He looked away for a moment.
‘He’s also apparently told some fundamentalist Muslim friends of his that I am looking for the Ark and that I am connected with Ateret Cohanim. The problem is that he has let people believe that I somehow want to use the power of the Ark against the Palestinians and Muslims in general. I told him how the Bible describes the Ark and the awesome power it was supposed to have. Some of these people are very superstitious and believe Jews have superhuman powers anyway. The message has got round that I am plotting against Islam.’
He lowered his voice to a whisper. ‘Word has it in the street that Hamas has been showing an interest in me. Yo u know the Hamas flag features the Dome of the Rock? They’ve been saying I want to dig up the foundations of the mosque to find the Ark!’ He giggled helplessly. ‘You see, it could hardly be worse!’
Hamas is the Arabic acronym for the Islamic Resistance Movement (Harakat al-Muqawamah al-Islamiyya). It had been founded some years before by Sheikh Ahmed Yassin at the beginning of the First Intifada - the Palestinian uprising against Israeli rule which lasted from 1987 to 1993. The charter of Hamas calls for the destruction of the State of Israel and its replacement with a Palestinian Islamic state in the whole of historical Palestine. Hamas was not very keen on Jews in general and Reuven had every reason to be afraid.
Reuven told me that he and Clara had moved to a rented flat in Te l Aviv for security reasons, and today he had just come back to his Jerusalem place to get some books. Clara had telephoned and pleaded with him to go straight back. However, inveterate collector that he was, he had taken the opportunity to nose round some antique dealers in the Christian Quarter. When he left one store, with a couple of manuscripts and books under his arm, a couple of Arab-looking men had snatched the books from him and pushed him around a bit.
‘It was the books they were after. They wanted to see what I am up to. I think I was very lucky.’
‘I doubt they’re Hamas,’ I said. ‘If they had been, and if Hamas has anything on you, you wouldn’t be sitting here enjoying a cup of excellent coffee! But strangely enough I just heard from a Palestinian friend that rumours are going round about me too. I guess people saw you coming to my place in the Old City. Or did you mention my name to Anis?’
Reuven shook his head distractedly and got heavily to his feet. We walked to the Jaffa Gate where Reuven’s driver was waiting to drive him back to Te l Aviv. At the last minute, he suggested I go with him.
I love Jerusalem like no other place on earth. But sometimes it makes you feel claustrophobic. Te l Aviv is the best antidote to too much Jerusalem. Having nothing better to do and feeling like a break I climbed into his comfortable dark blue Mercedes 500SE.
His encounter in the Christian Quarter seemed to have taken a lot out of Reuven. The headache he frequently had as a result of his slight wound in the Yo m Kippur War was troubling him. He rubbed the side of his head, took a handful of pills, and in a few minutes was fast asleep. I sank into the luxurious leather seats and enjoyed the ride down through the forests of Judea.
I reflected that the Ark had passed this way more than once thousands of years ago during earlier Jewish conflicts with local populations. As I was wondering what its impact on the current conflict was likely to be I dozed off as well and only woke up when the engine was switched off in front of the elegant apartment block where Reuven lived near Dizengoff Street. Clara was out for the evening, it was the maid’s evening off and we had their place to ourselves.
Reuven showered and changed into a pair of jeans and a white T shirt.
‘What happened to your orthodox clothes?’ I asked.
‘With the security situation everywhere in the world being as it is, I do not feel like sticking out like a sore thumb. With a shnoz like mine,’ he said, tapping his nose, ‘anyone can tell I’m a Jew, but I do not need to advertise it any more than God intended. Clara has persuaded me to dress in a more discreet manner, at least for the time being.’
‘And your quest, Reuven?’ I asked softly.
‘This is what I wanted to talk about. I want you to help. I’ve been reading all I can and a number of people have been assisting me. Some progress is being made. However I can now see that the whole thing might be a little more complicated than I first imagined. I am losing my sense of what the Ark really was. I don’t really know what it is I am looking for.
‘On the one hand it appears to be some kind of a weapon. On the other it often formed part of a kind of procession along with tambourines and trumpets. And in addition it was both the footstool and throne of the Almighty. All very good, but what was it? There’s a big question mark over what it actually was.’
My friend looked worried and driven. It was obvious that the whole issue of the Ark was beginning to frustrate him. The more he studied it, the less he understood what it was all about. It would therefore be very difficult to find it. But with massive investment of money, he kept saying, and with a proper businessman’s organization it should be possible. He rambled on, talking of special investments to finance the long-term search for the Ark and then plunging back into its intricate and ambiguous history.
He rubbed his head in his characteristic gesture and I supposed that his ‘Yom Kippur headache’ had returned.
With a strange look on his face he left the room, moving like a sleepwalker, leaving me alone for about half an hour. In the distance I could hear him on the phone to someone, speaking volubly in Hebrew.
When he came back he was carrying a tray full of bread, olives, salted and pickled herring, dill pickles, soft goat’s cheese - jibneh in Arabic - the humus I had bought from Abu Shukri’s which I had put in the fridge, and a bottle of white Golan wine. He opened it, served us both, muttering under his breath that he should not be drinking wine with a bloody, uncircumcised goy, and downed his glass. He ate silently for a few moments and seemed to regain his composure.
It was a warm, unbearably humid Te l Aviv night and I was dressed for Jerusalem, not for Te l Aviv. I had taken a shower but I felt sticky and could feel the sweat trickle down my back.
‘Come outside, there’s a bit of a breeze,’ Reuven said, leading me onto a covered terrace from where I could see the lights of the esplanade and beyond that the inky darkness of the sea.
‘I have been speaking to Rabbi Getz at Ateret Cohanim,’ he continued. ‘He doesn’t actually claim to have seen the Ark or to have found its hiding place, but he believes in his heart it might be down there under the Temple Mount in some secret place although he knows as well as we do that the area has been excavated constantly at least since Roman times. I am beginning to doubt it’s there at all. If it had been, why did the knights Templar, who had full access, and unlimited manpower and who spent years looking, not find it?
‘For the moment, anyway, the Government has forbidden any more digging. The last time Getz and his friends burrowed into the foundations, Muslims up on top heard the noise coming up through a cistern and rushed down to see what was happening. Yo u know about the unrest that followed. The entrance has now been sealed up by ten yards of reinforced concrete. I’ve decided I do not want to be involved in any digging around in Jerusalem. Especially after what I heard about Hamas.’
‘That I understand,’ I said, nodding in agreement. ‘In any case, people looking for the Ark in Jerusalem are tripping over each other. In addition, there’s not the slightest proof at all that it is there.’
‘Quite so,’ said Reuven gloomily. ‘Getz said that they had weeks down there before they were discovered. They found traces of many earlier excavations but little else. I think that I am at a dead end.
‘A couple of days ago I was reading the Talmud and came across the passage in Masekhet Shekalim about the Temple priest who noticed that a flagstone on the floor of the Temple wood store was shaped differently from the others.