The Land Agent

by J David Simons

  ‘Get off the street, for fuck’s sake.’

  ‘What’s going on?’

  ‘The Arabs are trying to move into the Jewish Quarter. We need to hold them off until the Brits arrive with their warship. Stay here with Madame Blum. And take this.’ Mickey handed over a rifle. ‘It’s loaded.’

  ‘I’ve never used one.’

  ‘I thought you Polish boys shot boar and bear?’

  ‘My brother did. I wasn’t allowed to.’

  Mickey held up his own rifle as an example. ‘Jerk back this bolt here, let the next cartridge slot in and you can fire again. Five cartridges is all you have, so make them count if you have to. With a bit of luck, just showing them your weapon will be enough to put them off.’ Mickey stared at him straight, gave a quick smile of encouragement, then left him to manage a Lee-Enfield Mark III rifle for the first time in his life.

  Lev went quickly back into the house, checked on Madame Blum. If she could just stay asleep like this for the next couple of hours, his life would be much simpler. He filled up a flask of water from the kitchen tap, picked up an apple, a pair of field glasses hanging on the door. He then went back out into the courtyard, took up a position crouched behind the stone pillars of the front gate. From there, he had a view down the hill to where the mob was still being contained, as well as behind to Max Kaplan up on the roof. He wiped the sweat from his eyes, tried to calm himself with several deep intakes of breath.

  The Lee-Enfield had been well used, the wood cut and chipped in places, but the actual mechanism was polished clean and recently oiled. Without touching any levers, he tried to figure out how it would be to re-load it. He then rested the tip on the topmost of the ornamental ledges cut into the pillar. Using the binoculars, he had a good look round.

  Down in the lanes, the mob had quietened and appeared no closer to him than when he had first seen them. Up on the rooftops, he saw that Max Kaplan was just one among several snipers. Then, focusing out beyond the bay, he was able to pick out the movement of a British warship bearing down on the town. He wondered if those in the crowd below had seen it too and that was what had calmed them. But just as he was feeling more relaxed, the ‘Kill the Jews’ chant started up again. He put down the field glasses, took a proper grip of the rifle, pressed the butt hard into the bed of his shoulder.

  The two riders on horseback Lev had seen earlier had disappeared. That left a few of the more adventurous among the crowd to break loose and begin inching forward in a press against the walls of the lanes. The rest of the mob surged forward several yards in the wake of this advance party, then stopped. Lev looked back at Max who signalled with the flat of his hand to do nothing. The youths in the vanguard continued to move ahead, hugging the walls, testing the safety of the advance. The chanting was getting louder, more people were breaking away from the main group, spreading out across the lane, scrambling upwards, throwing stones at invisible targets. The mob began to move with them. A drop of sweat fell from Lev’s nose onto his fingers where he gripped the butt of the rifle close to his chin. He realized he might have to shoot someone, to kill someone. Another drop of sweat on to his hand. He must not waver, he must keep his breathing even, his rifle steady.

  The crowd drew closer. He could see some of their faces clearly now without the need of binoculars. The rage, the hatred, the whipped-up fervour. It was frightening. A young Arab broke through from the front, running ahead of everyone else, stooping, picking up a stone, throwing it, running again, this lone figure, Lev could see his eyes, the mouth twisted in anger, screaming: ‘Kill the–’

  The shot came from somewhere behind him, the shock of it causing Lev to pull on his own trigger, jerk back from the force of the firing. He saw the burst of dust and plaster as his bullet hit a wall yards from anyone. Where the previous bullet had gone he had no idea. But that crack-crack noise blew a hole in the fabric of the whole situation. It was as if the day had missed a couple of beats as the echoes of the shots faded over the town. Everything stopped. The Arabs might have armed themselves with sticks and knives and swords, but they didn’t have guns. Guns were different. Guns were power. The youth who had moved forward on his own, turned and ran. As did the rest of the crowd, scattering, scuttling away. To leave, once the dust had settled, a single body lying on the ground. A church bell rang out from somewhere. Lev looked at his watch. It was eleven o’clock.

  Thirty-six

  MADAME BLUM WAS MAKING LUNCH. She was only too happy to do so, humming away as she fried the fish, boiled the potatoes. What was a poor woman to do in such a situation? Not just a woman, but a widow. Widowed twice – in her heart if not by legal document. What did she care about earthquakes and land deals and betrayals and riots and shooting in the street and guns in her house? Better that she just cook. For she was in high spirits. She had not slept so well for years, ever since she was a little girl, ever since she could remember. Until she had been woken so crudely at eleven o’clock by all these noises. She turned the fish in the pan, pleased to see the skin bubbled up all brown. She was lucky to have bought these fine sea bream the day before. For the markets were closed this morning, what with all the troubles.

  Lev sat next door in the dining room with Mickey, their rifles stacked in a corner, a revolver lying between them on the table. Lev’s whole body was still taut and tingling from the fear, excitement and sheer relief of the morning’s events. His voice sounded louder, his eyes opened wider, his belly ached from the smell of fried fish.

  ‘I was lucky it wasn’t me,’ he conceded.

  ‘Damn right,’ Mickey agreed. He had got rid of the bandana, wiped the oil off his face. ‘The Brits went straight in and arrested the first person they saw.’

  ‘Poor Max had just come down off the roof.’

  ‘Bloody idiots. His rifle was fully loaded yet they still took him. If you hadn’t nipped in to see our dear landlady, you were first in line. And you had a spent cartridge at your feet.’

  ‘I told you. I fired by mistake.’

  ‘Don’t worry. I know exactly who the sniper was.’

  ‘What’ll they do with Max? Charge him with murder?

  ‘Attempted murder. The boy was shot in the thigh. But it’s good the Arabs know someone has been arrested. It will calm everyone down.’

  ‘Everyone except Max.’

  Mickey laughed, gave the revolver on the table a twirl. ‘We’ll sort out matters with Max and the Brits later.’

  ‘I always thought Haifa would be safe from all of this.’

  ‘Not any more. The whole of Palestine has exploded. It’s been waiting to go off for nearly ten years now. Since the last riots. And yesterday was the day. Jerusalem was always going to be the spark but now we’re hearing terrible things from Safed and Hebron. To be honest, we also didn’t think there would be trouble here. We were wrong.’

  ‘Who is “we”?’

  Mickey shrugged.

  ‘It’s the Haganah, isn’t it?’

  ‘The Haganah doesn’t exist. The British are the military force in Palestine. It is illegal to have a secret army here.’

  ‘A secret army everyone knows about.’

  ‘I have to feed you the official line, Lev.’

  ‘So Sammy was right. You are selling guns. You’re selling guns to the Haganah.’

  ‘My business is my business.’

  Lev bit his lip, listened to Madame Blum cooking away in the kitchen. Then he leaned over, whispered: ‘You sold Sammy the gun.’

  Mickey didn’t even blink at the accusation. ‘He told me he needed it for protection. Money he kept in the house, something like that. I didn’t think he was going to kill himself.’

  ‘What are you two talking about?’ Madame Blum said, as she emerged from the kitchen with a plate of fried fish. She placed the dish on the table after moving Mickey’s revolver to make space. ‘My two boys,’ she said, patting Lev on the shoulder. ‘I’ll just bring the potatoes.’

  With Madame Blum back in the kitchen, Mickey said: �
�I’m sorry about what happened with Sammy. But don’t expect me to have a conscience about it.’

  ‘I didn’t think you would have.’

  Mickey leaned back in his chair, stretched out his arms in an exaggerated yawn. ‘I think we should talk about something else.’

  ‘I agree.’

  ‘Haifa should be safe now the Brits are here with their destroyer.’

  ‘And the rest of Palestine?’

  ‘We have units in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem doing their best to protect the Jews there. But it’s the settlements I’m worried about.’

  Madame Blum was back with the potatoes. ‘Now eat these while they are still hot,’ she said. ‘I am going to make a dessert. Do you think the markets will be open now?’

  ‘Not a chance,’ Mickey told her. ‘It could be days before that happens.’

  ‘I’ll have to steal one of your watermelons,’ she said, before disappearing once again.

  Lev picked up a knife, topped and tailed the sea bream, pulled back the skin, cut himself a slice. ‘I want to buy some of your guns.’

  Mickey chuckled. ‘What do you want with guns?’

  ‘For one of the settlements.’

  ‘Where Celia is?’

  ‘And Amshel too. They’ve got very little protection up there.’

  Mickey chewed on his fish, nodded thoughtfully. ‘It won’t be cheap. Bottom line, I’m a businessman. Even if it’s you who’s buying.’

  ‘I have money.’

  ‘Not that kind of money.’

  ‘Don’t worry. I’ve got the cash.’

  ‘How much cash?’

  ‘How much for the guns?’

  Mickey smiled, named his price. Lev told him how much money he had.

  ‘That’ll give you six rifles like the one you had this morning. All oiled and primed, ready to go. Plus six hundred cartridges. It’s all I have.’

  ‘I’ll need someone to take me and the guns to the Jordan Valley. That’s part of the deal.’

  ‘Quite the little businessman,’ Mickey acknowledged. ‘Yes, I can arrange that. When do you want to go?’

  ‘As soon as I’ve finished this fish.’

  Two hours later, Mickey returned with a flatbed truck, loaded up with strapped-down bales of hay and several jerry cans of petrol.

  ‘Where did you get this junk heap?’ Lev asked.

  ‘The best I could find in a hurry.’ Mickey poked at one of the bales. ‘The guns and cartridges are hidden underneath. I’ve thrown in twenty First Aid boxes as well. There’s a tarpaulin to cover it all.’

  ‘Who’s the driver?’

  ‘I am. I’ll take you there, then I’m coming straight back. I’ll add the petrol to my bill.’

  Lev stared out of the truck window at the warship sitting out in the bay, a dull-grey fearsome blight on an otherwise bright blue vista. Mickey had his nose close to the windscreen, trying to avoid the potholes, speeding up whenever he came across sight of anyone on the road, either walking or on horseback. The occasional truck passed from the opposite direction but they were almost all British Army vehicles carrying personnel back into Haifa. As soon as they cleared the town, the roads became devoid of man and mule, the villages were quiet too, everyone apparently holed up indoors until the tensions subsided. Mickey began to relax, enjoying himself as he drove around the holes in the road, speeding off to the side so the vehicle would run along at a tilt and back down again, Lev gripping the seat just to keep himself from sliding into his friend or falling out of a door hanging loose on a dodgy lock.

  ‘Where did you learn to drive?’

  ‘One of many skills acquired courtesy of His Majesty’s forces.’ Mickey ground through to a higher gear as if to prove his point.

  ‘I always thought you made most of that up, your time in the Army.’

  ‘Private Michael Rosenblatt. All information correct as stated.’

  ‘What about the Haganah? How long have you been with them?’

  Mickey swerved hard round a pothole then straightened the vehicle again. ‘Right from the start. I was like a lot of Jews serving with the Brits who wanted to do something to protect ourselves once the war was over. Especially after the riots in Jaffa a few years back. We weren’t ready then. We’re better prepared now. You saw that this morning with our snipers on the rooftops. But we’ve got no money, few weapons, no proper training and we’re illegal. Although all that might change now.’

  ‘Why do you say that?’

  ‘Fear is a great fundraiser. A great recruitment officer as well.’

  The truck boiled over in the heat on the steep climb from the Jezreel Valley towards Tiberias, forcing Mickey to pull over. It was an anxious delay by the roadside waiting for the engine to cool. Any sign of an approaching vehicle or traveller had the two of them standing up primed in an alertness for rioters or bandits, their hands reaching for the rifles hidden at the back of the truck. Lev eventually went into the cabin to fetch an old newspaper, returned with a battered backgammon set instead. They climbed up on the bales, sat down on top of their load.

  ‘The Garden of Eden is situated down there somewhere,’ Mickey said with a nod down towards the Jordan Valley. ‘If you believe in such a thing.’

  Lev didn’t believe in such a thing but he could see why God might have chosen this place. The outlook was spectacular, taking in the slopes of Mount Tabor, the stretch of the hills all the way down to Tiberias and the serene blue of the Sea of Galilee, shaped like a human heart.

  They played on in quietness, falling into a rhythm with the rattle of the dice, the clip-clip of the wooden disks on the board, the fading light, the lessening heat. Until Mickey said: ‘She must really matter to you.’

  Lev didn’t respond.

  ‘Why go to all this trouble then?’ Mickey persisted.

  ‘It’s a PICA settlement. I’m merely protecting our assets.’

  Mickey picked up a couple of disks from the board. ‘There’s no shame in loving a woman,’ he said in that world-wisely way of his.

  It wasn’t shame Lev felt. It was fear. He threw the dice against the board. Double six. What did that signify? ‘I like her a lot,’ he conceded.

  Mickey smiled, Lev waited for the inevitable sarcastic remark. None came. ‘I can see that,’ was all his friend said.

  Lev won the next couple of games, Mickey lost patience, deemed the radiator cool enough, then used up the last of their precious drinking water for the refill. They drove on to arrive at the makeshift guardhouse on the perimeter of Kfar Ha’Emek just as darkness properly set in, which was just as well as the headlights on the truck weren’t working. Mickey switched off the engine. Lev made to get out but Mickey held him back.

  ‘Better let them check us out first,’ he said. ‘A truck with no lights.’

  Two men emerged from the hut, both holding lanterns, one armed with a rifle. The lamps swayed back and forth across the windscreen, making it hard to make out the men’s faces until one of them was over by the passenger door peering in. Lev recognized him as Moshe, a farmer from Russia who had not only survived the Revolution but also a lightning storm that had killed both his parents on their family escape to Palestine.

  ‘The man from PICA,’ Moshe said, gripping the top of the sill with his thick, scarred fingers then looking in and around the cabin. ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘I’ve brought guns.’

  The other lantern appeared at Mickey’s side. Jonny the doctor. ‘What did you say?’

  ‘I’ve brought guns.’

  ‘Six rifles in the back,’ Mickey added. ‘Cartridges as well.’

  ‘Who are you?’ Jonny asked.

  ‘Mickey Vered. Haganah.’

  ‘Haganah? I thought you chaps weren’t supposed to exist.’

  ‘We crawl out of the woodwork from time to time.’

  ‘Show me the guns,’ Moshe said, standing back to let Lev out while Jonny dragged open the other door. Mickey went to the rear, unfastened the tarpaulin, shifted over the bal
es to reveal the crate of rifles. He pulled off the lid, passed one of the rifles over to Moshe who whistled and said: ‘Lee-Enfield Mark III,’ as if it were a rod of gold he was holding. Lev watched as he handled the reloading mechanism with an enviable expertise. ‘PICA send them?’

  ‘You could say that,’ Lev replied.

  ‘This is going to make a huge difference,’ Moshe said.

  ‘What’s your current status?’ Mickey asked.

  ‘Fourteen of us,’ Moshe told him. ‘Unless someone else has deserted since this morning. Twelve men, two women. There are also four children. Until now, we had just this one rifle for the whole settlement. A few machetes, a scimitar. One nervous guard dog. That’s about it.’

  ‘Any attacks?’

  ‘Bandits have been coming in across the border for two or three weeks now, raiding some of the other settlements. They tend to enter further north as we’re protected here by the ridge. They haven’t come this far south yet. But that’s probably only a matter of time.’

  ‘What about the Bedouin?’ Lev asked.

  ‘We’re no longer on friendly terms,’ Jonny explained. ‘The worry is with all these riots going on, they might take up with the bandits as well.’

  ‘To be honest,’ Moshe added, ‘we don’t really know what’s going on out there. We just want to protect ourselves the best we can. Rafi’s set up a guard duty rota. Three shifts through the night.’

  ‘Where is Rafi anyway?’ Lev asked.

  ‘Probably asleep. He’s just come off two straight shifts.’

  Mickey kicked at the front tyre with his heel. ‘I can’t get this thing back tonight with these broken headlights,’ he said. ‘Put me down for one of the later shifts. What about you, Lev?’

  ‘What time’s the next one?’

  ‘You can come with me,’ Jonny said, picking up one of the rifles. ‘I’m going out in about half an hour. In the meantime, I imagine your brother will be pleased to see you.’

  ‘Where is he?’

  ‘You could try Celia’s tent.’