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Collingwoods in Cairo through a mutual friend. Though he had always been a zealous Muslim, he had developed a casual friendship with the Collingwoods. Before leaving Cairo for the United States when Esther’s health problems increased, the American couple had invited him to look them up in the States.
    Then two years previous, Dakkar had come to the United States to pursue graduate school. But he had dropped out and asked the Collingwoods for a job. Bill had recommended him to Roland Dupree, knowing that the young Arab had had experience training and riding Arabians for a Saudi family—and later, for a wealthy family in Egypt.
    Now Dakkar stood in the doorway, staring at Bill.
    â€œYou look like you’ve got something on your mind,” his boss said with a smile. He pushed himself back from the old wooden desk.
    â€œWhat is it?” Bill asked, probing.
    â€œMr. Collingwood—I had a talk with Mr. Dupree yesterday. I’m very worried…about my job…you think that I’m doing a good job, right?”
    Collingwood nodded. “Sure. I do. I’m a little concerned that sometimes you show up late and leave early. You know—you and I had a talk about your hours—”
    â€œRight. Absolutely,” Dakkar added quickly. “And I’ve been trying to do better. Much better. But Mr. Dupree, he says he’s thinking about firing me. Says he is tired of my not doing the right hours. Coming in at the perfect time. I had told him I couldn’t work one Saturday…and I didn’t think he’d been too upset about that. But now he says he doesn’t know if he wants to keep me. Is there something—please, sir—that you can do?”
    Bill Collingwood paused for a moment.
    â€œI’ll tell you what I’ll do. I’ll talk to Mr. Dupree for you. I’ll put in a good word.”
    The younger man’s face brightened.
    â€œOkay, thank you. Thank you so much, Mr. Collingwood,” he said with relief.
    Then he disappeared from the doorway.
    Collingwood turned back to his paperwork, but he still couldn’t focus. He was thinking about the implications for Gilead if he ended up being convicted of a criminal offense, even if it was a misdemeanor. A conviction would likely mean he would be disqualified from finishing at the mission school. Gilead had completed the first year before he’d dropped out and taken the position as pastor in West Virginia. Bill had been secretly hoping and praying that Gilead would complete his missionary training, and then return to the Middle East with the same missionary organization through which Collingwood and his wife had worked for more than two decades.
    Though Gilead had spoken little of returning to mission school and completing his training, Bill had hoped it would be so. But now, with the criminal charges…
    At least , the veteran missionary thought to himself, Will Chambers agreed to take the case. That was a blessing. But whether he can win the case remains to be seen.

11
    V IRGINIA D ISTRICT C OURT WAS IN SESSION in the courtroom of Judge Lawton Hadfeld, where testimony in the criminal misdemeanor trial of Gilead Amahn had taken up most of the morning.
    In his early forties, Hadfeld had been a judge for nearly a decade. His approach to the law was not particularly elegant, though it was thoroughly practical—having been shaped by general practice of law in Virginia, followed by his years on the district court bench. His court heard the mundane stuff of real life rather than the deeper mysteries of constitutional law—single welfare mothers being evicted, busy executives going eighty-five in a sixty-five-mile-per-hour zone on I-95, homeowners violating the brush-burning ordinances.
    Hadfeld was leaning back in his judge’s chair, rubbing his eyes.
    The prosecution case had started with the testimony of the “imam,” who supervised the worship in the Islamic Center Mosque, and of the