Dazzle - The Complete Unabridged Trilogy

by Judith Gould

  'Alive!' Tamara's eyes lit up and she clutched Inge eagerly. 'Where? How do you know?'

  Wordlessly Inge unfolded the newspaper she had been clutching and smoothed it on her lap. It was that morning's Los Angeles Herald Express.

  Tamara snatched it away from her and stared at it, the paper rustling in her quivering hand. Her smooth brow furrowed as she mouthed the boldface headline to herself: DELEGATION OF JEWISH PALESTINIANS TO VISIT HERE ON US TOUR. She wondered why on earth Inge had deemed this important enough to come rushing to the studio as if the world were on fire. Inge knew that although Tamara considered herself nominally Jewish, she was uninterested in practicing her religion.

  Then her eyes dropped to the bank of smaller lines directly below, and she jerked as though she had been punched by an invisible fist. There, in black and white, was a name she couldn't help but recognize: EVICT BRITISH AND FORM A JEWISH NATION, BORALEVI URGES.

  Boralevi. Thunderstruck, she sat paralyzed.

  Boralevi.

  She stared at the name as if in a trance. Was it possible? Could it be?

  A small photograph of a man accompanied the article. She jumped to her feet, lunged to the makeup mirror across the room, and switched on its perimeter of glaring, high-wattage bulbs.

  Schmarya Boralevi, the caption under the photograph read. His Goal is a New Middle Eastern State.

  Tamara held the slightly blurred picture closer to her eyes and stared at it in wide-eyed silence. What a handsome man Schmarya Boralevi was. His face had been caught head-on by the camera, and there was something infinitely heroic about the proud facial bone structure, the aristocratic, noble nose, and the large eyes which burned with an intense, almost spiritual fervour. The effect was further heightened by the insolent set of his sensuous lips, the paleness of his thick, pale blond or white mane of hair, and the strong granite set of the cleft chin barely visible under his luxuriant pale beard. Tamara stared at the photograph for long minutes, trying in vain to recognize something—anything—which would match up with the hazy, long-forgotten memories of the Schmarya Boralevi she had once known—barely. Then, eyes darting from line to line she greedily read the article.

  SPECIAL TO THE HERALD EXPRESS

  by John Fogel

  A six-member Jewish delegation led by Schmarya Boralevi, an outspoken Palestinian resident who is urging the British to surrender control of the eastern Mediterranean Mandate and turn it into a nation for the world's Jewish peoples, will stop here as part of a nationwide tour.

  Boralevi, a Russian Jew by birth, who suffered devastating bodily injury at the hands of the Okhrana, the dreaded secret police of the late Czar, and immigrated to the Holy Land in 1918, said in a New York speech that he will attempt to hand-deliver a detailed report to President Roosevelt during his delegation's stopover in Washington, DC. To date, there has been no response from the White House as to whether or not a meeting with the President will be granted.

  'Palestine is the Holy Land for the world's Christians,' an impassioned Boralevi told a packed synagogue on Manhattan's West Side, 'but everyone forgets that it was the Israelites whom Moses led there in order to obtain freedom from the oppression of the Pharaoh. Now, through military, police, and immigration tactics, the British are keeping the rightful heirs of Moses from their Promised Land.'

  He denounced the British Mandate as 'a yoke of slavery and oppression, which has more than outlasted its need or welcome'. He also claims that he is 'a fugitive of sorts' in his adopted land.

  'I am a wanted man, constantly in transit,' he said. 'For years now, the authorities have been trying to arrest me.' According to the British, Boralevi and a band of his supporters are wanted for smuggling hundreds of illegal immigrants into Palestine 'by land and by sea'. More recently, he claims to have been responsible for several air flights, originating from Greece or Cyprus, landing in deserted areas of Palestine by night.

  The problems in Palestine in general and with the British Mandate in particular are not new. As the Great War drew to a close, Dr. Chaim Weitzmann obtained the famous Balfour Declaration of November 2, 1917, from Great Britain, which pledged British support for the establishment of Palestine as a 'national home' for the world's Jewish people.

  However, as the Aliyah, or immigration, of Jewish pioneers to Palestine began, the British found themselves facing a greater wave of immigrants than they expected, as well as growing Arab unrest. Clashes between the new settlers and the old Arab inhabitants increasingly turned into bloody battles, with fatalities on both sides.

  Giving in to mounting Arab pressure, the British exempted Trans-Jordan from the provisions of the Mandate, thereby in a single move barring most of the territory from both Jewish immigration and land development. In their struggle to be impartial to both Arabs and Jews, the British deemed it necessary to stem the flow of Jewish immigrants. Laws specifically aimed at discouraging Jewish settlement paved the way to higher taxes and set strict rules in the area of agriculture.

  'First the government of Great Britain wants to help us set up a homeland,' Boralevi thundered, 'and simultaneously they try to make it impossible for our people to reach it, and if they do, to make carving out a decent living nearly impossible. If this criminal charade continues, Great Britain will have a lot to answer for in the years to come.'

  Sir Colin Bentley Plimmer, Great Britain's most outspoken critic of the Balfour Declaration, addressed a group of anti-Zionists recently in London, claiming: 'They [the Zionists] want nothing more than to wage war and wrest Palestine from its rightful inhabitants, the Arabs.'

  Plimmer went on to denounce Boralevi as 'a common criminal, a gunrunner, . . . and he should be branded as such. It is dangerous that he should be perceived as a hero. We have irrefutable proof that Mr. Boralevi and his small band of brigands are intent on attacking Arabs and British alike'. Plimmer says he deeply regrets the 'false sympathy' Mr. Boralevi is stirring up among Jews. 'Under the guise of raising money to help immigration and create a Jewish nation, he is smuggling immigrants and arms into Palestine, slipping in and out of the borders to make his deals. He must be stopped.'

  During his speech in New York, Boralevi denounced Plimmer's accusations as 'ridiculous'. 'If Plimmer considers me a criminal, then so be it. I will continue, however, to do as I have been doing. Throughout history we, the Jewish people, have been attacked, captured, enslaved, and slaughtered. Let it not be on my conscience that we did not adequately protect our women and children. If our enemy is armed, then unfortunately, so we must be armed to repel them. If we must fight, then we must fight. I have lived through one pogrom. I do not intend to live through another, and if I have to, I will go down fighting.'

  Slowly Tamara turned and looked Inge imploringly in the face. 'This . . . this is my . . . father?' she whispered. 'You're absolutely certain?'

  Inge met her eyes unwaveringly. 'Yes,' she replied definitely. She nodded her head. That is him. I recognize him from the picture even without first reading name.'

  'It just seems so ... so farfetched finding him through a newspaper article! I didn't think things like that could happen in real life. It's like something out of the movies.'

  'Often real life is stranger than make-believe,' Inge agreed.

  Tamara studied the photograph some more. She found it difficult to keep her eyes off it. Yes, her father was indeed very handsome, in a larger-than-life Biblical kind of way. She could well imagine why her mother had fallen in love with him. And this handsome man had been her very own father. He was a stranger to her. She couldn't even remember his ever having been there.

  'Do you think he'll like the food?' Tamara fretted while pacing the room nervously, constantly rubbing her hands together. 'Maybe he just eats kosher.'

  'He'll eat,' Inge assured her, keeping at her needlepoint without looking up.

  'What if he never arrives?' Tamara asked.

  Inge looked irritably up over her bifocals. 'Settle down,' she said sharply. 'You are acting like you are going to jump o
ut of your skin.'

  Louis said softly, 'Relax, princess. You look beautiful.'

  'How can I relax? Do you have any idea when I saw him last? Inge says I was four or five. If it weren't for the picture in the paper, I wouldn't even know what he looks like. I wish I could have gone and heard his speech. It would have made meeting him easier.'

  'You know that wasn't possible,' Louis said. 'O.T. was justified in not letting you attend. The press was probably all over the place, and someone would have been certain to make the connection between the two of you. IA just couldn't afford to take that chance. You're supposed to be the daughter of a Russian prince, not a refugee fighting for a Jewish state. I'm sure your father will understand.' All three of them looked up as the telephone jangled. Louis picked up the receiver, spoke quietly into it, and hung up. He nodded. 'That was the front gate. They're letting him in now.'

  Heels clicking sharply, Tamara hurried out into the travertine-floored foyer, where every available wall surface was a sparkling sheet of mirror, and an ornately carved wood console held an enormous stone urn brimming with begonias.

  The front doorbell rang suddenly, startling her so much that she jumped. As she heard the brisk footsteps of the maid approaching, she was filled with so much anxiety that she raced on tiptoe back into the living room, where Louis and Inge had already gotten to their feet. 'He won't like me!' she fretted, twisting her wedding band nervously round and round her finger. 'Louie, we should never have had him meet me here. It's so ostentatious!'

  'It's too late to worry about that, and I shouldn't think it would matter where you met.' He reached for her hand and gave it a reassuring squeeze. She tried to smile.

  They could hear the maid's disembodied voice coming from the foyer, and then another, deeper voice answering, and two distant sets of footsteps ringing out on the travertine, Esperanza's quick and steady and the other's heavy and uneven, as though from a severe limp.

  'Thank you, Esperanza,' Louis called out, 'you can go now.'

  'Si, señor.' Esperanza tucked her chins down into her chest, turned around, and waddled off flat-footed.

  Louis crossed the room with long strides to greet Schmarya Boralevi. 'I'm Louis Ziolko,' he said, holding out his hand, 'Tamara's husband.'

  The two men shook hands firmly. 'I am pleased to meet you,' Schmarya said in thickly accented English.

  Tamara stood rooted to the spot, her eyes focused on the floor. 'Go on,' Inge whispered. 'He's your father! Go to him!' Tamara took a deep breath and then felt Inge giving her a little push from the back. She went hesitantly forward, and when she had gone halfway, she looked up slowly. She stopped and stared at him, her heart beating unevenly, her silk skirt swaying around her ankles.

  One look into her father's eyes and she knew immediately the man he was.

  There are men who remain boys, those who mature, and a chosen few who embody the very essence of masculinity. Schmarya Boralevi was one of those few. There was something as unyielding as Gibraltar about him.

  His intelligent pale blue eyes were at once both hard and soft, set into taut, scarred leathery skin that on close inspection saved him from mere handsomeness. His thick, curly hair had been bleached white from decades spent in the sun. The high ridges of his cheekbones could have been sculptured by an angry artist, and his towering body was thickly slabbed with muscles to offset the weakness of his wooden leg. And yet his eyelashes were thick and golden and his lips were sensuous, as though to soften the endurance-hardened man he had by necessity become.

  He made her feel instantly safe and sheltered, somehow, as though he alone could keep the bad things of the world at bay.

  He gazed back at her steadily. Finally he nodded and spoke. 'My God, but you are very beautiful,' he said in the kind of deep, resonant voice that belonged behind a pulpit. 'You are just like your mother.'

  She smiled nervously and forced herself to walk the rest of the way toward him. Not once before in all her life had she felt this awkward or shy—not even when she had met O.T. Skolnik. 'Hello, Father,' she said guardedly, a lump blocking her throat. She held her hands out politely and he took them in his. She rose on tiptoe and kissed him on both cheeks.

  He took a deep breath. 'It is good to see you,' he said softly, still holding on to her hands when she stepped back. 'Let me take a good look at you.'

  She stood there silently, blushing under his gaze.

  'It has not been easy for me to come here,' he said, still looking down at her. 'When I received your letter I was so ashamed of having abandoned you that I almost decided not to.'

  'And I was so nervous of meeting you,' she confessed, holding his gaze, 'that for the three days since I had it delivered to your hotel I haven't known whether to be here or go away and hide.' She gave a low laugh. 'It's silly, isn't it?'

  'No, on the contrary. I can understand it.' His voice cracked. 'I should have never left you.' His eyes were moist.

  'But you came.'

  'Yes. I am glad.'

  She smiled. 'So am I.'

  Inge advanced slowly from the living room and studied Schmarya over her bifocals. He and Tamara were still holding each other's hands. 'You look well, Mr. Boralevi,' she observed softly. 'The years seem to have been kind.'

  He let go of Tamara's hand then and turned to Inge and frowned, clearly searching his memory for her.

  'I am Inge Meier,' she reminded him, holding out her hand. 'I was the Danilovs' nurse.'

  'Ah, yes, I remember now,' he said, taking her hand politely in his and giving a formal little bow over it. 'Although you looked different then.'

  'It was twenty years ago. I was much younger.'

  'And you did not wear glasses then.' He nodded. 'You have been with Tamara all this time?'

  Inge nodded. 'We were all the family we thought we had. We escaped Russia together.'

  'And Senda? She is well?'

  A veil seemed to slide down over Inge's eyes. 'She died before she could leave Europe.' She drew a deep breath and her voice quivered with thick emotion.

  For a long moment they stood awkwardly in the foyer, staring at one another. Then Louis clapped his hands together. 'Why don't we go into the living room?' he suggested. 'I'm sure you all have a lot of catching up to do and it's more comfortable there.'

  Schmarya nodded and Tamara hooked an arm through his elbow. 'This is a remarkable house,' Schmarya said, looking around. 'Why, this living room alone is much bigger than most houses! I have not seen anything quite like it.'

  'Neither have we,' Tamara joked weakly. Then she looked concerned. 'You are limping badly.'

  'I lost my leg in Russia.' Schmarya shrugged. 'I am used to it.'

  'I'm sorry. I didn't know.'

  'It was very long ago.'

  'I think this occasion calls for a celebration,' Louis announced, going around to the bar. 'Champagne?'

  'That will be fine.' Schmarya carefully lowered himself onto a couch and Tamara took a seat beside him. Crystal clinked in the background as Louis poured the drinks.

  'After I got settled, I wrote many letters to you and your mother in Russia,' Schmarya told Tamara.

  She frowned. 'As far as I know, we didn't receive any. But that's not surprising when you consider the state of things. I was too young to remember anything, but from what Inge told me, things in Russia were very confused. Everything broke down . . . communications, government, the postal system, transportation, food . . . everything. It took us a long time just to get here.'

  'That's not the reason you didn't get them,' he said softly. 'I wrote them, but ... I never sent them. Part of me wanted to, but another part did not. I was young and brash in those days and everything to me was black and white. At the time I left your mother and you, I blamed her for many things I now realize I probably had no right to blame her for at all.' He stared at her intensely. 'You are very like her, you know. But you are even more beautiful.'

  Tamara looked away suddenly.

  'I am sorry. I did not mean to stare. Unti
l I received your letter I had no idea that the great film star Tamara was my daughter.' He smiled apologetically. 'That will take some getting used to.'

  She was surprised. 'Then you'd heard of me?'

  He nodded. 'You are famous even in Europe and Palestine. There are cinemas in every large city, and American films are considered the best. However, even in my wildest imaginings it never occurred to me to connect my daughter to the film star, despite the name. "Tamara" is quite common in Russia; it would have been absurd to think it could be you. Or so I would have thought.'

  'Yes, it would have seemed rather unlikely,' Tamara agreed.

  Louis came to hand the glasses around. 'A toast,' he said, remaining standing. 'To old acquaintance, renewed acquaintance, and new acquaintance.'

  'I drink to that,' Inge said.

  'Mazel tov!' Schmarya added, leaning forward and clinking their glasses. The crystal rang true and clear and they sipped slowly.

  'This tastes good,' Schmarya said, savouring the smooth, bubbly taste on his tongue. 'Not sweet, not sour . . . delicious. It is not often that I get the chance to drink champagne.'

  'It's Dom Perignon,' Louis said, 'the best. Thank God it's easier and cheaper to get again, now that Prohibition's finally over.'

  'Not that that ever stopped him,' Tamara laughed. She explained for Schmarya's sake: 'You wouldn't have believed our bootlegger's bills. Louie always said that next to your doctor, your bootlegger is the most important person in your life.'

  Over the next hours Tamara and Inge kept answering Schmarya's questions about St. Petersburg, Germany, and the movies. Tamara was surprised and pleased that he was so interested, and regaled him with anecdotes. Underneath her father's imposing, larger-than-life physique and strength was a sensitive, gentle human. She could not imagine that this was the same man who had walked out on her mother and her.

  They ate dinner outside on the football-field-size terrace overlooking the flat, twinkling expanse of Los Angeles below. Sitting there on the hilltop in the warm night air, Schmarya had the impression that he was floating in space, the lights stretching off into the distance on all three sides in that kind of gridlike pattern. Throughout the meal, he had a hard time keeping his eyes off his daughter. The flickering yellow light of the candles inside the hurricane shade seemed to heighten her bewitching features and animation.