“How can one defile a grave in which there are no bodies?” I roared between pulls. I ignored his repeated pleas, tugging back on the wood, again and again, until the huge stone began to rock on its cradle of small supporting boulders. I kicked away some of the stones and pulled again. The stone budged, just a little. I pulled and strained. It trembled a few inches and then a few more. I dropped the pole and leaned against the stone with my shoulder. Sweat, salty and hot, ran into my eyes and down my cheeks and into my mouth. I was gasping for air. My chest hurt. I pushed. I grunted. I slipped and fell to my knees, still putting all my weight against the stubborn stone until it yielded reluctantly—six inches, then a foot, two feet—until at last I had managed to roll it completely aside from the mouth of the grave. Then I slid down the cliff’s smooth wall, spent.

Joseph stood over me, his two hands pressed tightly against both sides of his face. “Matthias, what have you done? May God forgive you. May God forgive me for bringing you here.”

I patted the hard stone beneath me. “Joseph, sit here, please.”

He knelt on one knee instead, with his head turned so that he could not see into the tomb. I reached out and touched his cheek, gently.

“Listen to me, please. Earlier you said that I was the investigator and you were my guide, did you not?”

He nodded sadly.

“And you brought me here, after I made that dumb wish on the Carson program, so that I could discover the truth for myself, whatever that may be, correct?”

He nodded again.

“There were no loopholes in that deal, were there? I could go anywhere, look at anything, and talk to anyone in my search for the truth, right?”

Without turning, he pointed back over his shoulder toward the tomb. “And you expect to find the truth in there?”

“I don’t know.”

“All you will find in there, Matthias, are three empty shelves and a few worms.”

“Perhaps—perhaps not.”

“But what else could possibly be in there? What are you looking for, my son?”

“I’m looking for the remains of a body.”

“A body? Whose body?”

“The body of Jesus.”

For a moment I thought he was going to faint. “Jesus?” he cried. “Why would you expect to find his remains here? Why?”