Kathy Reichs - Cross bones

“Picture this. The wall was burning. The Romans would pour in at dawn. There was no hope of escape. Ben Ya’ir argued that a death of glory was preferable to a life of slavery. Lots were cast, and ten men were elected to kill all the others. Another set of lots determined who among the ten would kill his fellow assassins, and, finally, himself.”

“There were no dissenters?”

“If so, those opinions were overruled. Two women and several children did hide out and survive. Most of Josephus’ information came from them.”

“How many died?”

“Nine hundred and sixty men, women, and children,” Jake said, his voice soft. “Jews view Masada as one of the most dramatic episodes in their history. Especially Israeli Jews.”

“What does Masada have to do with Kessler’s photo?”

“The fate of the remains of the Jewish zealots has always been a mystery. According to Josephus, Silva established a garrison on the summit immediately after Masada ’s conquest.”

“Surely Masada has been excavated.”

“For years, every digger on the planet was drooling for a permit. An Israeli archaeologist named Yigael Yadin finally got the nod. Yadin worked for two field seasons using a team of volunteers. The first lasted from October of sixty-three until May of sixty-four, the second from November of sixty-four until April of sixty-five.”

I had my first inkling where Jake was going.

“Yadin’s team recovered human remains?”

“Three skeletons. On the lower terrace of Herod’s palace villa.”

“Palace villa?”

“The periodic uprisings kept the old boy nervous, so he fortified Masada as a sort of safe house should he and his family ever need to escape. And Herod wasn’t into discomfort. In addition to the wall and defensive towers, he commissioned palaces complete with colonnades, mosaics, frescoes, terraces, gardens, the whole nine yards.”

I pointed to the photo. “This is one of the three?”

Jake shook his head. “According to Yadin, one was the skeleton of a male in his twenties. Not far away lay the bones of a young woman, her sandals and scalp perfectly preserved. I’m not kidding. I’ve seen the pictures. The woman’s hair looked like she’d braided it the morning she was unearthed.”

“Aridity makes for great preservation.”

“Yes. Though the remains weren’t exactly as Yadin interpreted them.”

“What do you mean?”

“It’s not important. According to Yadin, the third skeleton was that of a child.”

“What about this guy?” Again, I pointed at Kessler’s photo.

“This guy.” Jake’s jaw muscles bunched, relaxed. “This guy wasn’t supposed to be up there at all.”

“NOT SUPPOSED TO BE UP THERE?”

“That’s my theory.”

“Anyone share it?”

“Some.”

“Who is he?”

“That’s the puzzler.”

I sat back and assumed a listening posture.

“Following their victory, Silva’s troops would have thrown the zealots’ bodies over the cliffs, or buried the corpses communally somewhere on the summit. Yadin’s team dug some test trenches, but found no evidence of a mass grave. Wait a sec.”

Jake pulled two items from a battered leather briefcase, and placed them on the table. The first was a map.

I scooted my chair close and we both leaned in.

“ Masada is shaped like a Stealth aircraft, with one wing pointing north, the other pointing south, and the cockpit pointing west.”

My mind Rorschach-ed an amoeba, but I kept it to myself.

Jake indicated the upper edge of the summit, near the tip of his Stealth’s southern wing.

“There’s a network of caves here, a few yards below the casement wall.”

Jake slid the second item from under the map.

Old black-and-white print. Human bones. Boot-scuffed dirt.

Kessler déjà vu.

But not quite.

In this photo the bones of many people were scattered and jumbled. Also, this shot had an official north arrow/scale marker, and, in the upper right corner, an arm and knee could be seen as an excavator brushed something lying in the dirt.

“Yadin’s team found skeletal remains in one of the southern summit caves,” I guessed, not taking my eyes from the print. “This shot was taken during excavation.”

“Yes.” Jake indicated a spot on the Masada diagram. “The locus was designated Cave 2001. Yadin mentions it in his preliminary report on the Masada project, and includes a brief description by Yoram Tsafrir, the supervising excavator of the locus.”

“Minimum number of individuals in the cave?” I asked, counting at least five skulls.

“Depends on how you read Yadin.”

I looked up, surprised. “MNI shouldn’t be that tough to determine. Did a physical anthropologist examine the bones?”

“Dr. Nicu Haas of Hebrew University. Based on Haas’s evaluation, in his first field season report, Yadin gave a total of twenty-five individuals: fourteen males, six females, four children, and one fetus. But, if you read his wording carefully, he treated one very old male as separate from the other males.”

“Bringing his actual total to twenty-six.”

“Exactly. In his popular book-”

“The one that came out in sixty-six?”

“Right. Masada: Herod’s Fortress and the Zealots’ Last Stand. In that publication, Yadin does basically the same thing, saying Haas found fourteen males aged twenty-two to sixty, one male over seventy, six females, four kids, and a fetus.”

“So it’s unclear whether the total count was twenty-five or twenty-six?”

“You’re quick.”

“Blistering. Could be an honest error.”

“It could be.” Jake’s voice suggested he didn’t believe it.

“Ages of the women and children?”

“The kids were eight to twelve years. The women were all young, fifteen to twenty-two.”

Sudden insight. “You think our fellow here is the septuagenarian?” I tapped Kessler’s photo.

“I’ll get to him in a minute. For now, let me focus on the cave. In their reports, neither Tsafrir nor Yadin indicated when Cave 2001 was discovered or when it was cleared.”

“Could be just sloppy-”

He cut me off.

“The find was never announced to the media.”

“Perhaps that was done out of respect for the dead.”

“Yadin called a press conference when the three palace skeletons were found.” Jake shook his hands, fingers splayed like E.T. “Big excitement. We’ve got remains of the Jewish defenders of Masada. This was late November of sixty-three. Cave 2001 was discovered and cleared in October of sixty-three, one monthbefore that press conference.”

Jake’s index finger augured into the photo.

“Yadin knew about the cave bones and never brought them up.”

“If the dates weren’t made public, how doyou know when the cave was discovered or excavated?”

“I’ve spoken with a volunteer who worked the site. The guy’s trustworthy, and he’d have no reason to lie. And believe me, I’ve researched the media coverage. It wasn’t justthat press conference. Throughout both dig seasons the media reported regularly on what was being found at Masada. TheJerusalem Post keeps topical archives, and I’ve spent hours with their Masada file. Articles mention mosaics, scrolls, the synagogue, themikvehs, the three skeletons from the northern palace. There’s not a single word on the remains from Cave 2001.”

Jake was on a roll.

“And I’m not just talking thePost. In October of sixty-four theIllustrated London News published an extensive spread on Masada, pictures and all. The palace skeletons are mentioned, no respect for the dead there, but there’s zilch on the cave bones.”

Charlie chose that moment to yodel.