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mountain height
where no official expedition had been allowed—it was hard to resist a challenge
like that.

"All right, Rabbi," she said. "I haven't bought into this yet.
But I gather you have a pitch for me. I'm willing to hear it. All right?"

"Oh, that's wonderful, Ms. Creed. Thank you so much. Are you free for
lunch?"
    * * *
    RIGHT AROUND A CORNER FROM the
television studio was a fancy coffee shop of a sort she usually avoided, mostly
because they exuded a self-satisfied smugness that just scraped right up her
spine. She bought a cup of coffee for a price outrageous even in the Big Apple,
she thought as she walked away from the counter.

No seats were available in the crowded shop but there was some counter space by
the window where she could unlimber her notebook computer and avail herself of
their "free" Wi-Fi—although to her mind that was what she paid the
steep coffee tariff for.

She ran Leibowitz, Rabbi Levi through Google. She would have done it the
night before if she'd thought she'd ever have any more dealings with him. But
when she took her leave of him and his companions nothing had been farther from
her intent.

As soon as the search results began to pop up she wondered if maybe she should
have checked after all. Interesting, he looks legit, she thought.

She had been inclined to dismiss him as some kind of right-wing Israeli nut of
the sort who tended to run with a certain breed of U.S. militarists—ones like
Baron and Bostitch. Instead, she found, he was a homeboy of hers,
Brooklyn-based, a high-level genius making his name in the world as a leading
authority on ancient Middle Eastern languages and cultures. If not, as he
confessed, precisely a colleague of hers, he was a heavyweight in a closely
related discipline. Because their areas of specialization—his the ancient
Middle East, hers Renaissance Europe—lay so far apart, she'd never come across
his name before.

It did surprise her that she hadn't seen his name on any of the fringe
archaeology newsgroups she followed when time and energy allowed. The possible
existence of Noah's Ark, or really any significant artifacts on the
perpetually frozen top of a mountain, was right in the zone for discussion in
those groups.
    * * *
    "I HOPE I'M NOT
LATE," Levi said, sliding into a chair across from her.

They were in a Cantonese restaurant tucked away on Mott Street above Canal, in
a part of Chinatown where the locals still seemed successfully to be resisting
the inroads of the hipsters. The lunch crush had mostly eased. The restaurant
smelled of hot oil and a touch of spice. The soft gurgle of a fountain mostly
drowned out the conversations around them.

"Not at all, Rabbi," she told him. "I just like to get to a
place early."

So I can get a look at the party I'm meeting as he approaches, see if he's
acting strangely or has unexpected company, she thought. And so I have the best
possible chance of getting a seat away from the windows and doors, so I'm
harder to spot from the street. She'd made a practice of all of those things
long since inheriting the sword had put her in almost constant danger.

He smiled cheerfully at her. "Try the wonton soup," he said.
"It's to die for."

"Sounds good. I haven't been here before. It smells good, though. I'm
always looking for a good new Chinese place."

A tall, young waiter took their orders. They ordered the soup; Leibowitz
specified "no noodles," but she let it go. He ordered duck braised in
soy sauce. Annja went for the crispy bean curd stuffed with chopped shrimp.

When the waiter left he smiled shyly at her. "I always order it without
noodles," he said. "You get lots more wontons that way."

"Good thinking," Annja said.

"Are you sure you're not Jewish, Ms. Creed?" Leibowitz asked. The
waiter returned and poured them each a cup of steaming green tea. "After
all, if there's one characteristic the Chosen People have in common, it's love
of Chinese food."

"Not that I know of. In my case it's more just a New York