by E. L. Pini
“Rabbi,” I said, “am I a Jew, as far as you’re concerned?”
“Of course. A good Jew, even.”
“If I’m a Jew, so is my son. Let’s leave it at that.”
“It doesn’t work that way,” he persisted. “The authorities—”
“Authorities my ass. Look, Rabbi… here’s a Talmudic conundrum for you. What determines the quality of a loaf of bread?”
The rabbi shrugged, and I said, “A good baker uses good flour, right?”
“I suppose.”
“And the good baker makes good dough, and he molds it and shapes it well, and he puts it in the good oven. Right?”
The rabbi caught my drift and set his eyes on some point behind me.
“I’m the baker. Eran is made out of me. I put him in the best oven I could find, and nine months later, I took him out. I’m Jewish, so he’s Jewish, capisce? You’ve got connections up there; you make it work, you hear me?!” I was furious.
Bella placed a hand on my shoulder. “He’ll make it work, don’t worry,” she said, and I didn’t know which of us she was talking to. “If any problems come up, we’ll help.” She kissed the stunned rabbi on the cheek. I wiped away a tear. Every time I remember Eran’s face voicelessly contorting during the circumcision, I wipe a tear.
***
Garibaldi brought me back to the present, licking my face thoroughly. He sat back and then stretched majestically. I struggled to stand up. My right arm fell asleep, and a sharp series of aches and pains stabbed every inch of flesh in my stiff limbs.
I dropped into the pool and probably fell asleep in the water. I was woken by Garibaldi’s angry barks. Adolf was glaring at me reproachfully. I sloshed out of the water, took a quick shower and collapsed into the bed. I slept like a bag of bricks.
When I woke up again, I smelled coffee. Strong and fresh, right under my nose. Verbin’s face peeked at me from behind the little espresso cup. I drank the coffee and rolled over on my stomach, so that the heat radiating from her could seep into the slipped disks and the stiffness in my neck. Her fingers moved over my back, pressing gently into the pain, until it had melted away. When I rolled back over, she was gone. I fell asleep again.
After some unknown period of time, I managed to get out of bed. I looked for Verbin and couldn’t find her, in the house or outside. I was aware of the mostly virtual character of my relationship with Eran and wasn’t too eager to have a similar one with Verbin. I touched the espresso machine and found it still warm. The cup I had drunk from was on the dresser and still smelled faintly of coffee. I calmed down and went out to the garden. The two monstrosities were happily barking, loping at her side as she came up the path to the house. She was carrying a heavy-looking basket in one hand, a baguette in the other.
When she was done feeding me, she fed the dogs while I loaded the dishwasher. Afterwards we jumped into the pool together. Pool sex is nowhere near as comfortable as movies make it out to be—especially with the dogs patrolling around and having opinions about everything. We moved to the shower, and then to the bed. We lay there, calm and entwined. This was a perfect time for a cigar on the balcony, and maybe Campari with orange juice, like I used to drink with Eran.
“RP…” Verbin’s twin lakes stared at me. “Why do people call you RP?”
“It’s kind of a long story,” I said.
“I have all the time in the world.”
“Long and really boring. And unimportant.”
“Ehrlich!”
“Yes, my dear.”
“Fuck you.”
“Avec plaisir.”
“No story—no fuck,” she said with a comically coquettish French accent and kissed my eyelids. I realized there was no getting out of this.
“Okay, so once I told this asshole team leader—and possibly threatened him, just a bit—that I was two hundred and thirty pounds of rage and power, and after that the guys started calling me ‘Rage and Power,’ and later it just became RP, and that’s it, pretty much.”
“Ehrrrliiiich!”
“Okay, um. It was during an operation. We got our asses kicked, and then we kicked back. When they asked how we did it, I said the rage and power thing… it kind of stuck.”
Verbin leaned on me, slid her hand up my face and spread open my right eyelid with her fingers. She peered into my eye curiously. “You’re a fatalist, aren’t you? The kind that thinks every bullet has an address.”
“Nope.”
“Good,” she said, smiling. “That’s good.”
“I know every address has a bullet.”
“Okay. And the rest of the story?”
“That’s… pretty much it.”
“I see. And they give you medals for that kind of crap?” She didn’t wait for a reply, adding, “Was there an investigation after the operation?”
“Sure.”
“And no one thought to put you in an institution?”
“Doctor…” I used the most threatening tone I could muster and grabbed her by the hips, lifting her in the air like a child. She tried to wriggle free, kicking and pulling on my nose. I lowered her on top of me, gently, and kissed her. We clung to each other with no intention of ever detaching.
“It’s a good thing you aren’t obsessed,” she told me when we woke, still locked in an embrace.
47.
The war room constructed by abu Bachar—head of the Mukhabarat, the security service, and the sultan’s personal assistant—was buried forty feet underground. It lay just under the massive greenhouse, where thousands of colorful butterflies fluttered amongst saw palmettos and budding geophytes. The war room was equipped with top-of-the-line computer and control systems. Once the run-in period was done, abu Bachar gathered the British engineering team that had constructed it—he held a brief ceremony and gave each of the engineers an ornate mahogany box containing a gold bar: a bonus for their hard work.
“A nostalgic bit of memorabilia—not money, and therefore not taxed.” He smiled and suggested that they leave their bonus at the compound, “until you return.” He then escorted them to the private jet that would take them on a weeklong vacation, where they would enjoy all that the exotic Sultanate had to offer.
The jet’s black box, which was found intact several hours after the unfortunate crash, pointed at a critical failure originating with a pressure drop in the engine manifold. While the black box was examined, no one thought to check the reliability of the data, which had been entered prior to the flight. Abu Bachar noted in his log, with some satisfaction, that the only possible source of a leak regarding the secrets of his war room had been eliminated. It helped that they were all infidels.
“First the stick, then the carrot—that’s the strategy that seems to work best,” abu Bachar told Imad, who was sitting beside him, staring at the plasma screen. Cassius, the youngest of the Shabwah stuffed shahids, had passed the security check at Gatwick about two hours ago and had now been seen walking undisturbed out of Schiphol.
Imad glanced at the golden Rolex he had received from the sultan. In about an hour, the sheikh’s loyalists would assemble at the Great Mosque at Molenbeek. Imad lit a Camel cigarette and watched, for the third time, the short video abu Bachar had sent to his secure Telegram account. The video showed Anna walking through the Tiergarten Park in Berlin, with Francesca and the Sudanese boy, Abdu, the amputee. Anna had taken the kid from Shabwah and officially adopted him in Berlin. She seemed happy.
“I see you miss her,” said abu Bachar, not knowing how right he was. While thoughts of his father and Nasser filled Imad’s head with a thick, heavy fog, his thoughts of Anna cut into flesh.
“No wonder I’m missing her, with what you’re offering here. Fat, boring-ass Russians. The Turkish girls are even worse,” Imad responded dryly. “Speaking of which, the Turk who shot the video—is she capable of something more?”
Imad shrugged. “Before I come back from the dead, I need to shake Anna’s confidence in her current life.” After a small pause, he added, “First the stick, then the carrot, right?”
Abu Bachar promised that after the meeting at the mosque, he’d check with Tilda’s handler to see what could be done. The red light beneath the screen started to blink, signifying that H-Hour was nearing. Cassius went through the security check at the entrance and took off his shoes to join the mass prayer.
“He seems too far away,” said abu Bachar.
“I won’t activate until he’s right on top of them,” said Imad, and as though Cassius could hear him, he began to progress slowly toward the front rows, where the sheikhs prayed.
“Here, you do the honors—type in thirteen,” said Imad, passing the phone to abu Bachar.
He did—nothing happened.
“Try again,” said Imad, and then Cassius exploded. Horrified cries and shouts of Allah hu akbar filled the mosque.
“Good job. How many more of these shahids have we got?”
Imad shrugged again. “Nine left. After Rome, Paris, Riyadh and Córdoba, and before the Saudi bombing.”
“Saudi bombing?!” Abu Bachar roared with laughter. “Those assholes couldn’t bomb a dead donkey. The Israelis did it for them.”
“Kul kalb biji yomo,” said Imad, staring at the plasma screen. Belgian police and rescue teams were carrying away the bloody remains of the sheikhs. Every dog has its day.
“You should have looked after your little brother,” Baba said to him and smiled. Imad remembered the time he and Nasser had spent together at Uncle Mahajna’s house in Nablus, after Baba was murdered. It was November, just around the olive harvest, and little Nasser had vanished. The entire clan went out to look for him, terrified that the masked Israeli settlers might have harmed him. Eventually they found him asleep on a large sack of olives near the olive press. Uncle Mahajna laughed and picked Nasser up, placing him in Imad’s arms. Nasser awoke and burst into tears, wailing “Baba, Baba,” and Imad embraced him tightly and swore to protect Nasser until his last breath, hoping that Baba could hear him.
“Now, after the stick”—abu Bachar was smiling—“they’ll come running to do business with us.” Imad nodded and quickly pushed Nasser and Baba from his mind.
48.
Froyke seemed better. It was evident that the operation in Lebanon had supplied his body with some vitamin or mineral he had been sorely missing. We started that morning with the exasperating weekly staff meeting/inquiry. The DM opened the meeting with congratulations on a job well done, adding that “the cooperation with the counterparts23 was also executed perfectly. However, risk management”—a new term he had recently grown fond of—“left much to be desired, and was extremely lacking in consideration for human lives. Not to mention”—he failed to swallow a small smile—“a certain degree of infantile behavior.”
Froyke attempted to draw the fire, but the rest of the table seemed keen to expand on the subject of my irresponsible and childish behavior. At some point, the director turned to me. “Ehrlich, anything you’d like to say? This is your show, after all.”
“Is it a strip show? Is that why everyone here’s so eager to fuck me?” I said, and the muttering ceased.
“I’m glad you’re getting in touch with your feminine side,” said the director. “But still, we’d appreciate your input.”
“Look, boss…”
“Call me Moshe,” he said. “And keep that to yourself.”
“Sure, boss,” I said and reached into my pocket to pull out the monthly paycheck I had gotten from Bella that morning. I removed it from the envelope and looked at it. The silence grew thick enough to hear toes wiggling inside shoes.
“If you really want my opinion, I’d say that for this bottom line”—I raised the paycheck—“you’ve gotten more than your money’s worth.”
The director blinked several times, scrambling for something to say. Froyke folded into his chair, and the rest were buzzing amongst themselves like busy bees.
“Look,” he eventually said, apologetically, “you know we have hardly any control over… that. It’s a collective agreement… the lesser of two evils.”
I shoved the paycheck back in my pocket. “That’s exactly my point, boss—I mean, Moshe. Some things we can’t control, and whatever we can get… it’s the lesser of two evils.”
The director smiled. So did Froyke. The rest of the putzes retreated to their respective lairs. I joined Froyke down at his office.
“So, did we get the director’s approval?” I asked, removing the lid from the ceiling smoke detector so we could smoke in peace.
Froyke nodded. “Under the condition that they aren’t there,” he added, referring to Victor the Chechen’s Spetsnaz buddies.
I cut the wires connecting the small sensor to the board and replaced the lid. “Good as new.”
When I hopped off the table, I glanced at the photos on the desk. Near a photo of Froyke in diving gear next to the Flotilla base in Atlit, there was an old group photo of Froyke’s father among a group of other adolescents in light-colored khakis. They were standing in front of a large flag reading “The Hebrew Secondary School in Vilna–Lithuania.” One of the kids in the photo looked just like Eran.
I lit my cigar. Froyke pulled out a twenty-five-year-old cognac and poured.
“Well, this is new. Since when do I get the good stuff?”
“When’s your flight?”
“I leave for the airport in an hour.”
He handed me the glass. “You’ve earned it,” he said and slid a grainy photo across the desk. A body I couldn’t recognize was suspended from the end of a large crane. “Taken in Ghajar. The dangling corpse is abu Seif. This is how they do business up there,” he said and passed me another set of photos, colorful magnifications of the burning tanker.
“And this… is for the soul. Compliments of the GOC. Now”—he leaned back—“on for phase two?”
The primary goal of phase two was neutralizing the substance’s supply routes. Imad had thankfully dropped dead, but undoubtedly some other asshole was already popping up in his place. In these circles, supply creates demand—if the explosives are out there, there will be buyers.
The practical implication of this was that I needed some way to rein in the Chechen. The wheels were already in motion—Victor Zhdaniev had been spotted in Frankfurt. Luigi had taken over from the local team and made arrangements. The skilled technical team from Nevi’ot24 had outdone itself, providing us with high-quality eyes and ears. Froyke took the trouble to remind me again that the operation would only take place if Victor’s ex-Spetsnaz bodyguards are not present, leaving us to deal only with Victor and Sveta, his “secretary.”
Froyke looked at his watch. “Doctor Anna von Stroop. Her Berlin clinic. Is that her final decision? Is this what she wants?”
“UNICEF already rented and renovated the space,” I said.
“Is there anything we can do to help? She earned it, she really did. Did you offer to bring her to Israel? We’ll get her a clinic here, a good one.”
“I did,” I replied. “She refused.”
“Strange lady.” Froyke rubbed his chin. “On the one hand always looking for poor Arab kids to help, on the other hand, helping us out.”
“She’s pragmatic,” I said.
“Pragmatic?”
“In her own way. She does exactly what she thinks is necessary to make up for crimes she didn’t commit.”
“And that little file you compiled on that Nazi schmuck, von Stroop, with the photos of the children at the concentration camp… that probably didn’t hurt either. Okay. Next on the agenda: I found an opening—well, Bella found an opening for your guy Luigi.” He frowned. “How certain are you about this kid?”
“He’s creative, assertive, and completely obsessed. He gets the job done with no bullshit, and no politics.”
“Sounds like someone I know,” said Froyke, and he signed the promotion papers. “There, along with my blessing.”
After a brief pause, he added, “She’s cute, my little doctor. You two have been getting to know each other.”
“Just what the doctor ordered.”
“You must realize that you are well and truly fucked this time,” he said, smiling, and I completely agreed.
“Need anything else?”
“Could you scratch my back with the prosthesis? Right in the middle.” Froyke raised an eyebrow, and I cleared my throat. “Look, boss, after I shut down Victor’s shop…”
“Negative,” Froyke cut me off. “Chernobyl is not approved, and probably never will be. The prime minister refuses to even consider it. Let it go and—” He suddenly let out a hushed, pained cry and grabbed his leg. I got up, reaching for him.
“Do you know what a phantom pain is?” he ground out.
“Yeah, boss. Been having them for the past five years.”
Froyke looked up at me, puzzled at first, then nodded.
“Yes, I suppose you have,” he said. “Okay. Victor Zhdaniev. Are you good? Anything else you need?” he asked, for the third time that day.
I told him I was good. “Nora told me the goddamn Chechen is a vegetarian. Who’da thunk it, huh?”
Froyke shrugged. “So was Hitler. Are you and Nora still…?” He trailed off.
“Fucking?” I asked, to be as clear on the subject as I possibly could. “Absolutely not.”
“Okay. Well, if they’re there with him, the whole thing’s a no-go. It makes things a great deal trickier, this Chechen along with a whole gang of ex-Spetsnaz.” He reiterated, again, for good measure, and we were done.
Before leaving for the airport, I managed to pass through Bella. The old crone was the only one capable of sending Froyke to his checkups—or, if necessary, bring the doctors to him.