Embedded. Marc Knutson
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again in his mind, developing his story and differing angles he may wish to take in his approach to the story he is developing.” Why did I tell him all that, I didn’t need to, nor did I really want to, yet I felt compelled. I continued hearing the words come out of my mouth, but not having given permission for them to leave. As a stopgap measure, I rudely barked out, “I need to be left alone. Walk with me if you wish, or walk ahead of me, but I insist that I must be left alone.”
Once again, I was looking directly into his eyes, as I begged off his attempt at conversation. That’s where I discovered the root of my loose lips, his eyes. With a slight raising of his right eyebrow and a stare that could kill, he said, “All right then, Mr. Stanton, I shall leave you alone. In fact I will simply walk ahead. We are not far from the town now anyway. It was a pleasure to meet you. I trust the feeling is mutual?” Back home they would have said that his tone of voice was quite surly and disrespectful, however, I wanted him away from me. Far away. With him tagging along I really couldn’t think straight.
His gait picked up as he began to pull out ahead. I returned to my slightly head down position as I felt the breeze beginning to pick up, and sand once again crashed into my face. As I lifted and secured the scarf back into place around my mouth and eyes, I saw Eshek, about ten paces ahead of me, suddenly stop, and turn to address me again. He had an unmistakable air of unfriendliness written all over his face. I slowed down so as not to overtake him. Once again I grabbed hold of my laptop and looked at him with an expressionless stare.
“Mr. Stanton,” he began, with a low, dour voice. The wind once again seemed to dip just in time for him to speak his words. “This thing that you seek is not alive. This mission that you are on is a waste of your time. The stories of a messiah are old men’s tales, ancient fables developed by men to hold themselves accountable to an invisible God. You have no story here. It’s nothing but a hoax. You should be writing about economic or political issues of the land and leave these fairy tales to children’s writers. There have been many so-called messiahs who have come and gone. None were he. People’s hopes were inspired, only to be crushed on the rocks of despair. Go home, Mr. Stanton. Leave this messiah fable for the weaklings who need a crutch to get through life. Go home, Mr. Stanton.” With that, he turned and walked away, obscured by a slurry of sand and dust. While flying particles impaired my vision, I could vaguely see that there was a strange opacity about him as he disappeared.
Within minutes he had disappeared down the road, and must have made a turn, for as the wind gasped it’s final gusts, I didn’t see him anywhere. That left me with an eerie, sickened feeling.
I reminded myself to check with my science editor back at the Gazette to explain what causes that type of phenomenon. As a journalist, I have experienced many things in documenting my stories. Few things made me feel uncomfortable, but that sure did. Somebody was interested in my story as much as I was. That this man would walk up to me, want to befriend me, yet all in the name of stealing my story, or throw me off the track angered me. I determined that there was one important task that I had to perform when I returned to the hotel, and that was to confront Kahan. He must have been telling somebody about my inquiries. Thankfully I could see the outskirts of Bethlehem, which caused me to focus back on my assignment: find the Shepherds Bazaar and Amal.
It was not difficult to find the bazaar; all I had to do was follow my nose. The stench created by a mixture of hot, sweaty people, mingled with the odors of sun-dried meats, hanging above the edges of the concession tables, was literally a “dead” give away.
The bazaar was indeed bizarre, and it appeared that I had arrived there at quite a busy time. Ducking and dodging the canvas edges of the tent awnings, I found myself aimlessly weaving my way in, around and through the late afternoon shoppers. My senses all shifted to high alert. I scanned faces, looking for trouble, as I was being jostled and pushed by every Bethlehemite and their brothers who had all happened to be at the bazaar when I was there. Yet, as I looked at them, they didn’t appear to even see me. They were apparently so focused on the concession tables and haggling for a bargain that I was merely in their way. It was getting old quick, and I was getting tired of the bumping and shoving and oozing between them when I spotted two men talking. One looked like Eshek, but I couldn’t make out the face of the other. I didn’t like Eshek, I didn’t trust him either, but maybe now I could play on our road encounter and seek some assistance from him. Perhaps, between he and his friend, they may know where I could locate Amal. The two men were about twenty feet away as I approached. Bounding up and down on my tiptoes, I attempted to look over the passing crowd and stay on track towards Eshek. It made me feel like a fishing bobber in a moving stream. For a moment it appeared that Eshek looked at me and saw my approach, but just as I thought I caught his glance toward me, two huge bazaar shoppers rudely knocked me sideways. As I struggled to regain my balance and lock on to Esheks’ position, he was gone.
It was at that time that I felt a sharp pain in my left side, just slightly under my rib cage. I initially ignored it, but it occurred again. With innate reflexes, I reached down to the area that was exhibiting the pain, and I discovered that it wasn’t being internally caused.
My discovery was someone’s finger poking at me. With my left hand, I grabbed the right wrist of the offender and with my right hand I grabbed the index finger that was jabbing my side. Then scanned the crowd to see who was wincing in the resultant pain. To my astonishment, nobody visibly writhed. I applied more reverse angle on the finger, which elicited a groan, two people deep. Pulling the arm forward I was able to draw the attacker toward me. I estimated that if he were to stand at perfect attention, he might break the five-foot mark. For his size, he sure had an annoyingly sharp finger. Having been distracted by his probing made me realize that perhaps this was a ruse to steal my computer. I decided that the small bruise that would form would be a minimal expense to pay if my laptop were stolen. So, I released his hand and finger, and swiftly felt for my carrying case. Thankfully, it was still there.
The little man that was causing me such an annoyance stepped forward, massaging his wrist and visibly displaying that I had inflicted some sort of retaliatory pain on his finger. As a precautionary maneuver, I began to step back in case he was accelerating to a frontal, less cloaked, attack.
He looked up at me, and through squinting eyes and clenched teeth said, “Hey, why did you do that to me?”
Staying on guard, I kept my hands close to my side, at the ready position to defend myself in case he leapt toward me.
“All I was trying to do was get your attention. You were so focused looking in the other direction that I couldn’t get a response from you. So, I poked you in the side. You didn’t need to amputate my finger.”
With throngs of people still swirling around us, I felt his conciliatory tone ease the tension of the moment. I lowered my guard, but only just slightly. His wince turned into a half smile. Being as I am a six-foot man, looking down at this short, stocky fellow, meant that I would have to redirect my precautionary peripheral vision dangerously away from the crowd flowing about me. I wasn’t so sure that I wanted to do that. So I glanced at him, as I threw a terse response back, “Who are you? And why are you poking me in my ribs?” I immediately looked back up again, always the defensive position in this unfriendly environment.
“I told you, I wanted to get your attention, but you wouldn’t look at me,” came his sarcastic response.
“Wouldn’t look at you,” I found myself responding defensively. “Sir, I couldn’t even see you in this mob.” I nearly had to shout at him in the din of noisy bazaar bargain shoppers. Every concessionaire seemed to have three or four people haggling with him at once. It was a wonder that any business ever was transacted. Furthermore, how could these vendors ever make a profit if no one ever paid list price? I made a note to myself that I should do a story on that some day.
“Oh, is that a joke about short people?” was his wry response.
“No, of course not. It was the truth.” I couldn’t believe that I was actually stooping, in more ways than one, to talk to this man. “You have to admit, you are not a giant among men.”
“That hurts, sir. We have only just met, and now you are poking fun at me, belittling me and my stature.”
“I