Read 02 _ Maltese Goddess, The for Free Online Page B

anything.”
    “Tell him thanks for me. We’ll stay in touch until we get this job done.”
    I felt better talking to her, and realized I was hungry. I warmed up the stew as instructed by Marissa. It was close enough to dinnertime here. It was really very good.
Fenek,
I decided, meant rabbit. Rabbit stew. The bread was exceptional. It had a very crusty exterior, but the interior would almost melt in your mouth. I had to stop myself from eating the whole loaf, it was that good. There was a pleasant enough bottle of wine, local at that, to wash it all down. Soon I was feeling very mellow.
    Dinner took up all of thirty minutes of the evening. It’s amazing how slowly time goes by when you really just want to go to sleep but won’t let yourself. I’m a firm believer that the way to get over jet lag is to adjust your activities to local time right away even if you have missed a whole night’s sleep on the way over. I told myself I couldn’t go to bed before ten, or maybe nine-thirty. And it was now only six-thirty.
    I went upstairs and unpacked my suitcase. There were hangers in the closet, and the bathroom was fully equipped. There was even a nice, new, white terry bathrobe. Just like a fancy hotel. I had a shower in the white-tiled walk-in shower, and then with a towel around my wet hair and the bathrobe on, I eyed the bed. It looked very good—soft, down duvet, lots of pillows. I succumbed to the temptation.
    A noise woke me sometime later. It was very dark, and it took me a few seconds to remember where I was. I could not identify the noise that had wakened me, but I could tell the wind had come up in the night. My eyes adjusted to the light a little, and I got up and made my way to the window. I did not turn on the bedside light. The house had a goldfish bowl feel to me, with no curtains or shutters, and I would have felt exposed by the light.
    I stood at the window. I found the door to the upstairs deck was unlocked. That didn’t make me feel good, but I stepped out onto the deck. It was a little chilly, but the fog was lifting, the wind whipping it in drifts across the yard.
    As I peered into the darkness, I suddenly saw, or thought I did, at the far end of the yard, the figure of a man, standing very still. He was dressed in dark clothes, his head appeared to be hooded. I shrank back from the railing, my heart pounding. As quietly as possible, I backed into the house and closed and locked the door behind me. Then I went from room to room checking the doors to the balcony. All except mine had been locked. In the dark I made my way down the staircase and checked all the doors on the main floor. They too were locked. From the windows at the back of the house, I peered out into the yard again. I could see no one. The mist lifted, and the moon came out. There was no one there.
    “It’s your imagination, Lara, jet lag,” I said out loud, my voice echoing in the empty room. “Go back to bed.”
    I didn’t think I’d go back to sleep, but I did. I dreamed about a man in dark robes, beckoning me toward the edge of the abyss at the back of the yard.
    THREE
    Temples of stone, huge and round. Megaliths, tons of rock carved with the most primitive of tools, moved without the wheel. What fervor, what piety drives you, the temple builders? It is I. Life, death, rebirth. Built in My image, below ground first, then above, stretched above the sea. Offerings, animal sacrifice, the acrid smell of burning herbs. Then suddenly, silence once again. Where have you gone, you worshipped Me best?
    “Why is he sitting like that?” I asked.
    “Who?” Sophia replied.
    “The bus driver. Why is he sitting way over to the left, on the edge of the seat, and reaching back over to the steering wheel?”
    “Because Jesus is driving the bus, not him,” she said.
    Alex had told me that Malta is a devoutly Catholic country, but I had no idea of the extent of it. Part of me, the cynical part, wanted to laugh out loud. Another side of me ached