Miri pushed slowly away from him, her eyes moist, her lips tight. “Maybe this is the answer.”
Brad was shaken. “What do you mean?”
“Yesterday on Sinai we asked the Lord to show us what his will is for us. Maybe this is his answer.” Her lower lip trembled, and she bit it angrily. “I don’t think I could ever leave Israel to live elsewhere. Maybe it is time we face reality. Maybe your God is saying no to us.”
She stumbled to her feet and fled, leaving Brad to stare after her.
* * * * * *
Half an hour later Brad still sat where he was, sadly watching the lone figure on the nearest ridge. Ali awakened from his nap and, sensing Brad’s moroseness, stayed in the Volkswagen bus reading the scriptures. Three different times Brad started to rise and go out to her, then decided it wasn’t yet time. He hadn’t found the words. He wasn’t even sure but what Miri was right. Maybe this was the Lord’s way of answering them.
Suddenly Ali spoke through the open window of the bus. “What’s that?”
“What’s what?”
“Listen!” he commanded.
Brad cocked his head, feeling it now almost as much as hearing it—a low, rumbling sound coming from far away.
“Artillery?” Ali asked.
“Yes, but a long way off.”
Ali leaned back and reopened his book. “Probably another Egyptian-Israeli artillery duel across the Suez.”
“I suppose,” Brad answered, his thoughts already back on Miri. He glanced at his watch. It was one minute after two in the afternoon of Saturday, October sixth, the day called by the Jews Yom Kippur.
Twenty-five
“Are they Israeli?” Brad asked, closely watching the expression on Nathan’s face as he peered through the binoculars.
“Of course,” he answered, handing Brad the field glasses. They had climbed this high plateau about half a mile from the car when Nathan had first spotted the column of dust. Brad focused in and could barely make out tanks, jeeps, and half-tracks in the swirling dust. They were moving fast, heading north.
“That’s encouraging,” Nathan said as they rose and started back. “I would judge that road to be only two or so miles from where we are. We’ll build a signal fire as soon as it’s dark. If that doesn’t bring someone, we’ll hike to the road in the morning and see if we can intercept some traffic.”
They were nearly back to the car when they heard the distant throbbing of engines. Nathan stopped and waved Ali and Sarah, who were walking out to meet them, into motionless statues. “Helicopters!” he shouted, and sprinted up out of the depression they were camped in. Brad and the others followed close behind. There were six aircraft. They passed about a mile to the east of the stranded group, skimming a thousand feet above the ground. The noise even brought Miri running from where she had been sitting staring at the sunset.
They screamed and whistled and waved and jumped up and down, but in a few moments the helicopters disappeared, the sound of their engines dying away.
“We were in the sun,” Brad said, jerking his head in the direction of the orange-red ball of fire hanging low in the western sky. “No way could they have seen us.”
“Come on,” Nathan said, turning back toward the car. “Let’s gather some brush before it gets dark. We want to keep that fire going all night.”
“Do you think there will be others?” Sarah asked, falling into step beside him.
Nathan nodded. “The artillery has been pounding up north now for over three hours. That’s not typical. Usually they trade a few rounds back and forth, then quit. Maybe Sadat is going to get serious and try to regain a little face. He’s been threatening to revenge Egypt’s humiliation in the Six Day War for over a year now.”
“Do you think there will be war?” Sarah asked anxiously.
Brad stepped up his pace slightly so he could hear Nathan’s answer. Miri trailed behind, her mood returning with the disappearance of the helicopters.
“No,” Nathan responded to Sarah’s question. “It’s just that the other Arab countries are laughing at Sadat now, saying Egypt is all bluff and bluster. He’ll shell us for a day, maybe stage a quick raid across the Suez Canal or something to get people off his back. But that will work to our advantage. We seem to be moving up some forces as backup just in case. I expect more to pass us tonight, so we’ll have a fire going to attract their attention.” He smiled at her. “I fully expect to be home by tomorrow afternoon.”
“Really?”
“You bet. Later tonight when reception improves, we’ll try to get a news broadcast from Tel Aviv and see if they indicate what’s going on.”
If Nathan was aware of the sadness that lay over Miri and Brad, he gave no sign. They cooked a simple meal once the sun set, ending Yom Kippur and their fast. Then Nathan started piling the brush onto their little campfire, making it into a signal fire. They gathered around, each preoccupied with his or her own thoughts as they watched the leaping flames.
“It probably wouldn’t hurt for one of us to get out away from the roar of the fire and listen for any engines,” Nathan suggested shortly before eight. “We can’t keep the fire going full blast all night, or we’ll run out of brush.” He turned to Brad. “Do you want to go first, or shall I?”
“Miri and I will go,” Brad responded, glad for a chance to be alone with her and talk out their impasse.
She nodded and stood up, putting her sweater on. Ali watched them closely. He looked as though he was going to make some light remark, but finally said, “Good luck, you two,” as they passed him and headed for the ridge.
Brad put his arm around Miri, and she slipped her arm around his waist, but they walked in silence, both reluctant to revive the pain. It was another beautiful night in the Sinai, the stars like a generous sprinkling of silver dust on black velvet. The heat of the day was now completely gone, and the chill quickly deepened. By the time they were a hundred yards from camp, the silence was profound and deep, almost oppressive after the crackling of the fire.
Brad found a small patch of relatively flat rock, and they sat down. The moon had not come up yet, and he could barely see her face in the starlight. He touched her cheek gently and she leaned against him, sighing deeply.
“Miri?”
“Yes?”
“Let’s not give up yet, okay?”
He felt her face relax under his fingertips. “I don’t want to give up.”
“Let’s work on one problem at a time.”
“Brad, I can’t leave Israel. I just can’t! I’ve been thinking about it all evening. How can I leave my people when—”
He put his finger gently over her lips. “I know,” he murmured, torn with his own emotions. “But the first problem is to get you an answer to your prayers. We can work something out on the other.”
“What?” she cried in anguish.
He smiled at her in the dark, though it cost him a lot of effort. “Well, we could compromise and live in London. That’s about half way for each of us.”
To his surprise, Miri threw her arms around him and hugged him fiercely. “Oh Brad,” she whispered. “I don’t want to lose you.”
“Remember,” he said, “if you try to do that, you’ve got a fight on your hands. So let’s talk about something more cheerful.”
She took a deep breath and then nodded. “Okay, like what?”
“Like our children,” he said. “I’d better warn you, families are very important to Mormons. We like big ones.”
“How about four little boys, just like you?”
“And four little girls with dark eyes and jet black hair just like their mother.”
“Eight? You weren’t kidding about large families, were you!”
“Nope. I love kids, and I don’t think there are many more important things you can do with your life than to raise a good family. How many do you want?”
She was quiet for a long moment, and Brad felt his anxiety start to rise until she spoke. “It’s funny, but all of a s
udden I want eight, if they are ours. You can have your four little girls if I get my four boys.”
“A deal,” he said, burying his face in her hair.
“We’ll name the first one Brad…”
“And the second one Miriam. Little Miri.”
“Could we name the next one David?” she asked, warming to the game. Brad’s head shot up, and the frown was instantaneous.
For a moment Miri looked startled, and then she laughed out loud. “Not that David, silly. David, my brother.” The smile slowly faded. “The one who was killed in 1967.”
Brad relaxed, a bit sheepish. “In that case, of course.”
“I wish you had known him, Brad. He was so good.”
“Was he older than—,” Brad started, but suddenly Miri stiffened to attention.
“Listen!” she hissed urgently.
Brad jumped to his feet, and Miri joined him in excitement, straining to hear.
“Helicopters!” Brad cupped his hands and yelled. “Nathan, helicopters coming in from the west!” He grabbed Miri’s hand, and they ran quickly back to camp.
“More brush!” Nathan commanded, leaping to the stack of fuel they had collected. The fire shot up to twice its size as they hurled more branches on. The deep pounding sound of jet helicopter engines was now clearly discernible, even over the roar of the fire, as Miri and Brad waited breathlessly.
“If they can’t see this,” Ali shouted, “they had better have their eyes checked!”
The dancing flames were now brightly illuminating the landscape for thirty or forty yards in every direction.
But the pilots’ eyes were fine. There were two helicopters, and they came in low at about three hundred feet. For a moment the stranded party thought they were going to fly over, and once again they began to jump and shout. But the two craft circled immediately.
“Oh, they’ve seen us! They’ve seen us!” Sarah cried.
The lead helicopter suddenly turned on a high intensity spotlight, blinding them. The second followed suit. The two aircraft circled slowly, one spotlight frozen on the camp, the other methodically searching the landscape around the camp.
“What are they doing?” Miri demanded.
“Just checking things out,” Nathan explained. “This could be a typical Arab terrorist setup. They want to be sure no one is waiting out there to hit them when they come down.”
Evidently the man in charge was a very nervous type, or else the group on the ground looked particularly suspicious, for they were in no hurry to come down. The one craft hovered directly overhead, keeping them pinned in his beam, while the other swept the desert with his light in ever-widening circles.
“Keep your hands in plain sight,” Nathan shouted over the noise of the engines, as the helicopters finally began to descend. “Stay put. Let’s let them know we’re harmless.”
In spite of the blinding sandstorm whipped up by the rotors, Brad and Nathan saw the markings on the side of the helicopter before it even touched the ground. They both stared, unable to believe their eyes. The side door flew open and men spilled out, rifles ready and faces grim.
Ali was the first to find his voice. “They’re Egyptians!” he cried in stunned surprise.
Twenty-six
It was late afternoon, and the dark canvas was soaking up the heat of the Sinai, making the inside of the tent sweltering. The four of them sat listlessly, still in a state of shock. Miri and Sarah looked haggard and drawn. Nathan sat in a corner, his head in his hands. Brad was in the best shape of the group, but then what they had seen in the last twenty-one hours did not have the same personal impact for him as it had for the three Israelis.
The Egyptian commando raiding party had swooped them up after a brief but thorough search of the Volkswagen bus, and had dropped them at a small army camp, where they were placed under heavy guard. When the soliders discovered they had Israelis in their captivity, half the camp gathered around to gibe and jeer and to gleefully report the smashing success of their army in the afternoon’s attack. Ali, treated with cautious respect and some deference, was allowed to translate to his friends as the Egyptians bragged in great detail about the afternoon’s triumph. Nathan and the two women sat tight-lipped and silent, Nathan’s only comment a muttered reference to an Arab’s penchant for bravado and exaggeration.
But when they were transported north this morning to this larger camp near the Suez, it quickly became apparent that the almost ecstatic jubilation of the Egyptian army was not without cause. The road was strewn with the carnage of war: shattered hulks of tanks; still smoldering, blasted trucks; overturned half-tracks; and everywhere in the sand, bodies scattered in the grotesque, twisted agony of death. Some of the wreckage and many of the dead were Egyptian, but the clear majority were Israeli. The Israeli army had been clobbered and badly mauled. Brad held Miri’s hand tightly as the shock and horror in her eyes deepened with each new scene. The fury and frustration inside Nathan seethed with each new evidence of Israel’s defeat.
Most depressing of all were the hordes of Israeli prisoners. They lined the roads, filthy, barefoot, in some cases bloodstained, and in every case, stunned, their faces without hope.
The truck arrived at the camp about ten-thirty in the morning. A cluster of about fifty tents was surrounded by rolls of barbed wire. The five prisoners were pushed into a small tent and left under the watchful eye of a guard, a silent dark-skinned Egyptian soldier who stared at his prisoners without expression. At noon cans of American C-rations were brought in. Brad, who had eaten enough of those in Viet Nam to last him a lifetime, picked at his. Nathan ate absently, as though eating was a duty to be taken care of with as little thought as possible. Miri and Sarah left theirs untouched. Ali wrinkled his nose at the smell, but finished his.
At two-twenty, the intelligence officer arrived. He spoke fluent English and halting Hebrew. He began with Ali, then took Brad away next. It was a friendly and cordial interrogation but very thorough. He seemed satisfied with what Brad answered and returned him in the shortest amount of time. Nathan took the longest, Miri and Sarah about equal time. Then Ali was taken out again.
Now Ali, followed by the lieutenant, ducked in under the tent flap. “I’d like to speak to all of you together,” the lieutenant said. “But I have something I must attend to now. I’ll return in a moment.” The flap dropped back into place. The guard watched them in silence.
Ali sighed as he sat down on the cot next to Miri and Brad. “I’m not sure, but I think we’ve convinced him that we are telling the truth, that we are not some undercover group trying to infiltrate behind the lines.”
“Bully!” Nathan muttered.
“Listen, my friend,” Ali said, “you happen to be an Israeli officer carrying army ID, dressed in civilian clothes, and in a war zone. If he wanted to get nasty, he could treat you as a spy and make things very difficult for you. But he seems satisfied.”
“Do you have any idea how the war is going?” Miri broke in before Nathan could respond.
Ali shook his head. “Obviously he didn’t sit down and reveal all their plans, but as near as I can gather from what he did say and from hearing the soldiers talk, the Egyptians hold the entire east bank of the canal. The Syrians have attacked Israel on the Golan Heights, but much to the Egyptians’ disgust, they are evidently not doing as well.”
“What about the other Arab countries?” Nathan demanded.
“Staying out of it, except for token support.”
“What about Jerusalem and Tel Aviv?” Sarah asked.
Suddenly Brad felt ashamed. It had never occurred to him to assume the war had extended into the heartland of Israel. No wonder Miri looked so stricken. On every hand they had seen evidence that the Israeli army was smashed and in retreat. Why shouldn’t they assume that their homes and families were under siege too? He took Miri’s hand and held it tightly.
“I think the Egyptians had a limited objective,” Ali explained. “Get across the canal, grab some land, and dig in u
ntil the major powers halt the fighting. They’ve achieved the first part. There doesn’t seem to be any talk of pushing much further.”
“That seems like near-sighted strategy,” Brad said.
“Not if you understand Arab politics,” Ali explained. “Anwar Sadat is in a shaky position. He’s threatened again and again to avenge the humiliation of the Six Day War but has taken no action. He does not have the charisma of Nasser, and his people are restless. He must unite them behind him. That he has unquestionably achieved in this move. He has shown the world that the Arab can stand and fight.”
Brad couldn’t help but note the pride in Ali’s voice.
“Even if he were to be driven back across the canal tomorrow, he has won. He has achieved a stunning defeat of the Israelis. Every Arab can once again hold up his head and be proud.”
Nathan leaped to his feet, bringing the guard to alert attention. “The Israeli army is not defeated,” he cried. “The Arabs will yet turn their tails and run.”
Ali shrugged, obviously a bit angry himself. “Perhaps. But the Arabs I have seen here are not turning their tails. And the myth of the invincible Israeli warrior is shattered once and for all.”
Nathan leaped at Ali, unleashing the frustration and rage that had been boiling in him for the last twenty or so hours. His fist caught Ali high on the left cheek, catapulting him backward across the cot. Brad was on his feet in an instant, throwing his shoulder into Nathan’s chest and driving him hard against the far wall, but Nathan was on his feet again like a cat, thrusting Brad aside. The muzzle of the guard’s rifle stared directly at his head, pulling him up short. The flap of the tent flew open, and two more soldiers darted in, weapons ready.
Brad hurried over to where Miri and Sarah were helping Ali to his feet. The ring Nathan wore had laid open an ugly three-inch gash along Ali’s cheek, which was now dripping blood down the side of his face and onto his shirt. He touched it with the back of his hand and stared at it, then into Nathan’s eyes, which were still filled with fury.
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