Stephen England - Pandora's grave

12:25 P.M.

The security center

“I’ve got to go out there,” Harry said, watching the confrontation play out on the screens of the surveillance cameras.

Tex looked at him, a look of intensity on his typically stoic face. “If you turn yourself in to the Israelis, this mission is blown. The Israeli government will imprison you, the Agency will deny your existence. That will be the end, Harry.”

Harry nodded, his mind flickering back to Hamid’s words as he lay dying on the carpet of the masjid. It was fated to end like this, Harry. There is no escaping the will of Allah .

He couldn’t just stand there.

“There’s no way I’m going let him win,” he said finally, moving toward the door. He heard Tex call out to stop him, ignored the voice of his friend. In the end, the mission was the only thing that mattered. All else was illusory, friendship most of all. He had killed a friend this day.

His footsteps took him up the ancient stone stairs from which Hamid and Harun had fallen only a couple hours before. It seemed as though a lifetime had passed in the interim. Come and gone.

At the door to the outside he paused, removing the Colt 1911 from his holster. His thumb hit the release and he heard the sound of the loaded magazine striking the stone floor between his feet. His hands moving quickly over the gun, he racked the slide, ejecting the chambered round.

There was a tinkle of brass against stone and he bent down to retrieve the cartridge, laying it and the gun reverently to the side of the door, covering it with his jacket. The big pistol had saved his life too many times to count but all that was past. It couldn’t save him now.

If the Israelis forced their way into the masjid, in the wake of everything that had gone before, Jerusalem would erupt in violence. And with it the Middle East. All their sacrifice would have been for nothing. All the blood, the tears. Davood…

The noonday sun shone down upon his face as he strode out unarmed into the courtyard on the east of al-Aqsa, a cool north wind rippling through his dark hair.

He felt nothing. Anger. Remorse. Betrayal. They had all come and gone like strangers in the night, leaving him cold, empty. He knew only what he had to do.

12:27 P.M.

The bell tower

There was no identification on either of the bodies, which wasn’t surprising in the least. One had been shot, the other-well, from the position of his body it looked as though he had fallen from the belfry, breaking nearly every bone in his body.

But, they had been players, Sergeant Eiland reflected grimly, which couldn’t be said for the middle-aged Palestinian lying dead in the narthex of the church below, his throat slashed by a knife. The doorkeeper of the sanctuary, apparently, which meant there would be the devil to pay with the Lutheran church.

As such, these had probably deserved everything they had gotten. The question was, who had given it to them?

Yossi looked over to see Chaim kneeling by the body of the woman, his eyes roving over the scoped rifle clasped in her lifeless hands. “It’s a Barrett-recent American make,” the young sniper observed coolly. If the presence of the dead woman bothered him, there was no way to tell it.

With a weary sigh, the sergeant toggled his lip mike. “Lieutenant, I’ve got three Arab KIAs and an American rifle. Any good news on your end?”

12:32 P.M.

The Haram al-Sharif

“Negative,” Gideon replied in frustration. “When we first got here, we could still see the body of the shooting victim, but they took him away in a bag five minutes ago. Not a thing I could do about it. I-”

He broke off abruptly as he looked toward the east of the mosque. A tall man was striding across the open courtyard in his direction, toward the perimeter where the stand-off continued. There was something about him, something familiar.

“I’ll get back to you, Yossi. Do what you can there.”

As he watched, a small group of men emerged from the front doors of al-Aqsa, from underneath the Crusader arch, forming a protective phalanx around a man in a wheelchair.

Tahir al-Din Husayni… the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem. He had never met the Sunni cleric, but he was unmistakable.

He saw the tall man stop, turn to face the entourage. Gideon’s hand went to his pocket, withdrawing a high-powered monocular and focusing it in on the man’s face. It was as he had suspected…

It was the only way. The die had been cast long ago. What had he told Hamid? Fate is what we make of it . Perhaps.

Harry looked from the wheelchair-bound cleric to his bodyguards and back again. “It’s for the best.”

Husayni looked up at him, their eyes meeting, and once again Harry felt the strange charisma that had given the man such a power over the masses.

“You and I know differently, Mr. Craig ,” he replied quietly, putting a heavy, ironic emphasis on the false name he had been given. “This is not the way.”

“And you would suggest?”

“You have sacrificed much this morning in defense of my faith, but Allah does not ask this of you. He asks it of me .”

Without another word, Husayni gripped the wheels of his chair and propelled himself forward, across the stones of the courtyard.

Harry watched him go, then he felt two of Husayni’s bodyguards take him by the arms, steering him back toward the sanctuary of the masjid.

He didn’t resist. There seemed no point…

“I need to know what’s going on here.” The young Jewish officer wore no rank or insignia-not even a uniform, but Husayni knew he was in charge-sensed the air of command about him. He’d always been able to read people.

“And I need to speak with your superiors,” Husayni said gently, looking up into the swarthy face of the young man.

“How are the Americans involved?” the Israeli retorted, ignoring the request. Somehow he knew.

“With all due respect,” Husayni retorted, “this is well above your pay grade. I see you have a satellite phone. Call your superiors and tell them I need to talk to them.”

For a minute, maybe two, the two men regarded each other silently, then the officer reached for the phone on his belt. “I hope you have the answers to this…”

12:40 P.M.

Mossad Headquarters

Tel Aviv-Yafo

Avi ben Shoham sighed, leaning back in his chair. The phone on the desk in front of him was on speaker and he was sure his sigh had been heard. Frankly, he didn’t care. He wasn’t dealing from a position of strength anyway.

“My men tell me they made positive identification of an American agent named Harold Nichols near the al-Aqsa mosque a few minutes ago. What can you tell me of US involvement in this incident?”

“I have made myself clear, general,” Husayni replied firmly. “If you want my cooperation, you will have to content yourself with the information I am willing to give you.”

Shoham bristled at the cleric’s attitude. “What if I tell you we can do without your cooperation?”

“If I were you, I would think long and carefully before I made that assertion. Consider the facts, general. There were two bomb blasts in the Muslim Quarter this morning. The street will believe you are hiding something, whether any evidence points to it or not. A worshiper was slain in front of the third-holiest mosque in Islam, by a sniper with military training. Draw your own conclusions, but do not forget which ones the Arab world will draw: an arrow pointing straight at the heart of Israel. If it were not for me.”

He was right, and Shoham knew it. It didn’t mean he had to like it. “You pride yourself on your abilities.”