The Collaborator of Bethlehem

by Matt Rees

  “Abu Ramiz, you’re here?” the janitor said, surprised.

  “What happened?”

  The janitor coughed and spat. “It came from your classroom, Abu Ramiz. Mister Christopher is in there.”

  Omar Yussef pulled the janitor out onto the street and left him with two young girls who had come early to school. “Go to the bakery over there,” he said to one of the stunned children. “Tell them to call for an ambulance.” Then he went into the smoky corridor.

  The windows of Omar Yussef’s classroom were blown out along the left-hand side of the corridor. His feet crunched on glass. He pulled his handkerchief from his jacket pocket and covered his mouth and nose. With each breath the bitter smell of burned wood overcame the eau de cologne he doused every morning on the handkerchief. He coughed.

  The door of the history classroom hung from one hinge at a forty-five-degree angle. Omar Yussef pushed it aside and peered into his classroom. The bookshelves were aflame and some of the children’s desks in the front row lay on their backs. His own desk was splintered into so many parts that only the barest frame remained. Beyond it, Omar Yussef saw a hand. Its fingers were bent, as though it were trying desperately to grip the floor, driving its nails into the linoleum. Omar Yussef dropped his own hands to his sides in shock, and choked on a sharp, involuntary intake of breath that was caustic with smoke. He lifted the handkerchief again to his mouth and breathed hard. It was a hand, severed, there on the floor of his classroom. It must belong to Steadman. The janitor had said he was in here, and Omar Yussef, too, had expected that the American would be preparing for his class at that desk.

  Omar Yussef stepped past the remnants of the desk. Beyond the hand, the smoke billowed and then cleared, revealing what remained of Christopher Steadman. The American’s shirt was scorched away in the front. His pale chest and stomach were smeared with black and scraped bright red by the blast. He was half upright against the beveled bottom of the burning bookshelf, his head tilted back. He looked as though he might be resting, snoring gently through his slightly open mouth. Omar Yussef thought that perhaps he was alive. He hurried to him and knelt beside him. He must get him away from the bookshelf before it burned down to his head or the smoke suffocated him. He hooked his arms around Steadman’s torso and shuffled toward the door. The American was heavy. As Omar Yussef struggled, he averted his face. The scalp was singed away on the left, which was also the side on which he had lost his hand. Steadman’s eyes jarred open. They were blue and glassy. Omar Yussef almost dropped the American, when the head rolled toward him, the eyes gazing with the emptiness of a drowsy calf. He realized that the man was dead, but he pulled him toward the corridor anyway. Sweat ran into his own eyes and it mixed with the smoke, stinging them.

  Three teenage boys rushed into the room and helped Omar Yussef haul the corpse to the corridor and toward the entrance.

  “What happened, ustaz?” one of them asked. “Is he dead?”

  They lay Christopher Steadman flat on the step of the school’s entrance. Omar Yussef felt hopelessly for a pulse in the man’s neck. He took off his coat and laid it over the naked torso, the abraded scalp, and the handless arm, so that the other children would not see. That was the second coat he had given up in two days. The first he’d surrendered to a man who was as good as dead. This time it was for an actual corpse. Omar Yussef’s sweat chilled now that his exertions were over and he was away from the heat of the fire. This was too much death for him to have clothed. It was as though his overcoats had become shrouds. He wondered if his last remaining coat, back on a hook by his front door, would be his own winding sheet. It was a black anorak, a good color to die in.

  The siren of the camp ambulance wailed to the front of the school. Three medics cut through the gathering crowd of children. They were about to remove the coat from the corpse, but Omar Yussef stopped them. “Wait until he’s inside the ambulance,” he said. “For his dignity.”

  The medics nodded and slipped Steadman’s body onto a lightweight orange stretcher. Two of them took him to the ambulance, while the other checked the janitor’s wounds. Omar Yussef wondered that death caused him to consider Steadman’s dignity. The dead man felt his own pride too much when he lived, so Omar Yussef hadn’t cared about it then. Now he was the only one who would protect it.

  The fire truck arrived. The firemen took a hose down the corridor and began pouring water into the history classroom.

  A few of the children cried, though most were morose and silent. Omar Yussef stood on the step of the school. “Director Steadman has been killed. We can’t say yet what happened, but as you can see the school cannot operate today. Go home now, and tell the children from the afternoon shift not to come to school today.”

  As the crowd of children slowly cleared, Khamis Zeydan arrived with two jeeps. Omar Yussef watched the police chief approach him. Something in the way Khamis Zeydan looked at him suggested that he hadn’t expected to see his old university friend standing at the entrance to the school issuing orders to the children. Then Omar Yussef understood. Someone had intended to kill the teacher in the history classroom. There was no reason anyone would have wanted Steadman dead. The bomb—and this surely had been a bomb—was intended for Omar Yussef.

  “Abu Ramiz, what happened here?” Khamis Zeydan said.

  “There was a bomb. It exploded in the history classroom. Steadman was preparing to take my class. The explosion killed him. The ambulance took him away just a minute ago.”

  “Why was the American taking your class?”

  Omar Yussef thought Khamis Zeydan spoke with a hint of disappointment. He remembered that he’d told the police chief yesterday that he would be back in the classroom this morning. Could it be that Khamis Zeydan had set the bomb? Or that he had passed on the information, just as Omar Yussef suspected he did in the case of Dima Abdel Rahman’s death? Omar Yussef felt the smoke in his throat again and coughed until his eyes wept. Khamis Zeydan reached out to touch his arm, but he pulled away.

  “He was taking my class,” Omar Yussef spluttered, “because I told him it would be an insult to me in the eyes of the camp if he continued to employ a replacement.”

  “He was in the classroom at your request?”

  “No, not directly. But partly, yes.”

  “Is that so.” Khamis Zeydan stared at him, hard, his head turned to the left, but his eyes looking straight at Omar Yussef.

  “Are you suggesting that I had him killed?” Omar Yussef was furious.

  “He was trying to get rid of you, wasn’t he? Despite his recent public denials, he still intended to force your retirement.”

  “You’re insane.”

  “Listen, Abu Ramiz, you’ve been getting involved in some crazy things lately. I don’t know with whom you’ve been associating or what they’re doing for you, but I do know that you went to Hussein Tamari’s headquarters two days ago.”

  “Are you having me watched?”

  “I keep an eye on who goes in and out of Tamari’s hideout. What were you doing there?”

  “You know perfectly well that I was trying to help George Saba. Do you really think I went to Tamari to arrange for the American to be killed? Why don’t you arrest the people who killed Louai and Dima Abdel Rahman? They’re the ones who framed George Saba, and they’re the ones who set this bomb. Can’t you see they wanted to kill me? They thought I’d be in that classroom. You, in particular, know that very well.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Because I told you last night that I’d be teaching this morning.”

  “I didn’t believe you for a minute. I didn’t even think you’d be on your feet this morning. You’re tougher than I thought.” Khamis Zeydan stepped aside as the firemen came out of the corridor. He stopped one of them. “Is the fire under control?”

  “Yes, you can go in now.”

  “Look, Abu Ramiz, we shouldn’t suspect each other,” Khamis Zeydan said, quietly. “We should be calm. Why don’t you take control of the
staff, of the school, and arrange the cleanup? I’m going to start investigating the scene of the explosion.”

  Khamis Zeydan went into the school with half of his squad. The others stood in a semicircle around the entrance, surrounded by a dozen curious pupils who remained nearby. Omar Yussef noticed that Khadija Zubeida’s father was among the policemen who stood in the mud with their Kalashnikovs. He had come to the school that morning to ask the girl how to find her father, and here he was. He put his hand out to him in greeting.

  The policeman was friendly. “Morning of joy, ustaz,” he said.

  “Morning of light,” Omar Yussef replied. “Mahmoud, I need to talk to you.”

  Omar Yussef passed along the corridor with Mahmoud Zubeida behind him. The policeman glanced blandly into the broken classroom, where his colleagues were assessing the size and source of the blast. He’s seen this kind of destruction many times, Omar Yussef thought. It doesn’t even concern him that this is his own daughter’s classroom.

  The two men went into Steadman’s office. Omar Yussef closed the door and gestured for Mahmoud Zubeida to sit. The man tried to rest his Kalashnikov across his lap, but the arms of the chair got in the way, so he laid it on the floor. He rubbed the back of a finger nervously across his black moustache. He swiped off his beret and gripped it in front of his chest, like a medieval peasant doffing his cap to the seigneur. Omar Yussef remained standing behind the desk.

  “First, Mahmoud, thank you for allowing me to remain in the courtroom a little late the other night,” Omar Yussef said.

  “It’s nothing, ustaz. May I ask, was that the collaborator’s father? The old gentleman who was crying?”

  “Yes, he’s an old friend of mine.”

  “Even if he did raise a collaborator, one must have respect for the grief of a father. God knows it isn’t necessarily the father’s fault if the child is bad.”

  “Of course.” Omar Yussef leaned forward. “Mahmoud, I need you to explain for me what happened during the arrest of George Saba. Khadija told me you were there when Saba was taken in. I found her description very interesting. Would you mind telling me?”

  “Why? I mean, how does it interest you, ustaz?”

  “Mahmoud, something terrible happened here this morning, in the very classroom where Khadija studies. I hope you’ll understand that I can’t tell you everything right now, though I will share all I know with Brigadier Khamis Zeydan. But I believe there’s a possible connection between what happened to Director Steadman and the incident with Saba.”

  “Why would a collaborator be involved in the death of the UNRWA school’s director?”

  “It’s not as simple as that, Mahmoud. But, look, for the sake of your daughter, please tell me about the arrest.”

  Mahmoud Zubeida seemed nervous. His face was puzzled. He’s a simple man, Omar Yussef thought, and he doesn’t know if he’s going to get himself in trouble with Khamis Zeydan, or even Hus-sein Tamari, by talking to me. He’s also simple enough that anyone standing behind a desk intimidates and commands him.

  “We went to Beit Jala early,” Mahmoud Zubeida said. “There were three jeeps. We blew in the front door. We couldn’t wait to knock, because our commander told us that George Saba was dangerous. He might attack us or kill himself with a cyanide capsule. The Israelis give poison to their collaborators in case they are caught, you know.”

  “Who was the commander?”

  “Major Awdeh.”

  “Jihad Awdeh?”

  “Major Jihad, yes.”

  “He’s a major?”

  “In Preventive Security. We were assigned to work with his detectives that morning.”

  “What happened once you were inside?”

  “We got the Christian against the wall.”

  “Did he resist?”

  “No, he was very cowardly and frightened.”

  “Did he confess?”

  “Immediately. He said, ‘I know what this is about.’”

  “Did Major Jihad tell him the charges?”

  “Yes, he told him he was accused of collaboration with the Occupation Forces in the death of Louai Abdel Rahman.”

  “And George Saba confessed to that?”

  “Yes.”

  “Jihad Awdeh told him the charge and Saba said, ‘I know what this is about.’”

  Mahmoud Zubeida paused. “No, he confessed even before the major told him the charge.”

  “So he might have been confessing to something else?”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “He said that he knew why you came to arrest him. But he could have been wrong about the reason. Did he look surprised when Major Jihad told him the charges?”

  “I don’t remember, ustaz. I’m sorry.”

  “Did Major Jihad say anything else?”

  “Not that I remember.”

  “You took Saba out to the jeep?”

  “Yes. I rode with him back to the jail.”

  “Did he go quietly?”

  “Yes, he was very cowardly and scared, like I said.” Mahmoud Zubeida smiled. His teeth were the color of old ivory, from chewing betel. “Major Jihad really frightened him.”

  “How?”

  “On the way out of the door, he did like this.” The policeman mimed the act of slitting a throat. His laugh came through his stained teeth slow and deep, like a cartoon cretin. “The Christian went quite white.”

  Omar Yussef remembered the gesture George Saba had described in the cell. Jihad Awdeh had drawn his finger across his throat when George drove him and Hussein Tamari from his roof late at night. So he had repeated the gesture when Tamari sent him to arrest George for collaboration. Omar Yussef remembered how disquieting it was to talk to Jihad Awdeh at the gunmen’s headquarters two days ago. He couldn’t imagine the terror George must have felt as Awdeh gloated over the gunmen’s revenge.

  “Thank you, Mahmoud.” Omar Yussef sat in Steadman’s chair. “Perhaps you had better return to your guard duty before Brigadier Zeydan gets annoyed that you’re gone.”

  “You’re right, ustaz.” The policeman stood, pulling his beret down to his eyes. “Thank you.”

  When Mahmoud Zubeida left the room, the school secretary came to the doorway.

  “Greetings, Abu Ramiz,” she said.

  “Double greetings, Wafa.”

  “Are you here to help clean up the school?”

  Omar Yussef put his palms flat on the rough wooden desktop. He couldn’t spare the time to organize workmen and teachers. In twenty-eight hours, George Saba’s execution was scheduled to be carried out. But he couldn’t see how to proceed. He needed the police to help him, yet Khamis Zeydan was either dismissive of his concern with the matter or even involved in the cover-up. There was no use in rushing all over town talking to lesser officials. They would simply refer him to Khamis Zeydan or tell him to keep his head down for fear of incurring the wrath of the Martyrs Brigades. Well, that wrath was already thoroughly incurred. There was a charred schoolroom and a dead American to prove it. It might be better to remain close to the policemen for a while as they sifted through the bombsite. Though he thought Khamis Zeydan was in touch with the killers, no one would try to murder him while the school was full of investigators, workmen and teachers. Perhaps he should stay here and think things through.

  “Wafa, tell all the other teachers to check their classrooms for damage. I’ll call the Jerusalem office and arrange for them to send workmen to repair everything.”

  Wafa nodded. “Do you think they will send another American to be in charge of the school, Abu Ramiz?”

  “I haven’t thought about it, Wafa.”

  The secretary smiled. “I suppose you don’t have to retire now, anyway.”

  “Wafa, you’re terrible.”

  Wafa laughed and closed the door.

  Omar Yussef sat in the quiet room, listening to the dim sounds of the policemen in the destroyed classroom. Wafa was right: he no longer faced a boss who wanted to get rid of him. The hatef
ul government schools inspector would have to start working on the new director all over again, and this time Omar Yussef would prepare to defend himself more thoroughly. Suddenly his career prospects were brighter than they had been for months. For the first time since Steadman began to push for him to leave the school, he once again had something to lose. He considered for an instant that his attempt to clear George Saba risked that new security. He was immediately ashamed of the selfish thought, but he acknowledged that it was there.

  He turned on the small stereo Steadman kept on a shelf behind his desk. He tuned the radio to the government’s local news channel. Perhaps there would be an announcement of clemency or some other change in the case of George Saba. Even if there were some news for the worse, he would want to hear it as he sat in the office wondering what to do next. There might even be a report about the bomb in the school. He picked up the phone and dialed the UN office in Jerusalem.

  Chapter 20

  Bethlehem Radio broke into its morning discussion program with news of a martyrdom. This martyr sacrificed himself, the radio announcer intoned, when he detonated a bomb he carried to Jerusalem. He died in a street by a market called Mahaneh Yehuda. There was no more detail, but the announcer said he would be back with news of the martyr’s identity and the number of dead as soon as it was available. The gravity in his voice couldn’t quite disguise the excitement.

  Omar Yussef waited in Christopher Steadman’s office for the UN’s Jerusalem headquarters to call him back and tell him when the workers would arrive to fix the classroom damaged in their own bombing that morning. The police finished rummaging through the destroyed schoolroom and, with all the students sent home, the place was quiet.

  The discussion program switched to speculation about the likely origin of the bomber. One of the commentators believed that presently it was easiest to enter Jerusalem from Ramallah, so the bomber had probably come from there. Bethlehem, on the other hand, seemed to him unlikely, because so many soldiers were watching the edge of the town, where the gunmen fired across the valley from Beit Jala, and it would be impossible to sneak past them. The announcer came back with a death toll. He said eight occupiers were reported killed. Omar Yussef snorted. Occupation bargain shoppers. On military operations to buy fresh fish and a bunch of cilantro and two-dollar underpants.