Jerusalem Interlude

by Bodie Thoene

  To this end Rebbe Lebowitz prayed as Eduard looked on patiently. Eduard knew the prayers, but he did not say them. He shut them from his mind as the superstition of an old man. It was this sort of superstition, he believed, that would be the death warrant of the Jews of Poland. Eduard did not believe any longer that there was a God who heard their prayers. Not even here at the chink in heaven’s floor. He had no hope in miracles or prayers any longer. Without any emotion, he watched the old man sway and hum his requests.

  At last the rabbi turned and embraced Eduard with a kiss on his cheek. “I have been praying you would come with an answer just today. I have been asking the Almighty if perhaps I should leave them alone in Warsaw, already. If they are not maybe better off there after such things happen right here in Jerusalem, nu?” The old man sighed and took Eduard’s arm as if they were old friends. “But now at the hour of my darkest doubts and fears God has sent you to me, Doktor Eduard Letzno. And so, you must come home with me. Share a meal. You have come a long way to answer the prayer of an old man. And now I will not rest until Etta and my dear ones are here in Jerusalem with me.”

  34

  Twilight of the Gods

  Eli had arranged it all: a wedding at Christ Church! A furnished room in the Mahaneh Yehuda district of the New City where she could hide until Eli managed to find a job in Tel Aviv. And money enough for her to buy a pretty dress to be married in!

  The note was like a reprieve from the doubt that had imprisoned her these last awful weeks. Now the plots of her brothers would mean nothing to her! She and Eli could move far away from Jerusalem!

  Her hands trembled with joy as she wrote her thanks to Leah and the request that Leah and Shimon might come to a very small wedding at Christ Church next week. A happy nod, a quick kiss, and Victoria hurried out to catch the bus home.

  Suddenly the whole world looked different. Sunlight pierced through the circle of clouds, illuminating the Old City in light as Victoria’s bus moved down the slope of Mount Scopus and then on to Damascus Gate.

  Sheep bleated in their pens outside the gate. Heavily laden donkeys moved among the press of shoppers. Women with baskets on their heads and thin veils covering their faces walked with effortless grace in spite of their burdens. Crates of fruits and vegetables were stacked beside open sacks of lentils and coarsely ground flour. Victoria saw it all today as if she were seeing it for the first time. And yet she knew this would be among the last times she walked these crowded, cobbled lanes. She felt no remorse or regret, but amazement that at last she was leaving. Eli was taking her away, and there was no one in the entire Old City whom she could tell about it!

  The tall minarets pointed skyward like lances among the shops and houses. The voices of the muezzins silenced all conversation in the marketplace except for the braying of the animals. Rugs were placed on the hard ground and the faithful all knelt and bowed. Here and there English soldiers and a few brave or foolish tourists in the Arab Quarter watched as the population sank to its knees. Victoria hesitated. Not to bow would make her more foolish than the tourists who had come here in their ignorance of danger. Victoria was well aware of the eyes that watched every corner of the Arab Quarter from the Damascus Gate. She also bowed and knelt toward Mecca as she hid her intentions from those who might question the look of happiness on her face.

  She called on the name of Eli as if he were her god now. When she finished and raised herself once again, she looked up into the face of Ram Kadar. His black robes and keffiyeh seemed especially black today. There was no speck of dust on him. Except for his thick mustache, he was clean-shaven and scented as if he had anointed himself for an occasion. His white, perfect teeth smiled at her. She averted her eyes from his tanned face.

  “Salaam, Victoria.” He bowed graciously. “Have you heard the news? Your face has such joy. I have been watching. I followed you from Damascus Gate.” So many words from Ram Kadar seemed strange.

  “Salaam,” she answered, still not looking directly at his face or daring to smile. “I am just home from work, and . . . what news?”

  “Your father is home! I have spoken to him already.” He lowered his voice slightly. The clamor of the Quarter resumed around them.

  “My father?”

  “Home from Iran. And he will have a surprise for you!” Kadar seemed giddy. His nearness made her own joy dissipate. The note from Eli felt warm and dangerous in her pocket.

  “Then I must go,” she said, turning away from him.

  “I will walk with you.” It was not a question or request. He stepped a pace ahead of her as if to clear her path. His head was high and proud. His eyes swept the stalls within the twilight of the covered bazaars as if he, too, were seeing them for the first time.

  He knew the way to the Hassan home. Through the streets of the tinsmiths. Past the shoemaker’s shops. Along the street where prayer rugs were heaped up on display. The finest rugs were sold by Victoria’s father.

  Ahead of them she could see that the new Persian carpets were stacked just inside the shop. Yes, her father was home. That knowledge brought her no pleasure. The presence of Ram Kadar and his self-assurance as he walked with her gave her a sense of foreboding.

  Within the shop, Victoria’s father stood talking to Ibrahim. He still wore his business suit, English-made pin-striped, and on his head he wore a red fez. He was clean-shaven and unrumpled in spite of his journey, but when he looked up to see his daughter in the doorway, he seemed weary and sad.

  Victoria pushed past Kadar. “Father!” She ran to him and embraced him. She clung to him longer than she might have if Kadar had not been there.

  “Victoria, my daughter. You have missed me, eh? Allah be praised, I have come home to find you all in health in spite of the many reports about Palestine.”

  “She was praying just inside the gate when I saw her,” Kadar said. “I wanted to walk with her here. An unveiled woman alone in the Quarter? Well, soon we will remedy that Western rebellion.”

  Victoria turned to face Kadar. What did he have to say about her lack of a veil? And why had he been so presumptuous as to walk with her to her own home? “I thank you, Kadar. And now I wish to spend time with my father.”

  “Victoria!” Her father sounded shocked. “You forget your manners! Fix us tea.”

  Victoria blinked up at her father in surprise. She looked at Ibrahim, who had not said anything at all to her. He would not look at her. His hands brushed over a deep red carpet and he pretended to study the threads and pattern of it.

  “But, Father,” she began.

  He smiled at her strangely. “Do you not know, Daughter?”

  “Know what, Father?”

  He laughed nervously. His glance flitted from Ibrahim to Kadar, then back to Victoria. “Allah has willed that you are to be married.”

  Her breath came hard. Could they know about Eli? “What . . .”

  “You have not spoken of this with Ibrahim? Just an hour ago we settled the contract. You and Ram Kadar are to be wed.”

  Her eyes widened. She felt the blood drain from her face. What could she say? To be ungrateful or rude would result in a beating, a locked room. And yet tears of outrage came to her eyes in spite of her battle for self-control. “My father . . . ,” she began.

  “Ram Kadar is a man of substance. He will treat you well.” Her father looked aloof, beyond discussion. Ibrahim glanced at her with an uneasy guilt. Could her brother see on her face the accusation of betrayal?

  Victoria wanted to shout her refusal. She wanted to beat her fists against her father and brother, to run from the arrogant self-assurance of Ram Kadar. Somehow she managed to master herself. To do otherwise would have been foolish.

  “I had not imagined such . . . an honor, my father. Forgive me if I seem . . . ungrateful.” She dared to meet the steady gaze of Ram Kadar. “I simply had not expected Allah to answer my petition in such a way.”

  Her answer pleased Kadar. It also pleased her father, who sighed with relief. Only Ibrahim
dared to look at his sister with open suspicion. Only he knew better.

  Her father clapped his hands together happily. “Then we shall set the date.”

  “As soon as possible,” Kadar replied with a gracious bow. “Soon there will be pressing business that I will be required to attend to.”

  “Please—” Victoria calmed the sense of panic that threatened to break through her voice. “A woman needs time for such important arrangements as this. I must prepare myself.”

  Ibrahim’s eyes seemed openly hostile. He shook his head. He knew she would not consent or submit willingly, and yet Victoria was smiling pleasantly. Her hands trembled. Her eyes were pained behind the soft words and nod of compliance.

  “Ram Kadar is an important man,” Ibrahim blurted out. “He is a member of the council, and Victoria must fit his schedule, not expect him to fit into matters that are so trivial. The wedding should be soon. This week.”

  “No!” Victoria turned on him with a fierceness that startled her father and Kadar. “It is none of his business, Father. Tell Ibrahim it is none of his affair! I need time, I tell you! I must not be rushed!”

  “Well . . . ” Amal Hassan straightened his fez and shrugged in apology for his daughter’s outburst. “In this matter it is the bridegroom who suffers as the days pass on, and so—”

  Kadar seemed amused. He liked her spirit. He would tame it soon enough, as a man tames a headstrong horse. “I have waited this long. I can wait two weeks more for her.”

  Victoria swallowed hard. She felt her cheeks flush with the thoughts of her deception. In two weeks she would be the wife of Eli Sachar, and all this would mean nothing. A bad dream to be forgotten.

  “You are gracious,” she said softly, letting her eyes linger on the face of Kadar.

  He took her hand and bowed to kiss it. “My darling,” he replied. “Habibi . . .”

  It was difficult to keep her composure. Difficult not to jerk her hand away. Somehow she managed to maintain her smile.

  “And now, my father—” she bowed—“it has been a long day. A difficult day at the offices. There were many innocent injured and so the workload is greater for those of us lucky ones.” She let the venom she felt toward Ibrahim pierce him with a hard look.

  Ibrahim smiled. Yes. This was better. More what he expected from Victoria. A look of hatred and rage. Much better than this simpering acceptance of a marriage she certainly did not want. He touched his hand to his forehead in a nearly imperceptible salute. Enemy to enemy. Betrayer to the betrayed. Ibrahim preferred this to Victoria’s charade.

  “Perhaps Ibrahim will prepare your tea, Father. I am unwell from the difficulty of the day.” She smiled up at Kadar. “Forgive me.”

  Kadar offered a deep bow. She stiffly embraced her father before she walked silently back to the stairs that led into the house. She passed her stepmother in the hallway.

  “Well, if it isn’t our princess! Soon to be a wife! Soon to be gone from this house, Allah be praised.”

  Victoria did not reply. She went straight to her room and lay down on her bed while the bitterness of her anger washed over her. She stared up at the ceiling and considered Ibrahim’s betrayal of her and Eli. If she had a gun, she would kill him. Or a knife—

  But Victoria had no weapon tonight except her ability to pretend that a marriage to Ram Kadar was just what she wanted. She would play the game. She would disguise the truth that the thought of such a marriage revolted her. And she would think what she must do.

  ***

  After dinner Ibrahim entered the room of his sister. He did not turn on the light.

  “What do you want?” she asked angrily.

  “I want to let you know that I am no fool.”

  “It will take more than words to prove that to me now, Ibrahim,” she hissed.

  “What I have done is for your own good.”

  “And for the good of the Arab rebellion, I suppose.”

  “You will come around.”

  “You are a fool.”

  “I am watching you. Know that. Every move, I am watching.”

  “Then watch me tomorrow, my dear brother. Watch me buy a pistol and load it and shoot you.”

  “Then you will hang.”

  “Not if I say you tried to molest me.”

  “You would not do such a—”

  “If ever you come to my room again, I will inform Ram Kadar, and then I will not have to kill you myself.”

  Ibrahim was silent. Ram Kadar was a loaded gun, and Victoria could indeed point that weapon at Ibrahim’s head. He bowed in salaam and backed from the room. He would not bother her here again.

  ***

  The moment Etta had been dreading arrived. The strain showed on her face as she watched Aaron lead the two Polish policemen into his study. He slid the door shut, letting his eyes look up quickly to where she stood trembling on the landing. He frowned, nodded to her in a gesture of reassurance. But she was not reassured. Aaron did not know why they had come. She had never told him what had happened. What would he say when those men laid out their wicked slander before him?

  In a few minutes, she knew.

  From behind the door, Aaron’s voice roared against their impudence and crookedness. “Get out!” he shouted. “Leave my home and do not bother to come back! I shall report your blackmail to the proper authorities and then we shall see how long you carry a badge in Warsaw!”

  Another voice shouted back. “You will be sorry. We have the justice of Poland on our side. She has a police record, you know! And so will you if you are not careful!”

  The second thug joined in. “You know what your chances will be to emigrate if you have a police record!”

  The door crashed back with a startling noise. Aaron’s face was tight and flushed with fury. He stepped out of the study. “Get out!” he said again. “I am a citizen of Poland, as free as any man. I will not leave my country, nor will I live beneath the threat of stray dogs like you!” He clenched and unclenched his fists. The men wanted him to strike out, but he did not.

  “Filthy Jew,” muttered the red-faced man.

  “I would stay off the streets if I were you,” said the second.

  Aaron flung open the front door. Snow flurries blew in as the policemen stepped out. The house seemed very cold. Aaron looked up at Etta as he slammed the door shut. He said nothing as he stalked back to his study and closed the door behind him.

  ***

  The postcard from Paris, addressed to Elisa Murphy in London, lay on the desk of the Gestapo Chief Heinrich Himmler. Beside that was an envelope with the same address—the same distinct handwriting, the same postmark from a Paris post office not far from L’Opera.

  Himmler flipped open the thick file of correspondence from the German Embassy in Paris. There were handwritten requests for additional stationery, rubber stamps, and office supplies. The Gestapo chief sorted out the nondescript memos according to handwriting. Those written by Ernst vom Rath were placed neatly beside the Paris postcard and the plain white envelope addressed to Elisa Murphy. Himmler replaced the rest of the material and deposited the file in the re-file basket.

  Himmler did not need a handwriting expert to see that the script on the embassy memos matched the writing on the letters to Elisa Murphy exactly. For Himmler, this was a relief. Of course, Ernst vom Rath had been suspected of disloyalty to the Nazi party. These communications to Elisa Murphy were simple proof of the man’s guilt. Himmler only wished he had been able to acquire a copy of the letter that vom Rath had sent to the woman. Its contents might have shed some light on the extent of vom Rath’s disloyalty.

  He dialed the Führer’s private line as he tapped his pen beside the name of Elisa Murphy. A male voice answered. Himmler stated his name, and after a moment the voice of Adolf Hitler came on the line.

  “Good news, mein Führer,” Himmler said cheerfully. “We have made a definite connection between vom Rath and the traitor Thomas von Kleistmann! Yes. Now it is certain that our sacrifice for
the celebration of the November Putsch is not innocent. We are simply executing a traitor against the Reich.”

  Hitler seemed pleased by this information. He liked things well planned out. Even now he was discussing the routes and targets of the rioters for the demonstration against the Jews. Trucks would be on hand to transport the demonstrators out of their own neighborhoods and cities so that there would be no personal feelings involved when they attacked various Jewish homes and establishments. Of course, all this must seem very natural and spontaneous, the response of German outrage against a Jew murdering a member of the German Embassy. It was good to know clearly that vom Rath would die a martyr for their own cause. He was a minor actor in the play against Hitler, anyway. As for Elisa Murphy, she was more useful alive now than dead.

  Himmler was amused by the enthusiasm in his leader’s voice. Hitler was directing the entire November celebration as if it were a Wagnerian Opera. He had already made notes on Ernst vom Rath’s funeral service. All this would fall on the anniversary of the Beer Hall Putsch, Hitler’s attempted coup in November of 1923. Germany needed martyrs.

  Himmler wrote a few notes on the back of Ernst vom Rath’s envelope; then he gathered it all up together and placed it in a new file that he labeled Götterdämmerung—“twilight of the gods”!

  35

  Best-Laid Plans

  A single thought obsessed Herschel Grynspan now: to take vengeance on the Nazis for the persecution of his family.