The Last Testament (34 page)

The screen went black. David Rosen was crumpled in his chair, stunned by what he had just seen. Maggie was speechless. Uri, however, was furious.

He started pounding at the computer keyboard, trying frantically to find something else on the DVD, some further element they had missed. ‘It can’t finish there! It can’t!’ He was skipping back through the speech they had just watched. He played the last line again. ‘. . . Good luck, Uri.’ Once more, the screen faded THE LAST TESTAMENT

285

to black. Uri put his head in his hands. ‘This is so typical of that bastard,’ he said quietly.

‘What’s typical?’ said Rosen.

‘This. Another fucking dramatic gesture. He has a secret that got his wife killed, that could get his son killed, and does he reveal it? No. He plays fucking games.’

‘But Uri,’ said Maggie, trying to calm things down, ‘wasn’t he trying to tell you where it is? He said we have to start in Geneva.’

‘Oh, don’t listen to any of that crap. Not one word of it makes sense.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I mean it’s bullshit, from beginning to end.’

‘How can you be sure?’

He looked up, his eyes blazing. ‘Well, let’s start with the very first thing he said. You know, “I’ve put it somewhere safe, somewhere only you and my brother could know.” It’s nonsense.’

‘Nonsense? How?’

‘It’s very simple, Maggie.’ He paused to look her in the eye.

‘My father didn’t have a brother.’

Both Maggie and Uri were too fazed by that, too shocked by what they had seen on the DVD and too rapt in conversation to listen closely as they left the offices of David Rosen, Advocate.

If they had, they might have heard the veteran lawyer pick up the telephone, asking to speak urgently to a man both he and the late Shimon Guttman regarded as a comrade, an ideological kindred spirit. ‘Yes, immediately,’ he said into the receiver. ‘I need to speak right away to Akiva Shapira.’

C H A P T E R F O R T Y - O N E

RAFAH REFUGEE CAMP, GAZA, TWO DAYS EARLIER

They were running out of places to meet. The golden rule of an armed underground – never in the same place twice – required an infinite supply of safe houses and Salim Nazzal was fearful theirs was running out. The peace talks in Jerusalem had not been good for business; the Palestinian street was suddenly less sympathetic to those who would put bombs on Israeli buses and in Israeli shopping malls. Give the talks a chance, that had become the favoured position of the man in the café. No one’s saying we can’t go back to armed struggle if – when – the talks fail. But, for a few weeks, let’s see what the negotiators can bring us.

In that climate, there was a limited number of Gazans ready to open their doors to a breakaway from Hamas which, everyone knew, was out to sabotage the talks. The risks were insanely high. If anyone found out who was under your roof, your home could be flattened by an Israeli shell. Or you could be shot dead by the Fatah men who, while officially in coalition with Hamas, had not forgotten the street battles they had fought with the organization not that long ago. Or you could be murdered by your former brothers in Hamas itself, disciplined for daring to THE LAST TESTAMENT

287

rebel against a party line that was said to have the blessing of Allah himself.

So Salim bowed graciously to his host, a man, like himself, in his thirties with the neat, short beard of an Islamist. The house was like all the others here: a basic box made of breeze blocks, its floors covered with thin, threadbare rugs and equipped with a TV set, a cooker and a few mattresses on which an entire family would have to sleep. It wasn’t the tent city that international visitors would often expect from the words ‘refugee camp’. It was more like a shanty town, an urban slum. There were no streets as such, just networks of alleyways that would crisscross into a neighbourhood. This one was called Brazil, after the UN peace-keeping troops from that country who once had barracks here.

Tonight’s meeting was even more clandestine than usual. Salim had crucial, and highly confidential, information to impart. A technician at Jawwal, the Palestinian mobile phone company, had been closing down the account of the late Ahmed Nour when he noticed a last, unplayed message in the dead man’s voicemail box. The box was locked with a PIN code, but that was easy to over-ride. Curious about the Nour killing, he listened to it: a rambling, excitable message in English from a man who seemed to be some kind of Israeli scholar. The technician, a long-standing Hamas supporter with deep misgivings about the movement’s peace strategy, had then made contact with Salim, saying he wanted to pass this knowledge to Palestinian patriots and faithful Muslims.

‘
Masa al-khair
,’ he began.

‘
Masa a-nur
,’ the half dozen men present responded.

‘We are blessed to have heard news which will have a great bearing on our struggle. A Zionist activist and archaeologist claims to have bought, from an Arab in Jerusalem, a tablet expressing the last will and testament of Ibrahim.’ He paused for effect. ‘Ibrahim Khalil’ullah.’
Abraham, Allah’s Friend
. The 288

SAM BOURNE

men’s expressions broke out into a series of sceptical smiles, and there was more than one mocking snort.

‘My reaction too, my brothers. But the indications are – and I beg of you that not a word of this travels beyond this room –

that the document could well be genuine. Doubtless, this man will claim this text supports Zionist claims to Jerusalem.

‘We all know what the Hamas leadership will argue. They will say the tablet was looted from Iraq—’

There was the sound of a gunshot outside. After midnight in Rafah that was not so unusual. But all six men, including Salim, instinctively checked their mobile phones, to see if there were any messages warning of an imminent attack. None. After holding silent for thirty seconds, Salim continued. ‘We know what the leadership will say. Either that this is Zionist theft of Arab heritage, looted almost certainly from Iraq. Or that it is a fake and a forgery that only the Zionist media cannot see through, and so on and so on. We know what they will say because we would say the same.’

The men in the room nodded. Salim was younger than most of them but he was respected. In the second
intifada
he had played an active role in the Izz-ad-Din al-Qassam brigades, Hamas’s military wing. He was a bomb-maker, one of the few who had avoided the crosshairs of the Israeli military’s targeted assassination policy. That gave him a double credibility: he had killed Israelis and he had not got caught.

‘But none of that will matter. The Israeli right will not give up an inch of the Haram al-Sharif if they can point to some text that says Ibrahim gave it to them. The peace talks will be over.’

‘What if the document says the Haram belongs to us?’

‘I have considered that. I think it’s safe to assume that if a Zionist scholar had found such a text in the ground he would have put it straight back there.’

The questioner smiled, nodded and sat back.

THE LAST TESTAMENT

289

‘So the decision we have is like this: some Palestinians will, I am sure, work very hard to prevent this document coming to light. They will think the obvious: that if Ibrahim’s will is known, it will weaken the Palestinian claim on Jerusalem. Such people will kill and be killed to prevent this ancient text ever being revealed. They have probably already started.

‘But there is another view. That if this tablet emerges, and if it gives the Zionists all they want, then they will definitely not agree to the arrangements they have been discussing at Government House. Why would they share Jerusalem when Ibrahim has said it belongs to them, all of it?’

‘They will call off talks immediately,’ chipped in one of Salim’s most reliable lieutenants.

‘They will. And this sham of a peace process will be over. No more talk of recognizing the Zionist entity. No more nonsense about a truce with the enemy. We can return to the legitimate struggle, one the Prophet, peace be upon him, has determined we shall win.’

‘So,’ began another. ‘You’re saying it is in our interest for this will, this testament, to become public?’

‘If we want this betrayal of our people to end, I believe so, yes. But we do not need to decide this yet.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I mean that we can decide what to do with this document once we have it. But only once we have it. We must devote all our energies to finding it and capturing it. This is our holy duty.

Whatever has to be done to get it, must be done. Do I have your agreement?’

The men looked at each other and then, as if in chorus, they replied. ‘God is great.’

C H A P T E R F O R T Y - T W O

JERUSALEM, THURSDAY, 6.23PM

They drove back to the hotel in silence. Uri had turned up the rap music again, so that they could drown out whatever bug was listening, but Maggie couldn’t stand it. She would prefer to say nothing than have her head pounded with noise.

Her head was pounding anyway. She had scribbled down a few notes during the Guttman video-message and she looked at them now.

. . . somewhere safe, somewhere only you and my brother could know.

What sense did that make if Uri’s father had no brother? There was so much to ask. She yearned just to sit still, in a place where they could speak freely, without shouting over noise or looking over each shoulder. If they were being bugged, they were almost certainly being followed.

Once back at the hotel she led Uri straight to the bar. She ordered a Scotch for each of them and all but forced him to down his before ordering another round. Doubles. She found the early evening gloom of the bar soothing.

THE LAST TESTAMENT

291

‘What about this brother then, Uri?’

‘There is no brother.’

‘You sure? Could your grandfather have had an earlier marriage? A secret family he kept hidden?’

Uri looked over his glass, his eyes reflecting the pale amber of the drink. He managed the faintest smile. ‘After everything else, after Ahmed Nour and the last will of Abraham, it wouldn’t surprise me if my father had a secret brother. Nothing would surprise me now.’

‘So it’s possible?’

Uri looked tired. ‘I suppose it’s possible. If you can keep one secret, maybe you can keep many.’

Without thinking, Maggie placed her hand on his. It felt warm.

She let it linger, even after she felt self-conscious, just for a second or two. ‘OK, let’s put the brother thing to one side. We’ll come back to it.’ At the other end of the bar Maggie noticed an orthodox Jewish man munching peanuts and reading the
Jerusalem Post
, as if waiting for someone. She couldn’t remember if he had been there when they arrived. ‘Come,’ she said, suddenly and loudly. ‘I need to sit on a proper chair.’ She eased herself off the stool, beckoning Uri to follow. Once she had found a spot a good distance away from the bar, and directly behind the peanut-muncher, she placed her drink on the table and sat where she would have a clear line of sight. Now if the man wanted to watch them, or read their lips, he would have to turn around and reveal himself. She looked around again, over both shoulders. No one else but them.

She called over a waiter and ordered some food. They waited and then, on impulse really, with no planning, she began to tell Uri what had happened that morning. She kept it brief and fac-tual, working hard to show no self-pity. She spared some of the anatomical details, but still she saw Uri’s face turn from horror to anger.

292

SAM BOURNE

‘The bastards—’ he began, rising to his feet.

‘Uri! Sit down.’ She grabbed at his arm and tugged him back into his seat. ‘Listen, I’m angry too. But the only way we’re going to find these people is if we keep calm. Lash out now and they win.’ He paused, looking at her. ‘The people who killed your mother will win.’

Slowly he came back to his seat, just as the waiter brought over two plates of sandwiches. Maggie was glad of the diversion.

‘Look,’ she began, once she was sure Uri would not bolt again.

‘You know what I can’t work out? Why they follow us, but don’t strike. Why they don’t just take us out. They’re killing everyone else.’

Uri chewed for a while, as if trying to swallow his rage.

Eventually he spoke, making a clear effort to sound lighter than he felt. ‘Speaking as an ex-intelligence officer of the Israel Defence Forces, I’d say when you follow like this, but don’t strike, it can mean one of two things.’

‘OK.’

‘Either the target is too risky to take out. That would be you.

If these are Palestinians who are following us, the last thing they need is to kill an American official. Especially a beautiful, female one.’

Maggie looked downward, unsure how to react. Middle-aged diplomats often flattered her and she would reply with some eyelash-fluttering false modesty. But she couldn’t deploy that kind of manoeuvre now, one on one with Uri. Not least because this compliment, unlike the others, meant something to her.

‘Imagine how the American public would react if your face was shown for twenty-four hours on cable news, how they would feel about the evil Arabs who had killed you.’

‘All right, I get the picture.’ Maggie was still enough of a convent girl to feel superstitious about tempting fate. ‘The same would be true of the Israelis.’

THE LAST TESTAMENT

293

‘Even worse for them in a way,’ said Uri, slowly loosening up, helped along by the Scotch. ‘Spying on the Americans is bad enough and we’ve done that a couple of times. But killing them?

Not a good idea. Are you still an Irish citizen too?’

‘Yep. Never gave it up.’

‘Big fight with the Europeans too, then. If they killed you.’

‘What’s the other possibility? You said there were two.’

‘Oh, the other time you stalk but don’t strike is when you want the subject alive. To lead you somewhere.’

Maggie took a swig of the drink, letting an ice cube slip between her lips. She let it roll around her mouth, enjoying its chill on her tongue. So they wanted her to pursue this Guttman trail, whoever ‘they’ were. They would keep away for as long as she was useful. ‘But the people who attacked me today told me to back off, to stay away.’