The City of Lost Secrets: A Mara Beltane Mystery (4 page)
When I did start learning about God at the age of 17, however, things suddenly weren’t okay for me. The rest of that story is another tale for another time. Needless to say I don’t profess to have all the answers. I was here in Jerusalem to write a novel about the death of Jesus. My magnum opus. And if that documentary turned out to be true, that the final resting place of Jesus Christ had been found…well, all the better. That revelation would certainly rock Christianity to its core, almost guaranteeing that the novel I was going to write would be a best-seller.
Finally, at long last, I would give my readers—-and the whole world—-one hell of a page-turner.
One of the best ways to learn about a city, other than walking it, is to visit its museums. This is why I decided to visit the Rockefeller Archaeological Museum on my second day in the city. I’d read that this museum housed some wonderful Holy Land antiquities, including some of the Dead Sea Scrolls.
The museum was a short walk from my hotel, down Sultan Suleyman Street. I kept the walls of the Old City to my right and, once I’d reached Herod’s Gate on my right-hand side and saw a white limestone building wrapped around a central courtyard on my left across the street, I knew from my guidebook’s description that I’d arrived at the Rockefeller Museum.
I had arranged for a private tour of the exhibits with one of the curators. Given that he or she was an employee of the Israeli Antiquities Authority-–the same organization that excavated the Talpiot tomb--it would be interesting to see where he or she stood on the matter.
I stepped out of the heat and into the air conditioned lobby and approached the main desk. There were two women standing behind it, conversing in Hebrew. They giggled as if exchanging gossip, but stopped and composed themselves when they saw me walking towards them.
The taller, younger and thinner of the two ladies smiled at me and asked in perfect English, “How may I help you?”
“My name is Mara Beltane,” I said, surprised and yet not that the woman knew to address me in English. Surely I looked American to them, dressed as I was in casual attire that included a pair of sneakers, the most American of accessories. I leaned against the cool counter, reflecting briefly on the fact that not only do Americans stick out like sore thumbs abroad, no matter how hard we try to blend in, but that America is one of the few countries whose citizens aren’t bilingual. “I have a private tour of the museum scheduled for 10 a.m.,” I said.
The two women exchanged looks and nodded at each other. Thenthe older lady, perhaps fifty or so and plump, stepped out from behind the counter and clasped her hands in front of her. She wore a skirt the color of pink coral that skimmed her knees and a matching blazer. Her low, off-white heels matched the hue of the scarf around her neck, which accented her short, blonde hair.
“Welcome to the Rockefeller Archeological Museum,” she said in accented English. “My name is Tovah and I’ll be giving you the tour today.”
* * *
Thomas and I visited some of the best art museums in the world together: The British Museum; the Rijksmuseum; the Met; The Musee d’Orsay; the Guggenheim; Museo del Prado; the Louvre.
We both loved art and everything it represented. I was partial to painting, especially the experimental works of the Impressionists and the spirituality of the Pre-Raphaelites. Thomas had a thing for sculpture, most particularly, Rodin. Our very first date, in fact, had been to the Rodin Museum in Philadelphia.
Thomas respected Rodin (and envied him, I think, although he’d never admitted it) for his ability to create a thing of beauty from a slab of rock. Rodin could mold stone to look like human flesh and manipulate it to portray passion, desperation, love.
Thomas wasn’t blessed with any sort of artistic creativity. This haunted him and, I think, ultimately was partially responsible for destroying our marriage. I had my novels, but Thomas never had a creation to call his own.
As the years went by and our museum visits continued, I noticed he’d pause just a little longer at the Madonna and Child paintings of the Renaissance, tilt his head and smile at the family portraits of the 18
century Rococo, step closer as if to feel the fabric of Degas’ delicate ballet dancers.
These were the moments—-as children stared back at him from two-dimensional canvases—-that I think he was realizing there was something he could create after all, one thing that he could call his own: a masterpiece he would be proud to call son or daughter. The years passed and, although I continued to create novels, Thomas’s dream of fatherhood was slowly slipping away.
It wasn’t until he saw Georges Minne’s “Woman Weeping for Her Dead Son” that I think he realized his fate. He walked several times around the late 19
century black stone sculpture, which depicts a young boy laying limp and lifeless in his mother’s arms as she stretches her neck skyward in agony over her loss. I drifted off to view the other pieces in the room. He didn’t notice when I returned to his side a few moments later, not even when I touched his arm. He continued to stare at the woman and her dead boy as I slipped my hand into his, sure that that would awaken him from his melancholy trance. When it did not, I recoiled my hand, feeling that Thomas had somehow become a part of the sculpture during my brief absence. The intense sadness in his eyes, the slight hunch of his shoulders…If not for the warmth of his hand I’d have sworn he’d turned to stone as well.
For a moment I wasn’t Thomas’s wife, but a stranger walking in on an intimate scene between a man and a woman and their moment of shared grief. My sudden panic--the feeling of being alone, of thinking I’d lost him--made me take a step back. I couldn’t bear to be that near to him knowing that he was not mine, as brief as the moment was.
Thomas finally turned to me, when he’d decided he no longer wanted to be a part of the sculpture, when he no longer wanted to think about the lost child. He had a mist in his eye that I hadn’t seen before or since, not even as our marriage crumbled and separation became the only way to ease his bitterness and disappointment. At that moment, in a museum in Brussels, Thomas was mourning the child he’d never have.
It was one of the last trips we took together. I had denied Thomas his chance to create something special, something beautiful. He said he felt my writing career was more important to me than he was. He thought I didn’t care about his desire to become a dad. There was a resentment I could not bear.
Several months later we were going through the process of being legally separated. We sold the house we had shared together for seven years and each got a place of our own. We e-mailed back and forth for awhile, whenever little things needed to be resolved, like when we found things that belonged to each other: Thomas’ old Penn sweatshirt. A sketchbook filled with my writings. CDs. Books. DVDs.
Eventually the e-mails stopped altogether and then there was silence. That was more than a year ago.
It was hard not thinking about Thomas as Tovah led me from room to room through the museum. Each exhibition hall we toured resembled a cathedral--a cathedral Thomas and I had visited together: long rooms with high ceilings and impossibly large windows to allow for natural light. All the cathedrals and churches we visited came back to me in a rush of memories as we moved from hall to hall: Karlskirche in Vienna, where we saved twelve Euros by not going inside because we decided this Baroque church couldn’t possibly be any more beautiful on the inside than it was on the outside. St Paul’s Cathedral in London, which we decided was worth the price of admission so we could climb the 259 steps to the Whispering Gallery, and another 371 to the summit for the extraordinary view of the city. Notre Dame in Paris, where, in order to recover from the sheer beauty and magnificence of the rose windows, we sat on a nearby park bench and shared a crepe drenched in chocolate.
As Tovah led me from one exhibition hall to another, I imagined he was there with me. Thomas was suddenly by my side, inside the Rockefeller Museum. He smiled and took my hand as the tour guide said that this museum was the first in the Middle East to make a systematic collection of finds from the Holy Land. Tovah then mentioned the Dead Sea Scrolls and I muttered Thomas’s name and turned to him to say that we must see them before we leave…and saw only the tour guide, looking at me curiously.
Suddenly I was alone once again. The idea of Thomas had vanished, leaving me alone with my guilt and anguish and pity. Tovah narrowed her brown eyes at me and asked if I was okay, if I wanted to sit down or was in need of a restroom, to which I smiled and asked when I’d get to see the Dead Sea Scrolls.
“The Dead Sea Scrolls are housed at our nearby sister Museum, the Israel Museum, in a building called the Shrine of the Book,” Tovah said, a look of concern still on her face. “Your admission ticket is good for that museum as well. There’s a free shuttle bus that’ll take you there.”
Certainly, absolutely, I would take the shuttle over to the other museum. But first I had to remind myself of two things: First, that my time of touring the world with Thomas was over, and that he was, in fact, gone from my life, perhaps forever. And second, that I was in Jerusalem for a reason, and could not allow nostalgia to rob me of this important opportunity. I had two hours alone with a museum curator who had vast knowledge of biblical history and archeology. I’d be remiss not to probe her for information about the Talpiot tomb.
Tovah led me back into the lobby. She thanked me for coming, encouraged me to visit the gift shop, and asked if I had any questions.
“Yes, I do,” I said, looking around at the visitors milling around the lobby and scurrying every which way to the various exhibition halls. The museum was more crowded than when I’d entered nearly two hours before. I turned my head slightly in the direction of the entrance doors and saw out of the corner of my eye a tour bus outside unloading its passengers. In a matter of moments the large group would descend on the lobby, making conversation more difficult. I had to act quickly, especially if this group was Tovah’s next responsibility.
“I, um, I saw a documentary recently about a tomb found on the outskirts of Jerusalem,” I said, wringing my hands together out of nervousness. “Do you know which tomb I’m talking about?”
“Well, there are tombs all over Jerusalem,” Tovah said, folding her hands in front of her again. “In fact, this museum was built on the site of Hellenistic and Byzantine-era graves. Construction was halted for some time in order for them to be excavated.”
“The tomb in this documentary was older,” I said, starting to gain more confidence. “It dated from the time of Jesus. I’m trying to remember the name.”
“I’m sure I don’t know,” Tovah said.
“Talpiot!” I said, as if the name suddenly came to me. “The Talpiot tomb! That’s what it’s called.”
The smile melted from her face. “The Talpiot tomb?”
“Yes, it was uncovered in 1980, I think, and some say it is the lost tomb of Jesus of Nazareth.”
“I’m familiar with what is being said about it,” she said, shifting on her feet as if standing for two hours was starting to bother her feet. Or because she was unnerved by my questions and displayed her discomfort by fidgeting.
“Then you must have seen the documentary,” I said.
“Is that your question, Miss Beltane? If I’ve seen a documentary about the Talpiot tomb?”
“Not
a
documentary,” I clarified. “
The
documentary. It claims that Jesus was not resurrected, and that he was married to Mary Magdalene and they had a child, and that the Talpiot tomb and the ossuaries found inside are the proof.”
Tovah cleared her throat. “I might have seen it. I can’t recall.”
“All those ossuaries pulled from the tomb bore inscriptions of names who were members of Jesus’ family,” I said, continuing despite her obvious irritation. “How remarkable!”
Tovah shook her head. “Four of the ossuaries had no inscription. And to say that the remaining six must have belonged to Jesus’ family is a stretch. They were all very common names at the time. For example, one of the ossuaries bore the inscription Mary. Twenty-five percent of women in Jerusalem at the time were named Mary.”
The common name theory. From what I’d read, it seemed to be the most popular explanation among scientists and scholars debunking the Talpiot tomb.
“But do you think that’s enough evidence to discredit the claim?” I asked, glancing outside again at the bright, sunny day. All of the passengers had disembarked from the bus, and the bus was pulling away. Some of the passengers were already fanning themselves against the late morning heat.
“The IAA’s stance is that neither the Talpiot tomb nor the ten ossuaries found inside are extraordinary,” Tovah said.
“The IAA?” I asked, returning my attention back to her.
“The Israel Antiquities Authority,” she said. “It’s the government agency responsible for controlling and protecting Israel’s treasures. They also run this museum and our sister museum, the Israel Museum. So as a curator of this museum, I am also an employee of the IAA.”
“I understand that, and I’m familiar with the IAA,” I said. “But I’d really like to know how you personally feel about the Talpiot tomb.”
“Why do you want to know that?” Tovah asked, narrowing her eyes at me in suspicion. “Why the interest in this particular tomb?”
“I’m just curious,” I assured her.
Tovah eyed me for a brief moment longer before answering. “The Talpiot tomb is a typical first-century Jewish burial cave. Hundreds of tomb caves just like it have been found in Jerusalem and the vicinity.”
“So, in your opinion, it’s not the tomb of Jesus Christ?” I asked.
“Jesus’ family was from Galilee and had no ties to Jerusalem, so there is little likelihood that this is the tomb of Jesus and his relatives.”
“But Jesus died here,” I said. “The New Testament tells us what happened to his body. He was buried here, and, Christians believe, resurrected here. How can you say there were no ties to Jerusalem?”
