Wings of Refuge (36 page)

Throughout the summer of 1978, Hannah watched helplessly as Rachel threw herself at Ari Bazak, following him around the excavation at Gamla like a love-sick puppy, turning up under his feet with every step he took. The boldness of Rachel’s pursuit reminded Hannah of her own pursuit of Jake, but Ari was a very different person from her husband. While Jake had been naturally shy, Ari was the opposite—talkative, charming, and relentlessly flirtatious. He wasn’t offended at all by Rachel’s fan-club style of adoration but seemed mildly entertained by it—even though his many girlfriends weren’t.

“He’s very patient with her,” one of Hannah’s colleagues said after observing how Rachel shadowed him all day.

“Yes, he is,” Hannah sighed. “I’m afraid it’s only because she’s my daughter and Ari wants good grades. If he would just get annoyed and shoo her away once or twice, maybe we would all have a little peace and quiet.” She told Ari as much the next day after she had to punish Rachel for practically sitting on his lap while he tried to eat. “You have my permission to do whatever it takes to get rid of her, Ari.”

“Aw, she’s just a little kid, Hannah. She really doesn’t bother me. It must be pretty lonely for her being stuck way out here all summer with no other kids her age.”

“Believe me, she doesn’t think of herself as a child. In her mind she’s the same age as all these college girls.”

A few days later, instead of sitting around with Ari and the others after dark, Rachel made a big show of being sleepy and went to bed early. Hannah worked on reports in the field office for another hour or so before joining her in their tent. Rachel was tucked deep inside her sleeping bag and never stirred as Hannah came inside and yanked off her boots. She was about to set them by the tent door beside Rachel’s boots, when she noticed that Rachel’s boots were missing. She looked again at her daughter’s sleeping form. There was something very odd about the way Rachel was hunched into a ball on her cot. Hannah peered inside Rachel’s sleeping bag and found pillows.

Hannah shoved her feet back into her boots and grabbed her flashlight. The first place to look would be wherever Ari was. She hurried across the compound to where the college students sat around a folding table, playing a game of cards by lantern light.

“I’m looking for Ari. Have any of you seen him?”

“Ari? Gosh, he was here earlier, Dr. Rahov, but I guess he left.”

“Do you know where he went?”

“I can take an educated guess where he might be,” one of them answered mischievously. “Let’s see . . . who else is missing?”

Everyone laughed but, Hannah. She felt sick inside. Surely Ari had more sense than to play his games with a thirteen-year-old!

“Hey, Deanna is gone,” one of the girls said suddenly.

“Who?”

“The new girl. You know, ‘Miss America’ from New York University? Ari was flirting with her all day.”

Hannah felt only mildly relieved. “Excuse an old woman’s ignorance, but where might two people go on a ‘date’ around here?”

“Oh, Ari has several favorite spots,” another girl said, slamming her handful of cards down on the folding table.

Hannah judged from her sarcastic tone that she had been jilted by him earlier in the summer.

“Try the synagogue ruins first,” she added.

“You’re kidding.”

“Nope.” She tossed her hair off her shoulders with a shake of her head.

“Ooo, sacrilege!” someone murmured.

“Is he in trouble, Dr. Rahov?”

“No, dear, I just need to ask him something.”

“Do you want us to help you look for him?” the jilted one asked. Her voice was maliciously sweet.

“Yeah, we’ll help you look, Dr. Rahov.”

“Better make lots of noise so they’ll know you’re coming.” Their comments were interspersed with giggles and laughter.

Hannah didn’t relish a treacherous walk down the footpath to the ruined synagogue in the dark. She was trying to decide whether it was a good idea to let the students help her or not when she saw bobbing lights approaching up the hill and heard a loud voice—a distinctly American voice—telling someone off in a continuous tirade.

“For two cents I’d like to wring your miserable head right off your scrawny little neck! You’ve got a lot of nerve, you little sneak! I hope you get grounded for a week—for the summer . . . no, for the rest of your life!”

As the lights drew closer, Hannah was relieved to see the American girl dragging Rachel up the hill by the scruff of her neck. Ari trailed a few paces behind them.

“Just wait until I tell your mother what you did, you rotten little snoop!” she continued. “I hope she beats the tar out of you.”

When she saw Hannah and the others, she pushed Rachel forward into the light. Hannah stared at her daughter and couldn’t believe her eyes. Rachel was smirking!

“What’s going on?” Hannah asked.

Ari couldn’t answer. He was chewing his lips to pieces, trying not to laugh and make Miss America even more upset than she already was. But he didn’t need to answer. Miss America answered for him.

“You’d better teach your snoopy little daughter a lesson or two about privacy, Dr. Rahov.” She held up Rachel’s pocket camera, waving it by the strap. “She must have eavesdropped on Ari and me this afternoon and decided to follow us! We thought we were all alone! We didn’t know she was listening and watching our every move until she just popped up out of nowhere with her little flash camera, right when we were—” She stopped, shocked to discover that in her anger she was about to reveal far too much.

“Just when you were
what
?” Ari’s former dream-girl asked sweetly.

When everyone hooted with laughter, Ari blushed clear to the roots of his beard. Horrified, Miss America thrust the camera into his hands and stormed into her tent.

“Well,” Rachel said smartly, dusting off her hands, “that takes care of her.”

Hannah’s jaw dropped. “Rachel! Into our tent! Now!” She was astounded to see her daughter saunter away with a spring in her step. Hannah turned to Ari, who had stepped out of the circle of lantern light and was carefully backing away.

“Here.” He handed the camera to Hannah like a hot potato.

“Ari, I am so sorry.”

“No harm done.”

“I’d like to promise you that it won’t happen again, but—”

“It’s okay, Hannah. I’ll smooth things over with Deanna. Don’t worry.”

“Believe me, it’s not you or Deanna that I’m worried about.” She turned to go, then turned back. “Oh, and Ari?”

“Yeah?”

“In the future . . . please . . . not in the synagogue.”

By the time Hannah returned to her tent, Rachel had tossed all the pillows onto the floor and had snuggled beneath the covers in their place. Hannah sighed. “I know you aren’t asleep, Rachel. We need to talk about your behavior.”

Rachel rolled over to face her. She looked up at her mother in a perfect imitation of an innocent little girl, her dark eyes shining in the moonlight. “Yes, Mama?”

Hannah prayed for patience. “I know Mr. Bazak laughed it off—”

“He lets me call him Ari.”

“—but I’m not laughing, Rachel. Stay
away
from him. Leave him
alone
. Do you understand me? If you don’t stop—if there are any more incidents like this one—I’ll have to send you to Aunt Devorah’s kibbutz to stay with your cousins for the rest of the summer.”

“No, Mama!
Please
don’t send me there!”

“Then will you promise me that you’ll behave from now on? That you’ll leave Ari and his girlfriends alone?”

“You don’t understand, Mama!” Rachel sat up, gravely serious. With all the passion of a heartsick thirteen-year-old, she said, “I’m in love with Ari! I’m going to marry him someday!”

“Listen, Rachel—”

“But I
am
, Mama!”

“Sweetie . . .” Hannah stopped, recognizing her own youthful stubbornness in the set of Rachel’s chin. There was nothing she could say to change her daughter’s mind. Time and other-fish-in-the-sea were the only known cures for puppy love.

“Sweetie, go to sleep,” she said wearily. But as Hannah crawled beneath the covers of her own cot, she wished—not for the first time or the last—that Jake was alive to help her cope with their daughter.

The following morning, Hannah decided to dig a few more test pits in the synagogue floor—not only to see what she could find, but to create enough of an obstacle course to discourage any future nighttime trysts among the volunteers. For some reason, the floor of the synagogue had never been paved two thousand years ago. She was wielding the pickax herself, hoping the vigorous labor would take her mind off her problems with Rachel, when she suddenly struck and shattered an earthenware jar, buried only a few centimeters beneath the surface. She sank to her knees for a closer look.

“Someone bring me a petesh, quick!”

Ari handed her one, and she swung the smaller pick carefully, clearing away the hard-packed soil. Her heart began to race with excitement when she peeled back the broken shards and saw that the jar held parchment documents, some with wax seals. Hannah knew even before she read them that they were the most important finds she had ever made.

Ari was on his knees beside her, carefully sweeping away the loose dirt with a whisk broom. He stopped when he saw what was inside the jar. “Wow!” he breathed.

Hannah looked up at him. His face seemed to shimmer through her tears. “Yeah. Wow.”

CHAPTER 15

THE VILLAGE OF DEGANIA—
A.D
. 66

D
o you know what day this is, Miriam?” Leah asked as she and the servant poured wine and prepared the basket of unleavened bread for the communion service.

“Of course, my child. It’s the anniversary of your wedding to Master Reuben.”

Leah paused to gaze at her beloved friend. Miriam’s hair was no longer gray but snowy white, her fingers gnarled from age and years of work.

“I was remembering that it was the anniversary of his baptism, too,” Leah said.

Neither of them wanted to say that it was also the night that sicarii assassins had murdered Reuben six years ago as he journeyed home from Caesarea.

“How could the seven years that I was married to him fly by so fast,” Leah asked, “when these six years without him have plodded by so slowly?”

Miriam didn’t answer. She simply hobbled over to Leah and wrapped her arms around her—as she had done on the very first day they’d met—and soothed her with her gentle humming.

Leah’s grief had dulled over time but had never entirely disappeared, kept alive by the haunting knowledge that Reuben’s murderers had never been caught. One of the villagers had found his body after the Sabbath ended. Reuben lay slaughtered in the middle of the road a half mile from Degania. He’d had no Roman bodyguard, since he no longer worked for Rome, and his loyal servants had been murdered along with him as they tried to defend him. Then the assassins had brutally cut off Reuben’s finger to steal his ring. Leah had studied strangers’ hands for six years, searching for that ring, wondering what she would do when she found the man who wore it, the man who had killed her husband.

She quickly dried her tears as the other believers began to arrive for the service. The little fellowship that met in the villa in Degania had grown to more than eighty people—so many that they could barely squeeze into the reception hall. But Leah knew it was probably the last time they would ever gather there for communion. Nathaniel had come to the village with disturbing news.

“We’re meeting tonight to ask for the Lord’s guidance for our future,” he announced after everyone had arrived. “We have all watched the situation in our land grow steadily worse, especially since the new procurator, Gessius Florus, arrived from Rome.”

Murmurs of outrage swept through the room at the mention of the hated procurator’s name.

“A few weeks ago, Florus seized money from God’s treasury in the Temple,” Nathaniel continued. “Rioting broke out in Jerusalem with house-to-house fighting at times. It ended in countless crucifixions and the slaughter of more than 3,600 Jewish men, women, and children. The revolt that the Zealots have been clamoring for has finally begun.”

Leah shuddered as a hushed silence fell over the room. She glanced at Elizabeth, seated beside her, and saw tears in her seventeen-year-old daughter’s eyes. Leah took her hand. Elizabeth was betrothed to one of the believers in their fellowship, a young man named Judah, the son of a Pharisee. Judah’s father had disinherited him for becoming a believer, forcing the young couple to wait to marry. Now the uncertain times threatened to postpone their marriage even longer.

“The apostles believe that the time has come for the remaining believers to get out of the country,” Nathaniel said. “Listen to our Lord’s warning to us: ‘When you see Jerusalem being surrounded by armies, you will know that its desolation is near. Then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains, let those in the city get out, and let those in the country not enter the city. For this is the time of punishment in fulfillment of all that has been written. How dreadful it will be in those days for pregnant women and nursing mothers! There will be great distress in the land and wrath against this people. They will fall by the sword and will be taken as prisoners to all the nations. Jerusalem will be trampled on by the Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled.’”

“What does that mean, Nathaniel?” Leah asked. “‘Until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled’?”

Nathaniel smiled, erasing the sorrow from his gentle round face for a brief moment. “An amazing thing has been taking place in recent days,” he said. “It began when the apostle Peter was sent by God to preach the Good News to a Gentile in Caesarea—a Roman centurion, of all people. The man, whose name is Cornelius, believed and was baptized.

“After the persecution of believers began and we were scattered, we had more and more opportunities to spread the news to the Gentiles. Some of our brethren—Saul, Barnabus, and Silas—have been preaching throughout the Asian provinces. Many Jews have believed, but many more Gentiles have become believers. They received the Holy Spirit, just as we did at Pentecost.