Marcus smiled and sat in a chair near the mini refrigerator. He closed his eyes and felt sleep creeping up around him.
Six hours later, Alicia was still staring at the laptop screen. She began to sense the Carlson kingdom was an amorphous, seething creature that could alter its shape in order to prevent detection. She peeled though the layers of bonds, partnerships, income interest, bank accounts, payment transfers and hundreds of other small moves on his global chessboard. She calculated his assets to be in the neighborhood of fifty billion dollars. She found land and building acquisitions and leases held all over the world tied to thousands of bank accounts and holdings listed under hundreds of names, most fictitious. She traced the electronic money trails from Paris to Gibraltar to Athens to Kenya, Libya and Egypt…and finally Syria. Carlson’s Consolidated Energy Services was a clearinghouse for money laundering and illegal weapons trade. Alicia’s eyes were like heat-seeking missiles, examining every detail, focusing on each nuance of each complex relationship, looking for correlations and blemishes.
Another two hours and she worked in a near self-induced, hypnotic trance-like state of mind. She understood the inner working of Carlson’s cyber world from the perspective of inside his computers. It was as if she were part of the electrons moving through Carlson’s empire — balance sheets — emails — money transfers from Luxembourg to a Cayman Islands’ bank. Percentages of almost every transaction funneled into the island through non-existent, post-office-box companies.
Something caught her eye. An email arriving while she moved with ease inside his computer, she read the encryption:
Marcus may be in a position to implicate us on the K jr situation. Increase reward by 10-mil. Leverage and maneuver Tel Aviv into capture if possible. Retrieve spear and flash-drive immediately!
“Screw you, asshole,” Alicia whispered. Click…click…click… “See if you can trace that.”
She stood from the small table where she’d sat for twelve straight hours. After going to the bathroom, she touched Marcus on the shoulder. He opened his eyes, and she said, “It’ll be morning soon. We can’t stay here. I have what we need to sink Jonathon Carlson.”
NINETY
The morning light brought the extent of damages from the earthquake. Israeli authorities estimated that the destruction would cost more than three billion dollars to repair. At least seventy-nine people were dead and dozens more missing and feared dead. Aftershocks were felt as far west as Cairo, Egypt, and they spread into the western section of Iraq.
Alicia said, “I spent most of the night in Jonathon Carlson’s sewer. I need a very hot shower. I’ve uncovered further connections…links that substantiate a pattern, a legacy of involvement in the Middle East and much of Europe for a long time.” She handed Marcus a notepad. “I jotted down a bullet-point summation.”
Marcus took the notepad and read silently. After a minute, he looked up at Alicia. It all makes sense…oil n guns…all comes together. Israel is in the crosshairs, and they don’t know it or won’t recognize it. Maybe they will now.”
“There’s civil unrest, protests going on in most of the countries in the Middle East, all but Iran. The Internet and social sites have opened younger faces and minds to what’s outside the insular bubble that the kings and dictators have erected since World War II. Autocratic rulers are toppling from Egypt to Oman. The unknown is who will gain control and what will their relationship be with the West — with Israel?”
Marcus nodded. “Especially Israel.” He reached for his phone and punched in numbers. “I wonder if cell towers are still standing.”
“I’m getting strong Internet reception.”
After a half dozen rings, Jacob Kogen answered. “Are you okay, Jacob?”
“Yes, Paul. We’re safe. Where are you?”
“Here in Jerusalem. I’m at a hotel, but I’ll be leaving soon, if taxis or shuttles are running. The rental car was destroyed.”
“The library and university have very little damage.”
Marcus looked at the television screen, the channel on BBC International, to see reporters scattered all over Jerusalem doing live broadcasts, most via satellite phones.
“Paul, the university is on your way to the airport. Can you stop in a for few minutes? I have something I need to share with you.”
“Okay, I’d like to brief you on something, too. It’s the reason, I hope, that I was brought over here.” Marcus disconnected, walked across the room, and wedged the Beretta in the small of his back, under his belt.
Alicia looked up. “What’s going on, Paul?”
“We’re leaving, but before we go, we have to make an impromptu stop.”
Inside the library at the Hebrew University, in the lobby near the Ardon stained-glass windows, Marcus introduced Alicia to Jacob Kogen. Jacob said, “I’m saddened that the Old City has been taken to its knees in the aftermath of the earthquake. We shall rebuild. I hope your next journey here meets you with calm and the damage done to Jerusalem is no longer visible.”
“Thank you, Jacob,” Alicia said. “My prayers are with the victims of the disaster and their families. Those windows…the stained glass is so beautiful. It reminds me of Chartres.”
Jacob smiled. “The panel on the right is from Isaiah 2:3–4. Jacob shifted his eyes to Marcus. “Paul, you must leave Israel. Let’s talk in the research room. Nathan Levy is convinced you are working for Iran. He believes that you had something to do with the stepped-up operations of their nuclear program.”
Marcus said nothing, looking at the white board beyond the desk piled with Jacob’s paperwork. The mathematical problem Marcus solved was still visible in the dry erasable ink. “Jacob, you’re going to have to trust me here, okay?”
“Of course.”
“I did nothing to compromise the security of Israel. But, for your own safety, the less you know the less that can hurt you. Alicia’s niece, Brandi, and her fiancé were being held by Iran. Adam was released. Brandi is still there. I’m doing everything I can to free her and still not do anything to create a nuclear buildup. Do you believe me?”
“Yes, Paul. I believe this is part of a larger plan.”
Marcus reached in his pocket and pulled out the head of the spear. “I know this belongs to the bigger plan. We discovered it at Chartres Cathedral. It was hidden behind a marble statue, maybe the sculpture of Saint Longinus. Using the measurements of the sacred cubit, combined with the information I decoded from Newton and the Bible, ‘…for the shadow is to the seeker as the seeker is to the shadow…’ we found it.”
“Astounding…prophetic…may I see it?”
Marcus handed the spear to Jacob and said, “Someone knows we have that. And they want it enough to kill for it.”
“What do you mean?”
Marcus told him and added, “The real value in the spear isn’t the alleged power it has, but rather the direction it points.”
“What do you mean?”
“The future. It’s written on the other side of the blade.”
Jacob held the spear under his desk light. He turned the blade over, his eyes narrowing as he read. “It’s in Hebrew. ‘The city had no need of the sun, neither the moon to shine in it…for the glory of God did lighten it, and the Lamb is the light that will be there.’ Paul, what do you think it means?”
“It pointed us to passageways under the Old City, right after the quake. Look, Jacob, we found…the Ark of the Covenant.”
Jacob’s mouth parted. He set the spearhead on the desk and slowly sat down, knees weak, his eyes looking up to meet Marcus. “Hidden beneath Jerusalem?”