Fly Has a Hundred Eyes A, page 17
“Is this a proposal?”
“It could be.”
“You’re married to Ora. The girl with the giggle.”
“Only on Tuesdays and Thursdays.”
The road was smoother now, and they sped along the macadam. “I’ll drop you off at Leora and Gadi’s. Tell them to put the Mausers and ammo with the rest of the weapons in the root cellar. Under the onions and potatoes.”
“Where do they get the other weapons?”
“From friends. Gadi has a shop in Netanya. A linen shop. He goes to Belgium twice a year to buy tablecloths and lace.”
“He must have a good business.”
“He goes mostly to see friends. They give him gifts.”
“Chocolates?”
“Chocolate gives him hives. So they send other things. Special delivery.”
“To the beach? At night?”
Rafi nodded.
“What about Ora?” Lily asked. “Does she go along?”
“She lives in Hedera.”
Lily had been there once. It was another small, isolated beach town, north of Netanya. “She has a linen shop too?”
“A gift shop. Delft. Bohemian glass.”
“And her friends send her gifts from Holland and Czechoslovakia?”
“Not for much longer. She’ll close the shop after Hitler takes over Bohemia.”
“Then it will be the Mufti’s turn to shop for cut glass.”
“Exactly.”
“You won’t be able to go back tomorrow and get the rest of the guns after all,” Lily said.
Rafi reached for her hand. “If we get back to Tulkarm in time, the Mufti’s men won’t be able to use them, either.”
The road leading into Netanya was smooth and paved; close to town, the air lifted and wafted toward them with the soft tang of the sea. They passed the police post, stark and rigid as a prison, at the edge of town and drove down the main street of the little resort.
Couples strolled along a promenade or rode in horse-drawn carriages that clop-clopped gently along a broad avenue. Roses blossomed in the center divider and bright flowers bloomed on either side of the street—beneath the trees, in front of the shops, along the walks of pensiones with broad porches where people sat drinking tea.
Rafi pulled the car off the road into an orange grove and bumped along in tall weeds toward a white stucco house on a bluff. Faded green paint flaked from the window frames and a wooden door. Two bicycles rested against the side of the building.
He went toward the house and Lily followed. A woman in a flowered cotton dress answered Rafi’s knock. Her face, her arms, her neck were covered with freckles. A single, long, ginger-colored braid reached halfway down her back.
“Gadi here?” Rafi said.
“In the orange grove.”
“Tell him to empty the station wagon and park it out of sight, in the back. I have to get to the police post as quickly as possible. I’ll borrow a bicycle. Lily will fill you in on the details.”
He started down the road and turned back again. “I forgot,” he said, got off the bicycle, leaned over and kissed Lily on the forehead. “I’ll be back soon.”
“You’re Lily?” Leora said after he rode away.
“And you’re Leora.”
“Rafi talks about you all the time.”
Lily felt herself blushing. “Good things, I hope.”
Leora smiled and looked out at the grove toward the station wagon. “What’s going on?”
Lily told her about the cave filled with German guns, about the boxes with rifles and ammo in the back of the station wagon, about the encounter with the British patrol. “Rafi said to hide the rifles in the root cellar. The Brits don’t know we have these. Rafi is leading a police patrol back to Tulkarm to recover the cache, maybe catch the gang with the guns.”
Leora listened carefully, nodding and smiling.
“I like you,” Leora told Lily when she came back from speaking with Gadi. “You’ll be good for Rafi.”
Everyone’s a matchmaker, Lily thought.
Leora stepped back and examined Lily. “You look a mess,” she said. “Wait here.”
She returned with a bucket, a towel and two bars of soap. “This one’s for your clothes.” She held out a chunk of white soap. “And this one,” she brought the wrapped bar up her nose and savored the aroma, “is for you.” A whiff of jasmine wafted from the soap.
A dark red silk robe smelling faintly of lavender and mothballs was draped over her arm. “You can wear this while your clothes dry.”
“It’s beautiful,” Lily ran her fingers along the smooth surface of the robe. The silk was as smooth as cream. “Are you sure?”
“Gadi brought it back from Europe. It’s the wrong color for me. Makes me look like a spotted hen.” She handed Lily the bucket. “The shower is down that hall, on the right.”
Lily stood in the hot shower, soaped the dirty clothes as she peeled them off, scrubbing one piece at a time, dropping it in the bucket filling with water and stomping on it until she thought it was clean.
She unwrapped the bar of perfumed soap that Leora had given her and rubbed it back and forth against the sponge, releasing the sweet scent of jasmine. She squeezed the sponge. Bubbles spurted out, glistening on her arms and breast and clinging to her skin with milky softness. She slicked it gently against her shoulder, humming to herself, remembering Rafi’s fingers reaching out to stroke the curve of her neck.
* * *
In the kitchen, Leora was cutting cucumbers.
“Can I help?” Lily asked.
“All done. We’ll have supper after Rafi gets back.” She tilted her head and looked at Lily. “That looks good on you.”
Lily lifted the bucket of wet clothes. “Where can I hang these?”
“The wash line is just past the rose garden, near the stairs to the beach.”
Lily went through the house to the garden and felt the faint evening breeze caress her skin. It carried the scent of roses and the sea. Off to the left in the orange grove, Gadi was washing the station wagon. He paused to look at her walking among the roses, waved and turned back to the car.
Lily hung the clothes on the line at the far end of the garden. Beyond the road, the sky over the hills was already darkening. She walked around the rose beds, bending down to breathe in their perfume or to stroke velvet petals of a long bud.
She found steps that led down to an isolated cove, hidden from the garden, where dune grass bent and wavered in the evening breeze and the golden sun, low on the horizon, dappled the sea.
In the cove, she walked barefoot along the beach, the silk of the robe caressing her like a second skin. Wet sand crunched under her steps, and she dug into it when the surf lapped against her feet, squeezing the slurry of sand and water between her toes.
She paused at tide pools to watch the edge of the sea roil among the rocks; watch dentalium and cowrie tumble, water-washed in the foam; watch sand crabs wink at the rim of tiny breakers and sea anemones waver and undulate in the current.
She waited impatiently for Rafi to come back, to hear what happened at Tulkarm, listening for the tenderness of his voice.
She watched the sea inch up the beach, the cool water licking at her toes, advancing and receding, each time a little higher on the strand. She stood at the edge of the water, until she became a creature of the tide, feeling it billow back and forth, moving against the arch of her foot, caressing her ankles. She felt the sea retreat, pulling grains of sand back to the surf from under the soles of her feet.
She glanced back at the bluff. Rafi appeared at the top of the stairs. He came down the steps toward the beach, and she went to meet him, to ask what happened. “Did they…”
He stroked the side of her cheek, and she leaned into the fold of his arm.
“It went without a hitch,” he said.
She felt his hands trace her neck, felt the silken robe slip from her shoulders, felt it fall from her arms onto the ground, felt his hand along her back, felt the texture of his chest and shoulders, the curve of his neck. He kissed her cheek, her chin, her eyelids, the curve of her neck, and she felt the flow of skin against skin, smooth as water rippling in the wind. She leaned into the taste of him, the smell of him, while the sea pounded in her ears, and they clung together on the beach, bathed in the golden sunset, while the night overtook the sky.
TWENTY-THREE
Lily watched Rafi’s hands at supper, imagining them stroking her shoulders, reaching along the curve of her back. “We got there just as they were moving the guns.” She watched his lips as he talked about the police expedition to Tulkarm. “Police arrested four men. They’ll be sentenced to hang. Tomorrow the military command will bulldoze their houses. That’s standard punishment for terrorists.”
He has a beautiful mouth, his lips flexible and strong—and the line of his jaw—
“They’ll be released,” she heard Gadi say. “There’s always some excuse to free those brigands—not enough evidence, they were burying a dead donkey—anything will do.”
She watched Rafi butter a roll. “They claimed that they were digging up the arms to turn them in to the British authorities. A fellah told the police that I took a box of rifles, that I was the one who had buried the guns.” He paused. “Please pass the cheese.”
Lily’s fingers lingered on his forearm when she handed him the plate. “The one who chased us?”
Rafi nodded.
“You think the Brits will bulldoze the Strauss Hospital?”
“Of course,” Rafi said. “And the American School. They’re onto us.”
“Oh stuff it,” Lily said.
Gadi speared a slice of tomato with his fork and waved it in the air. “You’re in the clear. No one in the English-speaking community smuggles arms. Everyone knows that.”
“And a good thing too,” Lily said.
In the morning, Rafi took the station wagon to a garage in town. Lily and Leora had brought their coffee out to the bluff, where Lily sat on a bench overlooking the sea, her skirt spread around her, a smile on her face.
Children’s voices, high pitched and laughing, drifted up from the cove. Lily’s newly washed clothes were crisp and bright and smelled of sunshine and fresh air. She felt the sun brighten her cheeks, felt its warmth on the soft down of her arms, and she tilted her head back, throwing out her arms to embrace it all. Dawn had washed the world and the morning danced under a cloudless sky.
* * *
Lily and Rafi arrived at Chancellors Road in Jerusalem in late afternoon, in time for his shift at the hospital. She drove to the American School through the narrow lanes behind Mea Shearim. Bearded men in black suits pressed against buildings waiting for Lily to pass. Tired housewives lumbered along the pavement.
Boys with long side-locks and milky-white skin, miniature adults in black cloaks, somberly kicked a soccer ball. The ball hit the station wagon with a thump. The boys stopped the game, waiting silently for the station wagon to pass as it bumped over the cobbles. The side-curls gave the boys a look of sadness, like basset hounds.
A woman blocked the way. Lily sounded the horn. The woman, a black scarf tied over her shaven head, her shoulders drooping from sacks of groceries, turned around, glared at Lily and continued trudging down the middle of the road.
Lily parked the wagon in the back of the garden and ran up the steps to the portico. Lady Fendley sat at the desk in the office and called to Lily as soon as the door opened. “You were gone a long time for just a wedding.” It sounded like an accusation. “There are all sorts of messages for you.”
“The car broke down.”
“You should have called.” Lady Fendley put down the pen and drew in a breath. “In these times!” She shook her head and wagged her finger—as Lily’s mother had done when Lily had come home late—then ticked off messages one by one. “Kate wants you to bring the wagon back down to Kharub.” She turned down her index finger. “Someone named Jamal said he has tomorrow off and can go with you to Beit Jibrin. You going there? It’s morbid.” She was up to her ring finger. “And your friend Avi called. Something about an amphoriskos.”
“I’m sorry. Next time I’ll call.” Lily started up the stairs. “What about the amphoriskos?”
“And Eliot came by,” Lady Fendley called after Lily. “He was looking for the site report from Tell Abu Hawam. It wasn’t at your desk. He said you took it upstairs. I had to get the extra key so that he could look on your desk.”
“In my room?”
“You shouldn’t take books upstairs unless you leave a note on the shelf,” Lady Fendley said.
“But I—Never mind,” Lily said and hurried up the stairs to unlock her door.
The desk was in order, but her closet door stood open. The coverlet lay smoothly over the foot of the bed. Lily reached under the mattress where she had hidden the journal and pulled it out.
The drawings of plans and sections fell, loose, onto the floor. Lily remembered folding them carefully into the pocket at the back of the journal before she slid it under the mattress. The list of sites she had forged in Eastbourne’s handwriting was gone.
She unscrewed the back panel of the radio. The coordinates she had copied were still there.
Lily put the maps back in the folder and spread the plans on the desk. This time she focused on the sheet with drawings of small, round semi-subterranean structures with slotted, high windows and thick walls; plans of larger, square edifices with even thicker walls, casemates and turrets, similar in plan to ancient fortresses; and cross-sections of wide concrete culverts. A detailed illustration of a turret included plans for a revolving steel cupola, that could disappear and be raised or lowered by a lever and counterweight.
Lady Fendley’s voice called from the corridor. “Are you in there, Lily?” She knocked. “Telephone for you. Your friend Avi.”
Lily folded the map and plans, put them in the pocket of the journal, placed it in the desk drawer and headed for the phone in the upstairs hall.
Avi’s voice was almost drowned out by the rattle of dishes and the sound of running water in the background. “I’m in the kitchen,” he shouted, “and can’t hear very well. You have to yell.” He told her he had heard that someone brought a blue glass amphoriskos to an antiquities dealer in Tel Aviv.
“I have to bring the wagon back to Kharub tomorrow,” Lily said.
“I could meet you at the tel tomorrow afternoon, say four-thirty. We could drive up to Jerusalem together, go to Tel Aviv the next morning early.”
“Great. See you tomorrow,” Lily said. She put the telephone back on the table, then picked it up again. “Thanks,” she shouted into the mouthpiece and hung up.
She went back to her room to find Jamal’s number at the Austrian Hospice, and left a message for him to meet her at Damascus gate the next morning at nine a.m.
* * *
Jamal was waiting for Lily in the morning. He ran across the road from Damascus Gate in the face of traffic, and climbed into the seat next to her in the station wagon.
The road south to Bethlehem curved along the crest of the ridge. They drove through the German Colony with its staid Bavarian villas trimmed with green shutters and pots of red geraniums. They passed the stone houses of Bakaa with their flat roofs and wide, vaulted porches; passed row on row of long stucco buildings at Allenby Barracks.
Jamal slumped in his seat, chewing on the cuticle of his thumbnail, his eyes large and staring at the dash.
“What’s wrong?” Lily asked.
“I don’t like this. I don’t feel comfortable going back there. Maybe we should turn around and drive back to Jerusalem.”
The road crossed through the Judean Hills, covered with stone terraces, green with olive trees and grapevines. An ancient cinder-cone from a long dead volcano stood out against the golden hills of the Judean desert that cradled the blue mist of the Dead Sea.
“I told Kate I would bring the station wagon down today,” Lily said.
“How will you get back?”
“Avi will drive me.”
“Avi again,” he said, and examined his thumb, running a finger along the edge of his nail.
“Avi’s a nice boy.”
Ahead of them, Lily saw the church steeples and spires of Bethlehem. Just before they reached the kibbutz of Ramat Rahel, they came to a pillbox. Narrow slots below the conical roof squinted at them like eyes in an angry mask. It looks like the circular structures in the drawings in Eastbourne’s journal, Lily realized with a jolt. Why would Eastbourne have plans of modern military installations?
Why not? Yigael Sukenik, son of the chair of the Department of Archaeology at Hebrew University, was researching warfare in Biblical times and doing a survey of ancient Judean fortresses. “If we ever have an ancient war,” Sir William had once said of him, “Yigael will make a perfect general.”
Lily waved her hand in the direction of a kibbutz. A stone wall enclosed a water tower, some barracks-like buildings, and weed-covered knolls. “That’s Ramat Rahel,” Lily said. “Those mounds are probably the remains of a Judean fortress from over twenty-seven hundred years ago.”
“Canaanites were here before that.”
“Canaanites?”
“My ancestors.”
“I thought you were a Philistine.”
“Both. Canaanite and Philistine. This is the home of my ancestors. That’s why it’s called Palestine. Others come and go, like guests. Brits, Turks, Romans, Jews. But we were always here. And we will be here forever.”
“So you agree with the Mufti?”
Jamal clicked his tongue against his teeth and gave a quick shake of the head to indicate ‘no.“ ”I understand him,“ Jamal said. ”I don’t agree with him. I don’t like violence.“
“You back his opponent, Khalidi?”
He clicked his tongue again in a gesture of denial. “Palestinians have a hundred factions, each with a different point of view. It’s all a matter of perspective.”
“That’s what Avi says.”
“Avi again.” He went back to biting the edge of his finger.
Lily had already passed Rachel’s Tomb near the entrance to Bethlehem and Shepherd’s Field with its terraced olive groves. She drove through the narrow streets of Bethlehem.
