“On the contrary. I’m going into the lions’ den.”
“To Israel?”
“Yes. My cover will be the car restoration. I hear there’s a good selection of old Citroën models for parts.”
“I’m sure they have plenty of Deux Chevaux wrecks, but your old Presidential will only take SM and DS parts. I’ll run a search for you.”
“Thanks.” He handed Carl an envelope. “Snapshots for the passport. I’ll meet you in front of Metz & Co. tomorrow at noon.”
“I’ll do my best. Anything else?”
“A friend of mine will be staying with you while I’m away. She’s in danger.”
“Is she pretty?”
“She’s incredibly beautiful, considering she’ll turn sixty-eight on January first.”
They hugged, and Carl left. A few minutes later Lemmy headed back to his hotel. He walked quickly through the dark mist that descended on Amsterdam, his hands in his pockets, his head bowed against the cold.
From his room he called Christopher in Zurich and asked him to go to the bank the next morning and wait for his call.
*
Sabbath was over when three stars could be seen in the darkening sky. After the evening prayers and a light dinner, Rabbi Gerster and Itah Orr left Benjamin’s apartment. Itah wore a long dress and covered her hair with a scarf. They walked to the center of Jerusalem. Along the way, she used a pay phone to call her neighbor and ask him to feed her cat and clean its litter box every other day until she returned. “I hope you’re not allergic to cats,” she said as they resumed walking.
“I don’t know. There are no pets in Neturay Karta.” He hesitated. “I take it you’re not married?”
“Three times widowed. First husband killed by Egyptian artillery on the Suez Canal, left me with a baby girl. Second saw his son born—thank God for small favors!—before he was hit by a Katyusha rocket near the Lebanese border. I actually have the casing and a bunch of fragments from the rocket. I put them together like a puzzle showing the Russian manufacturer’s name, ink-stamps from Iranian and Syrian customs, and a Sharpie note from Hezbollah:
Jews are monkeys and dogs.
”
“Didn’t Mohammed say that?”
Itah shrugged. “Even a great man can sometimes say foolish things. Didn’t Moses tell God to go find someone else?”
“What happened to the third?”
“Johnny? He was Canadian—came to Israel too old to serve in the army so I thought we would be safe, grow old together, all that. Super guy. Helped me raise the kids like they were his own—though now they’re both in Toronto, studying art on Grandma’s dollar.”
“And Johnny?”
“Run over while crossing the street. Can you believe it?” She chuckled to dispel the morbidity of her marital record. “The fourth would have to be suicidal.”
“I disagree,” he said, and left it at that.
On Jaffa Street, a line of police barricades blocked vehicle traffic, allowing thousands of pedestrians to march down the wide road toward the Zion Square. A building overlooking the vast square had been decorated with flags of the Likud party. A huge banner read:
Peace only with security!
Many held placards with photos of victims from recent terror attacks as well as skeletons of blown-up buses. A chorus of a few hundred people adapted the tune of a romantic Zionist folksong to crude lyrics: “Yes, Rabin is a homo…yes, Rabin is an SOB…’cause Rabin is a dog…and a murderer!”
The offensive crooning repeated again and again, with more voices joining. Rabbi Gerster felt Itah grip his arm. He turned to see an elderly man in a suit, who held a sign with a photo of a young woman and the words: I survived Auschwitz, but my daughter didn’t survive Oslo!
The long balcony across the front of the building was filled with political leaders of the right, led by Ariel Sharon and Benjamin Netanyahu. The banner under the line of Likud leaders read: The Murderer Arafat Deserves Capital Punishment!
Underneath, the plaza was dense with people, many of whom now chanted, “Death to Rabin! Death to Rabin! Death to Rabin!”
Arik Sharon started talking into a loudspeaker, barely overcoming the chanting crowd. “The murderer Arafat was brought into our midst by the collaborators. It’s a government that forgets everything, forgets the victims of the war criminal Arafat!”
“Look!” Itah pointed at a stout young man wearing a white skullcap. “That’s Freckles!”
Rabbi Gerster recognized him as the leader of the small demonstration in front of the prime minister’s house. He was holding a placard with a life-size photo of SS leader Himmler in dress uniform, only the face was substituted with Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin’s face. Next to Freckles stood a few other young men with colorful placards on sticks, showing Rabin dressed as an Arab with a checkered kafiya, Rabin with a hangman’s noose around his neck, Rabin shaking hands with Arafat under the headline: Partners in Terror.
“Freckles is very creative,” Itah spoke into Rabbi Gerster’s ear as the noise around them was deafening. “But the money fuels everything. We need to find the old man in Paris!”
Rabbi Gerster nodded.
The crowd switched to another chant: “With blood…and fire…Rabin will expire!”
Next came Netanyahu, who managed to say, “Good evening,” before the crowd roared, “Bibi! Bibi! Bibi!”
Rabbi Gerster saw other signs rise above the crowd’s heads:
Government of Death!
Labor Party is Good for Arabs!
Government of Traitors!
Your Day is Coming!
Likud leader Benjamin Netanyahu declared: “Arafat is a serial killer whose rightful place is among war criminals. A wicked murderer who is now supported by the current Israeli government, which blindly enables him to implement the first phase in his plan to destroy the Jewish state!”
As the two of them advanced through the dense multitude toward Ben Yehuda Street, Netanyahu’s voice faded, while the eerie serenade continued, “Yes, Rabin is a homo…yes, Rabin is an SOB…”
*
At nine p.m. Lemmy called the American Hotel and asked for Frau Koenig. He wondered if Tanya knew she was hiding in the same hotel where another beautiful spy had stayed, though he hoped Tanya’s fate would be better than Mata Hari’s.
She picked up after the third ring.
“It’s your dead lover,” he said, “calling from the great beyond.”
“Not funny. Are you in Amsterdam?”
“Yes. How’s your head?”
“Achy and confused. Can you come over?”
“I’ll meet you at noon tomorrow in front of the Metz & Co. department store. You’ll be staying with a friend of mine until I come back.”
“Back? From where?”
“I’m going to Jerusalem. Elie holds the key to everything. I have to talk to him.”
“They won’t let you see him.”
“You underestimate me.”
“And you underestimate Shin Bet.” She was silent for a moment. “What about the bank?”
“Swiss banks move slowly. I can handle most things by phone through my assistant.”
“Especially inactive accounts.”
“Exactly.” Lemmy thought about the Mauser, which he’d left in Zurich, the writing engraved along the barrel. “Koenig was an Oberstgruppenführer in the SS, right?”
“Correct.”
“That was the second-highest rank in the SS.”
She hesitated. “He was an accountant by training, a genius really, when it came to budget allocations, financial administration, things like that.”
“Things like calculating how many humans could fit in a cattle-train car? Budgeting for bulk-purchased Zyklon-B gas canisters? Valuating human hair as an industrial commodity?”
There was a long silence. “I didn’t know about these things. I adored him.”
“And he adored you back.” An idea occurred to Lemmy. He sat on the hotel bed, pressing the receiver to his ear. “Enough to entrust the ledger to you.”
“Klaus knew that my heart belonged to him.” Then, as if an explanation was required, she added, “I was very young, barely fourteen, when he took me in.”
“A fourteen-year-old girl.” Lemmy paused. “Your birthday falls on New Year’s, doesn’t it?”
“I don’t celebrate it anymore, but yes, I was born on January first, nineteen twenty-eight.”
“I remember celebrating with you on the first day of sixty-seven. You bought a kosher cake so I could eat it.”
“You were struggling to balance your faith with…what we had.”
“It’s odd how certain things get stuck in your mind forever.”
“Please come over. We have so much to discuss.”
“It’s not safe,” he said before temptation took over. “I’ll see you tomorrow at noon in front of Metz & Co. There’s a green phone booth across the street. Wait for me there.” He was about to hang up, but the question just popped to his lips. “What’s Bira doing these days?”
“My troublemaking daughter?” Tanya’s voice softened. “She’s an archeology professor at Hebrew University, digging up sacred grounds, pissing off the ultra-Orthodox, including Rabbi Abraham Gerster, unfortunately.”
“A small world. Is she married? Has kids?”
“Yes. Her oldest is in the army already. Yuval. A wonderful boy, so smart and kind and idealistic. Just like Lemmy was…I mean…just like you were…back then.”
“And now.”
“But all these years.” Her voice cracked. “If you only knew…how much grief.”
“I’m sorry,” he said. “Good night, Tanya.”
*
Benjamin was waiting when Rabbi Gerster and Itah Orr returned to Meah Shearim. He had brewed fresh tea and set up cups on the dining table. “The chaplain from Hadassah Hospital brought a note for you.” He held it so they could read it together.
Abraham, I’m in the ICU at Hadassah, 4
floor, last room on right. Come ASAP. Long live Jerusalem! E.W.
Itah asked, “Who is E.W.?”
Rabbi Gerster sat down. He picked up the note and read it again, his hand trembling. “E.W. stands for Entirely Wicked.”
“Wicked?”
“He’s the devil himself.”
“
God shall safeguard his sheep,
” Benjamin recited, “
from evil spirits and deadly debacles that frequent this earth.
”
“Amen,” Rabbi Gerster said. “Did the chaplain say anything else?”
Benjamin offered Itah a jar of sugar cubes. “He said there were two young men guarding the patient, who appears weak, emaciated, and out of breath, yet in full command of his senses.”
“That’s an apt description.” Rabbi Gerster stood, gulping the rest of his tea. “Benjamin, kindly call a taxi for us.”
“At this hour?”
“Yes. Right now.”
“But it’s the middle of the night!”
“There’s not a moment to spare.”
“Then I’ll go with you. They know me well at Hadassah Hospital.” It was true. Every time a man, woman, or child from Neturay Karta was hospitalized, Rabbi Benjamin Mashash was praying at their bedside or helping feed them or comforting the distraught family members.
“I appreciate it,” Rabbi Gerster said, “but you must stay here with your sleeping wife and precious children. Itah will join me.”
“But—”
“Rest assured,” Rabbi Gerster smiled, “that nothing inappropriate will happen.”
Benjamin blushed. “I didn’t mean to imply such a thing.”
“Hey,” Itah said, “why not?”
*
The taxi brought them to the military cemetery on Mount Herzl. Rabbi Gerster gave the driver a five hundred-shekel bill and asked him to wait. The guards were off-duty for the night. He used a flashlight to find a service shed and took two shovels.
Itah followed him through rows of headstones. “I thought we were going to Hadassah.”
“The answer lies here,” he said. After so many years of weekly visits, he could find his way around the cemetery with his eyes closed.
“Where are we going?”
“To pay a final visit.” He pointed the beam at the headstone. “Here we are.”
Private Jerusalem (“Lemmy”) Gerster
Killed in Battle, June 7, 1967
In the Defense of Israel
God Will Avenge His Blood
When he inserted the edge of the shovel under the corner, Itah gasped. “What are you doing?”
“You saw the note.” Rabbi Gerster used the long handle as a lever, lifting the stone.
“No!” She kneeled and held the stone down, preventing him from toppling it. “It was just a form of salute.
Long live Jerusalem!
Like a patriotic cheer or something.”
“The man who wrote the note knows where to stab his victims for best results. I will be in pain until I find out the truth with my own eyes.”
“E.W.?”
“Elie Weiss. He spends most of his time in Paris.”
“You think he’s the one giving money to Freckles?”
“I’m afraid so. And now he’s trying to lure me to the hospital to facilitate his escape.”
“By hinting that your son is alive?” Itah picked up the other shovel. “It’s so transparent. Cruel!”
“But irresistible, right?”
“Surely you don’t believe him, do you?”
“A bereaved father would grasp at any straw of hope.”
“But you know the truth, right? Your son is long dead. No one can bring him back to life.”
“If anyone can, it’s Elie Weiss.” Rabbi Gerster grunted as he lifted the headstone and rolled it over, exposing the dirt underneath. “That devil has a history of playing with life and death.” He pushed the shovel hard into the soil.
“You can’t actually believe this, can you?” But still, she joined him, and they dug until the top of the coffin was exposed. He got into the grave, stood wide so his shoes were off the coffin, and bent down to grab the cover.
“This is so wrong.” Itah aimed the flashlight into the hole. “God will punish us.”
“God is an illusion, remember?” Rabbi Gerster tried to pull up the side of the cover. “And so are ghosts, in case you’re worried about the neighbors.”
The coffin creaked, and the beam of the flashlight trembled with Itah’s hand. “The body of your son is only bones now. How could you tell if it’s really him?”
“Can’t open it!” He straightened up, rubbing his hands. “Talmud forbids steel nails, only wooden nails are allowed in coffins. After all these years, it’s bonded together.”
“A chance to reconsider,” Itah said with a tremulous chuckle.
He climbed out of the grave, turned, and jumped back in, landing hard on top of the coffin, which broke under his weight.