01 Babylon Rising by Tim Lahaye Page B

and bring it back to Preston and have no hassles with officials or customs. Oh, and have it cost me no money.”
    Levi gave a long, low whistle. “What, you’re not going to make time for a round of peace talks as long as you’re in the neighborhood? Let me see what I can do. How soon can you get away?”
    “We have most of next week off for independent study, andI’ve just about got all my students covered, so I can leave immediately. Laura’s getting her office hours covered as well. I really owe you, Levi.”
    “Let’s see if I can deliver first. In the meantime”—Levi punched Murphy’s shoulder—“your coffee break is over. Get back to the bag.”

FOURTEEN
    “ WE ARE TWO men, but we make an interesting couple, Professor Murphy, do we not?” Murphy nodded deferentially to his host, Sheikh Umar al-Khaliq, but he wondered where he was going with this conversational opening. They sat drinking strong Arabic coffee in al-Khaliq’s beautiful home in Samaria, after a day of traveling, all arranged by Levi Abrams with amazing rapidity.
    Laura had gone to their guest bedroom, saying that she was exhausted from her flight, but privately she pointed out to Murphy that she was sensing the sheikh was no believer in women as being worthy of inclusion in any serious discussion. “Typical,” she said, “of so many Arab men of his generation. In fact”—she jabbed Murphy with her finger—“typical of so many men of every country.”
    “Hey, don’t point that finger at me. It’s loaded,” Murphy said. “I’m clean.”
    “But you could help bring the sheikh into at least the nineteen hundreds.”
    Murphy sighed. “I agree, dear, but could we not offend the generous hand that has made this trip possible? At least until the trip is over. Then, I promise, I will leave you behind to enlighten him. You will be my very special gift for the Samarian host who seems to have everything else.”
    “Murphy, it’s a good thing I have my maps to study. Because tomorrow, when we set out exploring, I’m going to pick out a really great place to leave
you
behind. Don’t stay up too late with your manly man talk.”
    Actually, Murphy was pretty certain what the sheikh might want to talk about, thanks to Levi Abrams, who had connected him with the sheikh. After working his cell phone for fifteen minutes while Murphy finished his workout, Levi said, “I think I’ve made a perfect match for you, my friend. Sheikh Umar al-Khaliq.”
    “And he’s perfect because …?”
    Levi sat Murphy down. “This may sound like the last thing you would expect me to know about the Mideast, Murphy, but did you know that there are more and more Arabs who are seeking out
your
God?”
    “I had read a little bit about the Christianity movement among Muslims, but I honestly believed it had to be about as likely as their coming to your God. No offense.”
    “None taken. At any rate, al-Khaliq is wealthy beyond belief, still enjoys diplomatic status for his fleet of private airplanes, and somehow, I guess, it was not enough. I had heardthat he was putting out some discreet feelers to some of the Christian missionary groups in the region. As you can imagine, such seeking is not a popular extracurricular habit in the Mideast, no matter how powerful you are. So I told him that you would be happy to counsel him in return for round-trip passage and supplies for a little digging.”
    “Levi, you are a genius. Can I trust him?”
    “I helped the sheikh out years ago with a messy situation with some trigger-happy Bedouins who were making it a little awkward for him to fight back against them on his home turf. I would trust him.”
    “Thank you, Levi. I owe you big-time.”
    “You owe me nothing. Take care of that wonderful wife of yours. You, I would miss not so much. Her, I would miss. And, Murphy, trust the sheikh, don’t necessarily trust anyone else who’s working with him. But you know the drill, so to speak, about digging in strange