“You told me those objects disappeared,” Béne said to Clarke.
“Another lie. I was hoping you’d let this go. I thought maybe the attempt on your life would stop you. But here you are. You couldn’t have found this place on your own, so I assume one of these outsiders is the Levite.”
That word Béne knew.
“I am that person,” Simon said.
“Liar,” Alle yelled. “You’re nothing.”
Simon faced Clarke. “I have come for the treasure.”
“Then you’ll know how to find it.”
Béne kept silent. What was the colonel up to?
Frank stepped to the lake’s edge. The water was shallow, no more than a third of a meter deep, its surface smooth as a mirror, like an infinity pool at one of his resorts. It was shaped as a rough oblong, about thirty meters wide, stretching the entire cavern.
“Leave,” Frank called out.
The two Maroons with machets climbed up the rocky ledges, disappearing toward the surface.
“This is a private matter,” Frank said.
But Béne was worried. Even though Frank still held the two guns and the flashlights lay on the ground, Rócha could make a move.
“If you think attacking me will solve anything,” Frank said, “be warned. Only the Levite can go from here. I know nothing. But I do need to show you something.”
Frank tossed one of the guns he held into the lake.
It sank to the shallow bottom.
Béne had already noticed stones scattered beneath the surface, and now realized that in between them was mud. Frank lifted a rock, about the size of a melon, and dropped it into the lake. A splash, then the water cleared and the rock met bottom, settling beside the gun. Bubbles oozed to the surface. Then the rock sank, sucking the gun down into the mud with it.
“At the time of the Maroon wars,” Frank said, “British soldiers were brought here for questioning. One of ’em was tossed into the lake and the others watched as he sank in the mud. After that, answers to our questions came easy.”
“The person who came here,” Sagan said. “The one who told you about the treasure. Was it Marc Eden Cross?”
Frank nodded. “I’m told he was a remarkable man. The colonels at the time had great respect for him. He asked for our help with a great duty imposed on him, and we provided it. This place was changed … for him.”
CHAPTER SEVENTY-FIVE
ALLE WAS WET, SORE, AND PISSED. AT SIMON. AT HERSELF. SHE’D been an idiot, allowing her anger, her whims, and her fantasies to be exploited.
“Who are you?” she blurted out to the older man who’d tossed the gun in the water.
“My name is Frank Clarke. I’m colonel of the local Maroons. This land is ours by treaty. That means I’m in charge. Who are you?”
“Alle Becket.”
“That man,” her father said, “who came here sixty years ago. That was my grandfather, Marc Eden Cross. Her great-grandfather. He told you the truth. He was fulfilling a special duty given to him.”
“I am told he spent a lot of time in Jamaica and came to know Maroons in ways outsiders rarely do. We offered him this place as sanctuary and he accepted.” Clarke pointed to the lake. “This pit filled with mud long ago. It’s a thick soupy mixture. You see the many stones scattered beneath the water. Some have numbers etched into them. Cross did that himself. His addition to this place. This water, this mud has served Maroons for centuries. Now it serves the Jews. It is for the Levite to take the next step.”
Alle was unsure what the man meant.
As, apparently, were the others.
“You saw how the gun rested on the bottom. The mud will support weight, so long as it’s not disturbed. The stones beneath the surface with no numbers rest on solid rock and will never sink. The others, with numbers, float on mud. The only way to the ledge on the far side is to step on the right stones.”
“And what prevents us from floating across?” Zachariah asked.
“It’s too shallow to do without a raft, and there’s none here. If anyone tries to cross this lake, except through the prescribed method, they die. That was our promise to the Levite. Three have tried over the past sixty years. Their bodies are in the mud. None has attempted it in a long time.”
“This is nuts,” she said.
“It is what your great-grandfather wanted. He created this challenge.”
“How do we know that?” she asked.
Clarke shrugged. “You have only my word. But he told us that another Levite would arrive one day and know exactly how to get across.”
“And what’s over there?” Rowe asked.
She wanted to know that, too.
“What the Levite seeks.”
She saw that Simon was thinking. In Prague she’d told him everything she could remember about the message her grandfather left in his grave. Including five numbers: 3, 74, 5, 86, 19.
Her father also knew those numbers.
“I know the way,” Simon said. “I accept the challenge.”
Clarke stepped away from the lake’s edge and casually motioned with the second gun. “Your success will tell us if you’re the Levite.”
———
ZACHARIAH WAS SURE HE WAS RIGHT.
The five numbers Alle had told him had to be the way.
3, 74, 5, 86, 19.
He’d noticed something about them while thinking on the plane. The first three together, 374, were the number of years the First Temple had stood until the Babylonians razed it. The second three, 586, the number of years the Second Temple had stood until the Romans wreaked havoc.
That was not coincidental.
Cross had obviously picked his numbers with care.
The last number—19?
He had no idea.
But he was certain they led the way across the lake.
Why else include them?
And there was something else Cross had done.
“Remember the message from Abiram Sagan,” he said. “The golem helps protect our secret in a place long sacred to Jews. A golem is a living body, created from raw earth, using fire, water, and air. Exactly what we have here. This lake is a golem.”
“Why flood it?” Sagan asked Clarke.
“It stays wet from rainwater and serves its purpose but, for this challenge, a bit more depth was required. Once I learned Béne was coming here, I ordered the dam be opened. We built it. If you fail here tonight, we will rebuild it and await the true Levite.”
“Why do this?” Rowe asked Clarke. “Seems like a lot of trouble for outsiders.”
“As I told you before, Béne, you really don’t understand us. Maroons were always outsiders, brought here in chains. We fled to the mountains to be free. The Jews were no different from us. They were never accepted, either. Many of us remember what they did for Maroons during the two wars. I am told that this was our way of repaying them.”
Zachariah had heard enough. He pointed at Rócha. “You go. I’ll direct the path.”
He saw the apprehension in his man’s eyes.
“Not to worry,” he said. “I know what I am doing.”
“Then go yourself,” Sagan said.
“And leave you here? I do not think so.”
He hoped that once he conquered the challenge this Frank Clarke would have no choice but to acknowledge he was the Levite, entitled to what awaited on the lake’s far side. Maybe then Clarke would deal with Rowe, Alle, and Sagan for him.
He faced Rócha. “You will be fine. I know the way.”
Rócha nodded his acceptance, then stepped to the rock edge. Torches shed a blood-red luster over the water. Half a dozen stones, all devoid of numbers, lay scattered across the bottom, about a meter apart, extending out five meters. Rócha plunged his foot through the shin-high water and stepped on the nearest one, nodding his head that it was solid. He then worked his way out into the lake, sloshing through the water, following more stones with no numbers.
Then stopped.