Contract With God Part 19

32.

2,700 FEET WEST OF THE EXCAVATION.

AL MUDAWWARA DESERT, JORDAN.

Friday, 14 July 2006. 1:18 a.m.

The tall man was named O and he was crying. He had to get away from the other men. He didn't want them to see him showing his feelings, much less talk about it. And it would have been very dangerous to reveal why he was crying.

It was really because of the girl. She had reminded him too much of his own daughter. He had hated having to kill her. Killing Tahir had been simple, a relief, in fact. He had to admit that he'd even enjoyed playing with him - giving him a preview of h.e.l.l, but here on earth.

The girl was another story. She was only sixteen years old.

And yet, D and W had agreed with him: the mission was too important. Not only were the lives of the other brothers crowded in the cave at stake, but all of Dar Al-Islam. The mother and daughter knew too much. There could be no exceptions.

'Meaningless s.h.i.+tty war,' he said.

'So you're talking to yourself now?'

It was W, who had come crawling over. He didn't like running risks and always talked in whispers, even inside the cave.

'I was praying.'

'We have to go back into the hole. They might see us.'

'There's only one sentry on the western wall, and he has no direct line of vision over here. Don't worry.'

'What if he changes position? They have night-vision goggles.'

'I said don't worry. The big black one is on duty. He smokes the whole time and the light from the cigarette stops him seeing anything,' O said, annoyed that he had to talk when he had wanted to enjoy the silence.

'Let's go back inside the cave. We'll play chess.'

That W . . . O hadn't fooled him for a moment. W knew he was feeling down. Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen. They had gone through a lot together. He was a good comrade. As clumsy as his efforts were, he was attempting to cheer him up.

O stretched out the length of his body on the sand. They were in a hollow area at the foot of a rock formation. The cave, which was at its base, was only about one hundred feet square. O was the one who had found it three months earlier, when he was planning the operation. There was hardly enough room for them all, but even if the cave had been a hundred times bigger, O would have preferred being outside. He felt trapped in that noisy hole, attacked by the snores and farting of his brothers.

'I think I'll stay out here a while longer. I like the cold.'

'Are you waiting for Huqan's signal?'

'It'll be a while before that comes. The infidels haven't found anything yet.'

'I hope they hurry up. I'm tired of being holed up, eating out of tins and p.i.s.sing into a can.'

O didn't answer. He closed his eyes and concentrated on the breeze on his skin. Waiting was fine with him.

'Why are we sitting around here doing nothing? We're well-armed. I say we go in there and kill them all,' W insisted.

'We'll follow Huqan's orders.'

'Huqan takes too many chances.'

'I know. But he's clever. He told me a story. Do you know how a bushman finds water in the Kalahari when he's far from home? He finds a monkey and watches it all day. He can't let the monkey see him or the game's over. If the bushman is patient, the monkey ends up showing him where to find water. A crack in the rock, a little pool . . . places a bushman would never have found.'

'And what does he do then?'

'He drinks the water and eats the monkey.'

33.

THE EXCAVATION.

AL MUDAWWARA DESERT, JORDAN.

Friday, 14 July 2006. 01:18 a.m.

Stowe Erling nibbled nervously on his ballpoint pen and cursed Professor Forrester with all his might. It wasn't his fault that the data from one of the quadrants hadn't gone where it was supposed to. He had been busy enough putting up with the complaints of their indentured prospectors as he helped them into and out of their harnesses, changed the batteries on their equipment, and made sure that n.o.body went over the same quadrant twice.

Of course, no one was there to help him put on his harness now. And it wasn't as if the operation was easy in the middle of the night, with only the light from a camping gas lantern. Forrester didn't give a d.a.m.n about anybody - anybody except himself, that is. The moment he had found an anomaly in the data, after supper, he had ordered Stowe to do a new a.n.a.lysis of quadrant 22K.

In vain Stowe had asked - almost begged - Forrester to let him do it the following day. If the data from all the quadrants wasn't linked, the program wouldn't function.

f.u.c.king Pappas. Isn't he supposedly the world's leading archaeological topographer? A qualified software designer, right? s.h.i.+t is what he is. He should never have left Greece. f.u.c.k! I bust myself kissing the old man's a.s.s so he'd let me prepare the headings for the magnetometer codes, and he ends up giving them to Pappas. Two years, two whole years researching references for Forrester, correcting his childish errors, buying his medicine, emptying his trash can full of infected b.l.o.o.d.y tissues. Two years, and he treats me like this.

Fortunately, Stowe had finished the complicated series of movements and the magnetometer was now on his shoulders and working. He picked up the lantern and placed it halfway up the incline. Quadrant 22K covered part of a sandy slope near the knuckle of the index finger of the canyon.

The ground here was different, unlike the spongy pink surface at the base of the canyon or the baked rock that covered the rest of the area. The sand was darker and the slope itself had a gradient of around 14 per cent. As he walked, the sand s.h.i.+fted as though an animal were moving under his boots. Stowe had to hold on tightly to the straps of the magnetometer as he made his way up the incline in order to keep the instrument balanced.

As he leaned over to place the lantern on the ground, his right hand grazed a splinter of iron protruding from the frame. It drew blood.

'Ouch - s.h.i.+t!'

Sucking on the cut, he began moving with the instrument over the terrain in that slow annoying rhythm.

He's not even American. Not even a Jew, dammit. He's a lousy f.u.c.king Greek immigrant. Greek Orthodox before he started working for the professor. He only converted to Judaism after three months with us. A fast-track conversion - very convenient. I'm so tired. Why am I doing this? I hope we find the Ark. Then History departments will fight over me and I'll be able to find a tenured position. The old man's not going to last much longer - probably just enough to steal all the credit. But in three or four years they'll talk about his team. About me. I wish his rotten lungs would just burst in the next few hours. I wonder who Kayn would put at the head of the expedition then? It wouldn't be Pappas. If he c.r.a.ps in his pants each time the professor even looks at him, imagine what he'll do if he sees Kayn. No, they'd need someone stronger, someone with charisma. I wonder what Kayn is really like. They say he's very sick. But then why did he come all the way out here?

Stowe stopped in his tracks, halfway up the incline and facing the canyon wall. He thought he had heard footsteps, but that was impossible. He looked back at the camp. Everything was still.

Of course. The only one not in bed is me. Well, except for the guards, but they're bundled up and probably snoring. Who are they going to protect us from? It'd be better if- The young man stopped again. He had heard something and this time he knew he hadn't imagined it. He c.o.c.ked his head in an attempt to hear better, but the annoying whistle went off once more. Stowe felt for the instrument's switch and quickly pressed it once. That way he could turn off the whistle without turning off the instrument (which would set off an alarm on Forrester's computer), something a dozen people would have given an arm and a leg to have known yesterday.

It must be a couple of the soldiers changing s.h.i.+fts. Come on, you're a little too old to be afraid of the dark.

He turned off the instrument and began making his way downhill. Now that he'd thought about it, it would be better if he went back to bed. If Forrester wanted to be p.i.s.sed off, then that was his business. He'd start first thing in the morning, skipping breakfast.

That's it. I'll get up before the old man, when there's more light.

He smiled, chiding himself for being alarmed over nothing. Now he could finally go to bed, which was all he needed. If he hurried, he'd be able to get three hours' sleep.

Suddenly something was pulling on the harness. Stowe leaned back waving his arms in the air to keep his balance. But just when he thought he was going to fall, he felt someone grab him.

The young man did not feel the point of the knife puncturing the bottom of his spinal column. The hand that had grabbed his harness pulled harder. Stowe suddenly remembered his childhood when he went with his father to Chebacco Lake to fish for black c.r.a.ppies. His father would hold a fish in his hand and then, in one swift motion, gut it. The movement made a wet, whistling sound very similar to the last thing that Stowe heard.

The hand released the young man, who fell to the ground like a rag doll.

Stowe made a broken sound as he died, a brief, dry moan, and then there was silence.

34.

THE EXCAVATION.

AL MUDAWWARA DESERT, JORDAN.

Friday, 14 July 2006. 2:33 a.m.

The first part of the plan was to wake up on time. So far so good. From that moment on, everything was a disaster.

Andrea had put the wrist.w.a.tch between her alarm clock and her head, with the alarm set for 2:30 in the morning. She would meet with Fowler at quadrant 14B, where she had been working when she told the priest about seeing the man on the cliff. All that the reporter knew was that the priest needed her help in order to neutralise Dekker's frequency scanner. Fowler hadn't told her how he planned to do this.

To make sure she would show up on time, Fowler had given her his wrist.w.a.tch since her own didn't have an alarm. It was a rough black MTM Special Ops with a Velcro wristband that seemed almost as old as Andrea herself. On the back of the watch was the inscription: That others may live. That others may live.

'That others may live.' What kind of person wears a watch like this? Not a priest, of course. Priests wear twenty-euro watches, at best a cheap Lotus with an imitation leather strap. Nothing with as much character as this, Andrea thought before falling asleep. When the alarm sounded, she was careful to turn it off straight away and take the watch with her. Fowler had made it clear what would happen to her if she lost it. Besides which, the face had a small LED light that would make it easier to get through the canyon without tripping over one of the quadrant strings and cracking her head open on a rock.

While she searched for her clothes, Andrea listened to see if the alarm had woken anyone up. Kyra La.r.s.en's snores eased the reporter's mind but she decided to wait until she got outside to put on her boots. Creeping towards the door, her customary clumsiness came into play and she dropped the watch.

The young reporter tried to control her nerves and recall the layout of the infirmary. At the far end were two stretchers, a table and the medical instruments cabinet. The three roommates slept near the entrance on their mattresses and sleeping bags. Andrea in the middle, La.r.s.en to her left, Harel to her right.

Using Kyra's snores to orient herself, she began searching the floor. She felt the edge of her own mattress. A little further on she touched one of La.r.s.en's discarded socks. She made a face and rubbed her hand on the seat of her trousers. She continued over her own mattress. A little further. That must be Harel's mattress.

It was empty.

Surprised, Andrea took the lighter out of her pocket and flicked it on, obscuring the flame by placing her body between it and La.r.s.en. Harel was nowhere in the infirmary. Fowler had told her not to let Harel know what they were planning to do.

The reporter didn't have time to give the matter further thought, so she picked up the watch, which she found lying between the mattresses, and went out of the tent. The camp was as still as a tomb. Andrea was glad that the infirmary was near the north-west wall of the canyon, so she would avoid anyone on their way to or from the toilets.

I'm sure that's where Harel is. I can't understand why we can't tell her what we're doing if she already knows about the priest's satellite telephone. Those two are up to something strange.

A moment later the professor's air horn went off. Andrea froze, fear tearing at her like a trapped animal. At first she thought that Forrester had discovered what she was up to, until she realised that the sound was coming from some distance away. The horn was m.u.f.fled but it echoed faintly through the canyon.

There were two blasts and then it stopped.

Then it began again and didn't stop.

It's a distress signal. I'd bet my life on it.

Andrea wasn't sure who to call on. With Harel nowhere in sight and Fowler waiting for her at 14B, her best option was Tommy Eichberg. The service personnel tent was the closest to her now and with the help of the watch's light, Andrea found the tent's zipper and burst inside.

'Tommy, Tommy, are you here?'

Half a dozen heads looked up from their sleeping bags.

'For G.o.d's sake, it's two in the morning,' said a dishevelled Brian Hanley, rubbing his eyes.

'Get up, Tommy. I think the professor is in trouble.'

Tommy was already climbing out of his sleeping bag.

'What's going on?'

'It's the professor's horn. It hasn't stopped.'