The Left Behind Collection: All 12 Books (63 page)

“Kennedy,” Feinberg told the driver.

“Excuse me while I use my phone,” Buck said. “Rabbi, let me see your bill so I get the number of the hotel.” He called the concierge and told her he would need his bag stored longer than he had expected. She asked him to hold and came back on. “Sir, someone took that bag for you.”

“Someone what?”

“Took that bag for you. Said he was your friend and would see that you got it.”

Buck was stunned. “You let my bag be taken by a stranger who claimed to be a friend of mine?”

“Sir, it’s not as bleak as all that. I think the man could easily be located if necessary. He’s on the news every night.”

“Mr. Carpathia?”

“Yes, sir. One of his people, a Mr. Plank, promised he would deliver it to you.”

Feinberg seemed pleased when Buck finally got off the phone. “Back to the temple!” he shouted, and the driver pulled his foot off the gas. “Not you!” Feinberg said. “Us!”

Buck wondered what a man with such unbounded energy and enthusiasm might do in another profession. “You’d have been a killer racquetball player,” he said.

“I
am
a killer racquetball player!” Feinberg said. “I’m an A-minus. What are you?”

“Retired.”

“And so young!”

“Too busy.”

“Never too busy for physical exercise,” the rabbi said, smacking himself on his flat, hard stomach. “Ah, the temple,” he said. The cab was soon stuck in traffic, and Buck kept scribbling.

When Hattie excused herself to answer the phone on her desk, Rayford slipped his New Testament and Psalms from his pocket. He had been memorizing verses from the Psalms, and as his anxiety over meeting Carpathia grew, he turned to those favorites and ran them over in his mind.

He found Psalm 91 and read verses he had underlined: “He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the Lord, ‘He is my refuge and my fortress; My God, in Him I will trust.’ A thousand may fall at your side, and ten thousand at your right hand; but it shall not come near you. No evil shall befall you, nor shall any plague come near your dwelling; for He shall give His angels charge over you, to keep you in all your ways.”

When he looked up, Hattie was off the phone and looking at him expectantly. “Sorry,” he said, closing the Bible.

“That’s all right,” she said. “The secretary-general is ready for you.”

With the cabby’s assurance that the rabbi was not going to miss his plane, Feinberg warmed to his subject. “The temple and the city of Jerusalem were destroyed by King Nebuchadnezzar. Seventy years later a decree was given to rebuild the city and eventually the temple. The new temple, under the direction of Zerubbabel and Joshua, the high priest, was so inferior to the temple of Solomon that some of the elders wept when they saw the foundation.

“Still, that temple served Israel until it was desecrated by Antiochus Epiphanes, a Greco-Roman ruler. About 40 BC, Herod the Great had the temple destroyed piece by piece and rebuilt. That became known as Herod’s Temple. And you know what became of that.”

“I’m sorry, I don’t.”

“You’re a religion writer and you don’t know what happened to Herod’s Temple?”

“I’m actually a pinch hitter for the religion writer on this story.”

“A pinch hitter?”

Buck smiled. “You’re an A-minus racquetball player and you don’t know what a pinch hitter is?”

“It’s not a racquetball term, I know that,” Rabbi Feinberg said. “And other than football, which you call soccer, I don’t care about other sports. Let me tell you what happened to Herod’s Temple. Titus, a Roman general, laid siege to Jerusalem, and even though he gave orders that the temple not be destroyed, the Jews did not trust him. They burned it rather than allow it to fall into pagan hands. Today the Temple Mount, the site of the old Jewish temple, is occupied by the Mohammedans and houses the Muslim mosque called the Dome of the Rock.”

Buck was curious. “How were the Muslims persuaded to move the Dome of the Rock?”

“That proves the magnificence of Carpathia,” Feinberg said. “Who but Messiah could ask devout Muslims to move the shrine that in their religion is second in importance only to Mecca, the birthplace of Mohammed? But you see, the Temple Mount, the Dome of the Rock, is built right over Mount Moriah, where we believe Abraham expressed his willingness to God to sacrifice his son Isaac. Of course we do not believe Mohammed to be divine, so as long as a Muslim mosque occupies the Temple Mount, we believe our holy place is being defiled.”

“So this is a great day for Israel.”

“A great day! Since the birth of our nation, we have collected millions from around the world for the rebuilding of the temple. Work has begun. Many prefabricated walls are finished and will be shipped in. I will live to see the reconstruction of the temple, and it will be even more spectacular than in the days of Solomon!”

“At last we meet,” Nicolae Carpathia said, rising and coming around his desk to shake hands with Rayford Steele. “Thank you, Ms. Durham. We will sit right here.”

Hattie left and shut the door. Nicolae pointed to a chair and sat down across from Rayford. “And so our little circle is connected.”

Rayford felt strangely calmed. He was being prayed for, and his mind was full of the promises from the Psalms. “Sir?”

“It is interesting to me how small the world is. Perhaps that is why I believe so strongly that we are becoming truly a global community. Would you believe I met you through an Israeli botanist named Chaim Rosenzweig?”

“I know the name, of course, but we have never met.”

“Indeed you have not. But you will. If not while you are here, then Saturday on the plane to Israel. He introduced me to a young journalist who had written about him. That journalist met your flight attendant, Ms. Durham, while on your plane, and eventually introduced her to me. She is now my assistant, and she introduced you to me. A small world.”

Earl Halliday had said the same thing when he’d heard that Hattie Durham, a former Pan-Con employee, was working for the man who wanted Rayford as pilot of
Air Force One
. Rayford did not respond to Carpathia. He didn’t believe they had met coincidentally. It was not such a small world. It was possible all had been where God had wanted them to be so Rayford could be sitting where he was today. This wasn’t something he wanted or had sought, but he was finally open to it.

“So, you want to be the pilot of
Air Force One
.”

“No, sir, that was not my desire. I am willing to fly her to Jerusalem with your delegation, at the request of the White House, and then decide about the request to become the pilot.”

“You did not seek the position?”

“No, sir.”

“But you are willing.”

“To give it a try.”

“Mr. Steele, I want to make a prediction. I want to presume that you will see this plane, experience the latest technology, and want never to fly anything less.”

“That may very well be.”
But not for that reason,
Rayford thought.
Only if it’s what God wants.

“I also want to let you in on a little secret, something that has not been announced yet. Ms. Durham has assured me that you are a man who can be trusted, a man of your word, and as of recently also a religious man.”

Rayford nodded, unwilling to say anything.

“Then I will trust you to keep my confidence until this is announced.
Air Force One
is being lent to the United Nations as a gesture of support by the president of the United States.”

“That’s been on the news, sir.”

“Of course, but what has not been announced is that the plane will then be given to us, along with the crew, for our exclusive use.”

“How nice of President Fitzhugh to offer that.”

“How nice indeed,” Carpathia said. “And how generous.”

Rayford understood how people could be charmed by Carpathia, but sitting across from him and knowing he was lying made it easier to resist his charm.

“When do you fly back?” Carpathia said.

“I left it open. I’m at your disposal. I do need to be home before we leave Saturday, however.”

“I like your style,” Carpathia said. “You are at my disposal. That is nice. You realize, of course, that should you get this job—and you will—that this is not a platform for proselytizing.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning that the United Nations, which shall become known as Global Community, and I in particular, are proactively nonsectarian.”

“I am a believer in Christ,” Rayford said. “I attend church. I read my Bible. I tell people what I believe.”

“But not on the job.”

“If you become my superior and that becomes a directive, I will be obligated to obey.”

“I will and it will and you will,” Carpathia said. “Just so we understand each other.”

“Clearly.”

“I like you, and I believe we can work together.”

“I don’t know you, sir, but I believe I can work with anybody.”
Where had that come from?
Rayford almost smiled. If he could work with the Antichrist, who couldn’t he work with?

As the cab pulled up to the curb at Kennedy International, Rabbi Marc Feinberg said, “I’m sure you won’t mind including my trip in your total, as you did interview me.”

“Certainly,” Buck said. “
Global Weekly
is more than happy to provide you a trip to the airport, provided we don’t have to fly you to Israel.”

“Now that you mention it—,” the rabbi said with a twinkle, but he did not finish the thought. He merely waved, retrieved his valise from the cabby, and hurried into the terminal.