Dazzle The Complete Unabridged Trilogy (111 page)

'If you like, I will arrange for you to have a tour of the
kibbutz and all its facilities.'

'I would like that.'

'Unfortunately, I must be gone for most of the day tomor
row, but I know that Dani will be happy to show you around.'

'D-Dani ben Yaacov?' She could not keep the fluster out of
her voice.

'Yes. Do you not like him? He is very bright. Also he is
fearless and inventive. I depend on him for many things. You
might say he is my right-hand man. Believe me, you could not
be in better hands. You can trust him with your life.'

Yes, she thought soberly, but can I trust him with my
emotions?

Chapter 26

Tamara slept well that night. She awoke early the next morning refreshed and filled with a sense of well-being. Her father
had left already, but he'd thoughtfully left a bowl full of cool,
sparkling clear water for her to wash with.

She dressed casually and ate a particularly hearty breakfast in the dining hall. Her appetite had returned with a vengeance,
and she had to force herself to curb it. She nursed two cups of
unsweetened black coffee while she waited for Dani.

When he arrived, he was all business. She was both relieved
and annoyed to discover that she had no reason to fear his
intentions. He was so well-prepared, had so many facts and
figures at his fingertips, and deported himself in such a professional manner that she guessed he was an old hand at this.

They started the tour in the very centre of the settlement
and worked their way outward. Ein Shmona, she came to
discover, did not have to rely on outside sources for anything
other than the water which flowed in four thick pipes from its
source somewhere in the nearby mountains. The place was a
city in microcosm. Dani showed her the infirmary, the general
store, the school, the electric generating plant, and even
several private homes. When she balked at entering a house whose residents were out working, he laughed. 'We have no
crime here,' he told her, 'and front doors are always unlocked.
We have no need for locks and keys. I hope it will always stay
that way.'

Tamara turned to Dani. 'Do you think there will ever be a
Jewish State? I know my father hopes so, but . . .'

'It will happen.' He spoke with confidence and his eyes
flashed with fervour. 'In the words of Theodor Herzl, "If you
wish, it will not be only a dream." I believe that in my heart,
and so do many others.'

'You sound so confident.'

'You should hear David Ben-Gurion on the subject! He is
worse than your father and me combined!' Abruptly he changed the subject. 'Would you like to have a look at our
plan for the future?'

'I'd love to!'

He took her to the temple. In the back of it was what had
originally been intended as a large storeroom. 'We're running
out of space,' Dani explained apologetically as he turned on the overhead light, 'so we use this as our planning office.'

She expected to see rough plans marked on paper; blue
prints at the most. What greeted her eyes was a ten-by-twelve-
foot table that took up most of the room. Artfully recreated on its top was a detailed papier-mâché relief map of the
immediate area, including the nearby mountains. It was a
colourful scale model of a town, each building faithfully repro
duced in miniature, like some extremely lucky boy's layout
for his electric trains. What amazed her was the size and scope
of the community in front of her. It comprised some five or
six hundred buildings, some of which looked like four-storey
apartment blocks with little balconies. And whereas the centre
of the town was still laid out circularly, as it was now, the
future plan was to spread out around it in a grid, so that the
perimeter of the town was in an L, belted by a four-lane road.
It was all there in miniature: parking lots, residential areas,
an industrial hub, a swimming pool, a park, even a distant
small airfield.

'
This?' she whispered. 'You want to
...
to create
this?'
She
turned to him. 'Here?'

He looked at her levelly. 'Why not?'

'It's . . . it's just . . .' She gestured agitatedly. 'I mean, it's
just so
big.
So . . . ambitious!'

'And why should it not be? If we continue to grow at the rate we have been, even what you see before you will be too
small in twenty years' time. In the last five years alone, our
population has more than tripled.'

'Will it be self-sustaining? Agriculturally? Even that big?'

He nodded. 'The fields will be pushed outward, to surround it all. At the moment, we have three thousand acres of flatland
to work with, purchased through the Jewish Foundation Fund
and the National Fund. We use only twenty-two of them now.
We have been trying to negotiate the purchase of more, but
the Arabs no longer want to sell us more land. In the begin
ning, it was easy to buy large acreage cheaply. As a rule, the Arabs have traditionally preferred hilltop villages or, like al-
Najaf nearby, an oasis. They were eager to sell plains,
swamps, and especially desert land to Jews, since no one else
was interested. Then, after the swamps were drained, the
plains planted and tended to, and the desert irrigated, the

Arabs began to become jealous, yes?' He paused and shook
his head mournfully. 'I fear it has made for much animosity.'

She remembered the cache of weapons hidden in her
father's house. 'Is there much violence?'

He flapped his hand back and forth. 'It comes and goes in
waves, but the potential is always there. We must never forget
that. In a moment of weakness, we could all easily be annihil
ated.'

It was a sobering thought.

'Now,' he said, leading her to the door, 'I want you to see
the general store . . .'

He turned off the light and they left the way they had come
in, through the synagogue.

Her initial thrill and delight were rapidly turning to fear. It
seemed so peaceful here, so quiet. But underneath it all was
the ever-present threat of violence. Yet despite it, the people
who lived here did so by choice. She didn't think she could,
not if she had to be ever-alert to the signs of danger. Not if
she had to look constantly over her shoulder.

The tour took up the better part of the morning and over
lapped into the afternoon. Dani saved the fields and irrigation
system for last. Before they headed out there, he stopped off
at the single men's dormitory to get his rifle.

Wordlessly Tamara watched him sling it over his shoulder
in the kind of casual manner that told of his having done it
many hundreds of times before. As they walked through the
fields, Dani pointed out the armed sentries keeping guard
while the kibbutzim toiled. Tamara was more than a little
disconcerted to find that every fieldhand had not only farming
tools at hand but also a loaded rifle within easy reach.

She struggled to keep up with Dani's pace. He was fit and
used to the heat, but she was beginning to tire. Small as the
kibbutz was, the sun was overwhelming and she felt hot,
wilted. Her feet hurt and her shoes pinched; sturdy as they
were, they hadn't been made for walking in such rugged ter
rain, and she'd been on her feet for hours. Her head was spinning from all the information Dani threw at her.

She was relieved when the tour was finally over and they
headed back to the dim coolness of her father's house.
Schmarya had not yet returned, and this time Dani came
inside. They sat facing each other across the round parlour
table. He'd pushed the menorah off to one side so they could
look at each other without obstruction, and poured two glasses
of wine. Tamara was so parched that she had to gulp two full
glasses of water before taking cautious sips of the wine.

Even so, because of her sudden tiredness, it went straight
to her head.

Dani's deceptively lazy eyes studied her openly from across
the table. She felt a stirring of fear. They were too intent for her comfort, those eyes. Their tawniness seemed both to leap
out at her and to stretch back into endless smouldering depths.
There was something unsettling about them, as if they could
see into places her eyes could not.

He caught her look. 'Is something the matter?'

She shook her head and quickly lowered her eyes as though
the wineglass she cupped in her hands was worthy of study.

'You are beautiful,' he said softly, startling her. 'Even more
beautiful than on film.'

She felt a rush of emotion and looked up. 'You saw some
of my films?' Quickly she raised her glass and drained it, hop
ing the wine would clear away her awkwardness.

'I have seen one.
Anna Karenina,
at the cinema in Jerusa
lem. I enjoyed it very much. I never liked Tolstoy until then.'
He smiled.

She returned the smile, feeling silly at how important his
approval suddenly was to her.

He picked up the wine bottle and refilled her glass without
once taking his eyes off her. 'Are you still planning to return
to Tel Aviv on Friday?'

She nodded. 'That's when I told Inge I would be back. If I
don't show up, she'll worry herself sick.'

'Why do you not invite her to come here?'

She looked startled. 'Can I?'

'Of course.'

'But . . . Brigadier Diggins. He's been having his men follow us. Surely sooner or later he's bound to find both of us
here.'

Dani suddenly laughed. 'Your father is an old fox. He has
outwitted the brigadier for years. What makes you think the
brigadier can catch him now?'