The English Teacher

by Yiftach Reicher Atir

  “When I told Stefan about the passport he shrugged and said it suited him, and he would introduce himself as a Kenyan farmer. I didn’t ask him if he’d visited that country before. He didn’t seem worried, and I knew that if something went wrong, no passport would help him. ‘They’ll check your passports and take them away for at least two days. Don’t object and don’t protest. You won’t need them after the shooting in any event, and in the getaway car there will be new passports waiting for you,’ I said.

  “Stefan reviewed again what Rachel already knew from the briefing. ‘You must make sure he shows me all of him,’ he said. ‘Make sure no one gets between us, and give me at least three seconds. I need all of him, the head isn’t enough. Putting a bullet between the eyes only works in the movies.’ Then he spoke to the armorer, who spread a cloth on the polished dining table and assembled the handgun, which had been fully dismantled. ‘This is what there is, and you’ll make it work,’ said the armorer, and he explained that only a small plastic pistol could get through the hotel’s metal detector. ‘We checked this with the firm that supplied the hotel with the appliance—it’s Israeli.’ He suppressed a smile, inserted a loaded magazine, and turned the television up to maximum volume, then fired a single bullet into the mattress in the bedroom. ‘That’s it—except for putting on the silencer, the pistol is ready for firing,’ he said. ‘You don’t need to adjust anything. It’s firing now and it will fire again. Don’t dismantle and don’t reassemble.’ Stefan didn’t respond, and I admired his ability to let the boy do his job, although he had already forgotten what this young man had yet to learn. The weapon was packed in the pouch specially prepared for it, in Rachel’s makeup case, and they were ready to set out.”

  ANGIE BROWN CHECKED INTO THE HOTEL, and when the clerk at the reception desk asked Mr. Brown for his passport, she answered on his behalf and kissed him and wrapped him in an impenetrable long embrace. The clerk smiled knowingly, said a bellboy would be there shortly, and apologized for the commotion in the lobby. “That’s the way it is when there’s a conference,” he said, and pointed to the metal detector placed alongside the revolving door. “It ruins the atmosphere,” he added, and Mrs. Brown smiled and said it was nice to feel protected.

  The bellboy opened the door for them and invited her to go in first. Tall and broad-shouldered, Stefan followed her inside, and his body nearly filled the too-small room. A young couple should have a bigger room for a honeymoon, she was thinking, but it didn’t stop her from thanking the bellboy with a smile for the bowl of fruit and the bottle of wine. She specifically asked for this room, and she had to lavish all the charm she could muster on the hotel’s reservation clerk, via a transatlantic phone call, to be sure of getting it. The room was at the end of the hall and the window gave direct access to the fire escape. It was another part of the detailed operation plan. An operative checked the hotel right after the Mossad received the information about the upcoming conference and located the security camera and the alarm sensor that was connected to the emergency exit doors at the end of the hall, so using those doors to get to the fire escape was ruled out. Rachel left her case on the double bed and went to the bathroom. Another operative who checked out the room for them two weeks before noted the shower wasn’t working well but the bathroom was clean, and it turned out he was right. Stefan stood at the window and peered out, saying nothing and paying no attention to the bellboy, who was explaining how to operate the air-conditioning.

  Rachel walked up to Stefan and hugged him from behind, kissed the back of his neck, gave the bellboy five dollars, and watched him leave the room. Stefan freed himself from her embrace the moment the door was closed and sat down on the bed. The springs groaned under his weight, his outstretched legs almost reached the end of the room, and he looked at her like a hunter watching a rabbit caught in the headlights of his car.

  TOWARD EVENING THEY STROLLED IN THE city. The trail from one tourist site to the next enabled them to check the escape route and the local traffic intersections. She marked the traffic lights and the one-way streets on the tourist map, and dropped the map behind a low wall before entering the hotel. Ehud wanted mapping for the benefit of the evacuation team due to arrive the next day, and another operative, waiting in a nearby hotel, retrieved the map and took it to the command yacht. Ehud was proud of the clean job executed by his young protégée. “Rachel’s performance was exemplary,” the other operative reported. She had hung on Stefan’s arm, given him adoring looks and kisses, and anyone observing them, whether casually or professionally, would’ve taken her for a young bride in love. “Stefan succumbed to her charms too,” the operative said, and described how Stefan’s big arm had wrapped around her waist as if she were his prisoner. Ehud took care to keep a professional expression on his face and didn’t reveal his feelings. “You must behave like newlyweds, they’re the only ones allowed to do silly things,” he told them at the preliminary briefing, and now they’re doing their job.

  They ate dinner in the hotel restaurant and walked up the stairs back up to their room, kissing after every landing. With this the preparations were complete, and all that remained was to wait and stare at CNN, the only channel in English. The Unit commander didn’t want them moving around outside any more than was necessary: “You’re a married couple. You can stay in the room and do what young people do.”

  SHE REMOVED THE COVERLET FROM THE bed and saw, as she expected, there was only one blanket, the normal arrangement for a double bed, and she contacted reception. The clerk told her there were no extra blankets. “Sorry, Mrs. Brown, they are all in the laundry, perhaps tomorrow.” Rachel laid the suitcase down by her side of the bed and pulled out her nightgown. “Only tarts sleep in T-shirts,” she said, and told him this was what her father said when he saw her going to the bathroom in the night. Stefan pretended not to hear, but afterward he mentioned this in his report. “A strange thing for her to say,” he wrote, and didn’t elaborate.

  The moment of truth arrived. It was clear that everything depended on her. Stefan sat on the single chair in the room and looked at her as she stood holding the nightdress up to her chest, like the last line of defense. She was silent and he was silent, and the noise of the street beyond the curtain and the double-glazed window was hushed too, waiting for their next move. She thought of Oren, left behind in another world, the world of Rachel Ravid from Israel. She stood in the alien hotel room and thought of the apartment in the capital city that belonged to Rachel Brooks, and she knew that now she must do what Angie Brown would do in her place. She asked Stefan what he expected to happen. “Nothing,” was his brief answer. “We’ll go to bed, get as much fun out of it as we can, and go to sleep.” “And is there another way?” she asked in a tone that sounded strange to her. “Like, you sleep on your side and I on mine, end of story.” “If you want to give me a hand job, or use your mouth, whatever suits you best, that’s fine by me too,” he replied. She refrained from asking if that was how things were on the farm. Before turning in, does he pick out a heifer from the herd, or a mare from the stable, and that’s the only way he can sleep?

  “No,” she said, and felt so small in comparison to him, like a novice taking a test that’s beyond her. “That isn’t going to happen. I don’t want you and this wasn’t part of the deal. You’ll wait until I go to bed and then you can go and masturbate in the shower to your heart’s content. Then come back and sleep beside me and don’t touch me.” It seemed to her he was enjoying the conversation, he liked being crude and arrogant and sure of himself. As it was on the kibbutz, where all the female volunteers wanted to go with him out into the countryside, to ride a horse, feel close to nature, and be screwed by him on the hard ground in the shack that he built for himself next to the barn. “You’ll see,” he said to her indifferently. “Better to do it and be done with it. It’s only sex between consenting adults. This isn’t an affair—there’s no beginning and no end, just the middle. It’s better that way, it rel
eases the tension. But I’ll do whatever you want, and I’ll lie down beside you, and we’ll both lie awake until you decide for yourself you’re going to touch me, and everything will be fine.”

  Then she knew he was right and she was even angrier at herself. She lay beside him tense and frozen and listened to his breathing and felt the warmth of his body and smelled his smell, till she realized if she didn’t give in to what was burning in her, she wouldn’t be capable of thinking about anything else, and then she touched him. Afterward, she hated him for the lifelessness of the experience, for the condom that he put on with such proficiency, for the way he loomed over her and the way he turned his back on her afterward. “We have a hard day ahead of us tomorrow,” he said before he fell asleep, and she lay on her back, put on the panties she had left on the bedside table, and pulled down her rumpled nightgown.

  TOWARD MORNING HE WANTED HER AGAIN. This time it was enjoyable. His heavy body covered her and she felt safe under his bulk. She didn’t come and didn’t even try to come. She gave him what he wanted and he gave her the confidence she was looking for. He won’t betray her. He won’t leave her behind if something goes wrong. Not after he slept with her and kissed her and caressed her with such tenderness. He dozed again, like a baby satisfied after a feed. A few hours from now they will have half a minute to carry out an operation that has been put together during the long weeks that elapsed since she was called away from the school and from the tranquil life she created for herself there. It seemed strange to her to think of the excursions and the lookouts as something easy and normal, but life has rhythms of its own and after some time she got used to the routine, and the sense of danger diminished. She actually enjoyed the teaching, enjoyed exploring the markets, and enjoyed the independence she felt within the parameters laid down by Ehud. She no longer thought that someone was listening to her, that the Mukhabarat was on her trail, she understood the environment in which she was working, and felt confident of her ability. And she knew this evening would be different. She’ll have to wait in the lobby until the target arrives with his bodyguard beside him, follow them into the lift, flashing her most winsome of smiles, and tap in the number of the lift on the transmitter concealed in her purse. She’ll apologize and press the button for her floor, and she’ll make sure, as only a woman knows how, to have the bodyguard backed into the corner of the lift, behind her. When the door opens Stefan will be there, ready to do his job. She must not fail, and she must not move. Stefan will shoot the target and then the bodyguard. It won’t be easy, and there’s a chance she’ll be hit. Now, lying in bed, she felt more confident. She played with his fingers and stroked his nails, with the traces of the farm embedded deeply beneath them.

  When the dawn lit up one of the corners of the room she carefully extricated herself from the bed, picked up the makeup case, which she made a point of keeping close at hand, and padded naked to the bathroom. She felt him watching her, quickened her pace, and closed the door behind her. When she came out, a towel was wrapped around her and she asked him to look away while she dressed.

  Stefan held out a hand and touched her. She didn’t think it was going to happen again, but until the evening they would have time on their hands. In her case there was a book, and she knew she’d be incapable of reading anything. She wanted to talk. She wanted him to look at her, touch her, assure her that his bullets won’t miss their mark—he owes her that much. Once the two targets are dead, they’ll go to their room at the end of the corridor, Stefan will break the glass window, and they’ll go down the fire escape to a vehicle waiting for them. If there are people in the corridor, Stefan will scare them away, and the security staff will be held up for some time by the door, which will be locked from inside. And despite all the planning and the training, of course things could still go horribly wrong. Stefan is a big and strong man, experienced and armed and coolheaded, and for her this is the first operation. “You’re not to move,” Stefan told her in the briefings. “I can take out the bodyguard as long as you don’t move. One moving target is enough.” But she knew the silencer would muffle only part of the sound and the bodyguard might grab her and use her as a shield, and from the moment the door opened it all depended on Stefan, who was now lying in the bed barely covered by a sheet and fiddling with the remote control.

  “How can you?” She sat down beside him in her clothes, as he put a hand on her knee. She tried to choose her words with care. They were both professionals and they knew it was forbidden to discuss operational matters in the room, and they had also learned how to conceal what they meant to say. “How can you lie here as if you’re bored, having screwed me twice, and look for an interesting program on the TV, when you know what’s at stake for us this evening, and it’s a deal that might not come off?” Stefan wanted to tell her you get used to it, with time it gets easier, and anyway there’s nothing he needs to be doing now, but he restrained himself.

  “SHE’S TOO YOUNG AND SHE HAS no experience,” Stefan said to Ehud, back in the holiday apartment in Sicily, rented for the time when they were preparing for the operation. Rachel had gone into her room to change her clothes for the final dress rehearsal, and he took the last opportunity to try and change the decision to use her.

  Ehud had seen the way Stefan was watching and sizing her up, and he now realized just how much Stefan liked her, and he told him she’d be fine.

  “Also, we have no one else,” said the Unit commander, overhearing the conversation. “Besides, you’ve seen how she conducts herself, like a lady. You can go anywhere with her and you don’t need to open your mouth.”

  Stefan ignored the allusion to his shortcomings as an operative. “She’s too sensitive,” he said. He started to say more but the Unit commander cut him off. “There’s no alternative. There’s always a first time, and I’m trusting you to bring her up to speed.”

  He winked at Stefan, and Ehud felt the anger and jealousy welling up in him. He hated this kind of fraternity talk and was uncomfortable having to be a part of it. Rachel was an operative. She had risked her life and spent time in a foreign location that none of the men sitting in this room would have been capable of reaching. She didn’t have as much experience as Stefan, and her only exposure to guns had been on the practice range, where all operatives were required to take firearms training, but in this operation she was risking her life like Stefan, perhaps more so, and yet they were talking about her as if she were an object, an appliance with only one purpose, to set up the target in the line of fire.

  Stefan wasn’t giving up, and he told the Unit commander how scared she was every time the door of the lift opened and he burst in with the drawn pistol.

  “Calm her down. Take the role of the father. You’re the responsible adult.”

  “Am I?” said Stefan. He didn’t smile.

  “Listen to her and be patient with her,” said the commander. “According to her psychological profile, she has a father-complex, and she’s looking for a substitute for the father she had issues with. Try for once not to seduce your partner.”

  The commander laughed and Ehud held his silence, because the operation was more important than Rachel, more important than her intimate secrets.

  STEFAN PLAYED WITH THE REMOTE UNTIL he found some raucous rock music and turned up the volume. He sat up and pulled Rachel closer to him “We have no choice,” he said. “We can sit here all day and let the pressure grind us down until we can’t move. I’ve seen this happen before. He looked away from the singer gyrating on the screen and turned to face her. “We won’t improve our efficiency by thinking about all the bad things. We need to rest and just wait patiently.”

  “Rest? Patiently?” she asked, and the tone of her voice told him that was unlikely.

  “I see you’ve brought a book,” he said, and pointed to the slim volume of poetry.

  “Yes,” she said. He had obviously never heard of Emily Dickinson, and she realized now that she would open
this book only if she had to wait too long in the lobby.

  “So how about it? Are you going to sit and read by the window, like in some movie? You could even read me something, if the mood takes you.”

  “No!” she said firmly. “We need to talk.”

  The room service arrived and she got up to take the tray. Stefan poured her a cup of coffee and she said now they really were acting like a couple. Stefan smiled at her. His smile pleased her and she didn’t want to lose it. She was afraid of something happening to him. He was the one who would hold the gun, the one who must shoot without hesitation and then disappear with her. They ate in silence, and she spread jam on a slice of bread and gave it to him and said that her father used to eat beans in the morning. Stefan was surprised, and she explained to him there are Englishmen who eat hot beans on toast for their breakfast.

  And then they talked, or rather she did, and Stefan, who was used to sitting alone on a horse, with only the dog to shout at from time to time, listened to her and recorded the words in his memory, and afterward wrote them up in a report that he marked for Ehud’s attention only, which needless to say didn’t work, because a report is a report, and it went into the debriefing file.

  “This is strange,” she said, “but I’m thinking about my father,” and she told him that when she was frightened in the night her father wouldn’t let her into her parents’ bedroom, and for as long as she could remember her parents had slept in separate beds. She wondered if they had ever shared a bed, but her mother died before she asked her.