Matthias? Gift of God. One of the many variations of Matthew. I had been christened Matteo, after an Italian grandfather on my mother’s side. Always hated it, so I had been Matt since grade school.

How did he know my name? The old boy was smiling, nodding and extending his hand in a silent invitation for me to sit up. When I did and looked around I almost lapsed back into unconsciousness.

The room we were in would have done justice to any royal palace in the world. Above was a vaulted ceiling of dark azure on which small metallic castings of gold and silver had been mounted to simulate the stars and planets of the heavens. The rectangular floor was completely inlaid with complex designs of multicolored stone chips, and at the mosaic’s center was a small pool being fed from the open mouth of a life-size marble lion. Surrounding the oval pool were silver-embossed flower boxes containing varieties of sweet-smelling flowers that I could not identify.

The old man who called himself Joseph watched with unconcealed amusement as I turned my head in awe and instinctively continued with my cataloging. The walls were paneled. in a dark wood, probably walnut, each serving as a backdrop for highly polished bronze and silver mirrors that hung above tables inlaid with tortoise shell on which were displayed intricate carvings of trees and animals in pale pink ivory. In each corner stood a bronze three-legged brazier banked high with coals, and through the only window, set high from the floor, I could see the tops of cypress trees swaying placidly against a sky of turquoise and copper tints.

Finally I got around to inventorying myself. The gold Omega wristwatch and wide-band wedding ring were missing. All my usual clothing was gone, replaced by a knee-length tunic that felt like linen and was belted at the waist by a thin strip of leather. Down the side of this material was a single purple stripe, approximately one inch wide, running from shoulder to hem, front and back, and underneath this simple outer garment I was wearing a soft loincloth of the same material. On the floor, beside the ornate couch, were two leather-thonged sandals.

So complete was my sense of disorientation that this all struck me as being low comedy, as if I had suddenly become part of a fraternity hazing and was finally getting repaid, in kind, for all the pranks I had pulled through the years. I began to laugh—hysterically, I’m sure. “Well, Joseph, if I’ve been kidnapped, whoever is doing it certainly has some class, I’ll say that for them. This is a lot better than being stuffed in the trunk of an automobile.”

“But you have not been kidnapped, Matthias.”

“Oh, no? What is it, then? Am I dead? Did that clown really hit me so hard? And if I’m dead, where am I? Is this heaven or—?”