“I told you,” Natasha said. “He talked about you guys all the time. And when he got back from that trip, he told me how proud he was of me for following in my grandfather’s footsteps, for becoming an archeologist. But then he took me aside and he warned me — gently, but firmly — that there was more to life than hunting for ancient artifacts like my grandfather or for oil like Dmitri and Miriam. He said he’d just had the same conversation with you, about finding real buried treasure, and that it had totally changed you. But he never said how.”
Bennett sat down in a chair. He could suddenly picture himself back on Gibraltar, having dinner with Mordechai and Erin and Dmitri and the conversation they’d had burning in his ears and heart.
“Well,” he said, “I remember Mordechai saying how moved he had been by reading the prophecies in the Hebrew Scriptures about who the Messiah would be. That Micah said He would be born in Bethlehem. That Isaiah said He would be born of a virgin and live in Galilee. I remember him saying how Daniel said after the Messiah was ‘cut off,’ Jerusalem and the Jewish Temple would be destroyed by an occupying power. And he talked about how David had written in the Psalms about how a band of ‘evil men’ would curse the Messiah, and mock Him, and gamble for His clothing, and then kill Him. And he said how moved he was reading Isaiah 53, that the Messiah would be ‘pierced for our transgressions’ and ‘crushed for our iniquities’ and that ‘the punishment that brought us peace’—peace with God, our salvation—‘was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed.’ And I distinctly remember Mordechai saying, ‘Look, I’m no rocket scientist. I just looked at the picture the prophets were painting and I said, who does that look like?’”
“Jesus,” Natasha said.
“Exactly.”
“And the part about buried treasure?”
Bennett sighed. He could feel the emotions of that night forcing their way back to the surface, and he had to discipline himself to hold them back, at least for now.
“Right, well, he said he was reading the New Testament one day — Matthew 12 or 13, I think — and he was reading a parable that Jesus told His disciples. Jesus said the kingdom of God is like a treasure hidden in a field. When a man found it, he hid it again and then in his joy went and sold everything he had and bought that field. Mordechai said it struck him that he was that man. He had finally discovered the truth that Jesus really is the Messiah. He had found buried treasure. The question, he said, was what was he going to do about it? Walk away? Forget about it? Act like it didn’t matter? Or was he going to choose to follow Jesus Christ whatever the cost?”
Bennett got up, walked over to the window, and looked back out over the Old City, imagining the Temple where it would soon be standing.
“I remember going to bed that night thinking, that’s me, too. I’d been brought up a skeptic, the son of two atheists, but now, somehow, I had no doubt that Jesus was who He said He was. And right in front of me, in Mordechai and Erin, I had two amazing examples of how God can totally transform the lives of people who choose to believe. They obviously had found buried treasure. They had a joy and a peace and a quiet confidence about the future that I didn’t have. I wanted that. I knew Mordechai was right, and I knew it was time for me to choose.”
“So what did you do?” Natasha asked.
“Mordechai made it pretty clear. Romans 10 says ‘if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.’ So that night, I got down on my knees next to my bed and did it.”
“That’s it? That’s all?”
“The Bible says salvation is a free gift,” Bennett explained. “We don’t deserve it. We can’t earn it. We can’t buy it. We just have to accept it. The hard part isn’t what you say. The hard part is getting to the point where you’re ready to say it.”
“So what did you say, Jon?” asked Natasha.
“Well, it wasn’t anything fancy,” Jon conceded. “I think I just basically said, ‘God, I really want what Erin and Eli have. I know I haven’t lived a perfect life. I know I really need to clean up my act. But I’m ready to cut a deal, God.’”
“A deal?” asked Natasha. “You really said that?”
“Hey, it was new to me. I was doing the best I could.”
Natasha laughed. “Is that all you said?”
“No, there was a little more.”
“What was it?”
“You really want to know?”
“I really do.”
“Then I’d be honored to tell you. I just said, ‘God, I’ve got so much to learn. But I do believe that Jesus died on the cross to pay the penalty for my sins. I do believe that you raised Him from the dead. And I do believe that He is the only way to get to You. I’m ready to follow you with everything I have. I just want to know two things, God — first, that I’m going to be forgiven for every stupid thing I’ve ever said or done, and second, that I’m going to be in heaven with you if I never live to see another day. Amen.’”
“What happened?” asked Natasha.
“I wish I could say there were flashes of lightning or angels singing or some sort of supernatural sign that let me know I was really in, that I was really born again into God’s family,” Bennett confided. “But the truth is I knew that I had just done what the Bible told me to do. And that was that. In my heart, I knew the deal was done. I had my buried treasure. I was the luckiest guy on the planet. I just cried myself to sleep, thanking God for having mercy on someone as stupid and selfish as me.”
Bennett looked over at Erin and took her hand. She had tears in her eyes, and when he looked back at Natasha, there were tears in her eyes, too.
“Is that something you’re ready to do?” he asked softly.
Natasha nodded.
They all closed their eyes and bowed their heads, and when they were done, Natasha looked up and said softly, “Now I’ve got my buried treasure too.”
EPILOGUE
It had taken longer than expected.
Two weeks, in fact, what with all the news out of Israel. But Indira Rajiv was finally about to get the face-to-face meeting she had been demanding, in the safe house owned by the late Viggo Mariano on the outskirts of Rome. In less than two minutes, she’d be sitting alone with the man who had recruited her to betray her husband, her friends, and her country, and she could barely contain her excitement.
She was prepared to build and run the world-class intelligence operation he would need to see his vision through, and she was fully prepared to hand over files that would effectively cripple the national security of the United States.
But two million dollars a year was not going to be enough. Not for the services she could provide. Not with all the wealth her benefactor had at his fingertips. She could never go back, after all. She was being hunted not just by the CIA and FBI but by Interpol and the Mossad.
She didn’t really need the money. Money was never what this was about. It was about respect. Money was just the tangible expression of the respect he was willing to afford her. And she wanted more.
Rajiv sat with her back to the door, staring out over the beautiful Italian capital. Her hands were perspiring. But she was determined to maintain a poker face at all costs. Any whiff of weakness and he could seize the upper hand.
Then the door opened and in walked Khalid Tariq, Al-Hassani’s right-hand man. Rajiv stood and greeted him with the traditional Arab kiss on both cheeks. She would get to the issue of money in due time, she decided. First she needed to show she was in this for the long haul.
“So, what does His Excellency want next?” she asked.
The answer seemed to suck all the oxygen from the room.