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unexpected turn of events.
"Yes, Mr. Hawthorne," Christopher answered.
"What are you doing here!?" Decker asked in confused disbelief.
"It's time to go, Mr. Hawthorne. I've come to get you," Christopher said,
making no attempt to explain.
Christopher walked from the room and signaled for him to follow. Decker lifted
the 115 pounds that remained of his body and followed Christopher toward the
door. Halfway there, Decker hesitated.
There was something he was trying to remember, something too important to
forget, something he could not leave without.
"Tom!" he said suddenly. "Where's Tom?" he asked of the friend he had not seen
since they were brought to Lebanon.
190 Acts of God
Christopher hesitated and then raised his arm slowly and pointed toward
another door. Silently
Decker opened it, looking for any sign of his captors. There was none. Inside,
Tom lay on a mat identical to the one Decker had spent nearly three years
sleeping on, sitting on, eating on ...
living on. Tom was lying on his side with his face to the wall. Decker entered
and began untying the bonds that held his friend's feet.
"Tom, wake up. We're getting out of here," he whispered.
Tom sat up and looked at his rescuer. For a moment they just stared at each
other's faces. Decker forced his eyes away and began untying Tom's hands. He
had not seen a mirror at any time during his captivity, and though he knew
that his body was emaciated, he had not seen his face, where the most dramatic
effects of his captivity were evident. Seeing Tom's face, he was struck with
such grief and sympathy for his friend's similar condition that he had to look
away to hold back tears.
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Outside the apartment, Decker and Torn walked stealthily down the hall, hoping
to avoid detection.
Christopher, on the other hand, walked on ahead of them, showing absolutely no
sign of concern about the seriousness of the situation. They went down a long
stairway, cluttered with trash and broken bits of plaster and glass. Still
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there was no sign of their captors. As they emerged into the open air Decker
closed his eyes as the bright sunlight struck him in the face with its warmth
and glow.
"Mr. Hawthorne."
"Mr. Hawthorne."
Decker opened his eyes and looked around, struggling to remember where he was.
Standing at the door was Decker Donafin. He was still in Petra.
"Wake up, Mr. Hawthorne, it's time to go."
Horror filled Decker's eyes as he suddenly understood what Tom Donafin's final
words had meant.
Chapter 11
Judas
10:05 a.m., Sunday, June 7, 4 N.A. (2026 A.D.)  The wilderness of Jordan,
north of Petra
The dusty gray four-wheel-drive truck sped across the off-road terrain north
from Petra, negotiating its way around rocks and ruts. Having long since given
up on the notion of conversing with her passenger  he had not said ten words
since he got in the vehicle outside the Siq of
Petra an hour before  the driver thought about plans for her upcoming
wedding. When she received her assignment to drive Decker to Jerusalem she had
expected a hostile passenger, still enraged about his abduction. Instead he
seemed almost in a trance, so preoccupied with his thoughts that he acted as
though she wasn't even there. Time and again he ran his right hand up the side
of his face and over his head, pulling at his thinning gray hair as it passed
between his fingers.
Alternating between nervous twitching or tapping his foot on the floorboard to
a frozen tableau, Decker tried to
191
192 Acts of God understand, tried to think if there was something that he
had missed. But there seemed no doubt what Tom had meant. Christopher was
going to leave Tom in Lebanon.
It must have been, Decker thought, his eyes squinting in reflection, that all
the similarities between his current situation and what happened in Lebanon
all those years ago had caused him to have the dream again. That part was
simple enough. Still, that did not negate the larger meaning.
How could he have missed it for so long? All these years and it had not sunk
in until now. Could it have been just an accident? Decker's mind was filled
with the single thought and its awful implications. It didn't make sense; it
couldn't have been an accident. Decker knew that if he was right, he had
discovered the single slip in an otherwise flawless plan. It had seemed so
insignificant at the time, but if he was right. . .
Another hour passed before the truck finally came to a real road, bounced onto
the blistering hot blacktop, and turned west. Decker's mind flashed back to
the road in Lebanon where he and Tom
Donafin had been rescued by the convoy carrying Ambassador Jon Hansen. Had
that really happened just by chance? he wondered.
About three miles down the highway, the driver pulled to the side of the road
and stopped behind a
Japanese-built station wagon. "The key is in the glove box," she said as she
handed him a canteen full of water. "Just keep heading west for about thirty
kilometers and you'll come to Jericho."
"Thanks," Decker said reflexively as he took the canteen and the leather
satchel that held
Elizabeth's Bible, and got out of the truck. The temperature was well over 100
degrees Fahrenheit
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