When Professor Silver went downstairs at 7 a.m., Ezekiel’s beige taxicab was waiting at the curb. The cabby had brought an extra cup of coffee for his passenger, but the sun was already up, and Silver could not drink it. Instead he held the rim of the plastic cup near his nose and enjoyed the aroma. Observing the daily fast during the month of Ramadan had given him renewed pride in his faith and endowed him with a sense of invincibility. Allah was on his side.
They drove through the quiet streets of central Jerusalem. Bus service didn’t run during the Sabbath, and the sidewalks were filled with religious Jews marching to their various synagogues, prayer shawls draped over their shoulders.
“You slept well?” Ezekiel turned the radio to soft Hebrew music.
“Blessed be the Lord.”
“The room nice? Bed comfortable?”
“Can’t complain.” Talking irritated the bruise inside Silver’s mouth. He hoped it would not start bleeding again.
The roads were coal-black with fresh asphalt, cut into the hillside crudely, as if there was no time to worry about aesthetics. New apartment buildings and homes passed by. They drove through a valley and climbed a crest along the Judean Mountains’ watershed, where they crossed the road to Ramallah. Silver tried to read the road signs, shifting his focus left and right to confuse the blotch. While the car stopped at a red light, he was able to decipher a sign pointing right: Hebrew University-Mount Scopus Campus. Large buildings of white stone covered the hillside.
The greenery of western Jerusalem gave way to the arid rocks of the West Bank. The descent was rapid, the road skirting massive clusters of red roofs, part of the Jews’ effort to encircle Jerusalem. Silver smiled. Man plans, and Allah laughs.
Ezekiel asked, “Enjoying the ride?”
“Beautiful,” Silver exclaimed. “We’re settling the Promised Land, as the prophets predicted.”
“The prophets predicted a lot of things. Have you read Ezekiel lately?” The driver laughed, his ringlets dancing around his bald pate.
Silver didn’t respond, his attention drawn to a clump of tents on a flat piece of desert. Camels grazed on yellow weeds. A woman in a head-to-toe garment tended a small fire while boys in jeans chased a scrawny goat.
“Bedouins,” Ezekiel explained, “the last free people on earth.”
It was true, Silver thought. Despite their primitive ways, a family of Bedouins had managed to save him. One day, when Palestine was united under Arab rule, he would find his Bedouins and reward their long-ago charity.
Farther down toward the Jordan Valley, they stopped at an Israeli checkpoint. A concrete wall stretched in both directions, dissecting the land. Two soldiers approached the car, guns at the ready. Silver grabbed the door handle, faking calmness.
Ezekiel lowered his window. “Shalom!”
The soldiers glanced inside and waved them through.
The landscape resembled the Arizona desert, the road cutting through pale-brown rocks as it continued its descent. “Hold your breath,” Ezekiel joked, pointing to a blue billboard at the side of the downhill road: Sea Level
For the first time since the TIR Prize ceremony, Masada slept through the night, uninterrupted by the gravity-defying nightmares. Morning sun flooded the room through the east-facing window, and she cringed at the memory of fainting in the bar the previous night. She had not drunk alcohol in years, let alone two tall beers on an empty stomach after almost three sleepless nights. Tara, on the other hand, seemed unaffected by the booze. She revived Masada, enlisted a couple of guys to carry her to the car, and got her to bed at the Ramban Hostel.
When Masada eased her legs off the bed, the pain she expected didn’t come. In the bathroom, her forehead seemed almost clear of Al’s beating.
Voices filtered in through the door, adults and children babbling in French as they headed to Sabbath morning services. She wondered how Ness had managed to get an air force plane and a pilot to entertain Tara on the holy Sabbath. He must have labeled it national emergency. It occurred to Masada that nothing would spoil his plans worse than her presence.
She had just enough time to shower, strap on the brace, put on clothes, and run downstairs with her hair still wet.
Tara was waiting in the lobby, chatting up the acne face at the front desk. She flashed a big smile at Masada, mimicked with her hand a plane taking off, and declared, “To the colonel and beyond!”
“How do you manage to look like this so early?”
“Good genes and lots of base.” Tara leaned over the counter, closer to the wide-eyed youth. “How about two bottles of water, sweetie?”
He dropped his handheld electronic game and rushed off.
Masada left her room key on the counter. “I’m going to ruin your date.”
“It’s not a date.” Tara laughed. “Merely sightseeing.”
“The only sightseeing you’ll get from Ness is a twisted view of innocent little Israel, so vulnerable without America’s weapons. He’ll skip the nuclear missiles and army installations and the social Grand Canyon separating rich from poor, secular from religious-”
“Chill out, girl! It’s Saturday!” Tara grabbed the water bottles, winked at the young man, and pushed Masada to the door. “Let’s have some fun, shall we?”
Starting her rented car, Tara tilted her head at the hostel entrance. “How’s the hunky rabbi doing?”
“I don’t care how he’s doing.” Masada drank some water. “I care what he’s done.”
Rabbi Josh pressed his back against the wall at the bottom of the stairs, listening in case Masada returned. What was she up to now? Ingratiating herself with the TV reporter to conjure up the next media attack on Israel? Whatever it was, he had to expose her, and stop her.
He draped the prayer shawl around his shoulders and stepped into the lobby. The front desk clerk was standing at the glass doors watching the departing women. Rabbi Josh noticed Masada’s room key on the counter and snatched it. Before the clerk turned, the rabbi tiptoed to the staircase and headed up, the stolen key in his hand.
“It is with pride and gratitude,” Elizabeth announced, “that I accept this award from the honorable minister.” She marked the spot in her notes to insert the dignitary’s name and full title before the ceremony. “I thank Allah for the opportunity to serve the Palestinian cause. My success in America grew from my modest roots here. First and foremost, I am a Palestinian woman. Celebrating with you today constitutes an affirmation of my commitment to Palestine.”
She lowered the pages of her draft speech and bowed at the certain applause. She looked through the open window at the Jerusalem skyline, which for this rehearsal represented the audience at Kalandria.
“Today I set aside painful memories.” She paused, thinking of the crude midwife who had investigated her repeat miscarriages with thick, probing fingers. “The foundations of my character and success were laid here, at this refugee camp.” She glanced sideways to where Father would stand on the dais, his eyes surely moistened. “I feel-”
An explosion shook the building.
Elizabeth ran to the window and looked for smoke. From her childhood in the West Bank she knew the sound of a bomb. Nine stories below, a small car with flashing lights raced up the street. A moment later, a fire engine passed, its siren wailing. The Jews’ peaceful Sabbath was no more.
She resumed her speech, more loudly to overcome the noise. “I feel redeemed by this award. Allah had a purpose in sending me to America so that one day I could help Palestine. Father,” she turned, “I now know that you served as Allah’s hand in fulfilling my destiny.”
Father would hug and kiss her, their reconciliation complete. She marked the spot on the page with a little heart.
“I live far away, but my heart belongs here.” She pressed a fist to her chest. “My career is in America, but my future is here with you.” She touched her abdomen then removed her hand quickly. Remember not to do it on the stage!
Elizabeth inhaled deeply, releasing the air in small bits, surveying the imagined audience from left to right. “To help our national dream come true, I decided to establish the Palestinian Women’s League, dedicated to equal rights and opportunities for all Palestinian women, irrespective of age or marital status, to offer job training and family counseling.” She raised her hand, expecting some grumbling-Kalandria was dominated by the Islamists, as she had learned from news reports. “I respect tradition, but the success of our national enterprise requires that we utilize every human resource in our collective possession.” She combed her hair back with calculated femininity. “How can we neglect half of our national creativity? Half of our industrial force? Half of our intellectual power?” She left the question hanging in the air for a moment. “We can’t! We mustn’t! No more!”
The sound of the explosion made Rabbi Josh stumble. He murmured a short prayer for the victims as he imagined blood and gore and wails of grief. Now he was part of it, not just in words, but in physical reality. As an Israeli citizen, he was a target, not only of Arab terrorism, but of Masada’s anti-Israel scheme. He cringed, recalling how she had manipulated him, pretending to be the victim of Israeli agents. Soon the world would learn the truth, and Americans’ anger at Israel would dissipate.
He climbed the remaining stairs two at a time. Room 511 was down the hall, second from last. He unlocked Masada’s door and slipped inside.
The first thing he noticed was Professor Silver’s book on the night table. The rabbi had read it back when Silver had joined Temple Zion. It seemed like a long time ago, but he still remembered how the book unsettled him with its cool analysis of the world’s indifference to the Jews’ plight at the hands of the methodical Nazis.
A cream blouse hung in the open closet and a laundry bag rested on the floor, the thin strap of a bra peeking out. Rabbi Josh hesitated. First he stole her keys, then trespassing, and now voyeurism. Levy would quote the verse “Sins love company.”
But wasn’t she the sinner, trying to destroy Israel? And wasn’t he one of her intended victims? God specifically ordered, “He who rises to kill you, rise first and kill him.”
He held Masada’s laundry bag upside down and shook it violently.
They watched Colonel Ness park his minivan and roll the wheelchair onto a hydraulic tray that lowered him to the ground. “Apologies for my tardiness.” He steered off the loading tray, which folded back into the minivan.
“We were about to leave,” Masada said. They had waited at the address he had given Tara at a business park south of Jerusalem.
Ness propelled his wheelchair across the parking lot toward a three-story office building.
Tara asked, “What was that explosion?”
“A synagogue near the Zion Plaza. Suicide bomber from Hebron, dressed as an Orthodox Jew.”
Tara caught up with him. “How many hurt?”
“Don’t know yet.” He circled the building.
“Hold on.” Masada grabbed Tara’s arm. On a Sabbath morning, the area was deserted. “Aren’t we driving to the airport?”
Ness rolled down the path, around another corner and through a gate in a brick wall. In the middle of an enclosed courtyard, a small helicopter sat idle, its transparent bubble reflecting the sun. Ness lined up his wheelchair with the cockpit, opened the door, and hoisted himself into the pilot seat.
“I don’t think so.” Masada exhaled loudly. “Let’s do breakfast instead.”
Tara asked, “Where’s the pilot?”
“You’re looking at him.” Ness adjusted the headphones over his white hair. He gripped a stick that protruded from the floor between his stumps and moved it around. “A child could fly this thing.” He twisted a handle, which was attached by steel wires to a set of pedals.
Tara settled into the middle seat. “Come aboard. Be bold.”
“Be suicidal.” Masada forced her right leg to bend enough at the knee to get it through the door. “Does this thing have airbags?”
They put on safety harnesses and bulky headphones. Ness started the engine. The small craft shook and rattled as the rotors gained speed.
They began to rise, the earth distancing from their feet under the transparent floor.
“Hoo ha,” Tara cheered, her voice tinny through the headphones.
Colonel Ness exchanged a few sentences with air traffic control while lifting straight up and veered left over the office building, through a crevice between two hills, and higher into the open air, passing a cluster of apartment buildings, wide roads with sparse traffic, a large hotel on the right, and a green area that bordered an expansive cemetery. “Veterans,” he said, “mostly from the Yom Kippur War.” He pointed to a group of white, rectangular buildings around a mushroom-like structure. “The National Museum of Israel. The round building has the Dead Sea Scrolls. You should go see it. The ancient text proves how long Jewish life has existed here.”
Masada was getting used to the weightlessness of midair suspension. “It proves that Jewish hermits once hid in desert caves from the gentiles who actually ruled this land.”
Pushing forward on the stick, Ness said, “The scrolls talk extensively about the Jewish kingdom and life at the time of the temple.”
“Reminiscent fantasies,” Masada said, “about a brief, glorious past.”
“We’ve restored that glory.” Ness pointed to a large square structure. “The Knesset. Our legislature.” He turned slightly toward a group of massive office buildings on the next hill. “Government ministries.” Flying in a circle over an elaborate set of arches, he gestured at a glass-and-stone complex. “The Supreme Court, completing the three branches of government on equal elevation at the three points of a triangle.” He directed the chopper at the rising sun, passing over a forested valley and higher over the vast city. “There’s the King David Hotel.” Tilting the stick right to avoid communication antennas, he pointed again. “Hebrew Union College.”
“The Reform Movement’s seminary,” Masada said. “Is that where Rabbi Josh studied?”
Tara glanced at the colonel.
“Rabbi who?” He slowed the helicopter until it remained stationary in midair, the Old City spread in front of them. “After two thousand years, we returned to King David’s city and created a modern state with high technology and democratic institutions.”
“Hardly democratic,” Masada said. “You’ve got a quarter-million Arabs simmering in East Jerusalem and another-”
“I’m most proud,” Ness cut her off, “of how quickly we’ve achieved all this. In less than half a century we practically rebuilt David’s kingdom from scratch.”
“Another myth,” Masada said, raising her voice as he pulled up, the engine roaring. “King David ruled the whole middle east, with armies and slaves and huge trade. Israel today is a fraction of that kingdom, and even his empire didn’t last long after his death. Jews never ruled themselves here for an extended period of time.”
“King David’s kingdom lasted five centuries. If we are determined and united, we will thrive much longer.” Ness glanced at her over Tara’s head. “You’ve turned into a defeatist, Masada. Where’s your fighting spirit?”
“Don’t speak to me about fighting spirit-you of all people!” She glared at him. “My brother would be alive if you had any fighting spirit, and the Arab who killed him would have been dead for sure.”
Ness accelerated, the noise preventing further conversation. They flew over barren land, the desert sloping gently eastward into the Jordan Valley and the Dead Sea.
Professor Silver got out of the taxi. It was hot, and the flat water of the Dead Sea idled at the edge of the unpaved parking area. A limp Israeli flag hung beside a gate topped with rolls of barbed wire. Sulfuric odors made him gag, and he recalled how Faddah had complained all those years ago.
Ezekiel put on a straw hat and went to the guard booth. It was attended by an armed man in short khakis, who was at least as old as Silver, yet tanned and alert. Ezekiel explained that the professor, an Oleh Hadash from America, was trying to find a relative who was involved in rescuing survivors from the 1982 accident on Mount Masada.
The kibbutznik let them in through the gate, handed them a map of the kibbutz, and pointed to an electric golf cart parked under a tree.
They drove by several squat buildings, including a library, a school, and a communal dining hall. Farther up, steel wagons, loaded with gray towels and off-white sheets, lined up along another structure. The electric cart hopped over ridges and cracks in the aging asphalt path. Higher on the hillside they passed modest cottages and a children’s playground. The view to the south was dominated by the sheer cliffs of Mount Masada, which stunned Silver with the improbability of their height.
Ezekiel slowed down, his hand waving grandly at the scene. “Beauty and history combined!”
Silver looked all the way up the cliffs. He remembered his son rolling through the air, over and over, screaming. A sob edged up his throat. He turned away, hiding his contorted face.
A helicopter appeared over Mount Masada, above the crumbling ruins at the edge, where the ancient fort clung to the rocks over the abyss.
“This guy’s too close,” Ezekiel commented. “He’ll clip the mountain.”
Choked up, Silver could not respond.
“Here we are.” Ezekiel stopped the cart. “Goodness, this is a big cemetery.”
Elizabeth wasn’t sure about the name. She considered The Palestinian Women’s Freedom League. But Freedom implied that Palestinian women were not free yet, which could insult some. Women of Palestine-Unite! She chuckled. Too old-fashioned. She liked her original idea: The Palestinian Women’s League. But with the abundance of groups, movements, and parties, an organization’s success depended on clarity of message.
The Palestinian Women’s Civil Rights League? The clerics would resent the Americanized phrase. She needed something more positive, hopeful, yet non-confrontational.
She glanced at the phone, willing it to ring. Once contact was established, she would no longer worry about the arrangements for her award ceremony.
Advancement! She tried it out loud. “I’m honored to announce the formation of The Palestinian Women’s Advancement League, dedicated to creating opportunities for the women of Palestine.”
Satisfied, she decided to brave the hotel lobby again. It occurred to her that a message might have been left at the front desk. With their strange Sabbath rules, the Jews might not ring her room.
The lobby was filled with talk of the explosion. A heavy odor of overcooked food hung in the air. The front desk was vacant, and a sign said: No registration or checkout until sunset.
“Can I help you?” A young woman in hotel uniform approached Elizabeth.
“Could you check if I received a message? My name is Elizabeth McPherson.”
The woman disappeared through a door marked Staff Only.
Rabbi Josh shook Masada’s laundry bag again, but nothing else fell from it. He poked the few clothing items. What was he hoping to find?
Voices in the hallway made him pause. Had the front desk clerk realized Masada’s key was missing?
The voices moved on.
In the closet he found a single blouse and Masada’s remarkably long pants. He went through the pockets, which were empty. Her clothes emitted her unique scent, and he thought of their last kiss.
He dropped her pants on the floor and slammed the closet door. The loud bang reminded him of Al’s gunshot, and he thought of the final flicker of life departing Raul’s eyes. Pain overwhelmed him, and he leaned against the wall, trying to fight back the tide of sorrow. But it was too much. He started crying, unable to hold back, the way Raul had cried over a broken toy or a scraped knee.
A few minutes later he calmed down. There was no point in fighting these abrupt bursts of crying. Having grieved for Linda, he had learned that peaks of sorrow, alternating with valleys of emptiness and eruptions of rage, were part of the mourning process that would continue until he accepted God’s judgment and the permanence of an abominable reality.
He looked around Masada’s room. The bed was not made, the indentation left by her body still visible. He removed the bedspread and felt around the sheets. Peeking under the mattress, he found nothing. The drawers in both nightstands were empty, as were the armoire and the vanity.
Three knocks sounded from the door.
He froze, uncertain what to do.
Another three knocks.
The clerk must have noticed!
Approaching the door, the rabbi understood. This was God’s response to his thievery. A divine thumb-down. Defeated, he reached for the door knob.
“King Herod’s private villa.” Colonel Ness controlled the hovering helicopter over the three-level palace. A narrow set of crumbling stairs led down to a circular balcony suspended on fabricated walls off the northern tip of Mount Masada. “He built it as a floating garden, watered regularly from the deep cistern carved into the rocks. It was a thing of beauty in this desert, and remained green even a hundred years later, when the Zealots came to hide here.”
The craft moved higher, over the casement wall of connecting rooms that surrounded the mountaintop at the edge of the cliff. Looking down through the transparent plastic floor, Masada recognized the place, She shut her eyes.
Ness held the craft above the room, right at the edge. “Right here, our lives changed forever.” Dust swirled in all directions, hiding everything but the roofless hostage room under their feet. “Masada lost her brother. I lost my legs. And we lost each other.”
Masada bit her lips.
He reached over and patted her thigh. “It’s good for you. Face your demons. It’s about time you-”
She slapped his hand away, and the chopper swayed in the air, banking sharply to the right, barely missing the cliff. The ruined citadel got away from them in a hurry as the chopper dropped into the gorge, then pulled up roughly and looped around between the rocky cliffs.
Tara hollered.
They ascended higher along the steep rocks opposite Mount Masada. Ness cleared a protrusion of boulders and eased down on a patch of flat dirt. He pressed a series of switches, and the rotors began to slow down.
Across the gulch, Herod’s citadel was in full view against the background of the Dead Sea. When the rotors stopped and the cloud of dust settled, Masada removed the harness and got out. She proceeded along the crest, out of view, and found a narrow crevice, where she bent over and convulsed, before sobbing burst out of her. She cried openly, with loud wails that didn’t sound like her. She cried like she had never cried before, and in the back of her mind, on a different level of consciousness, she was awed at being able to cry like this.
Finally the sobs subsided to sniffles. She wiped her face and stole a glance at the ruined fort across the deep gorge. She focused on the casement wall at the edge. Despite the distance, she could see the room, the low line of blocks that remained of the fallen outer wall. She remembered pulling the skinny Arab over it, into the void, and the other Arab yelling behind his mask, “Faddah! Faddah!”
She stood and looked at the distant bottom, where the young Arab had landed next to Srulie. Bending down, she touched the brace, feeling the outline of the bone in its sheath. “I miss you, Srulie.” She wiped her face. “Oh, God, how I miss you.” And as she said it, Masada realized that she missed even more the young woman who had landed on the mountaintop that night, filled with optimism and love, eager for an exciting future that never materialized.
The helicopter ended its aerobatics over Mount Masada, disappearing to the right, its sound dying down. Professor Silver looked at the vast cemetery and wondered how one kibbutz had produced so many dead people. The gravestones from August 1982 would be next to each other. He would write down the names and go to the office of the kibbutz to ask to meet the relatives. Someone would know where Faddah had been buried, maybe even the whereabouts of the woman soldier.
He noticed a single grave outside the cemetery. He looked again, focusing beside the blotch. He coughed, pounding his own chest until the pressure eased. Could this be it?
“You okay?” Ezekiel held his arm.
He nodded.
The driver pounded Silver’s back. “It’s the atmospheric pressure. You’re standing on the lowest dry land in the whole world.”
“I’ll walk around.” Silver coughed more. “Alone, please.”
“No problem. I’ll fetch us something to drink.” He drove the golf cart down the hillside toward the cottages and checkered plots of vegetables.
Silver followed the fence around the cemetery perimeter, through thorny shrubs and scattered rocks, and reached the isolated concrete slab. There was no name on it, only a crescent and a few numbers. He kneeled, removed his glasses, and gazed sideways. The writing was faded. A drop of sweat fell from the tip of his nose onto the dusty concrete, and he smeared it with his thumb, bringing out the numbers: 19.8.82. The date was written in the European style-day, month, and year. The anonymous corpse was buried here on August 19, 1982.
Faddah.
For years he had dreamt of finding Faddah’s grave, of breaking down and crying over his son. But now, his knees on a concrete slab that covered the boy’s remains, he felt relief, almost joy. It was a new beginning, a chance to correct a terrible wrong.
Silver gazed up at Mount Masada. Had they carried Faddah’s broken body along the whitened shore of the Dead Sea? Had they walked the distance through the desert, or had they thrown him on the back of a tractor? Had they dropped him into a hole in the dirt and laughed at his delicate hands and smooth cheeks?
He looked over the cemetery fence at the manicured flowers adorning the Jews’ graves and seethed at how Faddah had spent decades in this unattended grave. “They’ll pay dearly, my son! The woman who killed you and all the other Jews! Do you hear, Faddah? Your papa won’t fail again!”
The sound of steps made Rabbi Josh pause. Whoever had knocked on the door was walking away! He let go of the knob.
When the hallway outside was quiet again, he turned to face Masada’s room again. On the floor near the bed, he noticed a crumpled napkin. It bore the logo of Maccabee Beer and a few handwritten lines: Find additional connections between Ness amp; Rabbi Josh. Family?School? Mutual friends? Find local past for rabbi. Schooled in Israel? Volunteered in IDF? Developed / maintained friendships?Find rabbi’s rewards. Israeli gov. pension? Apartment? Car?
Sheen-Donor?
Did Sheen give $$$ to rabbi, who then delivered it to Zonshine?
Rabbi Josh read the note again. It made no sense. He recalled Masada calling him Agent Frank. He had assumed she was trying to confuse him, divert attention from her own culpability, but the scribbles on the napkin implied she really believed he was an Israeli agent.
He sat on the bed, confused. Hadn’t Masada dominated Al with sexual favors? Hadn’t Silver heard them clearly? So why was this note implying that she was investigating him, that she was convinced he had used Al to bribe Mahoney on behalf of the Israelis!
He crumpled the napkin and tossed it on the floor. This was too much!
The room suddenly felt too small. He needed air.
Masada returned to the chopper and accepted a can of iced tea from Ness. She listened as he told Tara about the ruins. “See the rectangular shapes over there?” He pointed to the northeast corner of the mountaintop. “These are the storerooms where King Herod kept dried food, enough to support ten thousand soldiers for a whole year.”
Tara whistled. “Who was he afraid of?”
“His Jewish subjects,” Masada said. “Herod was the son of an Edomite slave who converted to Judaism. He took advantage of internal Jewish fighting to convince Rome to make him king of Judea. He even married a Jewish princess, Mariamne the Hashmonaean, but the Jews still hated him.”
“Over there,” Ness pointed, “archeologists found a ritual bath that meets the strictest religious rules. The larger ruin further back is the main palace, which the Zealots later subdivided into small rooms when they holed up here at the end of the Great Revolt against the Romans. They found food, still edible seventy years after Herod’s death, and held out for almost two years. But the Roman army built the earthen ramp, dragged up siege machines, and broke through the wall.”
Tara asked, “That’s when the Zealots jumped off the mountain?”
“They didn’t jump.” He unfolded a green pamphlet. “Josephus wrote that the Zealots realized the Romans would be able to break through in the morning, so they met in the synagogue to discuss it.” He pointed at a ruined structure near the casement wall. “Josephus recites the speech given by their leader, Elazar Ben Yair: “Brave and loyal followers! Long ago we resolved to serve neither the Romans nor anyone other than God, who alone is the true and just Lord of mankind. The time has now come that bids us to prove our determination by our deeds. At such time we must not disgrace ourselves. God has given us the privilege to die nobly and as free men. Let our wives die unabused, our children without the knowledge of slavery. While our hands are free and can hold a sword, let them do a noble service. Let us die unenslaved by our enemies, leave this world as free men in company with our wives and children.”
Tara shook her head. “How sad!”
“How predictable,” Masada said.
Ness gestured at the fort. “They drew lottery to choose the ones who would help them die. In fact, Professor Yadin excavated eleven pottery shards with names. One of the pieces carried the name Ben-Yair.” He folded the pamphlet and stuck it in his pocket. “They believed in freedom, in national sovereignty on God’s Promised Land. They were the last free Jews until, two thousand years later, the modern State of Israel was founded.”
“They weren’t free,” Masada said. “They were captives of fanatic ideology that led to mass suicide. And now they are a myth, modern Zionism’s rallying cry: Masada shall not fall again!”
“Do you want it to fall?” Ness asked.
“It will fall, because Jews can’t live in peace with each other.”
“There are challenges,” he conceded. “But this citadel was a Jewish stronghold, and these stones prove that Jews lived here in freedom while the strongest army in the ancient world spent two years trying to break in. That’s a fact. You agree?”
She shrugged.
“And because there’s so much ballista ammunition left in the fort, it’s clear that Josephus was telling the truth. The zealots allowed the Romans to build this huge ramp up to the wall because they didn’t want to hurt the Jewish slaves whom the Romans used to do the work.”
Masada saw through his reasoning. “A mass suicide is not an example of freedom, but of extremism that leads to a dead end. You people glorify death rather than admit that sovereignty is worthwhile only if it protects lives. You Israelis have a mental sickness: The Masada Complex.”
“True,” Ness said. “When President Nixon accused Golda Meir of suffering from the Masada Complex, Golda responded, We do have a Masada Complex. We have a Pogrom Complex. We also have a Hitler Complex.”
The headphones crackled. Ness put them on and listened.
“Positive,” he said, “we’re on our way.”
“Look at the ramp,” Tara said. “What an engineering wonder.”
Ness flipped a few switches overhead and the engine started. “The Romans perfected siege technology. They knew how to break down the greatest fortifications and the most rebellious spirits.” The rotors sped up, and he raised his voice over the noise. “And to defeat the zealots on Mount Masada, Caesar sent his most brilliant general: Flavius Silva.”
Professor Silver kneeled at Faddah’s grave and promised him that, as soon as the State of Israel ceased to exist, his remains would be transferred to a new Palestinian National Cemetery in Jerusalem, along with all the other martyrs who had sacrificed their lives for the cause.
The helicopter reappeared over Mount Masada, but Silver paid no attention. With renewed clarity of purpose, he followed the rows of gravestones from the entry, looking for the four dead kids. He stopped at a grave that bore a familiar last name: Miriam El-Tal. The next grave was: Shlomo El-Tal.
Despite the heat, Silver felt a chill. El-Tal? Were these relatives of Masada? Perhaps her parents? Both were buried on 13.8.73. He calculated that Masada would have been ten or so. Could it be? Was this her kibbutz? He tried to remember if she had ever mentioned Kibbutz Ben-Yair.
The roar of the helicopter made him look up at Mount Masada, and it hit him. Of course! Her parents must have named her for the mythical mountain they had seen out of their window every day!
Masada. A young orphan.
As the initial shock passed, he realized this was a stroke of luck. Surely Masada knew about what happened in 1982, maybe even the name of the woman soldier who had killed Faddah!
Where was her little brother? She had always spoken of the three deaths in the same sentence, implying they had died together. But the next grave did not carry the name El-Tal. Was the boy only injured, dying weeks or months after the parents? The next few gravestones had other names. Had her brother been buried somewhere else?
Several rows down, he reached a stone dated 19.8.82. The next one was marked with the same date, and the next, and the one after that. The hostages! Four kids who would have lived but for the Israelis’ arrogance!
He wrote down the names, translating the Hebrew letters into English:
Orah Levtov
Dina Shemesh
Devora Almagor
Three girls. The fourth, he knew, would be the boy he had accidently pushed off the mountain. He jotted the first name:
Israel There was a nickname in parentheses: (“Srulie”)
And the family name: El-Tal
Silver stopped writing and peered at the stone:
Israel (“Srulie”) El-Tal
Son of Miriam and Shlomo
Murdered 19.8.82
Seventeen at his death
God Avenge His Blood
How could it be? He touched the letters, tracing each one, the concrete rough against the nerve endings of his fingertip. Israel (“Srulie”) El-Tal.
The roaring engine startled him. The helicopter descended from the mountain and flew across the arid valley, raising a dust storm that stung his skin in a thousand pricks. Fearing for his eye, he buried his face in his hands, bowing down until his forehead rested on the slab that covered Masada’s little brother.
“These tomatoes go to Europe.” Ness pointed at the greenhouses. “The hot weather and our advanced irrigation techniques give four crops a year. They use multi-level soil boxes to multiply field surface six times.” The helicopter hovered above a water tower. “The whole of Israel is smaller than Lake Michigan, so we have to produce more tomatoes per acre than any country in the world. Add efficient air transport and access to retail outlets, and you have speed and freshness. Within forty-eight hours of being picked, these tomatoes reach European consumers’ salad bowls.”
“And within another four hours,” Masada said, “their toilet bowls.”
Ness pushed on the stick, taking them low over the red roofs of Kibbutz Ben-Yair. She caught glimpses of her childhood-the narrow asphalt paths, the dining hall where members had met for hours to argue over socialism, the children’s house higher on the hillside, with swings and a tree house, now painted red, yellow, and green rather than the peeling white she remembered.
They came full circle over the crest of a hill, returning to the kibbutz cemetery, facing the blue water and the mountains across.
“It’s gorgeous,” Tara said. “Absolutely magnificent!”
Masada nodded. “The best spot is always reserved for our dead.”
“Let’s make a stop,” Ness said, “and pay our respects to your parents and brother.”
“No!”
“It’ll be good for you.” Ness maneuvered to land at a field bordering the cemetery. “Somebody’s down there. Let me land before he chokes on dust.”
She reached over Tara and pushed his hand on the stick. The helicopter tilted upward, and the engine uttered a tortured clattering.
“Hey!” Ness shoved the stick forward. Red lights flashed on the instrument panel. They lifted sharply, swayed from side to side, and dropped to the right, toward the ground.
Tara screamed.
The rotors cut the air faster, and the rate of descent slowed while the view disappearing in plumes of dust.
A buzzer joined the ruckus.
Ness pulled a lever over his head, which seemed to increase the noise. He shifted the stick sideways, back and forth, and held it in place as they began to ascend. The swaying reduced to shaking until they stabilized, finding themselves over the water.
He turned off the buzzer and increased power, moving up in a stable, direct course toward the mountains. Soon the kibbutz was only a green patch in the brown desert.
“Are we safe yet?” Tara peeked though her fingers.
Ness glared at Masada. “If you want to kill yourself, do it alone!”
The helicopter finally departed. Professor Silver pulled himself up and made his way through the graves. A voice repeated inside his head: Israel (“Srulie”) El-Tal.
He stumbled down the path, leaving the cemetery behind, his vision fogged in a haze of fear and confusion.
Murdered 19.8.82
God Avenge His Blood.
There was no other explanation. The boy he had pushed off the cliff was Masada’s brother!
“Allah hu Akbar!” His foot hit a rock, and he fell, the hot asphalt burning his hands.
Voices approached, talking urgently. Someone helped him up.
A woman spoke to him in Hebrew.
He hurried off, following the path between the cottages, passing by the laundry.
Masada’s brother!
Allah’s sense of humor.
“Professor!” Ezekiel emerged from the communal dining hall holding a plastic cup.
Silver got into the golf cart. “We must go! Back to Jerusalem!”
“Your wish is my command.” Ezekiel got behind the wheel and drove the cart down to the gate. As they walked through, the guard handed them each a sheet of pale blue paper.
Colonel Ness landed at a military base in the Jordan Valley, where they refueled and collected lunch boxes. They continued north, passing above a section of the security wall surrounding the West Bank. Beyond the Sea of Galilee, somewhere over the Golan Heights, he recited the number of gourmet wine boxes exported every year. Passing low over Safed, he showed them the apple orchards covering the graded mountain slopes and the pine forests burnt by Hezbollah rockets from Lebanon. He noted the vast industrial complex owned by Warren Buffett, which produced jet engine components for Boeing and Airbus. The citrus groves formed a green carpet across the Valley of Jezreel, reaching almost to Haifa, where Ness took them over the Technion Institute. He named the two scientists who recently shared a Nobel Prize for inventing a lifesaving HIV drug.
Masada knew exactly what he was doing but kept quiet, planning her ultimate retort.
They followed the Mediterranean coast southward, flying by the high-technology park at the foothills of Mount Carmel where, Ness explained, Medical Resonance Imaging-MRI-had been invented, and over the golden beach where the latest Olympic gold medalist in windsurfing had grown up learning the ropes.
Over the endless expanse of the Tel Aviv metropolis, he listed international corporations, such as Intel, Microsoft, Motorola, and General Electric, whose research and development centers employed thousands of Israeli scientists.
“These Israeli scientists,” Masada said, “would gladly relocate to the United States if they could get through immigration barriers.”
“And you,” he said, “now that the Americans kicked you out, where would you gladly go? Iceland?”
She wondered how he knew that. “I was deported because you hid the document I needed.”
“You got deported because a Jew-hating government official found a way to hurt you, just like the Jews who had been expelled from Spain, England, France, and Portugal. And those persecuted, robbed, and burnt at the stake on false charges for centuries. Anti-Semitism is as old as the Covenant. An independent Jewish state is our only refuge-your only refuge, as it turned out.”
They flew in silence until he swung inland toward the Weitzman Institute and commenced naming the Noble Prize laureates working there.
“That’s nothing compared to what Jews achieved before Israel existed,” Masada said. “The Diaspora produced the Talmud, the books of Maimonides, the interpretations of Rashi, the Shulkhan Arukh, which every religious Jew accepts as the codification of Jewish law. We made huge contributions to medicine, science, banking, music, art, and human rights. For two millennia we’ve made the whole world better, why do we suddenly need our own state?”
“Because the gentiles kept killing us!” Ness banked sharply and headed west toward the sandy Mediterranean coast, increasing the speed. “The Holocaust proved Jews could never be safe without a state.”
“On the contrary.” Masada ignored Tara’s elbowing. “It proved that Jews should be allowed to immigrate freely. The Germans were not the first regime wishing to get rid of its Jews. From Spain, Jews went to Turkey and Portugal, where they were even more successful. When Portugal merged with Spain, they went to Amsterdam, which is still enjoying the trade they established five centuries ago. England expelled them, so they moved to Poland and built it. And the first Jews in New York were refugees from Catholic South America. If the United States and England had allowed German Jews entry in the thirties, there would be no Holocaust in the forties.”
“Nonsense!” Ness reached the coastline and swept right again, back toward the tall hotels along the Tel Aviv beach. “Our people had a two-thousand-year experiment in living without a homeland, without an army. We were resilient and flexible and recovered from expulsions, pogroms, and crusades, but we still lost half the nation-six million Jewish lives! — to the German butchers.”
“Because of Zionism!” Masada was on a roll now. “If the Jews would be going to Palestine, why should other countries let them in? The European Jews were trapped because of the illusion of Zionism!”
“That’s an ass-backwards logic!” Colonel Ness raised his voice. “Only the early Zionists, who went as pioneers to Palestine before the war, only they survived the Holocaust. And the only defense against a second Holocaust is Israel! We’re only safe here!”
“Here?” Masada waved at the Tel Aviv metropolis that filled their view. “You call this safe? In exile, we were dispersed among the nations, able to sustain attacks, even a Holocaust. We were like seeds, spread by the wind, growing wherever we landed. But Zionism put all the Jewish eggs in one basket. A single devastating blow-nuclear, biological, chemical, or an earthquake-”
“Or a tsunami,” Tara added.
“Or a shower of conventional rockets,” Masada said. “thousands of them, which are already aimed and primed around the borders of this tight-waist country. The Jewish state is the biggest danger to Jewish survival. We make it easy for our enemies. Where would Islamic terrorism be without Lebanon, Gaza and the West Bank?”
Ness adjusted the headphones so his lips came closer to the microphone. “Where do you get your ideas about the Holocaust? Your friend’s book?”
“Lenin,” Tara said. “Are you talking about Lenin?”
“What’s Lenin got to do with this?” Ness jerked his head impatiently. “I’m talking about her friend, the professor. Is he your inspiration?”
The derisiveness in his voice stabbed Masada. “Levy is a better man than you.”
“You’re blind!” Ness flicked a switch on the instrument panel, and the headphones died. He found a major highway and flew over it through the Valley of Ayalon toward Jerusalem.
Professor Silver’s panic subsided only when he saw the Sea Level billboard pass by. He turned, catching a last glance of the blue oval of the Dead Sea through the rear window. He thought of the tall teenager who had wrestled with Faddah on Mount Masada, of himself ramming the boy, sending him over the edge.
Masada’s brother!
The possibility had never occurred to him. Why should it? Masada had only spoken once or twice about her parents and little brother-little! — causing Silver to assume the boy had died with their parents. But now he knew. Would he be able to face Masada as if nothing had happened? If she sensed his wariness, her tenacity could turn to investigating him. And if she discovered he was her brother’s killer, she would connect all the dots and expose the whole plan. She must be dealt with as soon as possible, her death staged to appear like a suicide. But how?
Silver picked up the pale blue flyer. Under a drawing of a burning candle, the kibbutz secretary announced a predawn memorial service at 4:30 a.m. on the 19th of August at Herod’s Fort on Mount Masada. “Cable car leaving at 4:15 a.m. Bring sweaters!”
The solution came to him like a puff of fresh air. Silver threw his head back and laughed, drawing a glance from Ezekiel. But he could not help it. His laughter grew as he dropped the flyer and clutched his hands together. Allah’s sense of humor!
Rabbi Josh saw Professor Silver get out of a taxicab in front of the Ramban Hostel. “Levy!”
Silver turned slowly.
“You won’t believe what I discovered!”
“Yes?” He folded a bluish paper and put it in his pocket.
Rabbi Josh took his arm, and they strolled down the street. He described breaking into Masada’s room and finding the bar napkin. “If she suspects me, it means she can’t be guilty!”
They passed by a large poster showing a yellow Star of David, from which emerged a black fist with the middle finger sticking up at Uncle Sam.
“Let’s rest.” Silver pointed to a bench under a carob tree. “It’s very confusing.”
“There must be another explanation to what you heard.” Rabbi Josh was too hyped to sit, and he paced across the sidewalk and back. “Perhaps she was mocking Al.”
“I can tell the difference between mocking and-”
“But the note shows she suspects me of being an Israeli agent, of controlling Al, of sending him to bribe Mahoney!”
“A contradiction in facts often has a simple explanation.” Professor Silver sat back, removed his black-rimmed glasses, and patiently rubbed the lenses on his shirt. “I heard them copulating, for God’s sake!”
Rabbi Josh cringed at the image. He still could not believe it.
“We know,” Silver continued, “that Al gave the money to the senator. We know what she did to Al later that night, after Raul was gone.”
The mention of his son pulled Rabbi Josh toward a cliff of despair, but he pulled back. “There’s another explanation.”
“She’s guilty. That’s the only explanation.”
“But Al loved Israel. Why would he help her hurt Israel?”
“But Masada’s so clever! She could have convinced Al that later on she would follow up with another article showing that the bribe actually came from haters of Jews who conspired to hurt Israel’s relations with America, which would make Israel the underdog and help it much more than a single law about mutual defense. You think Al wasn’t stupid enough to believe it?”
Rabbi Josh was confused. “That doesn’t explain the note I found in her room.”
“Al was in love. He would believe her if she said the earth was square. And you, my dear Joshua, suffer from a similar infatuation.”
“Is it that obvious?”
“I don’t blame you. If I were a younger man.” Silver smiled.
“But still, if she’s investigating me, how could she be the culprit?”
“A simple contradiction calls for a simple explanation.”
They reached the front steps of the hostel.
“Our Masada is in the center of an international crisis, and she’s very clever, isn’t she?”
The rabbi nodded.
“What would you do to confuse those who might break into your room?” Silver took the steps up to the entrance.
The rabbi caught up with him. “But the note was on the floor, like it had dropped out of a pocket or discarded!”
“Appeared to be discarded.”
They collected their keys from the front desk and climbed the stairs.
“You underestimate Masada,” Silver chided Rabbi Josh. “She knows that the best defense is offense, she expects someone to break into her room at one point, either the Israelis or the media, so she leaves a fabricated note that conveniently incriminates you.”
The rabbi felt deflated. Silver’s theory was logical, but it didn’t reconcile with the Masada he knew.
Silver patted him on the shoulder. “Allow yourself to grieve in peace, my dear friend. Don’t worry about Masada and her crimes. The time will come for that, I promise you.”
Masada expected a punishing bump, but Colonel Ness managed a feathery touchdown. He had not said a word since ending their argument. After shutting off the engine, he turned to Tara. “Are you free for dinner tonight?”
“Well.” Tara tilted her head in feigned hesitation. “My schedule is quite tight.”
“I’ll pick you up at seven forty-five.”
“Make it eight.”
Ness pulled himself out of the helicopter into his wheelchair. They followed him to the parking lot. He rolled his chair onto the van. Masada noticed several antennas on the roof.
Back in Tara’s car, they followed the van as it merged into light traffic heading into the city.
Masada flexed her knee. The colonel had toyed with them, pretending he didn’t know Rabbi Josh. Was he toying with them now? She hoped he wasn’t. They needed a break.
Tara glanced at her. “You were a real bitch up there.”
“He deserved it.”
“Ex-lovers always deserve hell.”
“This whole place is hell.”
“Nonsense!” Tara laughed. “I love it here! What an incredible little country!”
“Are you drunk?”
“I’m serious! I expected Israelis to be rough and rude, but they’re really cool, definitely friendlier than any Europeans. And the technology and history and music, and all these handsome guys in uniform. I’m falling in love every five minutes!”
“I’m determined to continue to hate this place,” Masada said.
“So please don’t confuse me with the facts.”
Tara slapped her on the thigh. “Bad girl!”
At the intersection near the Central Bus Station, Ness turned left.
“He’s not going home.” Masada found a city map in the glove compartment. “We need a camera.”
“Funny you should say that.” Tara pulled out her phone. “I got a text message this morning from a cameraman who heard I’m in town.” She browsed down her message list. “Here it is: Oscar Photography and Video.”
Even though he had never been to Jerusalem before yesterday, its streets felt familiar to Rabbi Josh. Entering the Old City through the Jaffa Gate, he made his way through the market alleys by intuition. He followed their gentle descent, filling his lungs with the smoky, odorous air while the Arab vendors proclaimed their goods.
At the end of an alley he found stairs leading all the way down to the great plaza under the Wailing Wall.
The giant stones were still warm, even though the sun had descended behind the surrounding buildings. He joined a group for the afternoon prayer and swayed back and forth to the familiar tune. At the end, he recited the mourners’ Kaddish, and the strangers around him said, “Amen.”
He lingered near the Wall, reluctant to let go of the sense of peaceful familiarity.
“Good Sabbath,” a man said.
He looked left and right, finding no one.
“Down here.”
“Oh.” He recognized the elderly amputee who had laid a wreath at Raul’s funeral.
The man moved his wheelchair closer and shook the rabbi’s hand. “How are you?”
Rabbi Josh sat on a bench. “I must accept His decision.”
“Acceptance first, then a struggle to make sense of the loss, to find meaning in what has happened.”
The rabbi looked away. “It’s hard.”
“I know. My son flew an F-14 in Lebanon.”
“I’m sorry for you. But at least his death served a great purpose.”
“True, but somehow the pride doesn’t diminish the pain.” He passed a hand through his white hair. “You must be angry at the writer.”
“She didn’t press the trigger.” Rabbi Josh sighed.
“Words often stimulate the pressing of triggers.” The man’s blue eyes were unwavering, all-knowing. “Your loss foreshadows our nation’s loss. It’s too late to bring back the dead, but there’s still time to prevent the political disaster she is bringing upon us.”
“She’s not an ordinary writer.” The rabbi forced his eyes away from the man’s penetrating gaze and looked up at the top of the Wailing Wall, where a soldier stood surveying the plaza. “She’s complicated.”
“Look at them.” Masada felt vindicated. “The master spy and his prized agent. Now you believe me?”
Tara peeked over the partition that separated women from men near the Wall. “They do seem chummy.”
“Where’s your cameraman?”
“I told him to look for a scruffy Brad Pit with a ponytail and a yarmulke.”
“Very funny.” Masada searched among the men near Ness and the rabbi. “The Orthodox will crucify him if he pulls out a camera before sunset. It’s still Sabbath.”
Tara moved away from the partition. “He’ll manage unless we blow our own cover.”
“We don’t have a cover.” Masada was already outlining in her mind the portion of the new article describing Rabbi Josh’s clandestine meeting with his Israeli handler, Colonel Dov Ness.
“They must be planning damage control for after the Senate approves the Fair Aid Act.”
“You’re naive. The Israelis will continue to work against it until the senate’s done voting.” Masada followed her, tailing a group of tourists. “Ness doesn’t give up. I mean, a normal amputee would be sitting at home, collecting disability and watching TV. This one’s flying helicopters and asking out blondes.”
Tara leaned closer and whispered, “He must have been a knockout in bed.”
“Hush! We’re at the Wailing Wall!”
They burst out laughing, drawing shocked glances from the tourists.
“I agree,” the man in the wheelchair said. “Masada El-Tal is a complicated woman.”
Rabbi Josh looked away. “She’s very different from the person portrayed by the media.”
“I knew Masada in the army. She was an incredible young woman.”
“You’re no government pensioner, are you?”
“I’m a concerned Zionist, like you.”
“I expected to be approached by someone from the government, but not someone like you.” The rabbi chuckled. “Anyway, Masada El-Tal was a member of my congregation. And a close friend. But I still don’t know whether she was the mastermind behind the bribe or a victim like me. The evidence points in both directions.” He gestured at the Wall. “I came here hoping for divine guidance.”
“If this is your dilemma, I can solve it. Masada is mentally incapable of manipulation or deceit.”
“But you’re capable of both.” Rabbi Josh felt a surge of anger. “Who are you … really?”
“I’m Colonel Dov Ness. Her former commander.”
“Why did you release her conviction to the media?”
“It’s not about me or Masada or you.” Colonel Ness leaned closer. “It’s about saving the Jewish state by finding who’s behind the bribe. You study Talmud, right?”
The rabbi nodded.
“Then you understand Talmudic logic about risk versus benefit. For Masada, the supposed benefit was revenge-if that’s her motivation. But she could achieve the same goal by writing critically of Israel, its policies, even its very existence. The risk of a criminal scheme, which could land her in federal jail forever, was disproportionally greater than the benefit. For the Israeli government, the benefit of a Mutual Defense Act would be miniscule compared with the risk of harming the relationship with the United States. Therefore, it would be illogical for Masada or the State of Israel to take the enormous risk of bribing a U.S. senator.”
“What seems illogical in hindsight may have seemed logical in foresight.”
“None of this has been an accident. There must be a person out there who planned it all, who controlled Al Zonshine, who knows why, how, and when this whole scheme was conceived and launched.”
“Masada?”
“Do you really believe it’s her?”
The rabbi wanted to nod, but he couldn’t. In his heart, he knew she was all good.
“You already know who that person is.”
“No.” Rabbi Josh stood. “I don’t.”
Ness looked up. “But you do, Rabbi. You don’t realize it, but you do.”
“I don’t!” His shout made a praying Hassid nearby pause and glance over.
“You do!” Ness rolled his wheelchair after the departing rabbi. “You just don’t want to see it. It’s too inconvenient.”
Masada and Tara waited at a bar for Oscar. He turned out to be a French-born Israeli with dark skin and a buzz cut, who fashioned a Hawaiian shirt. He showed them photos of Colonel Ness and Rabbi Josh-talking, arguing, the rabbi departing in anger. “No audio,” Oscar said, “too much background noise.”
“I didn’t see you at the Wall,” Masada said.
“That’s the whole point,” he answered.
It was almost midnight when she entered the Ramban Hostel. The acne-faced youth was still at the front desk, reading a book.
He handed Masada her room key and a blue sheet of paper. It was an invitation to a memorial service on Mount Masada.
By the time she reached her room, Masada had made up her mind not to go. Srulie’s memory lived with her every waking moment. She didn’t need patriotic songs and empty speeches to soil his memory.
While undressing, she noticed the beige pants had fallen off the hanger in the closet. She looked for the laundry bag, finding it on the bed, not where she’d left it that morning. And the scribbled napkin was crumpled on the floor. Had Ness sent someone to look through her stuff?