The Second Messiah

His parents and their Bedu driver, Basim Malik, were traveling in the front cab. Jack sat in the open back of the pickup, chatting and laughing with Lela Raul, an Israeli girl he had got to know in the last three months since her police sergeant father had been posted to the nearby kibbutz. Lela was smart and kind, with chocolate brown eyes, a sensuous mouth, and long black hair, and she’d made a big impression on a gangly, awkward nineteen-year-old.

Suddenly the vehicle veered out of control and Jack remembered the screams of the passengers and the sickening sensation as their pickup skidded across the road, plunged into the ravine, and rolled over.

A massive blast erupted from somewhere and he was thrown violently from the back of the pickup along with Lela, who lay sprawled nearby, and then the vehicle exploded in flames.

Jack tried desperately to stand but his left leg was shattered, blood gushing from a nasty gash below his knee. He couldn’t hear, for there was a painful ringing sensation in his ears. Helpless and in agony, he crawled toward the wall of flame to reach the upturned pickup, but already it was too late.

He saw the horrific image of his mother clawing wildly at the window, her blond hair on fire. His father yanked frantically at the passenger door as the cab was engulfed in smoke. The last thing Jack heard before he lost consciousness and everything faded was the muted sounds of his parents’ tortured screams.

* * *

When he came to he felt groggy and saw a Catholic priest kneeling over him, slapping his face. “Can you hear me? Wake up. Please wake up.”

Jack recognized Father John Becket but he could barely hear him. He was one of a small number of Catholic clerics working on the dig. Nearby, he saw that Lela was propped with her back against a boulder, unconscious, her head lolled to one side. Another priest tended to her, a red-haired man with a strong, sculpted face. He was small and wiry, with the build of a jockey. Jack remembered him as an archaeologist with the Catholic delegation.

Becket said, “The young lady’s concussed but she’s breathing okay. That’s Father Kubel. He was driving by the accident scene too. Father Kubel is skilled in first aid, he can take care of your friend. He thinks she’ll be fine. Do you understand me?”

Jack nodded and saw the wiry little priest patting Lela’s face, trying to wake her. “What—what about my parents?” Jack asked.

Father Becket looked toward the wreckage. The stench of burning flesh seared Jack’s nostrils and he stared in horror at the pickup. Someone had tried to force open the door but without success, and the windshield had been partly shattered, the dashboard turned to melted plastic, black smoke pluming out. He couldn’t see his mother or the driver but his father’s body was nearest the door, his flesh burnt like charcoal.

The priest’s ashen expression said it all. “I—I managed to force open the door a little but the oxygen only made the cabin fire worse. I’m truly sorry. They’re all dead.”

And then Jack’s head swam, his eyes flickered, and he drowned in darkness.

He awoke in the intensive care unit of a Jerusalem hospital. Sergeant Raul, Lela’s father, was seated next to him. He was a tall, fit-looking man with a tanned face and dark, sensitive eyes. “How are you coping, Jack?”

I’m not. Jack found it difficult to reply. He had lost the two people who had mattered most in his life and his grief seemed bottomless.

Sergeant Raul said gently, “You’ve been out of it for the last three days with a concussion. But thankfully your hearing’s recovered after the blast and the doctors tell me you ought to be up to talking. Do you feel like talking, Jack?”

“I don’t know how I feel.”

“That’s understandable, you’ve been deeply traumatized.”

“My—my parents couldn’t be saved?”

The sergeant said grimly, “I’m afraid not, Jack. Basim Malik, their driver, died too. It’s a terrible tragedy. I’ve examined the accident scene and the skid marks suggest that the army driver was on the wrong side of the road. Once the fire in the cabin took hold, your parents and Basim were trapped inside.”

Jack looked away, racked by anguish.

Sergeant Raul patted his arm. “Lela asks after you. She’s in another ward, doing fine. She’s been checking on you the last few days but you’ve been sleeping for most of it. I know she’d like to see you as soon as you’re up to it. I hear you two have been good friends. I know Lela thinks highly of you.”

Jack simply nodded. He could hardly speak, his heart as heavy as steel.

“It seems you and Lela owe Father Becket your lives, Jack. Luckily he came along when he did. And Father Franz Kubel too.” Sergeant Raul paused, then added delicately, “About the scroll your father excavated. Lela said it was in a map case in the front cabin.”

“That’s right.”

“I couldn’t find it. And forensics found no remains of the case. But the windshield had been partly shattered. I wondered if you recall seeing the map case after the accident, Jack?”