Annika decides to change the subject. ‘Last time I was here, you showed me an old photo album. You said you kept it in a box with your grandfather’s papers. Did he leave any letters or documents?’
‘Why?’
‘Have you thought of donating them to a museum so they can be kept for posterity?’
Eitan sighs. ‘There are some old papers, but I haven’t gone through them in any detail. As for museums, you don’t understand the situation here. Even now, after all these years, the name of Miklós Nagy evokes violent reactions, and for every one person who praises him for his courage, another one condemns him for collaboration. He isn’t even mentioned in any museum. When we tried to persuade the curator of the Holocaust Museum to dedicate some space to him in the section devoted to those who saved Jews, she told us that she couldn’t do it as it would upset too many people. She said he was too controversial.’
‘But that can be said of anyone who ever achieved anything, from King David to David Ben-Gurion. Your grandfather did something extraordinarily courageous and he should be publicly acknowledged and commemorated.’
‘I don’t understand why you’re so het up about this. Do you have some connection with my grandfather?’
She hesitates, wondering whether to tell him, and decides that having had the audacity to ask personal questions and give him advice on such a sensitive issue, she owes him the truth.
‘It started with my grandmother, Marika Horvath,’ she begins. ‘She had never mentioned him to me before, but when I told her I saw a photo of her taken in Switzerland just after the rescue train arrived, and asked about him, she refused to tell me anything. Actually she said she never wanted to hear his name again.’
She glances at him, hoping that her grandmother’s reaction hasn’t upset him, and adds, ‘I don’t know why she said that. It sounds terribly ungrateful.’
‘Don’t talk to me about ingratitude,’ Eitan says. ‘There was an orthodox rabbi on that rescue train who migrated to New York and formed his own congregation. When he was asked if he’d testify in the District Court that my grandfather saved him, he refused. And you know why? He said, “Miklós Nagy didn’t save me. God saved me!” So, coming back to your grandmother, I suppose you asked her why she was so antagonistic towards the man who saved her?’
‘You don’t know my grandmother. She is silk on the outside but granite on the inside. She’s a very private person with a high wall around her and an electrified fence. You trespass at your own risk.’
‘Come on, you’re not shy about asking personal questions. You must have tried to find out.’
‘I did try but it was impossible to get anything out of her. I can’t explain the power she has. Sometimes it’s easier to talk to strangers than to relatives.’
‘And your mother? Doesn’t she know anything?’
‘My mother is a very different kind of person. All her life she has protected my grandmother. She would never contradict her or say anything to upset her. Maybe it’s a second-generation thing, a belief that they have to protect the survivors.’
‘So by coming here you thought you’d clear up the mystery. And did you?’
‘I don’t suppose I ever will, but at least I’ve found out what an amazing man your grandfather was. And in the process I’ve found out a lot about human nature, and a bit about myself too. How I poke my nose into other people’s business,’ she adds with an attempt at lightness.
He rises. ‘I do have to go. The government is planning to build new settlements and we’re organising a protest rally for Sunday.’
At the door, she puts out her hand. ‘No hard feelings?’
He smiles. ‘No hard feelings. When do you leave?’
‘On Tuesday.’
She wishes him success and he wishes her a safe journey.
*
The warm afternoon stretches lazily ahead of her and she turns off Allenby Street and loses herself in a labyrinth of narrow alleys, twisting lanes and dilapidated houses that seem to be relics from the past, so different from the world of quirky boutiques, shopping malls and pavement cafés that she has left behind. Past Nahalal Binyamin Street, she comes to a bustling outdoor market squeezed into a narrow passageway.
The sign on the corner says Shuk HaCarmel, and she realises that she has wandered into the Carmel Market, which Dov once recommended for a glimpse of old Tel Aviv and a tasty casual lunch. All around her people are shouting, spruiking, arguing, and bargaining over fake designer handbags and T-shirts, or selecting flowers. ‘They’re roses, not diamonds,’ a stout florist snaps at a buyer who is examining the flowers petal by petal.
Past stalls heaped with St Peter’s fish, red mullet, sardines, and barbouni, where fishmongers chop crimson tuna with murderous cleavers, she passes colourful displays of dried apricots, dates and figs, jars of olives, mounds of aromatic spices and baskets of the reddest tomatoes and the biggest cherries and strawberries she has ever seen.
Soon she breathes in the yeasty smell of fresh pita bread, and her mouth waters at the smell of lamb skewers being roasted on charcoal braziers. Unable to resist the smell of cooking food, she stops at one of the stalls, orders a falafel, and, perched on a rickety stool, she bites into a bun filled to bursting point with crunchy falafel balls, hummus, tahini, fried eggplant and pickled cucumbers.
Sitting there, jostled by the noisy crowd of shoppers, she gazes contentedly at the scene around her, and laughs as she tries to catch bits of the filling that escape from the bun. For the first time that day she isn’t thinking about anything. She is enjoying the present moment.
And in that instant of complete relaxation, she suddenly understands why she has come to Israel. She dials Dov’s number.
‘You remember when we first met you asked me why I had embarked on this search, and when I told you it was on account of my grandmother, you didn’t believe me? I think you said you didn’t buy it. And another time, you asked me if I was grateful for everything I had received? Well, you were right on both counts. I’ve realised that I came to find out as much as I could about Miklós Nagy because it is personal. If not for him, I wouldn’t be alive today.’
Dov is silent, and she is about to ask if he is still there, when he says, ‘So you’ve made a pilgrimage of gratitude.’
She smiles. ‘A pilgrimage of gratitude. I like that.’
‘I like it too. When did you have that epiphany?’
‘This morning. By the way, do you know how can I find out if the right-wing group that Miklós Nagy’s assassin belonged to still exists?’
He laughs. ‘You never give up, do you? I’ll look into it and let you know if I come up with anything.’
In the silence that ensues, she is wondering how to say the words that she knows will change everything. But she has to say it face to face. Her heart is pounding as she says, ‘Dov, I need to see you.’
Twenty minutes later she sees him coming towards her. It’s obvious that he has been rushing, and he tries to catch his breath as he pulls up a stool.
‘I had to make an excuse to leave the office,’ he says, looking at her searchingly.
‘Dov, it’s about what you said the other night at your place,’ she begins. ‘I want you to know that the things you mentioned don’t matter to me at all. I like your daughter, and I don’t think you’re too old.’ She takes a deep breath. ‘What I’m trying to say is, I feel we’re right for each other.’
He leans across the table and takes her face between his hands so tenderly that, as they look into each other’s eyes, she feels that their souls have touched.
He shakes his head, as though unable to believe what he has just heard her say. ‘But you are still going back to Australia.’
‘Yes, but not forever.’
This is the second thing she has said on impulse that day, but as they both rise, and hold each other in a wordless embrace, she knows that this is one statement she won’t regret.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
Tel Aviv, 2005
Standing in a windblown street in a seedy part of Tel Aviv, Annika tries to summon the courage to press the buzzer on an intercom sticky with spider webs. It takes her back to the time she was writing investigative pieces for a daily newspaper, trembling with equal degrees of apprehension and anticipation each time she stood in front of the door of someone who would not welcome her intrusion.
With only two days left before her departure, she was impatient to spend as much of the remaining time with Dov as possible, but the unexpected phone call from Eitan later that afternoon promised to provide another piece of the Nagy puzzle.
‘After you left, I thought about what you said, and I came up with the name of an ultranationalist group that often tries to disrupt our meetings. They call themselves Israel First. They reckon we’re Palestinian collaborators, and threaten us with divine vengeance because we’re agitating for a two-state solution,’ he said. ‘They could be connected with the extremists who killed my grandfather, but even if they’re not, they might know something about Moshe Binsztok. Just tread carefully. They’re zealots with fundamentalist ideas and they don’t take kindly to opposing views.’
An hour later, she arrived at the busy office of Israel First in a cul-de-sac off Dizengoff Street. One wall was covered with maps of the West Bank marking terrain labelled Samaria and Judea, while another was hung with posters demanding the integration of these territories into the state of Israel. There were banners denouncing the government’s acceptance of a two-state solution as the betrayal of the Torah and God’s gift to the Jews.
The word God, she noticed, was either spelled without the ‘o’, or written in Hebrew letters. She also noticed that most of the men milling around the office wore skullcaps, and the women covered their hair with wigs, scarves or floppy berets. Small groups were huddled together, fervently discussing something, while in the far corner of the room a bearded man of about fifty was banging his fist on a wooden desk as he argued with a younger guy who was jabbing his finger at what looked like a blueprint for a poster.
She was in unfamiliar territory, and remembered Eitan’s warning.
A tall slim woman of about thirty in a long dress and a floral scarf twisted around her head, put down a book she was reading when she saw Annika. ‘You are looking for someone here?’ she asked in a tone that implied Annika must have wandered in by mistake.
‘I’m an Australian journalist and I wondered if you had a public relations person I could talk to. Your group doesn’t get a good press in our media. All we ever read are negative reports about you being extremists who ignore Palestinian rights, support settlements on Palestinian land, and fight with Israeli soldiers who are trying to evict settlers. So I’d like to write an article from your point of view, so that people back home can see you in a more balanced, sympathetic light.’
She doubted if the ethics section of the Journalists’ Association would approve of this approach, but she knew that coming straight out and asking about Moshe Binsztok would be guaranteed to arouse mistrust. Besides, she rationalised, what she said wasn’t altogether untrue. When she got back to Australia, she might write about their movement, though not, perhaps, in a way they would approve.
‘I’m Rahel. You can talk to me,’ the woman said curtly, and ushered Annika into a small room at the back of the office. ‘So what do you want to know about us?’
Rahel wasted no time talking up her beliefs and discrediting the opposition. With messianic zeal she denounced the treacherous agenda of politicians who were about to sell out their country, and the dangerous naivety of groups like Peace Now and their followers whose efforts to create a Palestinian state from land that the Almighty had given to the Jews not only threatened their nation, but constituted a crime against God. Judea and Samaria must be reclaimed.
‘Isn’t peace worth a piece of land?’ Annika asked.
‘A piece of land? Is that what you call it?’ Rahel’s eyes flashed with anger, and Annika remembered Eitan’s advice too late. She should have held her tongue.
Determined to convince Annika of her heresy, Rahel hardly stopped for breath for the next thirty minutes, speaking in an impassioned voice, and emphasising her arguments with sweeping gestures.
Occasionally members of the staff put their heads around the door to ask questions, and seeing Rahel glancing at her watch several times, Annika realised that their meeting would end before she had time to obtain the information she had come for.
‘I’ve heard something about the courage of the Irgun fighters in the terrible incident of the Altalena, and the role that Begin played,’ she said.
Her ploy worked. Clearly impressed by her appreciation of the Irgun position, Rahel became less didactic and condescending, and she recounted the story in a ringing voice, her eyes shining at the heroism of the Irgun fighters against the betrayal of the Jewish Agency leaders.
‘Moshe Binsztok was one of the members back in the fifties, wasn’t he?’ Annika said innocently. ‘Wasn’t he involved in the assassination of that guy who was accused of being a collaborator?’
‘Oh, yes, Binsztok. I believe he keeps to himself these days, but you should talk to him if you’re interested in those times. He could tell you all about the corrupt Mapai government that tried to protect the collaborator.’
Annika tried to keep her voice steady and casual. ‘That sounds like a great idea. Do you happen to know where I can find him?’
Rahel shakes her head. ‘I hear his name mentioned from time to time but I’ve never met him and I have no idea whether he lives in Tel Aviv. The group he was part of doesn’t exist anymore, and he never joined ours, but I can ask my colleagues. Someone might know where he lives.’
*
Now, as she presses the buzzer on the door of Moshe Binsztok’s building, she is almost relieved when no-one answers. Talking to Rahel wasn’t threatening, but how could she have the temerity to talk to the assassin himself? Why would he agree to answer her intrusive questions? She is about to give up and walk away when an unshaven old man in a loose singlet leans over a crumbling balcony on the second floor.
‘Shalom. You look for someone?’
‘Moshe Binsztok…’
‘You friend?’
There’s no simple answer to this question other than the one that will close Moshe’s door to her. ‘Yes,’ she says. It seems that in her quest for truth, she has become enmeshed in a web of prevarications, half-truths and lies, but she comforts herself with the thought that truth is usually found in nuanced shadows, not in the dazzle of sunlight.
The man looks at his watch. ‘He back ten minutes. You wait?
Annika nods, thankful that this is a street where people seem to know their neighbours’ movements.
As she strolls past buildings damaged by salt air, parching desert wind and unforgiving heat, a thin man with closely cropped iron-grey hair and a dark tracksuit casts her a quizzical glance as he limps past. She supposes that as this shabby neighbourhood doesn’t attract tourists, a foreign woman in jeans must be an object of curiosity.
Then she stops walking. She has no idea what Moshe Binsztok looks like, but the man who just passed her is limping towards the building where she pressed the buzzer a few minutes ago. From Eitan’s description, she visualises a skinny young bloke in a khaki jacket, but Moshe must be in his early seventies by now. Like the man who has just walked past.
She runs after him. ‘Mr Binsztok?’
He turns around, startled, and eyes that seem to burn with a menacing inner fire scan her face. ‘Who are you? What do you want?’
They’re standing on the doorstep, and the unswept leaves that the wind has pushed against the door crackle under their shoes. His key is in his hand and she knows that any moment now he will open the door and slam it shut in her face.
Speaking quickly, she explains who she is and why she wants to talk to him.
With a threatening expression, he takes a step towards her but although her heart is racing, she stands her ground.
‘You’ve got a nerve,’ he says. ‘You’re a complete stranger, and you just walk up to me in the street and expect me to talk to you. Who do you think you are? Who sent you here? What are you really after?’
Put off balance by his onslaught, she is stammering a reply when he cuts in. ‘How did you find me?’
She hesitates. Confessing the subterfuge by which she obtained his address will antagonise him even further and destroy any possibility of a conversation.
‘I don’t know what you want or why you’re here,’ he spits the words out, ‘but whatever it is, I’m not interested. Get this through your head: whoever you are, I don’t want to talk to you. Now go back wherever you came from and leave me alone.’
He is stepping away from her now, and she knows this is her last chance to change his mind. She speaks quickly.
‘I realise you don’t know anything about me, and I’m happy to tell you whatever you want to know. But please believe me, I don’t have any ulterior motives. No-one sent me here. I’m sorry if I upset you appearing out of the blue like this, but I’m leaving Israel soon, and I just want to hear your story, that’s all.’
‘My story. And exactly what part of my story do you want to hear?’
He is mocking her, but he is still standing there, so she pushes on.
‘I’ve read about the Nagy case and I just want to hear your side of it.’
‘To satisfy your morbid curiosity.’
‘No, my sense of fair play.’
He studies her in silence, and in that moment when the scales could tilt either way, she holds her breath. If she were superstitious she’d be crossing her fingers, but she holds his gaze instead. ‘I’ll give you five minutes,’ he says, and with a resigned gesture, he opens the door and lets her inside.
Up a steep flight of stairs, he opens the door to a bedsitter where the smell of mould makes her eyes water, and when she peers into the tiny space that serves as a kitchen, she sees a primus stove, a chipped enamel sink with a gas heater above it, and a few wooden shelves stacked with tinned food.
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