It was ten o’clock at night. For hours, Mustafa had watched and listened while Brother Peter slipped in and out of intelligibility. At the moment, the dying man was raving again. Something about Joseph, Mary, and Jesus’s flight into Egypt. Hard to follow, even though the name of Jesus, an early prophet of God, was certainly familiar to Mustafa.

“Herod, Herod sent his men after them. Don’t you remember? Don’t you remember? But Herod was a Jew, wasn’t he? These were Arabs. Remember them, mate? Rich, rich Arabs.’’

Mustafa listened more closely. He remembered when there had been rich Arabs in Van, asking questions.

“Running from them. Mary and baby Jesus. No more Joseph. Joseph died on Mount Ararat looking for the Ark.’’ Brother Peter shook his head fiercely. “Not Joseph. French name. Philippe! Yes, great man. My savior. Where is he?”

Mustafa sat very still. The Arabs, he recalled, had offered large amounts of money for information about a woman and child who had been with a man named Philippe.

“Then Joseph died,” Peter went on wildly. “So Peter had to take them. Peter. On this rock will I build my church. Took them in the van, remember the van we had? The van from Van.”

“Where did you take them?” ventured Mustafa.

“Egypt! Herod’s men hot after us. Was it Egypt? Bloody ugly city, it was.” For a while, Mustafa interjected questions, trying to channel Peter’s ramblings. It was like conversing with a sleepwalker, but at last, he had the bones of the tale. It was Brother Peter who had smuggled the rich man’s wife and son out of Van those many years ago, taking them to Erzurum—or maybe Ankara—in the mission’s old panel truck. No one around Van would have thought twice about seeing it on the road; it was as familiar as dust. To the airport in Erzurum. Or Ankara. Something about papers, new papers.

That was all Peter had to tell, now or ever. Toward midnight, with one last shout for Jesus, he fell silent. Then he was gone.

Mustafa did as he had been told. He did not touch the body, but locked the room behind him, removed the mask and gown, drenched himself in a fluid that smelled of alcohol, and called the hospital. Told to wait, he did. Hours later, to his astonishment and great fear, two foreigners—European doctors working for something called the U.N.—arrived. They praised him for following orders; he might have saved many lives, they said. Then they confined him to a room in the mission.