by John Altman
Those had been good summers, full of firsts: not only first cigarettes, but also first beers, first parties, first kisses—the last two on the same night, on a rooftop on Sixty-Eighth Street. “My dad is kind of a big deal,” the kid hosting the party had told her solemnly. The boy’s name had been Robert Thorpe Jr. III, which Jana had never understood—wasn’t that redundant or something? His tongue had explored her mouth like a dentist searching for cavities, hitting every corner.
Miriam, only one year older but vastly more experienced—a year meant a lot at that age—had laid out the facts of life before the party. “Guys like girls who wait. Let him offer you a beer. If there’s a joint, wait for him to pass it; never reach for it. Let him make the first move. Hang back. Be cool.” Not the most feminist advice, perhaps, but it had worked. When Jana had tried a similar tack with Asher years later, however, he had been too shy. Finally, fed up, she had made the first move herself.
Where was Miriam now? Had she ever met her tall, dark, handsome stranger? Jana had found hers, only to lose him to a terrorist bomb. The Ouija board had not mentioned that part.
Dusk—shadows quickening, temperature dropping. She reached Beltway traffic an hour past nightfall. Eye twitching, she alternated between a snail’s pace and a standstill.
Her second time in DC. But she had never before visited the Columbia Heights neighborhood of the safe house: lower income but gentrifying, with a tapestry of ethnicities that she might easily blend in with. As she parked, she heard from the next block a sound that might have been either a backfire or a gunshot. And Americans thought Israel was dangerous.
Jack-o’-lanterns leered from stoops and windowsills. Trick-or-treaters moved in unruly groups down the sidewalk: princesses, vampires, skeletons, ghouls. Teenage girls revealing the maximum possible acreage of bare skin. Strange holiday, thought Jana. In Israel they also wore costumes, on Purim, but for a purpose: to commemorate salvation from the Persians.
The address she sought was squeezed in between a liquor store and a check-cashing place. No trick-or-treaters inside, no hint of the festive vibe on the street. She climbed four flights of stairs, receiving hints of lives behind closed doors: an audibly aspirating dog, a squalling infant, frying onions, disinfectant.
She found the key taped to the bottom of the welcome mat. Inside, two rooms offered a view of a church across the street. Dirty white marble Virgin Mary out front. Exposed radiator on the wall, exposed pipes on the ceiling. Water damage. Cockroaches. It reminded her of the shabby old Jewish Agency house she had grown up in.
She explored. Sheets folded neatly on bare mattress. Bureau with peeling veneer. No soap in the bathroom. Kitchen cupboards stocked only with flour, sugar, rice. In the Vermont house, her contact had often cooked food from back home. Israeli breakfasts of eggs and smoked fish, challah on Shabbat, and soup with kneidlach, and tahini with everything. Here she would be on her own.
She went back to the Mazda and brought her luggage upstairs, then fell across the bare mattress, eyelid twitching. An incipient headache probed. She hadn’t eaten since morning. She would make some rice. Better yet, go shopping. Buy some soap and real food. Some hair dye—according to Yoni, her target liked blondes. Change the license plates, move the Mazda to long-term parking at the airport. But for now she just lay still. Gathering her energy. Preparing herself.
She listened against the mattress to her own faint but steady heartbeat. She had chosen this path, she reminded herself. She could have been just another mindless Hasid cow, getting knocked up, handing away her selfhood in service to husband and children. She could have stayed in the intelligence corps, collecting hemorrhoids and backaches. She might even have moved to America, gone to prep school with Miriam, perhaps sired Robert Thorpe Jr. IV. But she had wanted more. She still wanted more.
Of course, this was what she had signed up for. She had given herself willingly, as a tool to be used.
Head throbbing, eye twitching, she lay on the mattress, looking at the swirling patterns of frost on the grimy window, trying to make herself get up, get moving, get started.
North of Tel Aviv, Israel
Yoni’s Subaru was parked in the driveway again.
After her driver helped carry her parcels inside, Naomi stood alone in the kitchen, listening. Her husband and Yoni Yariv sat in the courtyard, talking in furtive voices. Straining to hear the words, she registered only the low creak of the front gate closing behind the departing limo, the night wind rustling through the korizia trees.
She loaded spices and pastries into cupboards and refrigerator, then considered making herself a bit of supper. But her stomach felt sour, uneasy. She settled for a glass of juice. Then she carried a bag of jewelry and hand-embroidered scarves up to the bedroom, switching on lights as she went.
After making space in the closet and jewelry box, she wandered over to the window and looked down into the courtyard. Her husband’s bald pate glinted in the moonlight. A bottle of wine and two glasses sat on the small table, alongside a small stack of file folders. The two men leaned in toward each other, intimate as lovers. Three times a week lately, Yoni came over and they talked softly and intently … about what?
No food, she noticed. She might bring them a platter. And she might conceal her iPhone beneath the linen. Then she could find out what they were talking about.
She gave her head a small shake. Things had gotten bad, yes. But not so bad that she was going to start spying on her husband. She was not ready to become that woman.
She moved into the bathroom, shucking off clothes as she went. She ran water, and as the tub filled, she looked dispassionately at her own naked body. Skin ever more translucent, as if the veins were forcing their way to the surface. Belly flesh sagging like a deflated football. Perhaps her husband was hooking up with one of Yoni’s young girlfriends. Some slut with a taut stomach, flexible enough to hook her ankles behind her ears, easily impressed by an older man’s achievements. Perhaps the file folders were filled with potential candidates, eager volunteers …
Naomi sank into the almost too-hot water, submerging her head briefly, then surfacing and letting her wet hair fall heavily around her shoulders. She sank down again, resurfaced. After soaking for a few minutes, she left the bath, toweled off, and ran a comb through her hair. She wiped away condensation and considered her reflection in the glass. She would be scowling but for the browful of Botox that prevented it.
She dressed beside a marriage bed that had not known the rumpled disarray of lovemaking for longer than she cared to remember. She had broached this subject, gently, a month ago. Her husband had responded with a joke about conjugal obligations varying by profession, according to the Talmud, and donkey drivers being largely exempt. His point being that he spent his days since the promotion wrangling with politicians and bureaucracy, and she should therefore expect less of his attention. She wondered if that was really all there was to it.
No harm, she thought as she buttoned her blouse, in learning what they were talking about out in the courtyard—just to set her mind at ease.
She took her phone from the nightstand. In the kitchen, she assembled a platter of pita with sayadiya and besarah. Beneath the small plates went a paper doily. Beneath the doily, a sheet of linen. Beneath the linen, her iPhone.
When she carried the platter into the courtyard, her husband stopped talking, glowering at the interruption. But Yoni Yariv found a winning half-smile, versions of which had doubtless tumbled no end of young ladies—and perhaps a few more mature specimens—into countless beds over the years. As she set down the tray, Yoni said: “Shookran, Naomi.”
She returned the smile warmly, with a half-ironic curtsy.
She went inside again, fear fluttering like a hummingbird in the hollow of her chest. What would happen if they found the phone? God have mercy on her soul.
She would not even listen to the recording. After Yoni left, she woul
d count her blessings that she had not been caught, and delete the file.
She dallied in the kitchen, aching to reverse her mistake as soon as possible. Then made herself stop. If she loitered too long down here, they might grow suspicious.
Upstairs, she changed into a nightgown, brushed her teeth, flossed. She reached for the book on her nightstand. But she couldn’t concentrate. She closed the book, held it in her lap, frowning. Lost track of time. At last she heard a door downstairs open and close. A lock turned, clicked soundly home. The alarm system chirped.
Her husband climbed the stairs. He came into the bedroom without brushing his teeth, changed into pajamas without saying a word, and slipped beneath the covers and switched off his lamp.
A few seconds later, Naomi put down her book and followed suit.
She waited, the hummingbird now a great crow flapping in her chest.
Shadows slid across the ceiling. His breathing slowed, coarsened. Otherwise, the silence was absolute.
At last, she put her legs over the side of the bed and padded back downstairs. Darkness pooled in corners and behind furniture. She moved quietly past the piano, into the courtyard. Two wine bottles stood empty. The platter of food was untouched. She retrieved the iPhone from beneath the linen. The app was still recording. She brought the phone inside, locked herself in the bathroom off the kitchen. The device had captured nearly thirty-five minutes of sound. The file was named by date and time. She started playback. Wincing, she reduced the volume and held the speaker to her ear.
As she listened, cold fingers closed around her heart; pinprick hackles rose along the nape of her neck.
A soft footstep outside the bathroom door sent a gust of alarm tingling through her solar plexus. She stopped playback. Making a split-second decision, she found Share and scrolled through the contacts. A name leaped out. No time to look further. She selected Gavril Meir’s number, pressed Send, and watched the recording drift out across the digital ether.
She deleted the message thread. Hiding the phone in a pocket of her nightgown, she worked the lock, turned the knob. Her husband stood very close to the bathroom door, his eyes two heavy-lidded crescents.
With an effort, she affected a light tone: “You’re up.”
“What are you doing?”
She touched her stomach. “I had some bad fish in the souk.” Reproachfully: “I was hoping for some privacy.”
She started to step past him. He seized her wrist. She snatched her hand away, clutching it defensively to her chest, tight against her thudding heart.
He grabbed her wrist again, twisting sharply, bearing down, forcing her to her knees. She lashed toward his groin with her free hand. He dodged without releasing her wrist. Then he was atop her, trying to slam her head against the floor. The phone skittered from her pocket. They were grappling, her thumbs fumbling for his eyes. He twisted like a dervish, whipping his head back and forth. Grunting, straining, muscles cording in his neck. She raked her nails across his cheek, digging up bloody furrows.
“Kus ima shelkha,” he snarled. Fuck your mother.
A sound rose in her throat—a howl of pain and fear. Suddenly, he released her, changed position, grabbed her windpipe with both hands.
Her screams choked off. She kicked, hit air. Kicked again and hit air.
Her mouth opened soundlessly. She felt her eyes rolling back. Let me go. Had she said it out loud, or only thought it? Let me go.
A terrible pressure filled her breast. The phone gone, lost. Her husband panting, his breath in her face like a sink backing up, like effluvia belched up from the sewer. He was talking, but she could not make out the words.
Rocking her hips, she tried again to dislodge him. Again, more weakly.
She gave up. There was warmth and comfort in giving up. Something in the perfect center of her skull gave a short, hard snap. Then embroidered darkness folded in. She collected it, wrapped it around her, and let go.
Part Two
Chapter Four
Hopewell, NJ
As the recording played, Gavril Meir watched Dalia closely.
When the voices had finished, the speakers conveyed a few moments of scratching wind, like the runoff groove of an old record. Then Meir stopped playback and there was only silence, broken at last by the snap of Feigenbaum’s lighter.
“You and I,” said Meir, “have more in common, my dear, than you might recognize.”
Dalia said nothing. She was still trying to get her head around what she had just heard. A murky, amateurish recording, but clear enough. She had listened with dark, sick wonder, but not with surprise—in fact, with whatever was the opposite of surprise.
“Of course, you are the more naïve. Teaching an entire generation to stretch out their throats for the Arab’s jambiya.” He shot Feigenbaum a quick, indecipherable glance. Before the fireplace, the German shepherd twitched its tail in a dream. “But these hawks, with their fairy tales of boot heels crushing the enemy once and for all—these are our common enemy.” He reached for a cigarette and flicked open the lighter. “Not true Israelis, if you ask me. More like Brownshirts.”
She gave a distant nod. Her scalp was crawling.
“So …” A pause to exhale smoke. “Connect the dots. I’ll wager we are hearing the plans for a false-flag operation. A high-value target in Washington, DC. To strengthen America’s resolve against our enemies.”
“Not without precedent,” Feigenbaum put in dryly.
Another dazed nod. In 1959, Israeli military intelligence, faced with the UK’s decision to withdraw from Egypt, had concluded that the British would stay if faced with a crisis. A series of bombings, dressed up to seem the work of restive Arabs, had targeted Western interests across the region. The plot was exposed only because a makeshift bomb had exploded inside the pocket of a young Zionist in Alexandria, who had proceeded, under duress, to confess everything.
Meir examined the ember of his cigarette. “Did you recognize the voice on the recording—the older one?”
Feeling numb, she nodded again. She traveled in similar circles as the rosh hamossad, who had once been a senior advisor to the Israeli General Staff. She had met him in person more than once at lectures and fund-raisers.
“So you understand why we cannot, in devising our response, turn to the Mossad.” He smoked. “What remains? We might try the CIA, the FBI. But a whiff of this caught by the wrong nose, twisted to suit someone’s political ambitions, could do serious harm.”
“Lashom harah,” said Feigenbaum. The halachic term—literally, “evil tongue”—for derogatory speech that, although true, becomes destructive when known to the public. “We cannot lose our most important ally because of one rogue intelligence leader.”
She opened her mouth to say something, then closed it.
“We might do nothing,” Feigenbaum continued rhetorically. “Let the cards fall as they may.”
“Or perhaps, if we extend ourselves, we might find some back channel that pays dividends. You have some personal acquaintance with Lee Chazan?”
She started. How had they …? But of course, before approaching her they would have investigated every past romance and ill-considered dalliance.
“He has risen”—Feigenbaum jetted smoke from his flaring nostrils—“to a position of some authority. Yes? Executive director of Israel’s largest lobby. Undoubtedly, he has the ear of the prime minister.”
“He might solve our problem,” Meir suggested. “At its source.”
She shook her head. He drank the Kool-Aid, she almost said. Made appearances on Fox News, hitting every talking point, defending policies of evangelical Christians who believed that the Bible was the literal word of God, who wanted Jews in the holy land so that the end-times could come as prophesied. But deep down, of course, Lee Chazan was smarter than that. Deep down, his real crime was opportunism.
“I sa
w him interviewed recently,” said Meir. “He struck me as reasonable.”
Feigenbaum gave one cuff a fussy tweak. “He wouldn’t throw you under the bus … right?”
Both men strained invisibly toward her. She could feel the palpable grasp of their need. Smoke from two cigarettes collected beneath the low ceiling. The dreaming dog kicked restlessly. Outside, the wind gusted. Her heart sped up, leaving almost no space between beats.
Lifting her chin slightly, addressing the smoky air halfway between the two men, she said, “Get me my son.”
“Dalia.” Meir paused to shave the sharp edge off his voice. “It takes time—”
“Get my son. Then we’ll talk.”
“Listen to reas—”
“Fuck your reason.”
Feigenbaum was shaking his head. But Meir’s heavy brow was lifting, and to her surprise, she caught the Galicianer smiling at her chutzpah: a quick approving flicker, then gone.
* * *
She drove too fast between serried legions of rustling corn stalks, back to Princeton.
She parked two blocks from her faculty housing. Inside the tiny kitchen, she splashed a finger of Remy Martin into a glass and downed it, the burn fading to a glow.
She followed the narrow hallway connecting the tiny kitchen with the tiny bedroom. Sitting on the edge of the unmade bed, she kicked off her shoes—thump, thump—and lay back, closing her eyes. Too tired, too wired, to sleep. But she could drift. And if a jaded, selfish old woman such as she could feel guilt, so would she feel.
But nothing would change. She had rebuked McConnell, after all, for embracing half measures. She would not repeat his mistake. She would commit fully to whatever had to be done. She would save her only boy, whatever the cost.
