Hostage (17 page)

Shaltiel thought that if he came out of this alive, he would go visit the old men who lived and worked, each in his own way, for revolutionary ideals. His story might entertain them. And if he was murdered, he would have a very special story to relate to the heavenly court.

Ahmed had become melancholic. It was as if he had suffered some kind of attack. Things were not going according to plan, and it was affecting him.

“I sometimes say to myself,” he said to Luigi, “that I’ve
ruined my life. I miss my family. My wife. My children. I see them when I open my eyes at dawn. They smile at me. I tell them that they’ll be proud of their father one day as I am of them. I know they’re dead, but their smile makes them come back to life. I don’t see them in my dreams. When they were alive, I used to dream about them. My dreams have changed. They are haunted by my enemies. I kill them in my dreams. They’ve replaced my loved ones. My loathing for the infidels throws a shadow over the love I had for each member of my family. Initially, as a young soldier for the Prophet, I saw myself rising to seventh heaven. During the training period in the desert, we would dance around the fire in the evening singing of our faith. Thanks to us and our sacrifices, I will no longer be uprooted, stateless, an exile everywhere in the West. Along with my comrades, we’ll build the future of our nation in a violent kingdom, purified by violence. For the first time in history, there will be a Palestinian state, free and proud. Meanwhile, here I am with you in this dungeon, facing a man who refuses to give in. If someone had told us that the strength of this storyteller would be greater than ours, would you have believed him?”

“Yes,” answered Luigi.

“That doesn’t bother you?”

“No. It doesn’t.”

“That’s because you’re Italian.”

“That’s true. We like stories.”

“So do we,” said Ahmed. “But we don’t like all storytellers. Not this one, for example.”

Hearing Ahmed express his doubts, Shaltiel had the crazy thought to appeal to them man to man.

“Listen to me,” he said, surprised by the sound of his own voice. They didn’t hear him. “Listen to me,” he repeated.

This time, they heard him. Ahmed walked over and stood in front of him.

“What do you want, you dirty Jew?” Ahmed cried out, ready to hit him.

“I’d like to tell you something.”

“A Jewish tale? Another one? This is what I think of your tales.”

He struck him in the face.

“Leave him alone,” Luigi said. He looked at Shaltiel. “We’re listening.”

“This is a poem that is supposed to be a prayer or a vision,” he said in a voice that he hoped was strong and deep. “It’s not by me, but by an old immortal Sage. He ascribed it to a mute Etruscan.

“I like the Etruscans,” said Luigi.

“Why?” asked Ahmed.

“Because they were all massacred and yet they continue to give us poems.”

“I don’t understand them,” said Ahmed.

“I don’t either,” said Luigi, “but I like them.”

Later on, alone in the musty-smelling basement, Shaltiel wondered: Didn’t he live in the Tower of Babel? Didn’t we all? In those days, languages were all mixed together, words had no more meaning, people didn’t understand their fellow men. My listeners, what are their languages? My torturers, what is their
true language? What’s the point of making words to tell the truth about life if no one listens to you or understands you?

The storyteller and his ramblings. Locked up in a jail built of words.

In school, Shaltiel remembered, no one knew anything about the situation and destiny of his strange schoolmate, Yohanan. The handsome adolescent was different from the others. He was withdrawn, timid, detached from his environment; he never raised his voice but listened intently to everything that was being said. Sometimes he uttered incoherent sounds, unintelligible noises whose meaning no one understood. Amused or serious, he seemed to be attuned to a different universe. Some students made fun of him at first. Admonished by their teacher, they stopped. He had been accepted into the school out of compassion for his parents or grandparents, who had greatly suffered in exile, it was said.

One day, he stopped coming to class. It was thought that his parents had taken him on a trip or placed him in a specialized institution. Later, Shaltiel learned the details. The world-renowned ethnologist Professor Robert Marcus was a friend of Yohanan’s father. He came to visit him one evening and, by chance, he heard the boy’s babbling. “He’s ill,” his father said. Intrigued, Dr. Marcus listened to him attentively. The noises followed a regular rhythm. It took a trained ear to hear them. “Your son isn’t ill,” he said to his friend. The scientist returned to the house regularly. He and Yohanan became inseparable. Ten months later, an international academic colloquium was held in New York where about twenty ethnologists were invited to
listen to Yohanan. Guided and supported by Dr. Marcus, the young adolescent recalled distant events in his language. Specialized journals devoted enthusiastic pages to him. One of Marcus’s students chose him as the subject of his doctoral thesis.

One morning, to everyone’s astonishment, he started to pronounce a few simple words: He was hungry and thirsty. He said he missed someone who was waiting for him. He died a short time later with a smile on his lips. Professor Marcus delivered the funeral oration. He said, “Beloved Yohanan, you knew a truth that is hidden from us, that of the ancients, and now you brought it back to them, intact and pure.”

“Yohanan’s poem,” Shaltiel said, “is a prayer. Sometimes it is recited by man, at other times by God himself. Both are in jail.”

“I like it,” said Luigi. “Your friend makes me sad, but I like that sadness.”

And what if I myself were Yohanan? Shaltiel wondered. And what if my present-day stories were addressed to generations buried centuries ago? And who will relate—and in what language—the story I am living through right now?

I was unaware that initially my two jailers belonged to two different small groups but later joined a large terrorist movement recently founded in America by a young Saudi activist known as Hassan ibn Hassan. Their strategy was to destabilize the situation in Israel by striking American Jews, Israel’s main supporters. That’s how, by pure chance, I became their target. It was the Mossad envoy who first suggested the possibility. It was soon confirmed by a message received at
The New York Times
.
Below is its content, similar to the message Blanca had received at the beginning of this misadventure.

That evening Luigi revealed to me the terms of the deal.

“There’s still a chance you’ll survive,” he said. “We’re waiting for the official response to our request. I’m confident.”

“What accounts for your confidence?”

“The pity I have for you.”

“The pity for what?”

“We thought you were someone else; it’s silly, but that’s what happened. We made you suffer without even thinking about who you were.”

“Should I thank you for your humane confession? Have no illusions: Your deal won’t be accepted by either America or Israel. They’ll see it as despicable and they’ll be right.”

“In that case, be aware that you’ll never see your family again.”

Later, my thoughts turned to my older brother, Pavel. Hadn’t he gone to Moscow to help the revolution?

So I’ll die soon. That’s obvious. Terror, that refined prison of modern times, imposes its law—
a
implies
b
. It was clear from the first day, the first hour. The Arab’s voice said it clearly, regardless of his words.

At this fateful moment facing death, does everyone, the patient in the hospital, the exhausted old man, have the same feeling, not of incoherence but of confusion? Does thought move forward or backward in fits and starts? Does the rhythm of time slow and gather speed independently of our will? Does childhood become close and the future distant and inaccessible? For me, the planet has shrunken to the size of a basement. I see now that I will live out the rest of my days with these two enemies as my sole companions. They alone will be present for my last minutes on earth. It will be their images that I’ll bring with me into the other world. But to whom will I relate the story of my final hours?

Now everything will depend on the downhill speed.

In prison, you cling to memory. It’s a form of freedom.

I am about five or six years old. It’s a summer day. The sky
and everything else is luminous: the face of my grandfather as he takes me into his garden, the grass, the fruit trees. I pick up a plum. I recite the appropriate prayer before putting it in my mouth. My grandfather congratulates me. “That’s good, my child. Do you know who eats without praying?” I don’t know. He tells me. “Animals. They eat because they’re hungry.”

I answer, “And I ate that plum without being hungry.”

“It’s true. You ate that plum because it was there.”

“But why the prayer? In order to thank God?” I say.

“Yes, that’s it. To thank God, blessed be He.” Grandfather nods his head and asks me to translate the prayer:

“Blessed are You, God, our God, King of the universe, who has created the fruit of the tree.”

My grandfather smiles. “But the words ‘thank you’ aren’t included! You’re just blessing God.” I probably disappointed my grandfather. He caresses my head and says, “Every prayer means acknowledging that everything on man’s earth comes from the Creator: the leaves rustling in the wind, wine, thirst, the clouds and the sun, joys and sorrows, happiness and desire—as well as this moment in time that we’re spending together.”

He kisses me on the forehead. And we continue our walk. I love my grandfather. He has been dead for years, but I love him in the present. Tall, majestic, his eyes alternately feverish and soothing. He is there when I call him. Did I sometimes call out to him without knowing why? Just to hear his voice? To make sure he could hear me?

But now, I don’t understand: What’s this incident doing in my prison? Oh yes, I remember. My grandfather concluded in a whisper: “You’re at the bottom of the mountain. May you climb up without suffering.”

From my father, I heard spellbinding stories about my grandfather. He raised his children in a small village next to his native town. He owned an inn and his whole family worked in it. It was closed on Saturdays, which complicated matters for Christian customers. Most of them understood. However, every so often drunkards came and knocked at the door, demanding a bottle on the Sabbath. Some of them threatened to wreck the place. My courageous grandfather confronted them in his Sabbath clothes and told them in no uncertain terms that the God of the Jews could strike them dead in the blink of an eye. The hotheads always backed off, except once when there was a brawl. Grandfather and his children lost one battle, but not their honor.

Help, Grandfather!

I miss being able to wash. I feel dirty, ugly, disgusting. The bathroom is nearby, and when I hear the water running, that too tortures me. I’m tied to a stool now; before I was spread out on the floor. My wrists and ankles are sore. The migraines continue. It takes an intense mental effort to summon those I love, living and dead.

Memory, please stay open for the beloved faces, the smiles, joys, words of my father. My love for them makes me vulnerable, fragile. I will die far away from them.

The door opens quietly. My abductors are both there. No doubt they’re bringing me my meal: stale bread and lukewarm water, as usual? Is it my morning meal or evening meal? I’m more thirsty than hungry. They’ve released my wrists so I can go to the toilet, but they still hurt. So do my eyes. The men
help me climb to the first floor. In a dry, hoarse voice, the Arab says to me, “Look around. You feel the air? We opened the window a bit, so you can see the world you’re about to leave. Look at the apple tree; take it in. It’s the last one you’ll see. And don’t blame us for all of this. Blame your Jews. They’re still rejecting our conditions. Meanwhile, you’re being of no help to us. We just want you to write a letter begging them to have pity on you and your family. And to free the three prisoners.”