m telling you, Dad, since a little before his birthday, we’ve been finding out what the Terrible Twos are all about.”
“It’s not that bad, is it? He’s naturally going to be a little rambunctious, having to play inside all the time.”
“We’ll survive. Roughhousing with his dad takes a little of the steam out of him. He’s all boy, I can tell you that. But, hey, this is a business call.”
“Really?”
“I need to call in a favor. Do you owe me anything?”
“Let’s pretend I owe you everything. Give me an assignment. Co-op, I assume.”
“Oh yeah. One of our biggest trades ever could happen in about three months, but it has to be done by air, and we need a larger than normal crew. I’d like you to head it up on the western side. Mac’s going to run things from the east.”
“That big, huh? I’m all ears.”
“I’ve been sitting on this awhile, trading off bits of it here and there, but both parties have too much inventory. They don’t need what they’ve got, but they’re ready to trade with each other. You know how water has become as valuable as wheat?”
“Sure.”
“Our Argentine friends are willing to prove it. We’ve got a contingent, run by a Luís Arturo, at Gobernador Gregores on the Chico River. They’ve harvested thousands of bushels of wheat. Naturally they are worried they’re on borrowed time, with the size of the operation. And they’re worried about water. The Chico is getting more polluted all the time, and they are suspecting it’s intentional on the part of the GC.”
“They’ve got wheat and need water. Who’s got water?”
“The most unlikely place. Well, maybe not as unlikely as the middle of the desert, but this isn’t a place you normally think of for bottled water. Probably the biggest underground church outside of America. Bihari’s group at the Rihand Dam.”
“You’re not saying . . .”
“I am.”
“India?”
“That’s the place. They’ve got about as much volume of water as the Argentineans have wheat, and they’re willing to trade straight up.”
“You need more than a big crew, hon.”
“Tell me about it. We need big planes. Albie got something lined up out of Turkey, of all places, and he’s having it retrofitted to hold the skids of water.”
“Regardless, it should work fine for the wheat.”
“Thing is, Dad, we can’t wait. We’ve got to do this almost simultaneously. The wheat’s got to be heading toward India while the water’s on its way. Albie and Mac are going to pick up Abdullah and bring Bihari with them. I’d like you to choose three other guys from the States—”
“Well, Buck and George—”
“Not including Buck this time, if you don’t mind. Don’t look at me that way. It’s just a feeling.”
“That this is a doomed mission? Thanks for sending me!”
“Not at all. I just think Kenny needs him right now, and frankly—I may be self-servi
ng or prejudiced or whatever—I don’t think he has the time to take away from The Truth.”
Rayford leaned back and looked at the ceiling. “George and Ree from here, if you can spare ’em.”
“We’ve got time to work around their schedules, sure.”
“And I’d look first to Whalum for a plane that big. And if he’s got one, he ought to bring it here to pick us up and serve as our fourth.”
“I’m for that,” Chloe said. “That’ll get Leah off my back.”
“Still wants a ride to Petra?”
“Yeah. Which is not all bad, except we haven’t been able to work it out yet, and I think she’s taking it personally.”
“What a shock, eh?”
“Well, we both know what she’s up to, and I’d almost like to get Tsion’s permission before I send her over there to start stalking—that’s overstated—shadowing him.”
When the time came for the project, Lionel Whalum was en route to San Diego, sans Leah, who was none too happy.
CHAPTER 17
“If your wizards can do all these tricks, Leon, why can they not turn a whole sea back into salt water?”
Chang sat listening through headphones.
“Excellency, that is a lot to ask. You must admit that they have done wonders for the Global Community.”
“They have not done as much good as the Judah-ites have done bad, and that is the only scorecard that counts!”
“Your Worship, not to be contrary, but you are aware that Carpathian disciples all over the world have raised the dead, are you not?”
“I raised myself from the dead, Leon. These little tricks, bringing smelly corpses from graves just to amaze people and thrill the relatives, do not really compete with the Judah-ites’, do they?”
“Turning wooden sticks into snakes? Impressive. Turning water to blood and then back again, then the water to wine? I thought you would particularly enjoy that one.”
“I want converts, man! I want changed minds! When is your television debate with Ben-Judah?”
“Next week.”
“And you are prepared?”
“Never more so, Highness.”
“This man is clever, Leon.”
“More than you, Risen One?”
“Well, of course not. But you must carry the ball. You must carry the day! And while you are at it, be sure to suggest to the cowardly sheep in Petra that an afternoon of miracles is planned, almost in their backyard, for later that same day.”
“Sir, I had hoped we could test the area first.”
“Test the area? Test the area?”
“Forgive me, Excellency, but where you have directed me to have a disciple stage that spectacle is so close to where we lost ground troops and weapons and where we have been unsuccessful in every attempt to interrupt their flying missions, not to mention where, my goodness, we dropped two bombs and a—”
“All right, I know what has gone on there, Leon! Who does not?! Test it if you must, but I want it convenient to those people. I want them filing out of that Siq and gathering for our event for a change. And when they see what my creature can do, we will start seeing wholesale moves from one camp to the other. You know who I want for that show, do you not?”
“Your best? I mean, one of your—”
“No less. Our goal should be to leave Petra a ghost town!”
“Oh, sir, I—”
“When did you become such a pessimist, Leon? We call you the Most High Reverend Father of Carpathianism, and I have offered myself as a living god, risen from the dead, with powers from on high. Yours is merely a sales job, Leon. Remind the people what their potentate has to offer, and watch them line up. And we have a special, you know.”
“A special, sir?”
“Yes! We are running a special! This week only, anyone from Petra will be allowed to take the mark of loyalty with no punishment for having missed the deadline, now long since past. Think of the influence they can have on others just like them.”
“The fear factor has worked fairly well, Potentate.”
“Well, it is sort of a no-more-Mr.-Nice-Guy campaign, one would have to admit. But the time is past for worrying about my image. By now if people do not know who I am and what I am capable of, it is too late for them. But some blow to the other side, some victory over the curse of the bloody seas—that can only help. And I want you to do well against Ben-Judah, Leon. You are learned and devout, and you ask for worship of a living, breathing god who is here and who is not silent. It takes no faith to believe in the deity of one you can see on television every day. I should be the easy, convenient, logical choice.”
“Of course, Majesty, and I shall portray you that way.”
Lionel Whalum turned out to be a compact black man, a tick under six feet and about two hundred pounds. He wore glasses and had salt-and-pepper hair, and was a skilled pilot of almost any size craft. He brought a transport lumbering into the clandestine strip in San Diego, and within an hour was airborne again with George and Ree in the back and Rayford in the copilot’s seat.
“Chloe has told me so much about you,” Rayford said, “but it’s all been business. I think I know the basics of that story, but how did you become a believer?”
“I love when people ask,” Whalum said. “A big reason I was left behind had to do with how I lived. I know there’s nothing wrong with being successful and making money, but in my case, speaking just for me now, it made me deaf and blind somehow. I had tunnel vision. Don’t get me wrong. I was a nice guy. My wife, she was a nice lady. Still is. We ran in our circles, had nice things, a beautiful home. Life was good.
“We were even church people. I had grown up going to church, but I was a little embarrassed about it, to tell you the truth. I thought my mama and my aunties were a little too emotional and showy. And about the time I should have figured out what the whole church thing was about, I was old enough to not want people knowing I even went. When Felicia and I got married, we didn’t go to church in Chicago regularly. And when we did, it was to a higher sort, if you know what I mean. Very proper, subdued, not demonstrative. If my people had visited that church, they would have said it was dead and that Jesus wouldn’t even go there. I would have said it was sophisticated and proper.
“That’s the kind of church Felicia and I found in the suburbs too. It fit our lifestyle to a T. We could dress the way we did for work or socializing. We saw people we knew and cared about. And we definitely were never hollered at or insulted from the pulpit. Nobody called us sinners or hinted that we might need to get something right in our lives.
“Now our kids, on the other hand—two girls with a boy in between—they went the other direction. They got off to college and wound up, every one of them, in the kind of church I grew up in. Wrote us. Pleaded with us to get saved. Asked why we hadn’t exposed them to this when they were kids. Flabbergasted me, I have to tell you.
“But did it reach me, change my mind? Not on your life. But then somebody in our neighborhood invited us to a Bible study. If it hadn’t been for who it was, we never would have gone. But this was a cool guy. This was a guy who had made it, and big, in real estate development. He made this deal sound as casual as a golf game. No pressure. No hassle. They just read the Bible and talked about it, and they traded off meeting in about six different homes. We said sure, put our house on the list, and never missed.
“I was kind of bemused by it. After a while they started adding prayer to the thing. Nobody got called on or had to pray, and so Felicia and I didn’t. But people starting telling prayer requests, asking for prayer for their families and themselves, their ailments, even their businesses. I mentioned a couple of prayer requests now and then, but still I never prayed.
“One time the guy who invited us the first time asked if he could talk to us afterward. When it was just the four of us—his wife didn’t say anything—he kind of put it to us. Wanted to know where we were spiritually. I thought he meant where did we go to church, so I told him. He told me
that wasn’t what he meant. He laid out how to become a born-again Christian. I had heard it. I knew. It was just a little overboard for me, that’s all. I told him I appreciated his concern and asked if he would pray for us. That always got ’em, was my experience. But he thought I meant right then, and so he did.
“He wasn’t pushy. Just a little intrusive. I forgave him. That’s sort of what it felt like. I thought it was good to feel so strongly about something and feel so deeply that you felt you should tell your friends and neighbors about it. That was it for me, end of story. No big deal.
“Two days later, millions of people all over the world disappeared. Including—are you ready?—every last person in that Bible study except us. And all three of our kids were gone.
“Saved? We got saved in, like, ten minutes.”
Abdullah was so excited about the operation with his old friends that he had been packed and ready for several days. He didn’t know or care how much of the actual piloting he would get to do. It would be enough to be together with Mac and Albie. To him the idea that the International Commodity Co-op could pull off such a huge trade, given the stepped-up persecution of believers around the globe, was just one more proof of the sovereignty of God.
When he knew Rayford and the other three from San Diego were in the air, he could barely contain himself. They would head directly to Argentina to load the wheat, which meant Mac and Albie would soon be on their way to pick up Abdullah. They were often spied upon and followed, so the plan was that they would bring some supplies into Petra and stay the night, not leaving for India until the next day. That way, if everything worked according to plan, the three of them plus their Indian fourth, Bihari, would be in the air toward Argentina at the same time the Americans were on their way from Argentina to India.
Abdullah felt a spring in his step as he moved about Petra, singing more loudly with the mass congregation, trying to pay attention and listen as Tsion and Chaim taught the Scriptures. This was the day that the computer and television technology center in the city would beam a signal of Tsion to Global Community headquarters at the palace in New Babylon, and a large monitor in Petra would receive the GC’s transmission of Leon Fortunato. Abdullah, for one, believed Leon didn’t have a clue what he was up against in a man as scholarly as Tsion—especially considering Tsion was a man of honor and truth.