Virgin Page 6

  Rockefeller Museum translation

  FOUR

  Father Dan Fitzpatrick strolled the narrow streets of his Lower East Side parish and drank in the colors flowing around him. Sure there was squalor here, and poverty and crime, all awash in litter and graffiti, but there was color here. Not like the high-rise midtown he’d visited last night, with its sterile concrete-and-marble plazas, its faceless glass-and-granite office towers.

  A mere forty blocks from the Waldorf, the Lower East Side might as well be another country. No skyscrapers here. Except for aberrations like the Con-Ed station’s quartet of stacks and the dreary housing projects, the Lower East Side skyline rises to a uniform six stories. Window-studded facades of cracked and patched brick crowd together cheek by jowl for block after block, separated occasionally by a garbage-choked alley. They’re all brick of varying shades of red, sometimes brown or gray, and every so often a daring pink or yellow or blue. With no room behind or to either side, a mazework of mandatory fire escapes hangs over the sidewalks, clinging to the brick facades like spidery steel parasites, ready-made perches for the city’s winged rat, the pigeon.

  Everywhere Dan looked, everything was old, with no attempt to recapture youth. Graffiti formed the decorative motif, layer upon layer until the intertwined snake squiggles and balloon letters were indecipherable even to their perpetrators. The store signs he could read advertised old bedding, fresh vegetables, used furniture, and the morning paper, offered food, candy, magazines, cashed checks, and booze, booze, booze. And some Korean and Vietnamese signs he couldn’t read. He passed pawn shops, bodegas, boys clubs, schools, churches, and playgrounds. Children still played, even here.

  He looked up at the passing windows. Behind them lived young, hopeful immigrants on their way up, middle aged has-beens on their way down, and too many running like hell just to stay in place. And out here on the streets dwelt the never-weres and the never-will-bes, going nowhere, barely even sure of where they were at any given moment.

  He wore his civvies this morning—faded jeans, flannel shirt, sneakers. He wasn’t here on Church business and it was easier to get around without the Roman collar. Especially in Tompkins Square. The collar drew the panhandlers like moths to a flame. And can you believe it—every single one of them a former altar boy? Simply amazing how many altar boys had become homeless.

  Tompkins Square Park was big, three blocks long and running the full width between Avenues A and B. Black wrought-iron fencing guarded the perimeter. Oaks, pale green with new life, stood inside the fences but spread their branches protectively over the surrounding sidewalks. Homeless shantytowns used to spring up here every so often, and just as often the police would raze them, but closing the park between midnight and 6 a.m. every night had sent the cardboard box brigade elsewhere.

  Dan walked past the stately statue of Samuel S. Cox, its gray-green drabness accentuated by the orange, red, and yellow of the swings and slides in the nearby playground, and strolled the bench-lined walks, searching for the gleaming white of Harold Gold’s bald head. They’d met years ago when Dan had audited Hal’s course on the Dead Sea scrolls. They’d got to talking after class, found they shared an abiding interest in the Jerusalem Church—Hal from the Jewish perspective, Dan from the Christian—and became fast friends. Whenever one dug up a tasty little tidbit of lore, he shared it immediately with the other. Dan was sure Hal had picked up some real goodies during his sabbatical in Israel. He was looking forward to this meeting.

  He didn’t see Hal. Lunch hour was still a while off but already seats were becoming scarce around the square. Then Dan spotted someone waving from a long bench in the sunny section on the Avenue A side.

  No wonder I couldn’t spot him, Dan thought as he approached Hal’s bench. He’s got a tan.

  As usual, Hal was nattily dressed in a dark blue blazer, gray slacks, a pale blue Oxford button-down shirt, and a red-and-blue paisley tie. But his customary academician’s pallor had been toasted to a golden brown. His nude scalp gleamed with a richer color. He looked healthier and better rested than Dan had ever seen him.

  “The Middle East seems to agree with you,” Dan said, laughing as they shook hands. He sat down next to him. “I can’t remember ever seeing you looking so fit.”

  “Believe me, Fitz, getting away for a year and recharging the batteries does wonders for the mind and body. I heartily recommend it.” He looked around. “You came alone?”

  “Of course. Who else would I bring?”

  Dan knew perfectly well who Hal was looking for.

  “I don’t know. I thought, well, maybe Sister Carrie might come along.”

  “No. She’s back at St. Joe’s, working. You’ll have to come by if you want to see her.”

  “Maybe I will. Been a long time since I stopped in.”

  Dan knew Hal had a crush on Carrie. A strictly hands-off, unrequited, love-from-afar thing that reduced him to a stumbling, stammering twelve-year old around her. But he wasn’t alone. Everybody loved Sister Carrie.

  “Do that. And bring some food. A long time since you made a contribution.”

  Just then an eighth of a ton of black woman in a frayed yellow dress lumbered up and spread a large green garbage bag on the bench. She seated herself so close to Dan that one of her massive thighs rubbed against his. He smiled at her and inched away to give her some room as she settled herself.

  Hal clapped Dan on the shoulder. “Saw you on TV last night, Fitz.”

  “Did you. How was I?”

  “You sounded good. I thought you came off very well.”

  You wouldn’t think so if you’d been there, Dan thought.

  .you just ain’t gettin’ it done … His herd at his heels, he’d slunk back to St. Joe’s with his tail between his legs. At least that was they way it had felt. The on-camera interview Hal had seen had been taped during the fund-raising dinner, while he and the demonstrators were all waiting for Senator Crenshaw to come out. After the senator’s exit—after he’d been sliced and diced—Dan had fielded a few questions from reporters but his answers weren’t as sharp as they might have been. They’d seemed almost … empty.

  But perhaps that was just his own perception. Everyone he’d seen so far today had told him that he and the protesters had come across extremely well on the tube. Dan would have to take their word for it. He’d lacked the nerve to tune in last night.

  Luckily, no one seemed to have caught Senator Crenshaw’s little diatribe on tape. Dan knew the wounded part of him within would shrivel up and die if he had listen to that again.

  “What the—?”

  Hal’s voice jolted Dan back to the here and now. He glanced up and saw Hal staring past him in horrified fascination at the fat black woman. She’d removed the mirrored half of a compact and a pair of tweezers from her huge purse and was now plucking at her face. Dan couldn’t see anything to pluck at but that didn’t seem to deter the woman. She was completely engrossed in the task.

  Hal shook himself. “Anyway, seeing you reminded me that I have a present for you.”

  He picked up a football-size box from the bag between his feet and placed it in Dan’s hands.

  “What’s this?”

  “A gift. From the past … sort of.”

  Dan hadn’t expected a gift, though God knew his spirits needed lifting after last night.

  “Well, don’t just stare at it. Open it.”

  No ribbon or wrapping to remove, just a plain, oblong wooden box. Dan lifted the lid and stared.

  “What … ?”

  “Your own Dead Sea scroll.”

  Dan glanced at his friend. He knew Harold was kidding, but this thing looked so damned … real.

  “No, really. What is it?”

  Harold launched into the explanation. A fascinating story, during which a pair of thin, dark-haired, mustached men seated themselves on the far side of the
black woman; each began drinking his lunch from a brown paper bag. Dan listened to Hal and sensed the mixture of excitement and disappointment in his voice. When he finished, Dan looked down at the loosely rolled parchment in the box on his lap.

  “So, you’re giving me a first century parchment filled with twenty-first century scribbles.”

  “An oddity. A collector’s item in its own right.”

  Dan continued to stare at the ancient roll of sheepskin. He was moved.

  “I … I don’t know what to say, Hal. I’ll treasure this.”

  “Don’t get carried away—”

  “No, I mean it. If nothing else, the parchment was made in the early days of the Church. It’s a link of sorts. And I’m touched that you thought of me.”

  “Who else do I know who’s so nuts about the first century?”

  “You must have been crushed when you found out.”

  Harold sighed. “Crushed isn’t the word. We were all devastated. But I tell you, Fitz, I wouldn’t trade the high of the first few days with that scroll for anything. It was the greatest!”

  Just then a woman dressed in satin work-out pants and a red sleeveless shell top walked over to the bench and stood on the other side of Hal. She was middle aged with a bulging abdomen. Dan noticed that she wore red slipper-socks over red lace knee-highs. She’d finished off the ensemble by wrapping Christmas paper around her ankles.

  Hal looked down at her feet and said, “Good Lord.”

  She smiled down at him. “Ain’t blockin’ yer sun, am I?”

  Hal shook his head. “No. That’s quite all right.”

  She then pulled a bottle of Ban deodorant from her pocket and began to apply it to her right underarm—and only to her right underarm. Dan and Hal watched her do this for what seemed like five minutes but was probably only one. During the process she also managed to coat half of her shoulder blade as well.

  She was still at it when Dan turned back to his gift and spotted a legal-size envelope tucked in next to the scroll. He pulled it out.

  “What’s this?”

  Hal dragged his eyes away from the woman with the deodorant. “The translation. I know you’re pretty good at old Hebrew, but this will save you from risking damage to the scroll by unrolling it. And as jumbled, paranoid, and crazy as it may read, you can rely on the accuracy of the translation. The folks who did it are tops.”

  “As usual, Hal. You’ve thought of everything.”

  An elderly man in a shabby blue suit slipped past the Ban lady and seated himself next to Hal. Immediately he began untying his shoes.

  “You don’t mind, do you?” he said in an accented voice as he slipped the first one off. “They’re really sweaty. I need to air my feet something awful.”

  “Be my guest,” Hal said, rolling his eyes at Dan as the odor from the exposed feet and empty shoes began to rise. “We were just leaving. Weren’t we, Fitz.”

  “Gee, I kind of like it here, Hal,” Dan said in his most guileless tone. “Why don’t you save our seats while I run up to the corner and buy us a couple of hot dogs. We can eat them right here. You like sauerkraut?”

  “I’ve lost my appetite,” Hal said through a tight, fierce grin. “Let’s. Go. For. A. Little. Walk. Shall. We?”

  Dan hadn’t the heart to play this out any longer. After all, Hal had just given him a first century scroll.

  “Sure.”

  As they left, the Ban lady took their spots and switched to her left underarm.

  When they reached the sidewalk on Avenue A, Hal said, “I think I preferred living under the threat of a Hamas attack.”

  Just then a very pale woman with very black hair, black blouse and black stretch pants walked by balancing a loaded green plastic laundry basket on her head.

  “And sometimes I wonder if I’ve truly left the Middle East.”

  Dan smiled. Poor, fastidious Hal. “You should be at Princeton or Yale.”

  “Yeah. I could have been. But I thought I’d like New York. Don’t they get to you?” Dan shrugged. “Those folks are like most of the people I hang out with every day, but considerably more functional.”

  “How do you do it? You all but live with them. And you don’t have to.”

  “Jesus hung with the down and outs. Why shouldn’t I?”

  He noticed Hal looking at him closely. “You don’t think you’re Jesus, do you?”

  Dan laughed. “Hardly. But that’s what being a priest is all about—modeling your life on the J-man, as he’s known around here. Truth is, we don’t know much about His life.”

  “Well, we do know that he rubbed the higher-ups the wrong way.”

  “I’ve done my share of that.”

  Dan thought of his long-running battle with Father Brenner, St. Joseph’s pastor, over his soup kitchen in the basement.

  “It got him killed.”

  Dan laughed again. “Not to worry. I’m not looking to get my palms and soles ventilated.”

  “You can’t be too careful, Fitz.” Hal glanced back toward the plaza. “A lot of these folks are more than a few bricks shy of a full load.”

  Dan nodded. “I’m aware of that.” He thought of the couple of occasions when some of Loaves and Fishes’ “guests” got violent, mostly screaming and shouting and pushing, but one had gone so far as to pull a knife during an argument over who would sit by a window. “And I’m careful.”

  “Good. I’m sure there’s a place in heaven for you, but I don’t want you taking it just yet.”

  “Heaven’s not guaranteed for anybody, Hal. Sometimes I wonder if there is such a place.”

  Hal was looking at him strangely. “You?”

  He didn’t want to get into anything heavy so he grinned. “Just kidding. But how about lunch? It’s the least I can do.” He pointed to Nino’s on the corner of St. Mark’s Place. “Slice of Sicilian?”

  “I’ll take a rain check.” Hal extended his hand. “Got to run. But I want to get together with you again after you’ve read the translation. See if you can make any sense of it.”

  “I’ll do my best. And thanks again. Thanks a million. Nice to own something this old—and know it’s one of a kind.”

  Hal frowned.”Not one of a kind, I’m afraid. Shortly before I left, an Israeli collector came in with another scroll identical to this one. The parchment and the writing carbon dated the same as yours—about two thousand years apart.”

  Dan shrugged. “Okay. So it’s not one of a kind. It’s still a great gift, and I’ll treasure it. But right now I’ve got to get back to the shelter for the lunch line.”

  Hal waved and started down the sidewalk. “See you next week, okay? For lunch. I should have my appetite back by then.”

  Dan waved and headed back to St. Joe’s, wondering how many these weird scrolls were floating around the Middle East.

  She had been dead for two years and more, yet her body showed no trace of corruption. The brother had kept her death a secret. He and the others feared that Ananus or Herod Agrippa or even the Hellenists might make use of her remains to further their various ends.

  from the Glass scroll

  Rockefeller Museum translation

  FIVE

  Ramat Gan, Israel

  Chaim Kesev stared westward from the picture window in the living room of Tulla Szobel’s sprawling hilltop home. He could see the lights of Tel Aviv—the IBM tower, the waterfront hotels—and the darkness of the Mediterranean beyond. The glass reflected the room behind him. A pale room, a small pale world—beige rug, beige walls, beige drapes, pale abstract paintings, low beige furniture that seemed designed for something other than human comfort, chrome and glass tables and lamps.

  Kesev wrinkled his nose. With all the money lavished on this room, he thought, the least you’d think she could do was find a way to remove the cigarette stink. The place
smelled like a tavern at cleanup time.

  He had arrived here unannounced tonight, shown Miss Szobel his Shin Bet identification, and all but pushed his way in. Now he waited while she procured the scroll from a room in some other quarter of the house.

  The scroll … he’d begun a low-key search for it immediately after its theft. A subtle search. Not I’m looking for a scroll recently stolen from a cave in the Judean Wilderness. Have you seen or heard of such a thing? That kind of search would close doors rather than open them. Instead, Kesev had extended feelers into the antiquities market—legitimate and underground—saying he was a collector interested in purchasing first-century manuscripts, and that money was no object.

  Perhaps his feelers hadn’t been subtle enough. Perhaps the seller he sought preferred more tried-and-true channels of commerce. Whatever the reason, he was offered many items over the years, but none were what he sought.

  Then, just last year, his feelers caught ripples of excitement from the manuscript department at the Rockefeller Museum in Jerusalem. A unique first century scroll had been brought in for verification. As he homed in on the scent, word came that the scroll turned out to be a fake. So he’d veered off and continued his search elsewhere.

  And then, just last month, whispers of another fake, identical to the first—the same disjointed story, written in the same Aramaic form of Hebrew, on an ancient parchment.

  Something in those whispers teased Kesev. The scant details he could glean about the fakes tantalized him. He investigated and learned that the first scroll had been brought in by an American who had since returned home. But the second … a wealthy woman from a Tel Aviv suburb had brought that in, and taken it home in a huff when informed that she’d been duped.

  Kesev was standing in her living room now.

  He heard her footsteps.

  “Here, Mr. Kesev,” said a throaty voice. Her Ivrit carried a barely noticeable Eastern European accent. “I believe this is what you want.”

  He turned slowly, hiding his anticipation. Tulla Szobel was in her mid fifties, blonde hair, reed thin, prematurely wrinkled, and dressed in a beige knit dress the color of her walls. A cigarette dangled from her lips. She held a lucite case between her hands.