The City of Lost Secrets: A Mara Beltane Mystery (10 page)

“It depends on who you ask. The Geneva Convention may say it is illegal, but Jews are the people of the Bible.” Uri held a hand to his chest. “We believe we are doing God’s work. The Old Testament promised us this land.”

“And the Palestinians?” I asked. “What do they think of all this?”

“They think we are thieves,” he said, a tone of resentment in his voice. “They think we are stealing land that belongs to them.”

“Why do they think this land belongs to them?”

“Their claims of territory ownership are based on centuries of occupation.”

“So the Jewish viewpoint is based on an ancient pact with God, while the Arab viewpoint is based on who’s lived in the Holy Land longer?”

“It is more complicated than that, of course,” Uri said. “But you have cut to the heart of it.”

“And future generations? What do you think they’ll face?”

Uri sighed. “If I had children, I would fear for their future. I am optimistic that we’ll see an end to the conflict, but I don’t think it’ll be in my lifetime.”

Until then, it didn’t occur to me that Uri could’ve had children. He wore no wedding ring and never spoke of a wife. Being childless myself, I didn’t think to ask if he had any children of his own. I thought of Uri as simply a man and a professor—-not as a man, professor, husband and dad.

Uri wasn’t a father, but was he a husband or boyfriend?  

“So, who’s right?” I asked, pushing the thought of Uri’s relationship status from my mind.

“I have Arab friends,” Uri said. “I respect them and their religion. I don’t think it is a matter of right or wrong.”

Then he spun around, his arms in the air. “Look around you!” he said. “Have you seen a site more beautiful?”

Uri had refused, yet again, to answer a delicate question, to give his opinion on a sensitive subject. Perhaps the professor in him forbade him from tainting the education of others with his own ideologies. 

“Jerusalem is a troubled yet culturally rich city,” I said. “I can see why you want to stay here and be buried near your ancestors.”

Uri nodded, then motioned me inside the Mosque of the Ascension. “Now, come inside,” he said. “There is something you must see.”

*  *  *

My lack of religion meant I didn’t see the insides of many churches as a child. I saw two, to be exact. But once I got married and started traveling the world with Thomas, churches were almost always on the top of my list of things to see. Not from a religious standpoint--from a cultural and architectural standpoint. Churches always wound up being the most beautiful and historic buildings in a city.

But this troubled me. Here were these churches, these cathedrals—-grandiose, ostentatious, expensive monuments-- lorded over by men who preached piety and selflessness and simple living. How hypocritical. Because in reality, these men of God dressed up every Sunday in their costly silken robes and prayed in their gilded, gold-laced temples in search of redemption.

They are human, after all. They are just as guilty as the rest of us. They are liars and cheats and thieves and abusers. And they were searching inside their temples for a clean slate. They hoped the beauty of it all would save their sinful souls.

It was fear that kept them praying. Fear of what might happen to them if they died before atoning for their sins. Catholicism, in fact, was invented to keep people living in fear. I was sure of it.

Jesus was invented, too. He’s merely a fictional character. His life was fabricated. Every story in the Bible was just that: a story. And these stories were created to stand as a lesson for us all. Never do bad things; only ever do good things. And if you find yourself committing a bad act, atone for it. Otherwise, you’ll never go to heaven.

All these stories were then compiled into a book called the Bible. It was sold to the masses as the truth, a way to emotionally manipulate millions of people into believing that if you were a sinner, life after death meant eternity in hell.

And the Catholic Church got rich, gained power, and its coffers swelled…

Meanwhile, millions of people all over the world were scared straight. And as long as people were scared, they’d continue to go to church and pray, and they’d continue to hand over their hard-earned money to an establishment that did nothing but lie to them.

At least, that’s what I believed as a teenager. My views of religion have softened over the years—-from believing that organized religion is fundamentally flawed and corrupt to accepting that religion is a powerful thing that must be respected, if not completely understood. Still, to this day, when people ask me the best novel I ever read, I say the Bible.

And now here I was, stepping inside a religious temple for the first time in awhile, with a man whose own faith was completely foreign to me. So in spite of my lack of religion, I said a little prayer on my way in—-asking that I wouldn’t say or do anything to offend my new Jewish friend.

“Mara, look. Over here,” Uri said, directing me to the other side of the stone interior of the Mosque of the Ascension. He pointed down to four elongated slabs of rock that formed a rectangle around what appeared to be a footprint set in stone.

Uri explained the history of the building, how it was originally built as a chapel in the fourth century A.D. to commemorate Christ’s ascension. Over the centuries it was added to and rebuilt, until finally it became a Muslim shrine in the 12
century.

“Centuries ago, many believed a miracle occurred in this building,” Uri said. “Dust from the floor formed the image of Christ’s footprints. Eventually they were set in stone, but by then only the right foot remained.”

I crouched down so I could get a better look at the supposed right footprint of Jesus Christ. It didn’t look like much to me, but I allowed myself to imagine what it must’ve been like for early Christians to see such a thing. To them, believers of a new and burgeoning religion, knowing they walked where Jesus walked, it could have been no other person but him who left his mark in the dust.   

From there, Uri showed me the Church of the Paternoster, built above a grotto where Christ supposedly taught the Lord’s prayer; down a dirt path surrounded by densely-packed Jewish cemeteries; and over to the Dominus Flevit Chapel, the site where medieval pilgrims believed Jesus sat on a rock and wept over the fate of Jerusalem. We paused briefly at the chapel’s west window to gaze out at the breathtaking view of Old City, framed perfectly by the Dome of the Rock at the center.

By the time we’d descended to the bottom of the Mount of Olives several hours later and stood in the Garden of Gethsemane, the site of Christ’s betrayal by Judas, I was delirious from the heat, dizzy from the whirlwind tour, and in desperate need of rest.

I looked around for someplace to sit, my face flushed and my body unsteady.

“Only a little bit further to Mount Zion,” Uri promised, encouraging me forward. “No tour is complete without seeing the hill synonymous with the Holy Land.”

*  *  *

Uri first took me to St. Peter in Gallicantu, the church commemorating the traditional site of St. Peter’s denial of Christ. He took me down to the crypt, where a series of caves are said to be the place Jesus spent the night before being taken to Pontius Pilate. I welcomed the respite from the desert heat, where even a damp, dark cave offered relief.

Uri did not let me pause long, however, because there was much more he wanted me to see: The Church of the Dormition, where the Virgin Mary is said to have fallen into “eternal slumber”; the Hall of the Last Supper, on the first floor of a Gothic building, said to be the site of Christ’s last meal with his Disciples; and beneath the Hall of the Last Supper, King David’s tomb, one of the most revered Jewish holy sites.

According to tradition, King David’s tomb is also the site where Christ washed the feet of his Disciples after the Last Supper. 

By the time we’d climbed down to this underground holy site, I could go no further. My feet ached, my head was spinning, and my stomach was growling for nourishment. I collapsed on a rock inside the main chamber to rest momentarily, before Uri would no doubt whisk me to some other place—-a tomb, a chapel, a grotto, a cemetery. 

In the low light of the cave, there was intense quiet. Occasionally my heart fluttered as it settled down to a normal rhythm. Suddenly I heard an unusual noise in the room, like labored breaths echoing in a hollow tunnel. The sounds seemed to originate from right next to me, as if they were meant for my ears only. Why did the noises sound familiar? Where had I heard them before?

It took several seconds for me to make the connection. This morning, while I was in my hotel room preparing for my day trip with Uri, my cell phone rang. I said hello several times but whoever was on the other end refused to speak. But someone was on the other end because I heard them breathing. Labored, echoed breaths, as if the caller was running through a tunnel.

Startled, I rose from my rock perch and peeked my head around the corners into the adjoining rooms to look for other visitors. There were none who had entered since we’d arrived.

“Did you hear that?” I asked, returning to the rock where I’d just sat.  

“No,” Uri said, looking at me curiously.

“I must be imagining things—-perhaps the heat and exhaustion are playing tricks on my mind.”

“What did you hear?”

“It sounded like…someone breathing.”

“Breathing?” Uri asked.

“It could have come from anywhere, but it sounded like someone was standing right next to me, breathing in my left ear.”

Uri took a step closer and listened for a moment. He shook his head. “No, I’m sorry,” he said. “I heard nothing.”

“I got a call this morning on my cell phone, and the person on the other end was breathing heavily but didn’t say anything,” I explained to Uri, hoping he wouldn’t think I was crazy. “The noise I heard a minute ago sounded just like that. I’m sorry, I must be imagining things.”

“What?” Uri said, facing me directly now, a look of concern on his face.

“I said I must be imagining things.”

“Yes, I understood that part. You said you got a call on your cell phone this morning?”

In the low light I could see his eyes darting back and forth as he searched my face for answers. He was standing close to me, and now I could hear his breathing as well as my own.

“I could hear someone on the other end but they didn’t say anything,” I said. “They eventually hung up. It must have been a prank call, or maybe someone accidentally dialed the wrong number…”

Uri placed his hands on my shoulders, as if willing me to focus. “What time did you receive that phone call?”

“It was right before I met you. So, around 9 a.m.”

“Not again,” Uri said, sighing. “Not you, too.” He looked up at the low ceiling of the cave, shaking his head in disbelief.

“I don’t understand,” I said. “What do you mean?”

In that moment, in the cramped confines of a dim cave, I felt myself starting to succumb: my body, to the intense weight of sheer exhaustion; my brain, to the deranged hallucination of a disembodied voice; my heart, to the gentle touch of a beautiful stranger.

Uri gripped my shoulders again, tighter this time.

“So you want to see the Talpiot tomb?” he asked.

“Yes, of course,” I said, straightening my shoulders in Uri’s grasp, attempting to hide my physical and emotional discomfort. “It’s my whole reason for being here.”

“Then we must hurry before it’s too late.”

“Too late for what?”

Uri waved off my question. “Meet me tomorrow morning at Lev’s shop. If you want to see the Talpiot tomb, then it must be soon.”

“Why the sudden hurry?”

“Talk to Lev,” Uri said, holding up a hand to stave off further questions. “He has the answers. And he is the only one who can get us inside.”

CHAPTER TWELVE

“Hello again, Miss Mara,” the boy said to me, smiling.

He was arranging items on one of the glass display cases in the middle of his small store when I returned, a day after visiting the Mount of Olives with Uri.

“Hello, Lev,” I said.

“What brings you back to my store? Looking for another olive wood trinket?” He pushed his glasses further up on his nose.

When we’d met for the first time several days before, Lev wore jeans and a pull-over collared shirt, a casual look that almost pegged him as a traveler, not a proprietor-in-training. Today, however, he fit the bill, wearing a white dress shirt tucked into a pair of dark blue slacks.

“Well, I--” I started.

Just then the chime above the door sounded. Lev turned towards the door to see who had entered and was surprised to see Uri standing in the threshold. His mouth fell in shock.

“Professor Nevon,” he said, quickly replacing the items he held back on the shelf. “What are you doing here?”

“Well, it’s nice to see you, too, Lev,” Uri said mockingly.

“I’m sorry,” Lev said. “Where are my manners? How have you been?” He walked closer to where Uri and I stood.

“I’ve been well.” Uri looked around the store, at the white walls painted with intricate patterns in blue and green, at the service counter in the back of the room, and finally to the glass display cases in the middle of the store near where Lev stood. The two men’s eyes met once again.

“I like what you’ve done with the store,” Uri said. “You’ve painted since I’ve seen it last.”

“Yes,” Lev said. “It was long overdue.”

There was a moment of silence before Uri finally said, “It has been too long, my old friend.”

Lev looked uneasy. His eyes darted between me and Uri. “So…what brings you both here?”

“Lev, I’m sorry,” I said, feeling the need to apologize for our unexpected visit. “I want you to know that--”

“Mara, it’s okay,” Uri said, placing a hand on my shoulder. “Let me explain.”

Lev’s shoulders hunched slightly and he glared at Uri. “You want my help getting inside the Talpiot tomb, don’t you?” He slid his accusing eyes to me. “That’s why you’re both here.”