The Harbinger (20 page)

“I have no idea,” I replied.

“Is it not also the symbol of a fall?”

“I’m not getting it.”

“But you will.”

“So first the warning’s given, and then a final calamity.”

“More than one warning may be given,” said the prophet. “If one alarm is ignored, then there comes a second.”

“Then there
comes
a second, or there
may
come a second?”

“Then there
comes
a second.”

“Then a second warning is coming?” I asked.

“A second warning,” he said, “a second alarm…a second shaking.”

“A second shaking of America?”

He turned his gaze so that he was now looking directly into my eyes as he gave his response.

“There comes a second,” he said again.

Then he handed me a seal. It was the same one I had just given him back.

“The seal of the Ninth Harbinger? I just returned it to you.”

“Yes,” he replied.

Then he began descending the Capitol steps. I followed after him. But hearing my footsteps, he stopped and turned around. “No, Nouriel,” he said. “That was the last Harbinger. Our time is finished.”

He resumed his descent. I stayed where I was. But I shouted after him as I had done before, only now with more urgency at the thought that it might be my last chance of getting an answer.

“So what do I do now?”

“About what?”

“About everything. About everything you’ve shown me…”

“You don’t forget it.”

“That’s not enough. I need something specific. What do I do now…specifically?”

When he got to the bottom of the first set of steps he stopped, turned around, and responded. “Specifically?” he said.

“Yes, specifically,” I replied.

“You go home. You go home…and you watch.”

“And what am I watching for?”

“
There comes a second
,” he replied.

He descended the next set of stairs as I finished descending the first. Then, from the terrace in between the two staircases, I watched as he walked away from the Capitol and down the Washington Mall…until he disappeared from my sight.

Ana waited for something more, for the account to continue. She was hoping it wasn’t end of the story. But Nouriel was silent.

“So what did you do after he left?” she asked.

“I went home.”

“And…?”

“I watched.”

“For what exactly?”

“For what exactly I wasn’t sure. I focused on the prophecy. I went back to the library and spent hours and hours searching…poring through the commentaries on Isaiah 9:10.”

“And…?”

“I found a match—what the prophet said to me when he left and what the commentaries said about Isaiah 9:10…they matched.”

“How?”

“In one of the commentaries I found this:

“And that means what?” she asked.

“It means that there was a purpose behind that first calamity, that first invasion of the land by the Assyrians. Its purpose was
remedial
—to correct, to wake up the nation, to turn it back to God, a purpose of redemption.”

“But you knew that already,” she replied. “What did you get from the commentary that was different, or that matched what the prophet told you?”

“What it’s saying is that those purposes won’t stop until they’re fulfilled. So if a nation rejects one expression of that purpose,
another must be found
. The force or purpose will manifest itself again in another form. That’s what I found in the one commentary. And then, in a second commentary on Isaiah 9:10, I found this:

“The commentaries were consistent in linking Isaiah 9:10 with the same principle. And then, in another commentary, I found this:

“‘
There comes a second.’
That’s what the prophet kept saying to you the day you last saw him.”

“He kept saying it because he knew it wasn’t the end. Isaiah 9:10 is the beginning, the first link in a chain of progression. There’s more to it. It leads to something else.”

“So then if Isaiah 9:10 is joined to America with the Harbingers, it means that what happened on 9/11 isn’t the end of the matter. Then it’s not over; there’s more to come.”

“Yes. Then there comes a second.”

“A second what…exactly?”

“A second warning…a sounding of the alarm…a second chastening…a second shaking.”

“But what exactly? What form does it take?”

“The prophet spoke of the Harbingers as symbols. That was a clue. The World Trade Center was a symbol of America’s global financial and economic power. So what would such a fall foreshadow?

“An economic…fall?”

“As in a financial and economic collapse.”

“The collapse that began the
Great Recession
?”

“Yes.”

“The collapse of the American and global economy is connected to 9/11?”

“Yes.”

“But how?”

“It all goes back to the prophecy…everything—the collapse of Wall Street, the rise and fall of the credit market, the war in Iraq, the collapse of the housing market, the foreclosures, the defaults, the bankruptcies, the government takeovers—everything—politics, foreign policy, world history—everything that happened after. It all goes back to the prophecy and to the ancient mystery.”

“That’s a pretty big proposition,” she said. “In fact, it’s colossal.”

“I realize that,” he said.

“And nobody else realizes it? All the economists and experts and think tanks and intelligence agencies, they have no idea?”

“I don’t know. I guess not.”

“But how do
you
know?” she asked. “How did you put it all together?”

“I told you,” he replied. “It wasn’t me. It was what I was told.”

“I understand that…with the Harbingers. But now you’re talking about what happened
after
you were shown the Harbingers. So how did you come to know these things if the last time you saw the prophet was on Capitol Hill?”

“But it wasn’t the last time.”

“He reappeared?”

“When we parted that day on the Capitol steps, it was the first time he left me without a seal…or without a new seal. So I assumed there was nothing more to be revealed. I didn’t think I’d ever see him again. Still, occasionally I’d walk alongside the Hudson to the place where we first met, in the hope that he’d reappear. But he never did. Several years passed, and just when I had given up any hope of seeing him again…”

“…he reappeared?”

“He reappeared.”

“But the last time you saw him, he told you that his time with you was finished.”

“It
was
finished. He appeared the first time to reveal the first part of the mystery. The first part was complete. But there was more.”

“So he appeared again, but this time to reveal the second part of the mystery?”

“Because there comes a second.”

Chapter 15

The Isaiah 9:10 Effect

A
T THAT HE
was quiet. She was quiet as well, thinking it right to give him a chance to rest from speaking but, at the same time, concerned that if she waited too long, he might not continue. Finally she broke the silence.

“You
are
planning to tell me the second part of the mystery,” she asked.

“As long as you have the time,” he replied.

“Forget time,” she said. “I want to know the second part.”

“I know how busy you are.”

“Not any more, Nouriel.”

“I just wanted to make sure.”

“Wait. Before you continue…what if we go for a walk? I need to walk, if that’s OK with you.”

“It’s fine.”

They left the office, took an elevator down to the first floor, exited the building, and began walking down the street. They would walk down many streets that night, passing office buildings, stores, street vendors, apartment houses, and others also walking the city streets that night. But the two were largely oblivious to their surroundings, caught up in the ancient mystery and the words of the prophet.

“So when did you see him again?” she asked.

“I was working on a project that had me in Lower Manhattan for several weeks. During my free time, I’d go for walks around the area. One day, during one of those walks, I stopped in front of the New York Stock Exchange. I was staring at it, at the side with the columns, the famous side. I don’t remember exactly what I was thinking when I heard the voice.”

“The voice of the prophet…”

“It had been several years since I last heard it.”

“You didn’t forget, did you?” he said.

I turned around. He hadn’t changed…nor had his long dark coat. He looked the same as when I last saw him. “Forget what?” I asked.

“What you were shown.”

“I recorded everything. But, no, I didn’t forget.”

“Good. And how have you been, Nouriel?” It was the first time he ever asked me that.

“OK, I guess,” I replied. “And you? What have you been up to these past few years?”

“Watching,” he answered.

“Watching.”

“And now to begin the second part.”

“The second part of…”

“The mystery. Are you ready to begin?”

“I don’t think I’ve ever been ready.”

“Then let’s begin. What concerns us now is that which comes after…starting with the prophecy. What comes after Isaiah 9:10?”

“What do you mean?”

“What comes after Isaiah 9:10?”

“Isaiah 9:11.”

“Not the number…the words.”

“I can’t remember…offhand.”

“Isaiah 9:10:

“Now, Isaiah 9:11:

“So what’s going on in Isaiah 9:11?” he asked.

“The nation’s first shaking is followed by a second?”

“And why is that?”

“Because the nation didn’t wake up or turn back after the first.”

“Isaiah 9:10 is a vow of defiance. Isaiah 9:11 is a prophecy of future calamity. The two are connected. The one leads into the other. The first brings about the second.”

“So the vow brings about the nation’s future calamities?” I asked.

“The vow,” he replied, “but not the vow alone. If it were only a vow and nothing more, it would have ended differently. It’s what the nation did once the vow was made that determined its future.”

“Which was?”

“It fulfilled the vow with quarried stones and sycamores. The nation embarked on a campaign to rebuild and fortify itself, to emerge stronger and greater than before…”