The Masada Complex (29 page)

Silver watched Al advance down the aisle toward the dais.

“But I don’t,” Masada said, “
prefer
to die for these it.”

“But you are
willing
to sacrifice yourself.”

Al reached the foot of the dais and raised his arm, pointing the gun at Masada.

Hilda Zonshine screamed, and the rabbi turned and saw Al’s gun.

“
So shall all thy enemies!
” Al coughed, struggling to complete the sentence.

Rabbi Josh threw himself across the dais to shield Masada. At the same time, Hilda Zonshine rolled off her seat in the front row and launched her stocky frame at her husband, yelling, “
Alfred!”
She collided with him just when a shot exploded.

The entire congregation erupted in shouting and screaming. A stampede headed for the doors. Silver stepped aside just in time to avoid being trampled.

When the flow of Jews dwindled to a whimpering trickle, Silver stepped to the door, only to be knocked down by a man running out. It was Al, who tried to say something but could not make his mouth work.

Silver pointed to the gun. “Remember Mahoney!”

Al turned and ran.

Through the sudden quietness, Silver heard a man shouting. It took him a moment to recognize the rabbi’s voice.

He pulled himself up and entered the sanctuary.

“Help,” Rabbi Josh cried, “somebody
help!”
He was kneeling on the stage, his back to the hall.

Coming down the aisle, Silver saw the boy’s legs on the dais. Stepping closer, he saw blood pooling under the crouching rabbi, who looked up and wailed, “
No! Please God! Not my son!
Not Raul!
”

A chair was toppled over, a large hole in the backrest. Blood had sprayed across the two national flags flanking the Ark of the Torah.

Silver mounted the dais and circled the rabbi.

The entry hole was small, as if a finger had poked into the boy’s chest. But Silver knew the exit hole in the back was bigger than a finger, bigger than a fist, or a basketball. He had chosen the bullets exactly for that effect.

The rabbi’s cries turned to sobbing as he cradled his dead boy. “Raul. My baby. Please don’t!
Raul!
”

An memory came to Silver of his own torment, laying over the edge of a bleak precipice, wailing for his son, his heart tearing apart with the realization that Faddah was gone forever.

A siren sounded in the distance.

The room started spinning. Silver tried to reach a chair, but his legs folded under him. The wood planks of the dais rose and collided with the side of his head. Darkness descended.

Saturday, August 9

I
ncessant knocking woke up Elizabeth. The clock by her bedside read 12:06 a.m. Someone was at the door to her apartment, and the first thought that came to her mind was the professor’s immigration file. She had been exposed!

Getting out of bed, she tried to think. How had they found out? What mistake had she made that raised a red flag?

The knocking continued. She had to open the door before the neighbors woke up. But what would she say?
Let me call my lawyer. But I am a lawyer!

Elizabeth found her slippers and went to the door.

Professor Silver stumbled inside.

She leaned on the wall, weak with relief. “What happened to you?”

“
Hell
happened to me.” He went to the kitchen and dropped into a chair.

Elizabeth gave him a glass of water. It occurred to her that he was putting on an act to regain her sympathy. “Do you know what time it is?”

He took her hand and kissed it. “
Yâ aini, tfaddal!
”

Elizabeth paused.
My dear, please?
The confident manipulator had turned into a frightened old man, begging for kindness. “For your sake, I hope you’re not playing games with me.” She refilled his glass and sat down. “What happened?”

He glanced at the door as if expecting someone to burst in and gripped his trembling hands together. “It’s a long story, but I had to use a stupid Jew as a conduit to bribe the senator, whom he know from Vietnam. That same idiot had just tried to shoot the Israeli writer in a fit of jealousy, but instead hit a little boy.”

“How badly?”

“Killed him.”

Elizabeth pressed a hand to her mouth.

“The rabbi’s son. Five years old.
Terrible!
” Professor Silver put on his eyeglasses. “If they arrest him, he’ll sing like a bird, and the whole story will come out. Can you imagine the backlash? The Jews will shed crocodile tears about how they were victimized
again
by the Arabs, that we were liars and cheaters, that we peddled fantasy, that our national saga—the Palestinian narrative we’d recited for half a century—was a fable!” He stood up, pounding her kitchen table. “And we’re so close to ending American support for Israel!”

“Our people have survived worse.”

“It’s over. I might as well shoot myself and save our brothers the trouble.”

“Pull yourself together.” Elizabeth knew that this man’s fate was tied to hers. If the professor was arrested and unmasked, his immigration file would be examined. Her forgeries might hold after years in the archive, but an immediate investigation would reveal the fresh paint on her creation. And then? Dismissal, criminal indictment, trial, and jail. Elizabeth grabbed her purse. “Come, Abu Faddah, let’s find your crazy Jew.”

Marti Lefkowitz blew his nose into a handkerchief embroidered with yellow flowers. “I grieve for Al too,” the florist said to Masada. “He’s ill, mentally speaking.”

She watched the police investigators mark up the dais.

“The real Al wouldn’t hurt a fly,” Lefkowitz insisted, his chins shaking. “He’s gone
meshugge
. Now, look at this!”

Masada was numb. When Mahoney shot himself, she had deflected any guilt by focusing her mind on his crookedness of a money-grabbing politician. But now, less than a week later, another bleeding body rested before her, and Masada could muster no strength to deflect the darkest remorse. Raul’s death was her doing, as if her own finger had pulled the trigger. She had missed all the clues pointing to Al. If not for her incompetence, Raul would be alive.

“I’m also worried about Levy,” Lefkowitz kept talking, “fainting like this, then refusing medical attention and running off. At our age one cannot be too careful. I told him, but he left anyway.”

Two officers lifted the small body bag onto a stretcher.

Rabbi Josh walked behind the stretcher as it was wheeled toward the door, where the officers paused to pull open both doors. He began to cry again, calling his son’s name.

Masada fought her tears with self-recrimination. She had lost her focus, allowed feelings to get in the way of her work. Raul’s freckled face came to her, smiling.
Why are you crying?

Outside, cameras flashed at them like lightning strikes. She helped the florist’s weeping wife into their car. Marty Lefkowitz said, “Come stay with us until they catch him.” She shook her head, unable to speak.

Professor Silver directed Elizabeth to his house, and they parked down the street to wait for Al. She asked, “What car does he drive?”

“A white van.” Silver glanced over his shoulder.

They waited. A few cars came and left, but not Al’s van.

“There’s another possibility,” Silver said.

“What?”

“He could be heading to her house.”

“The Israeli writer?”

“It’s possible.”

“To make another attempt on the same night? Is he that stupid?”

Despite the situation, Silver laughed. “Elzirah,
yâ aini
, you don’t understand! Allah gave me the stupidest Jew in history!”

Masada entered her house, which still smelled of the fire. She turned on all the lights. Guilt and anger boiled inside her. She had failed to make the connection, to predict Al’s next crime. Was she failing again? What if Al came here to finish the job? She wasn’t worried about her own safety; she worried about failing to catch him. He could tell her who had really been behind Mahoney’s bribe!

Masada carried a tall stepladder back to her bedroom. She brought over a ten-gallon paint container, which she had bought the day before, planning to spend Saturday painting her scorched walls. The bedroom door was solid oak, eight feet tall, attached to the door frame with three brass hinges. She closed the door, but not completely, leaving a narrow opening, and climbed the ladder, pulling up the paint container rung by rung. She balanced it evenly on top of the door, the side of the container leaning against the wall above the door frame. She slowly let go.

The trap was set, the heavy bucket of paint ready to drop on Al’s head should he dare to invade her home.

When she got into bed, Masada reached for Silver’s book on the nightstand. It wasn’t there. She turned off the reading light and closed her eyes. Immediately she heard Raul trying to startle her, the big smile on his little face.

Are you brave yet?

She saw Rabbi Josh holding the dead boy in his arms, pleading for help.

Curled into a fetal position, Masada sobbed.