Cafe Nevo (23 page)

She saw her mother's face again, heard the bitter words, “You got what you wanted.” It was true: she had been determined enough and unscrupulous enough at twenty-one to discard her family to attain it. Even now, she could not regret it.

Not for anything would she go back to that tiny, airless apartment; designed, as David would say, by men of little soul for men of little soul, to that press and stink of bodies, the snatched privacy, and the constant noise.

Longing, suddenly, to be safe in her apartment; cocooned in luxury and alone, Ilana decided to find the nearest cab stand and taxi back to Tel Aviv. But as she reached the door leading to the stairwell, it opened, and her father stepped out onto the roof.

He blinked in the strong sunlight; squinting at Ilana, who backed away warily.

“Your mother called me,” he said. “The neighbors told me you came up here.”

“I was just leaving,” she said.

“Yes,” he said. “But come for a walk with me first.”

He led her to a forest on the outskirts of the village, behind the housing project. When Ilana had played there with her brothers, it was a child-sized forest with trees no higher than a grown-up's head. Now the trees were tall enough and the foliage broad enough to block out the sun. A cool breeze shifted through the trees, and in the shade the temperature dropped ten degrees. By mutual accord they paused to rest just inside the wood, leaning against two trees some feet apart. Staring at the ground, her father said, “Your mother tells me you are with child.”

“Yes.”

“Is the father Jewish?”

“Yes.”

“Are you going to marry him?”

“No.”

“Are you going to have the baby?”

She paused. “I want to.”

“And keep it?”

“If I have it, of course I'll keep it.”

Her father nodded and said, “That is right.” Ilana lifted up her head and gazed at him, remembering him as he had been: a stern man, not given to laughter, fair and judicious with his children. She had feared him in those days, feared his untold stories, which must have been too terrible to tell—for if not, why not tell them?—and his temper, which, though well controlled, was fierce. He believed in respect and discipline, and would strap his boys (though not Ilana) for serious infringements. The worst offense of all, for which corporal punishment was mandatory, was rudeness toward their mother. The children learned very young that nothing but absolute respect toward Katya would be tolerated; they were taught to rise when she entered a room and to address her as “ma'am.”

She felt none of that fear now. Perhaps all those years of sinning had produced some wisdom after all, or at least an area of clear vision, for now his emotions seemed as legible as any other man's, though his purpose was firmer. She saw that he felt love as well as anger for her, that he was torn in his feelings but not in his determination. She read fatigue in the postman's slump of his shoulders, as if he'd been carrying that bag for too long now ever to straighten up. For no particular reason she remembered the time her brother Hezi brought home a stray. Katya, always indulgent toward the boys, shook her head doubtfully and said, “Ask your father.” When Yitzhak came home, all five children were lined up at the door to greet him. He looked pleased, then suspicious; his eyes traveled over the ascending line of his children's heads to meet his wife's. Katya shrugged and nodded toward the kitchen. When Yitzhak saw the rangy yellow Bedouin mutt; a half-breed Canaani, his brows came together fiercely. “Can we keep him?” the children chorused hopefully.

“Keep a dog?” he thundered without raising his voice. “Keep a dog, feed a
dog
, when Jews are starving?”

The children fell back, but need not have bothered; Yitzhak had eyes only for his wife. “Feed a dog?” he asked, reproachfully.

He ordered the children to find another home for it or else give it to the pound the next day. The dog was allowed to stay the night, but Yitzhak absolutely forbade them to feed it. “If you feed it,” he said, “it always comes back.”

Sadly, the children went to bed, where they fell asleep to the plaintive lullaby of the dog. Very late at night, Ilana awoke to silence. She slipped out of bed and crept past her parents' bed, through the living room, and into the kitchen. Her father stood beside the icebox, watching as the dog lapped up a saucer of milk. He looked up and said sharply, “What are you doing out of bed?”

“I woke up,” she whispered. She expected to be sent summarily back to bed, but instead, her father fixed her with a brooding stare, then shook his head and said in a voice that was neither apology nor explanation, but trembled with passion, “I
hate
hunger. Even in a dog.”

Now her father shook his head to rid himself of her gaze. “You shouldn't have come here,” he said. “You had no right to upset her like that.”

“It was a mistake. Quite useless. I see that now.”

“Worse than useless. Wrong.”

“Wrong” was a word seldom heard in her walk of life. In her father's mouth it clamored like an old church bell.

“She
was wrong,” Ilana said, her voice strident. “
She
was cruel.”

The forest was very still. Yitzhak clenched his fists but did not raise them from his side. “Cruel?” he said. “She is charity itself.”

“But I came to beg for forgiveness and reconciliation. What charity is it to turn away the prodigal daughter with a curse?”

“You don't understand how she suffered—”

Ilana clicked her tongue impatiently. “Was there ever a day in my life when I didn't know she suffered? And I
do
understand. She suffered, you suffered, everyone suffered—but not everyone lost their humanity. I know you think I'm a terrible sinner, Papa, but at least I'm human, I have feelings!
She
has none for me. She never had.”

“She had feelings,” Yitzhak said. “You just never understood them.”

“She hates me.”

“Did you say that to her?”

Unwillingly, she answered, “More or less.”

“And she said... nothing?”

“What could she say? It's true.”

“Her charity lies in silence. Even as you rub salt in her wounds, she protects you.”

“From what?”

“From the truth.” He added with a terrible coldness: “But now you will hear it.”

“No.” She stepped back. “I've heard enough.”

“You must.” He came closer, until face to face she could smell his sorrowful breath. “You deserve to know.”

“Let me go. Let's forget I ever came back.”

Closer still, he murmured: “How do you think she survived the camp? Didn't you ever ask yourself? She wasn't strong; she had no skills they needed. All she had was a pretty face, as pretty as yours, and a youthful body. How do you think she survived?”

“I don't know.”

“You must have wondered.”

“No, no,” and she pushed him away and stumbled into the forest. As she ran, half blind with tears, she heard his flatfooted, shuffling run crashing through the undergrowth, his harsh breath coming closer. In a short time he passed her and then turned, thrusting himself before her so that she must either stop or crash into him. She stopped. He crossed his arms over his chest and did not touch her.

Lowering her head, she wept. “I'm sorry I came here.”

Her father's voice was not without kindness. “You can't undo the things you've done, any more than we can undo the things that were done to us. You made your bed, and now you have to lie in it.” He reached out as if to touch her, but his hand fell short. He straightened his back and said, “I brought you here for a purpose. Come.”

Powerless to refuse him, she followed. As they walked deeper into the wood, she felt herself diminishing in size and age until she was a little girl again, trailing in Papa's foot-steps. She remembered other expeditions to the woods and knew suddenly and with absolute certainty where he was taking her now. Her legs quivered, and she halted.

Yitzhak looked back sternly. “Come.”

They emerged into a small copse lit by the filtered rays of the setting sun. In the center of the clearing was a circle of young pines, surrounding a twisted, hardy oak. Her father stepped into the circle and laid his old hands on the bark of the oak. “This was your mother and I.” Touching each young pine in turn, he said, “These were planted upon the birth of each of our children. Yehezkel. Joshua. Avram. Eliezer.” Then he pointed to a gap in the circle where stood the stump of a tree that must have been cut down young, for it was very slender, overgrown with moss and wildflowers.

“That,” he said, “was my only daughter.”

Ilana felt pieces of herself break off and disappear, like fragments of an ice floe swept away by an Arctic sea. Her legs could no longer support her body. Dropping to her knees beside the poor aborted stump, she laid her cheek against its blanket of moss. She felt a sense of mourning, of irreparable loss, as if her own child lay buried in this place. For a time she could see nothing but deep inner darkness, illuminated by intermittent flashes of lightning. Though frightened, she knew that she was not alone; a second heart beat inside her, shoring up her own. When she returned to herself, her father's hand was stroking her head.

 

 

 

Chapter Fourteen

 

Four men pulled stockings over their faces and gloves onto their hands. While one hunkered down in the garden beside the house, the others slipped the lock and went inside. Moving silently over the carpeted floor, they checked the house to make sure they were alone (the children were away at camp). Upstairs they walked through the open door of the darkened master bedroom and took up their positions: Yaki by the door, Coby beside the wife's bed, and Arik next to Pincas Gordon. Arik drew a snub-nosed revolver from his pocket and with a shrill and wordless shriek leapt onto Gordon's bed, landing with his knees in the small of the sleeping man's back. At the same time Coby dove onto the wife, pinning her to the mattress.

Pincas Gordon started awake, breathless and with a crushing pain in his back, certain he was experiencing a heart attack until he felt the cold metal kiss of the revolver barrel pressed to his temple and heard his wife cry out. Twisting his head back, he caught a glimpse of Arik's masked face; then his head was slammed back onto the pillow, his neck pressed down with what felt like an iron bar but proved to be a forearm.

“What do you want?” he gasped.

These words, that tone of abject terror, were shamefully familiar to Arik. Slipping into his army persona as easily as into battle fatigues, he barked, “Get up!”

Gordon stiffened to attention but did not rise; he caught his breath and held it. “Hey, man,” Coby called softly. Suddenly Arik realized that he'd spoken in Arabic. Angrily, he repeated the command in Hebrew.

The fat man sagged in relief. “D'you mind if I get dressed?”

“Get your ass out of bed before I cripple you.” Without waiting (for in Lebanon the drill had been to carry out the first threat simultaneously with its utterance, so that the subject would not think of doubting the second), Arik jump-kicked the fat man in the side, sending him crashing to the floor.

Gordon used a sturdy oak night table to lever himself up to his knees, then climbed shakily to his feet. He wore a pair of stained blue boxer shorts, overhung by his gross belly. In a voice higher than usual he asked, “What do you want?”

“Open the safe.” As Gordon shook his head, Arik pointed a finger at his forehead. “There are two possibilities. The first is that you do it now, quietly, with no trouble. We take what we came for and get out.”

“But there
is
no safe in the house. Only in my office.” Gordon glanced sideways at his wife.

“The second,” Arik continued as if he had not heard, “is that you tell me there is no safe. I don't think your wife would enjoy the consequences—but you never know.”

The woman sat up in bed, clutching the sheet to her chest. “It's over there,” she said. “Behind the mirror. Open it, take the money and go!”

“You stupid bitch!”

“Maniac! It's only money.”

Yaki was already at the mirror, lifting the heavy oak frame from its moorings. Behind it a steel safe with a combination lock was set into the wall. Arik asked the woman for the combination.

“I don't know it,” she said.

Coby grabbed an inch of flesh on her upper arm and squeezed. “Then how are we supposed to open it,
darling?”

“Stop that!” she squealed. “Break into it; you're thieves.”

“Open it,” Arik told Gordon.

Gordon spat in his face.

It was the second time in Arik's life and the second time that day. That morning he'd attended the funeral of a young soldier from his unit, killed by a sniper's bullet in Lebanon. Half the unit had been given leave to attend the funeral; after services, a few of his men, as he still thought of them, came up to shake hands with their former commander. The rest turned their backs. At the grave site ululating women kept up a high keening. When Arik approached the dead boy's father, the old man spat on his shoes. “Deserter!” he shouted. “Where were you?” Arik walked away, crying.