“Good afternoon, Miss Shadmi,” he said cheerfully. “Is your father in?”
“He’s in the shop,” she answered, not looking up.
“Thank you,” he called as he turned away, too pleased with his idea to let her set him off the track.
Shadmi, holding a large piece of olivewood statuary, was jammed into one corner of the narrow shop, surrounded by three elderly women. They were speaking what sounded to Brad like German or Dutch. The hotel owner lifted his eyes in a combined expression of greeting and pleading for deliverance.
Brad studied the crowded shelves idly until the women had completed their purchases and squeezed past him. “Hello, Mr. Shadmi.”
“Levi, please,” he said with a pleasant smile. “How are things today, Brad?”
“Fine, thanks. Have you got a minute I could talk to you?”
“But of course. Let’s go over to the office where we can sit down.”
“Oh, this is all right,” Brad said a little too quickly, thinking of Miri behind the desk. “It will take only a minute.”
Shadmi smiled knowingly. “Whatever you say.”
“I’ve just spent three hours lost in the Old City,” Brad said, plunging right in. “No, it wasn’t that bad,” he added quickly in response to Shadmi’s look of sudden concern. “I had a map and thought I could find my way.”
“Ah yes,” the older man sympathized. “Inside the walls is a different world, no?”
“Absolutely. Well, anyway, it started me thinking. I decided it might be of value if I had someone to show me around. Someone who knows the city—not only where things are, but the historical significance of them, the places of real interest. You know what I mean?”
“Of course. A guide.”
“Yes.”
“A very good idea.”
“I know so little about Israel. After I get better acquainted, then I’ll be fine on my own. It just seems like a shame to blunder my way around a city as significant as this.”
“Yes, I agree. A terrible mistake.”
“Well, I noticed the signs you have posted at the desk, about the guide service for either groups or individuals.”
“Ah!” Shadmi said with sudden understanding. “Yes, that is a service we can provide for our guests.”
“Can you tell me a little bit about it?”
“Well, we arrange whatever tour you are interested in. Usually we do this for groups, but occasionally some of our guests prefer to have a guide just for themselves or their family.”
“Yes, that’s what I’m thinking about. Is it terribly expensive?” Then noting the hesitation on the older man’s face, Brad quickly added, “And no deals please. You have done far too much for me already.”
Shadmi sighed. “Ali was right. You are too proud.”
“I know, but I really mean that. What are the regular rates?”
“You can schedule either half-day or full-day tours. A half-day is fifteen dollars. A full-day is twenty-five. We also have weekly rates.”
Brad hesitated, trying to keep the dismay out of his eyes. And yet, he thought, wasn’t it just as foolish to spend the money to come over here and not get the full benefit? He was saving significantly on his board and room.
He nodded. “That sounds good. About how far in advance would I have to schedule a guide?”
Shadmi laughed. “At the moment, fifteen minutes. Most tourists come here on tour with groups and have all their arrangements already made. Our service merely fills the needs of a few like yourself who come on their own.”
“So, if I wanted to start tomorrow—?”
Shadmi shook his head quickly. “Tomorrow is Shabbat and we do not provide the service on the Sabbath.”
“Oh, that’s right,” Brad said. “We have church tomorrow too. So I couldn’t go then either.”
The blue eyes widened a little. “Your church meets on Saturday?”
“Only in Israel. The President of our Church gave the branch here special permission to meet on the Jewish Sabbath since otherwise people would have to get off work to come to church Sunday, and so on. So anyway, Sunday would be my first opportunity too. Would that be possible?”
The older man started to nod, then frowned slightly. “There is one possible problem.”
“Oh?”
“You see, we have only two licensed guides. Nathan and—”
“Miri!” Brad finished for him, the dismay evident in his voice.
“Right.”
Brad’s mind was racing, looking for an out, as Shadmi went on talking.
“I know she was very rude to you, but it was because she worries so much about my finances. I am helping my brother Shlomo get a business started. I lent him some money, and she worries if we will pay the bills.” He was watching Brad closely. “She is an excellent guide. Even better than Nathan. In addition to guide school, she has also graduated from the university in history and archeology. Miri has a great love for Israel, past and present. She would be very good—if you are willing.”
Brad shrugged. There was no way he would offend this man after the great generosity he had extended. “That’s fine with me. She might have some feelings about it though.”
Shadmi brushed that aside. “It is nothing.”
Brad choked on that one, grateful that her father didn’t know about their last two encounters.
“Besides,” Shadmi added, “a guide is not paid to take only people she likes.”
A good point to be made with Miri, Brad thought. But he just nodded. “Then I’m willing.”
“Let’s go talk with her.” Shadmi pushed past Brad and went out into the lobby.
“Miri!” Shadmi’s deep voice boomed off the marble walls.
She had gone into the office and now came out, hesitating when she saw the two of them together.
“Do you have anything on the schedule for Sunday morning?”
“Just to be here to help you.” The words came out slowly, as though a sudden sixth sense had warned her there was a trapdoor beneath her feet.
“Good. I can cover the desk for that long. Mr. Kennison would like a guide to show him around Jerusalem.”
It was a credit to her that she was able to contain the anger that sprang to her eyes. Her voice was cool and polite. “Oh?”
“Yes, just the half-day tour. Is that okay with you?”
“Of course,” she said, calmly.
Brad felt a tremendous surge of relief, which she instantly flattened.
“And what price has Mr. Kennison negotiated with you for this service?”
“Miri!” Shadmi snapped. “That is enough!”
“That’s all right,” Brad said. “You might as well confess. Tell her what we agreed upon.”
It evened the score a little to see her triumphant look vanish as her father said, “Fifteen dollars per half day. Twenty-five for a full day’s tour.”
The lovely face was impassive as she nodded. “And what time would Mr. Kennison like to leave Sunday morning?”
“You’re the guide,” Brad shot back.
“Good! We’ll leave the hotel at four-thirty A.M.”
Shadmi hooted at the startled look on Brad’s face. “Miri thinks the best way to see Jerusalem for the first time is from the Mount of Olives at sunrise.”
“If you prefer to sleep in,” Miri challenged, “we can leave at nine o’clock.”
This one wasn’t on the defensive very long. “Fourthirty sounds fine. As I said, you’re the guide. Meet here in the lobby?”
She nodded, turned away, and stalked back into the office.
Brad held up his hand to cut off Shadmi’s apology. “We’ll be fine. Really. Now, let me ask you one other question. I’d like to learn as much about Israel as I possibly can. About the people, the history, the land, everything. Could you recommend some books and tell me where to find them? If I have slow time on the desk, that will give me something profitable to do.”
“Say no more,” Shadmi said, pleased at Brad’s re
quest. “I have many books that would be very good in that area.”
“In English?”
Shadmi looked startled and then sheepish. “Some. Enough for now. I will call my wife and have her bring them when she comes to get me this afternoon. You can start tonight.”
Nine
“We’ll park and walk from here,” Miri said as she opened the door of the hotel’s Volkswagen van and got out. She didn’t wait for him. She didn’t even look around. These were the first words she had spoken to him this morning. Her eyes had stayed locked on the road ahead, her neck rigid.
She wore a softly tiered cotton skirt in a pastel floral print that fell gracefully around her tanned legs. Teamed with an embroidered peasant top, it gave her a charmingly cool look. Her feet were bare except for white sandals. She had a matching purse slung on her shoulder and carried a medium-sized notebook and a small Bible. Sunglasses were perched atop her head, nearly lost in the thickness of her dark hair. She was obviously used to Jerusalem’s summer heat and dressed accordingly.
Brad watched as she strode away, totally unconcerned as to whether or not he was coming. Then he reached over the seat, grabbed his camera bag, and climbed out to trail after her. It was just now approaching quarter to five and yet daylight had fully driven away the last remains of the night. He estimated it was only four or five minutes to sunrise. A high stone wall that ran next to the sidewalk blocked any view of the city, and he quickened his pace slightly in order to draw even with Miri by the time they reached the place where the wall’s height suddenly dropped in half.
Brad stopped in midstride and stared at the panorama that suddenly lay before his eyes, letting out his breath in a long, slow expression of amazement. “That is incredible!” he whispered in awe.
Her sense of timing was precisely correct. Though they were still in shadow, being below the crest of the Mount of Olives, the entire Old City of Jerusalem lay across the valley, bathed in the first gentle rays of the morning sun. The burnished, golden sheeting of the Dome of the Rock dominated the entire scene, drawing the eye to itself like a selfish debutante who wanted to be the center of everyone’s attention.
Brad reached instinctively for his camera, then slowly let his hand drop. Distraction was unwelcome at this point. He stood in silent awe, trying to let his mind soak up what his eyes were seeing.
“You were right, Miri,” he finally said, unconsciously using her first name. “This is the only way to see it for the first time.”
She nodded, pleased in spite of herself. “Each time of day has its own mood,” she said softly, “but I love this one the best. The city opens herself to view, innocently, fully, as though she had nothing to hide.”
“It is beautiful,” Brad murmured. “This is what I came for.”
Miri was watching him closely, searching for the slightest hint of mockery or sham, almost unwilling to accept the fact that he was as stirred by the sight as she hoped he might be. But it was evident that Brad was enthralled, almost unaware of her in his enchantment with the city before him. Her stiffness lessened slightly.
“The ancient rabbis had a saying: ‘The Holy One of Israel, blessed be his name, created ten measures of beauty for the world. He gave nine of them to Jerusalem.’ ”
They stood, silent for a moment, and then Miri shook off the mood, remembering her resolve to maintain a quiet aloofness. “There is a place to sit a little further down. I will orient you to the city there, and then we will go to see it.”
But before they sat down, Brad took out his camera. He had bought the best equipment he could find while he was in the Orient, and now he put it to its full use. He started with his wide-angle lens, the only one capable of coming close to embracing the full view. Then he went to his standard lens, clicking away steadily as he moved slowly from left to right trying to capture it all. When he switched to his telephoto lens, Miri let the professional guide in her take control.
“The corner of the wall, there directly across from us, is the pinnacle of the temple, the traditional site where Jesus was led by Satan and encouraged to jump.”
Brad lifted his camera and focused in on the spot.
“If you wait a moment, there is a truck coming up the hill. When he is directly under the pinnacle, it will give you a better sense of perspective in the shot.”
He followed her suggestion and was grateful immediately. The truck looked like a tiny bug laboring up the slope, dramatizing the massiveness of the walls. He clicked the shutter, then gave her a long look. “That was an excellent suggestion. Thank you.”
That was the pattern for the next five minutes. She would raise her arm and point out things for him, explaining briefly what it was and why it was significant. He would nod, focus, and record it on film. To call it a cordial, warm partnership would have been a gross overstatement, but the tension that had filled the air on the way over from the hotel had largely disappeared.
Satisfied at last, Brad put the camera away and sat down. “Thank you,” he said, sincerely meaning it. She had called his attention to things he would never have seen as important. “I’m ready for the orientation now.”
To his surprise, she sat down next to him. It wasn’t close enough to touch, but after their beginnings this morning, had Miri chosen a spot several feet away, it would not have surprised him.
For almost a full minute there was a comfortable silence, as Miri gazed at the panorama that lay before them. When she spoke, her voice was low, emphasizing the huskiness of it. “Yerushalayim—or Jerusalem, as you say it—is a strange choice of names for this place. Its name is made of the Hebrew word uru or yehru, which means city or dwelling place, and shalem, which means peace.”
“Like shalom?”
“Yes. It is the same word. To call it the dwelling place of peace is one of history’s great ironies. There are probably few places in all the world that have seen more blood and less peace than the land that lies before us. The city itself has fallen to conquering armies twenty-six times in recorded history.”
Brad gave a low whistle. “Twenty-six times!”
“It is a tragic history as well as a glorious one,” Miri nodded. “The ground that you see before you has literally been irrigated with the blood of those who have died here.” She held up her long, slender fingers and began ticking them off as she spoke. “Egyptians, Assyrians, Babylonians, Persians, Greeks, Romans, Saracens, Crusaders, Turks, British—each has come with its armies and left a trail of blood and horror in their wake.”
Her eyes were saddened as she gazed out across the city. “And always they leave Jewish bodies broken and dead beneath their feet. Under the Romans in A.D. 70, the siege was so terrible in Jerusalem that the people turned to cannibalism. If they tried to escape, the Romans crucified them. At one point there were waiting lists for crosses even though they were crucifying five hundred a night.”
Brad shook his head, deeply sobered as he pictured the fleeing refugees nailed to crosses, perhaps right on the very spot where they now sat.
Miri turned back to Brad. “Of course, Jews are not the only ones who have died. When the Crusaders conquered Jerusalem in 1099, they butchered thousands of Arab Christians. Since they looked like the ‘infidel’ Arabs, they were cut down even as they held up crosses and begged for mercy. Several thousand Jews fled into the main synagogue. These Christians—,” the word was almost spat out in contempt, “promptly set fire to the building and drove anyone who tried to escape back into the flames at the point of the sword.”
She stood up, suddenly restless. “When it was over, the Crusaders sheathed their swords and trooped off to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. It was Sunday, and the Holy City was in Christian hands once again.”
“Not Christian hands,” Brad corrected softly. “Only hands that carried crosses. There is a great difference.”
She turned around slowly and measured him with those somber eyes. The defiant set of her jaw relaxed, and he thought he detected just a flicker of admiration in her voi
ce. “Yes, I suppose you are right.”
Choosing his words carefully, Brad spoke again. “And it is not over yet, is it?”
“What do you mean by that?” she asked, her voice challenging.
“Jerusalem is still not ready to earn her name, is she?”
Miri took the sunglasses from their perch on top of her head and put them on, shaking her head once to rearrange her hair. The glasses hid her eyes, making it harder to read what she was feeling, but her face was sober. “You are right. The characters have changed, but the drama is still the same. Now it is the Arabs who encircle the city, and the Jews who wait for the final assault on the walls.”
“While the world stands by, empty gasoline cans in hand, hoping all will turn out well in the end,” Brad added.
To his surprise that brought a sad smile to her lips. “Exactly. At least well for them. And they grow impatient when the Israelis are so stubborn and uncooperative.”
Brad spoke slowly and solemnly. “Now I personally have never met an Israeli who was like that.”
Miri threw back her head and laughed out loud, a totally uninhibited and delightful sound. “Touché, Mr. Kennison. Touché.”
Brad smiled back at her, relieved he hadn’t triggered another explosion.
“Well.” Miri picked up her purse and notebook and stood up. “Enough of this gloom. Let us stop looking at Jerusalem from a distance and go to meet her. She has seen much sorrow, but she has also seen much joy.”
Shouldering his camera bag, Brad stood up to join her. “I am anxious to come to know her well.”
* * * * * *
Thirty minutes later they stood inside the Garden of Gethsemane. It had been locked at this early hour, but Miri had found one of the Catholic priests she knew, and he had opened it for them.
The site lay in the bottom of the Kidron Valley, the deep, narrow ravine that lay between the Mount of Olives and Mount Moriah or the temple mount in the Old City. Beyond the walls of Gethsemane, the walls of the Old City loomed bright golden in the morning sun. A thick, bushy vine with violet and burgundy flowers hung over the stone walls that formed the garden’s enclosure. The bright pink oleanders were thick clumps in each corner. Numerous flowers and small shrubs, set off by neat, stone-lined walkways, were well tended within the garden. But the eight olive trees were what arrested the gaze and invited the attention. They were grotesque, the trunks twisted and gnarled as though they too had suffered the agony of that night two thousand years before. Their silver-gray leaves stirred slightly in the morning breeze.
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