their own investigation. Michael had been missing for thirty-six hours now, with no word from his kidnappers. Neither David nor Monique could rest until they’d found him.
Unfortunately, the search stalled as soon as they arrived at Hebrew University of Jerusalem. They’d assumed from the start that Olam ben Z’man—a name that didn’t appear in any Israeli records—was a fanciful code name that one of the university’s professors had adopted. Because there was a chance that this professor had shared his secret with a colleague at the school, Lucille headed for the computer science department and began questioning the faculty members and students. David and Monique sat in on the interviews; they’d brought some respectable suits to Israel so they would look more official. Several of the interviewees laughed when Lucille mentioned the name Olam ben Z’man. But no one had heard it before.
The only other clue came from Verizon Communications, which had tracked down the phone calls that Adam Bennett had mentioned, the calls Olam ben Z’man had made to Jacob Steele’s laboratory. The records showed that these calls had indeed originated from a fiber-optic line in Israel. What’s more, the very same line had been used on other occasions to transmit millions of gigabytes of data, sometimes sending the information from Israel to the University of Maryland and sometimes carrying it in the opposite direction. But according to officials at Bezeq—the Israeli phone company—the line didn’t connect to any computer at Hebrew University. Instead, the flow of data seemed to terminate at a switching station in East Jerusalem, on the Palestinian side of the city.
By the end of the day Lucille decided to reach out for help. She called an agent she knew at Shin Bet, the Israeli equivalent of the FBI. Lucille had worked with this agent a few years before, helping him identify a Brooklyn imam who raised money for Hamas and other Palestinian terrorist groups, so he owed her a favor. First, she asked him to send one of Shin Bet’s telecommunications experts to the East Jerusalem switching station. Then she set up a meeting to talk about the search for Olam ben Z’man. Because the agent insisted on seeing no one but Lucille, she headed alone to a hummus restaurant near the Shin Bet headquarters. Before leaving, though, she asked David and Monique to go to the switching station to confer with the communications expert.
The station turned out to be a small windowless building located just outside the walls of Jerusalem’s Old City. It was 7:30 P.M. when they arrived, fifteen minutes before sunset. As David stepped out of the rental car he shielded his eyes from the sun and gazed at the spires and minarets of the Old City, which gleamed magnificently in the golden light. Then he turned around and stared at the ancient, sprawling cemetery that stretched eastward toward the Mount of Olives. Monique, meanwhile, eyed the switching station, paying particular attention to the antennas on the building’s roof.
They found the Shin Bet expert, Aryeh Goldberg, in front of the station, bent over a set of blueprints he’d spread across the hood of his car. He was a short, chunky man in his late forties or early fifties, wearing jeans and a gray polo shirt. He’d propped his glasses on top of his balding head so he could scrutinize the schematics. He was so engrossed that at first he didn’t hear Monique say, “Hello, Mr. Goldberg.” But when she repeated the greeting he stood up straight and smiled. He had a dark complexion and lively brown eyes, and he seemed unperturbed by the fact that they were making him work overtime. Lowering his glasses, he shook hands with Monique and then with David.
“Ah, the Americans!” he said in heavily accented English. “My supervisor says you’re from the FBI, yes? The G-men? And now the G-women, too?” He pointed at Monique. “I know about the G-men because I have the DVD of that gangster
Unfortunately, the search stalled as soon as they arrived at Hebrew University of Jerusalem. They’d assumed from the start that Olam ben Z’man—a name that didn’t appear in any Israeli records—was a fanciful code name that one of the university’s professors had adopted. Because there was a chance that this professor had shared his secret with a colleague at the school, Lucille headed for the computer science department and began questioning the faculty members and students. David and Monique sat in on the interviews; they’d brought some respectable suits to Israel so they would look more official. Several of the interviewees laughed when Lucille mentioned the name Olam ben Z’man. But no one had heard it before.
The only other clue came from Verizon Communications, which had tracked down the phone calls that Adam Bennett had mentioned, the calls Olam ben Z’man had made to Jacob Steele’s laboratory. The records showed that these calls had indeed originated from a fiber-optic line in Israel. What’s more, the very same line had been used on other occasions to transmit millions of gigabytes of data, sometimes sending the information from Israel to the University of Maryland and sometimes carrying it in the opposite direction. But according to officials at Bezeq—the Israeli phone company—the line didn’t connect to any computer at Hebrew University. Instead, the flow of data seemed to terminate at a switching station in East Jerusalem, on the Palestinian side of the city.
By the end of the day Lucille decided to reach out for help. She called an agent she knew at Shin Bet, the Israeli equivalent of the FBI. Lucille had worked with this agent a few years before, helping him identify a Brooklyn imam who raised money for Hamas and other Palestinian terrorist groups, so he owed her a favor. First, she asked him to send one of Shin Bet’s telecommunications experts to the East Jerusalem switching station. Then she set up a meeting to talk about the search for Olam ben Z’man. Because the agent insisted on seeing no one but Lucille, she headed alone to a hummus restaurant near the Shin Bet headquarters. Before leaving, though, she asked David and Monique to go to the switching station to confer with the communications expert.
The station turned out to be a small windowless building located just outside the walls of Jerusalem’s Old City. It was 7:30 P.M. when they arrived, fifteen minutes before sunset. As David stepped out of the rental car he shielded his eyes from the sun and gazed at the spires and minarets of the Old City, which gleamed magnificently in the golden light. Then he turned around and stared at the ancient, sprawling cemetery that stretched eastward toward the Mount of Olives. Monique, meanwhile, eyed the switching station, paying particular attention to the antennas on the building’s roof.
They found the Shin Bet expert, Aryeh Goldberg, in front of the station, bent over a set of blueprints he’d spread across the hood of his car. He was a short, chunky man in his late forties or early fifties, wearing jeans and a gray polo shirt. He’d propped his glasses on top of his balding head so he could scrutinize the schematics. He was so engrossed that at first he didn’t hear Monique say, “Hello, Mr. Goldberg.” But when she repeated the greeting he stood up straight and smiled. He had a dark complexion and lively brown eyes, and he seemed unperturbed by the fact that they were making him work overtime. Lowering his glasses, he shook hands with Monique and then with David.
“Ah, the Americans!” he said in heavily accented English. “My supervisor says you’re from the FBI, yes? The G-men? And now the G-women, too?” He pointed at Monique. “I know about the G-men because I have the DVD of that gangster
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