The Oracle Year(18)

A vision popped into Jonas’ head, very clear—the reverend’s wife opening the study door some hours from now, and finding both her husband and his assistant dead on the rug before the fireplace, poisoned from the fumes generated by some ancient preservative.

Jonas stepped forward and put a hand on Branson’s arm.

“Please stop, Reverend. What are . . . what are you doing?”

Hosiah swiveled his eyes toward Jonas. Sweat was pouring down his forehead, beading in his eyebrows. He wiped it away with his sleeve.

“That prediction was a direct attack, Jonas! He’s trying to destroy my credibility—make me a joke. And not just me, either. Hindus, Muslims . . . we’ll all get it. We can’t compete. The Oracle hasn’t come out and said he’s the voice of God yet, but it’s only a matter of time, and then . . . a prophet whose predictions actually come true? We’re done. Faith is fickle, I’m sorry to say. The Oracle’s doing what we do, just . . . better, and people are paying attention. Shifting their loyalties. The Site’s only been up for three months and our donations are down by . . .”

“Fourteen percent,” Jonas answered, without hesitation.

“Fourteen percent,” Branson echoed, nodding his head. “We have to stop him. I won’t let my life’s work be ruined by some charlatan.”

“Charlatan?” Jonas said. “I mean . . . the predictions he’s making . . .”

“Yes, a charlatan. A fraud,” Branson said. “I can admit to some doubt, early on. That prediction about me . . . pepper on my steak . . . I couldn’t get my head around it. Not at first. That’s why I had to take this time—these days away—just to think it through. But now . . . I know what to do.

“We’ll take him down, Jonas. You and me, and some of my powerful friends. It’ll work. I know it. After all, we’ve got God on our side.”

Branson smiled again—that neon-bright grin.

“Do you really think it’ll be that easy, Reverend?” Jonas said. “I mean, the Oracle does seem to be able to predict things before they happen. We don’t know what else he’s capable of. What powers he might have.”

“No. We’ll be fine,” Branson said.

“But . . . how do you know?”

“The Oracle isn’t a god. He’s got no magic. He’s just a man. Without a doubt. Do you know how I know that?”

“How, sir?”

“Because he fucked up.”

Branson eased himself down onto one of the couches, the leather creaking under him.

“He got rattled,” Branson said. “He sent that prediction at me like a sniper’s bullet, like some kind of attack, but it’ll bite him in the ass, I promise you that.”

He sipped Jonas’ sherry, savoring it, taking his time.

“I didn’t see it at first. I’ll admit, I was probably a little rattled myself. The Site is so pervasive . . . even I sometimes forget that it’s all a lie. But I tell you this—there is nothing supernatural about the Oracle.

“The fool said I’ll supposedly put pepper on my steak on such and such a date. Well, I have a choice, don’t I? I have free will. When the time comes, Jonas . . . it’s simple. I just won’t do it.”

“But I don’t see how . . .”

“Because,” Branson said. “I’ll have that steak live, in the ministry’s cathedral, on television, with the signal going out all over the world. And I’ll lift that pepper shaker, and then I’ll look at it, and I’ll smile, and I’ll set it right back down, unshook.

“Everyone on the planet will see that the Oracle can be wrong. And between now and then, we’ll use every resource this organization has at its disposal, every connection I have, every favor I’m owed, to find him. We will name him, and we will take away his power, and that . . . will be that.”

He raised his sherry glass and drained it.

“The Oracle gave us the weapon we’ll use to defeat him. He fucked up. That’s how I know he’s just a man.”

Branson shifted his gaze toward the fireplace, the flames fueled by blackened, smoking, shattered saints.

“God doesn’t make mistakes.”





Chapter 8




At his kitchen table, surrounded by stacks of thick-bound books and scattered web page printouts, Hamza examined the table of contents of The Swiss National Bank Law: A Treatise. He flipped to the section on international currency exchange regulations.

Even the introductory paragraph was a rat’s nest—a set of sentences so convoluted that they had to be combed for meaning like a weaver preparing wool.

Hamza sighed and began to take notes.

Fifteen minutes later, as he was attempting to understand the reasons Switzerland preferred to keep its American dollar reserves in money market accounts, he heard a phone ring. Without taking his eyes from the page he was reading, he reached across the table for his phone.

And then he realized it wasn’t his cell phone that was ringing. The sound was coming from the bedroom, where Miko was grading papers. Also where he had set up the extremely secure (and extremely expensive) satellite line he was using to maintain contact with a very select group of people.

Hamza’s eyes shot up from the book, and he half rose out of his chair.