Operation Bethlehem, page 17
“We’re ordering lunch soon,” Jonathan called out after them.
“Order for us too. We eat anything!” Yael replied and closed the door behind her.
The room was fairly small and set up like a home office, a desk with a computer, family photos, shelves filled with books, and a sofa bed. Yael pulled back the curtain and opened the window, letting in the unique atmosphere of a Friday in the Jewish Quarter. She sat on the sofa, holding a notebook and pen. Daniel stood at the center of the room, looking out the window. Two young ultra-Orthodox men with towels hung around their necks entered the alley, arguing loudly. He assumed they were returning from the ritual bath. He turned to look at the photos of the anonymous residents of the house.
“Cute, huh?” Yael asked as Daniel focused on the face of a happy-looking baby.
“Very!” he agreed. His gaze wandered to the other pictures. “It’s strange,” he said.
“What?”
“This isn’t a regular safehouse. We’re in someone’s home, a family’s. They live here, maybe they’re on vacation and sublet the house, I don’t know... but they have no idea that for a few hours their life has entangled with ours. It’s just kind of bizarre.”
Yael smiled, “You’re right, it is.”
“Well,” Daniel sat on the sofa, keeping some distance between them. “This meeting is also bizarre. You’re my handler...”
“Would you prefer someone else?”
“I think you know the answer to that,” Daniel replied and added hesitantly, “So that’s it? You’re not in the field anymore?”
“You could say I haven’t been for a while,” she replied, doodling in the notebook. For a moment she looked like a shy high-school girl.
“Where are you now? Did you leave the team?”
“I’m not in the division anymore,” she explained, a wide smile on her face. “I’m where I wanted to be since I was recruited.”
Daniel knew exactly what she was talking about. He was surprised. “Really?”
“Yes! I’m finally using my artistic talents to forge documents!”
“Wow!” Daniel blurted. “I didn’t expect that. Why did you give up on operations?”
Yael paused before responding, “We don’t have time for that now, we’ll talk about it later. So how did the return to Bethlehem go?” She got down to business, “Did you notice anything suspicious, any probing questions, anything unusual?”
“I think they all believed my story; it’s solid. I didn’t feel like anyone doubts me or is suspicious.”
“Excellent.” She rested an ankle on the opposite knee and balanced the notebook as she wrote. “So, what’s the story with the Hamas guy, Toufik? I don’t like where that’s going.”
“It wasn’t planned,” Daniel explained, glancing at her exposed ankle, “I was in a situation, it was under control. It’s possible that there was no ulterior motive, and I’m just thinking the worst.”
“Stay away from them!” she warned him. “Don’t volunteer where you shouldn’t!”
“Maybe it’s an opportunity,” he persisted, “Hamas?”
“I don’t think you need to take unnecessary risks. We also have a clear agreement with the Shabak; all the missions Jonathan assigns to you go through the Office first. I won’t approve him sending you on adventures even if you agree.”
Daniel was surprised and smiled to himself. Yael seemed very emphatic.
“What?”
“I like your concern.”
Yael smiled at him. “Field agent safety comes first!”
“But it’s not just that, is it?” He was digging for something more personal. “And I’m not exactly a field agent in this case.”
“You’re right.”
“And what about my concern? The artifacts? Are you making sure that’s also being taken care of?”
“As much as I can,” she replied. “That’s part of the deal. If I suspect that Shabak is putting it off, they’ll hear from me. Let’s see how they deal with the article you sent – it’s a major lead.”
“Yaeli, I trust you.”
“Did you bring the map and the other material we discussed?”
“Yes.” He went to his bag and took out the notebook and his grandfather’s sketch.
Yael held out her hand for the notebook and examined his notes. They were written in French, and apart from a few words, she didn’t understand anything. “Listen,” she said, a smile spreading across her face again, “hiding your notes under the cover of a manuscript is brilliant. But why did you decide to pretend to be an author? Why not something else?”
“Think about it – an author is a great cover for anyone making notes, and I also think that writing a book is no different than developing a cover story – making up a believable character, being in someone else’s shoes, making sure there are no loose ends, what-if’s, analyzing scenarios. Come on, you know, you’ve done it before yourself.”
“So maybe the Office should start recruiting authors?”
“Maybe,” Daniel replied, watching her laugh. He loved her laugh; it had always blown him away, just like now. He handed her the sketch.
Yael’s expression turned serious. She pulled the yellowed piece of paper out of the plastic sleeve, spread it between them on the sofa and straightened the folds with her fingers. Daniel watched her hands move and beat down the desire to lace their fingers together. She was wearing her engagement ring, and it kindled a strange, inexplicable feeling, like a single heartbeat that stood out, stronger than the ones before and after.
“I remember this sketch,” she said, a slight tremor in her voice. “I don’t understand what these shapes mean, the lines between them and the names. But yes, I saw it in the boxes you left. I’m glad I sent them to you.”
“So am I,” Daniel said. He explained the sketch and his grandfather’s findings in depth, using his written notes.
Yael listened closely, taking notes and asking questions for clarification. “You think they’re really there?” she asked when he was done.
“The treasures?”
“Yes.”
“I really hope so,” his eyes gleamed. “I fantasize about it a lot.”
“Tell me.”
“Sometimes, when I walk along the paths or in the woods with Ibrahim, I imagine that I’m walking right over the room where they have been waiting in the dark for hundreds of years in some old wooden crate or clay jar, or wrapped in cloth...”
Yael smiled at him as he spoke; he looked happy. He was cut off by Jonathan knocking and opening the door.
“We’ll be there in a minute,” Yael said.
“The food isn’t here yet,” he replied. “Eran, you’ve had a few calls from an unknown caller. You want to answer?”
“Uh-huh.” Daniel walked out to the living room with Jonathan. The security guard handed him his phone.
Daniel looked at the display, “Four calls?! Interesting. Let’s wait until they call again.”
A minute later the phone rang. Unknown caller. Daniel motioned to everyone to remain silent.
“Hello? Rashid!” Daniel’s face showed surprise. “In Al-Quds. Why aren’t you calling from your phone? I would have answered the first time... your battery... I see, no, I don’t have a pen, text it to me...”
Yael and Jonathan looked at him with interest. Yael suddenly came up close so she could hear the call, her head against his. A shiver ran down Daniel’s spine.
“Right, the battery, okay... I’ll get a pen from someone here... call me in a couple of minutes. Bye!”
“What’s up?” Yael and Jonathan simultaneously whispered, as if someone was listening in.
“That crazy Rashid,” Daniel chuckled, “Someone from East Jerusalem owes him money and he asked me to go get it for him since I’m already here. You get it, right? ‘Owes him’...”
“Of course,” Jonathan said.
“I don’t like it,” Yael added.
The phone rang again.
“Get the number from him,” Jonathan requested.
“I said I don’t like this, Jonathan!” Yael repeated.
“I’m answering,” Daniel said, “Just shut up and we’ll deal with this in a minute.”
“Rashid. I’m writing it down. Zero, five, zero, six... I’ll try... you need anything else?” Yael gave him a wide-eyed warning look and Daniel winked at her. “Okay, see you soon.” He ended the call and gave the phone back to the guard, who returned it to the box in the lobby.
“If until now I thought Rashid was innocent,” Daniel started, “now I’m not so sure. I don’t buy that his battery just died. If I had to guess, he’s afraid someone was listening, and he made it up. But why would anyone be listening?”
Yael and Jonathan exchanged glances, and Daniel tried to figure out what was going on. It looked like they were hiding something from him.
“I’ll check out the number he gave you.” Jonathan took the slip of paper on which Daniel had written the digits.
“Let us know when you have something. Let’s continue, Eran.” Yael lifted her chin toward the room. “We don’t have much time.”
They went and sat on the sofa, once again facing one another.
“I think he’s trying to use me to transfer dirty money,” Daniel said.
“As a courier! I think so too,” Yael agreed. “And I don’t want you to get involved in things like that. That isn’t the goal of this arrangement.” Her irritation was evident in her hand gestures. “The last thing we need is for you to get in trouble with the Palestinian Intelligence; they’ll turn you over to the French, and boom, there goes your cover story.”
“Wait for Jonathan to check it out,” Daniel suggested. “Let’s get back to the archaeology. I want you to have the full picture, so you can explain to them upstairs that everything is backed up. Like I told you when I was detained.”
“Daniel,” Yael said his real name for the first time that day, “They didn’t let you go just like that. You know that the Prime Minister insisted they first validate with people who were close with your grandfather. Respected, trustworthy people. From what I understand, the story excites him much more than what Hamas is hiding there. He’s convinced that your grandfather knew something about the Temple and the treasures. Take your notes back with you but leave the sketch here.”
Daniel’s head wanted to cast doubt, but his heart refused. He trusted Yael, but the tremble in her voice made him slightly suspicious.
“You know, it’s hard to believe that’s the case,” Daniel said honestly, “It’s too good to be true.”
She nodded, “I agree with you. But it’s true!”
“Are you sure about the sketch?” He folded it as he asked. “Why leave it here?”
“Because it’s an original document from your real life – Daniel’s, not Jalal. You know the rules, even though you didn’t follow them: never take anything into the field that can be tied to your real identity. We even change wedding rings! So yes, supposedly, the rules of the game don’t apply to you, but there’s a reason for them. Official or not, it doesn’t matter – you’re undercover! And anyway, you don’t need the sketch. It shows the general location of the treasures, and your grandfather assumed that they are now under the hospital. It’s served its purpose.”
Daniel knew she was right and was angry at himself for taking the sketch to Bethlehem. It really did only indicate the area as the Temple treasures’ last stop and wasn’t needed anymore. “You’re right. Take care of it,” he asked and gave it to her.
Yael looked pleased. There was a knock on the door before it opened. Daniel and Yael looked up at Jonathan.
“Did you win the lottery?” Yael asked. “You look excited.”
“The phone number Rashid gave you was a money changer that we know. We’ve been trying for a while now to find his contacts.”
“That worries me,” Yael exclaimed.
“Forget about that,” Jonathan said, a huge smile on his face. “I just got the results back on your article.”
Yael and Daniel hurried after the Shabak agent and sat around his laptop. The screen showed a full picture of Ibrahim, the hero of the article. Daniel clenched his hands nervously.
“You see that small hill behind the people?” Jonathan pointed. “That’s a pile of dirt and stones, probably from a dig.”
Yael and Daniel nodded.
“Okay,” he continued, “Fortunately, they didn’t just cut out the article; they saved the entire page, so we know when it was published. On May twenty...”
“Four, nineteen sixty-seven,” Daniel said. “I saw that too.”
“Correct,” Jonathan confirmed. “We asked the archive for aerial images of Bethlehem around that date – before and after. There were six aerial photography flights.”
“Comparative analysis?” Yael asked.
“What’s that?” Daniel had mostly been in the field and was less familiar with the behind-the-scenes intelligence work.
Jonathan explained. “We asked an aerial imagery analyst to scan the wooded area at the hospital and look for any sign of changes on the ground that could be related to that pile.”
“Great! And what did he find?” Daniel spoke with uncharacteristic impatience.
Jonathan clicked on the mouse and the picture was replaced with a black and white aerial image. “The analyst identified two suspicious areas two days after the article was published. Can you see? Marked by these red circles.”
Daniel and Yael leaned toward the screen. Jonathan clicked again, and an enlarged image showed the first area.
“Okay,” Jonathan hovered over a light-colored spot at the center of the red circle, “these dark spots are the tops of the trees, and here, the lighter spot – do you see it? Under the shade of the trees – that could be the pile of dirt.”
Daniel concentrated on the image, his brow furrowed. Yael looked pensive.
“Sometimes you just need some luck,” Jonathan added, “Skill isn’t enough. If these trees were denser, we wouldn’t have been able to see the pile.”
“Are you sure? That’s the pile from the image?” Daniel asked enthusiastically.
“Patience,” Jonathan said and clicked again. “The second area we found,” he pointed to another light-colored spot, “you can see it more clearly. It’s at the edge of the forest and not under the shaded area.”
Daniel nodded. “Yes. It is clear. But it looks like a flat-topped rock. There are several of these in the woods.”
“Nice.” Jonathan nodded, “Bingo!”
Daniel gave Yael a satisfied look.
“So, we’re left with the first area,” Jonathan continued. “The next step is to verify that it is indeed a change in the topography. The analyst checked the aerial reconnaissance flights before the date of publication. The first one he examined was taken eight days before, and this spot doesn’t appear in it. He also checked images from two weeks before; there was nothing there either, and it was even taken from a lower altitude and the details are sharper. So, we’re pretty sure that whatever that spot is – it’s not natural, and from a week before the picture in the article.”
Daniel stood up and started pacing. “That must be it! There’s no way it could be anything else! What do you think, Yael?”
“I don’t know,” she sounded thoughtful and was staring at a spot in front of her. “It could be anything.”
“Okay, Jonathan, show me the first image again, the one that covers more area. I want to understand exactly where it is in the woods.”
“You’ll see in a minute. This is the good part!” Jonathan announced, a smug look on his face. “That was just the promo!”
Daniel went back to stand by the computer. “There’s more?”
Jonathan clicked and a sharp, aerial image filled the screen. “This is from a few days ago.”
Daniel froze, and Yael was startled out of her contemplative mode like she was bitten by a snake. The two exchanged astonished looks. Daniel held both hands to his head in disbelief.
“No way!” Yael blurted.
6
Three hours later, more excited than ever, Daniel was already on his way back to Bethlehem. The events threatened his impressive capacity for self-control, feeding his desire for immediate action. If it were up to him, he wouldn’t have even waited for a taxi – he would have run all the way, grabbed a shovel, and started to dig on the hospital grounds.
The taxi stopped at the border crossing. Daniel bypassed the crowd of people with Palestinian passports and went to the “privileged” line. He had mixed feelings about the envelope stuffed with five thousand dollars that the money changer had counted twice before sealing. It was deep inside his bag. If the money was indeed laundered, he hoped that someone at the crossing would find it in a random search and seize it. If not – then let Rashid enjoy it. Yael’s objections echoed in his mind. She and Jonathan argued about the risks and chances. And it was Daniel who finally convinced her that it was a calculated risk, that the mission was under control. Although at first he’d thought Yael was being friendly yet keeping her distance, the more time he spent with her, the more he felt that her concern for his safety stemmed from something else, deeper and more emotional. He was almost convinced that she was even trying to stop him from going to Bethlehem and was startled by her reaction to the aerial images that Jonathan had shown them. She seemed fearful for him, as if the Shabak’s findings had surprised her.
The envelope wasn’t discovered, and Daniel quickly made it to the other side of the concrete wall – controlled by the Palestinian Authority. Rashid was already waiting for him in the parking lot, leaning against the Mitsubishi with a cigarette in his hand, looking agitated.
“Jalal!” he called out, waving to him, his expression changing instantly.
Daniel waved back, walked toward his friend and decided to conduct a little experiment. He slid his hand into his messenger bag, as if he wanted to pull out the envelope. Rashid jumped up, threw his cigarette on the dusty gravel and shook his head, signaling Daniel to be discreet. He rushed over and put his hand on Daniel’s arm. “In the car,” he whispered.
