The Missing File (12 page)

“I left home at five a.m. I was up already at four fifteen. Hannah also got up and we had coffee together. I then drove to Ashdod and left the car at the port, as always. As far as Hannah told me, Wednesday morning was a regular one too, no different from any other day.”

But on the morning of that Wednesday, Ofer had left for school and didn't get there, and hadn't been seen since. The father hadn't gone into the boys' room before he left. Nevertheless, he was certain they were both sleeping at the time. He hadn't heard any sound coming from their room.

Avraham tried to remember if he had asked all he wanted to. “While you were out Tuesday evening, could Ofer have taken any money or a credit card from somewhere in the house without you noticing?” he asked. “Maybe from a drawer in which you hide some cash?”

“I don't hide any,” the father replied. “There's always some cash in the inner pocket of a jacket in my closet, and Ofer knows where it is. When I'm away, he and Hannah take money from there. He doesn't have a credit card. And he didn't take anything. It was one of the first things I asked Hannah to check.”

Avraham remembered she had told him.

“And you haven't noticed anything missing from the apartment since your return, right? Something he may have taken with him?”

The pages in front of him were filling up with his handwritten notes—diagonal lines of text in blue ink. This time, however, his fingers were clean. He said, “Is there anything you'd like to tell me that I haven't asked about?” and the father shook his head to say no.

He hadn't dared to with the mother, but he felt that Rafael Sharabi was up to it, and so he said, “Tell me, what's your gut feeling? Where do you think Ofer might be? What could have happened to him? Try to imagine where he might be right now.”

The father's response was unexpected. “I have no idea,” he said. “I'm angry with him. Do you have any idea what I'd give to know? I told Hannah I thought he decided to run away for a few days. Just to scare us. Maybe we did something to him, hurt him in some way. But I am also angry about what he is putting us through, Hannah in particular. She doesn't believe me. She thinks something has happened to him.”

Avraham hadn't expected the father to speak of anger. Maybe it was his way to avoid contemplating the worst, a way to imagine seeing his son again and talking to him as before. Had this anger ever turned into violence? he wondered. Had he ever hit Ofer? Avraham's eyes were once again drawn to the father's large hands.

“How is your wife doing?” he asked, and Rafael Sharabi said, “She has dreams, nightmares. And she had to cope alone until yesterday. She's barely sleeping.”

I
lana had been briefed about Shrapstein's “interesting direction” and thought it was a good idea to bring the suspect in for questioning.

“What suspect? Who thinks he's a suspect?” Avraham tried to remain calm.

“We do,” she replied. “Bring him in. Let's rule out any possibility we can.”

Neither his conversation with Rafael Sharabi nor the picture that was emerging made any impression on her. She was more taken by Shrapstein's arbitrary shift in action. Avraham knocked on his door, but there was no answer. He then called him on his cell phone and asked if he could return to the station to handle the Ze'ev Avni interview for him. Shrapstein refused. His inquiries were progressing and he had received important information from the parole officer about the suspect who lived in the neighborhood. Apparently he hadn't been in touch with her the previous week, contrary to what was required of him.

Avraham had no choice but to wait in his office for Ze'ev Avni.

Perhaps Ilana was right. Despite the open talk he had with the father and the filling-in of some details, he still didn't have a clear notion of the nature of the relationship between Rafael Sharabi and his son—aside from the absences. When he had asked him if he knew who Ofer's friends were, the father had shrugged his shoulders and replied, “I don't think he has many friends. Don't know.” Apart from pointing out the fact that Ofer had taught him how to use the Internet, there was nothing in his words that spoke of closeness, only of responsibility and duties and mutual assistance. The mother looked after the daughter, and the father, when he was home, helped with the younger son, taking him to kindergarten in the morning and bathing him in the evening. But what about Ofer?

Avraham stared at the walls of his office, with neither a window nor a picture, and thought about Igor Kintiev, who was waiting in a detention cell for his indictment. Suddenly he wanted so much to fly to Brussels. A plane took off from Ben-Gurion Airport and turned westward, flying over the sea, where tiny cargo ships sailed.

Only a few more days—unless something unexpected happened, and unless he canceled the trip at the last minute. What was he going to do for a week in the company of Jean-Marc Karot?

The crazy Belgian police officer who would be hosting him in Brussels had stepped out into the arrivals hall at Ben-Gurion Airport dressed in a black suit and tie. He looked thirty years old, maybe a little younger. He was as tall as a basketball player and as elegant as a movie star. And Avraham stood there like an idiot, carrying a sign that read “Jean-Marc Karot” and dressed in a formal police uniform. It was back in late March, in the afternoon, and the weather was mild.

“Excellent! So let's drop off my suitcases and go out and find some hookers” were the first words out of the Belgian's mouth after Avraham had told him that he would take him to his hotel in Tel Aviv and that the exchange program didn't start until the next day. Avraham was sure he was joking. He subsequently learned that that was the entirety of what Jean-Marc Karot planned to do in Israel. He was married and had two children. Advanced training courses and police exchange programs were of zero interest to him, and he even hinted to his host that he was welcome to join him in a threesome.

Avraham remembered he hadn't checked to see if his passport was still valid. If it had expired, he'd have to cancel the trip.

There was a knock at the door.

8

I
t was his
first time inside a police station.

He had of course seen the precinct house from the
outside a number of times; to him, the gray building—short and flat topped,
compressed, as if someone had squashed it—had always represented everything ugly
about Holon. From afar, it looked like a handful of trailers that had been
joined together in a sandy wasteland. Not an ounce of splendor—a building
typical of a city whose inhabitants expect nothing from life other than basic
survival. Perhaps because he had never lived among them, Michael Rosen had
described them as simple people who led simple lives, Ze'ev thought.

A few years ago, Ze'ev had almost gone to the Tel
Aviv central station to file a complaint about a bicycle that had been stolen
from a shed in the yard, but was persuaded that the cops wouldn't do anything
about it. This time he had been called in. He opened the glass door. To his
left, behind a counter, stood a uniformed policewoman. She was eating a rice
cracker. The place looked more dingy and grimy than a branch of the Unemployment
Services.

He was tense but felt no fear. Had he been called
into the police the morning of the day before, he wouldn't have been able to
handle it. The time that had since passed had left him stronger. The fear had
disappeared by the evening, after the writing workshop and the conversation with
Michael Rosen. He had felt liberated enough to write.

“I've been called in for a meeting at five with
Inspector Avraham,” Ze'ev said to the policewoman behind the counter. “Can you
tell me where his office is?” and the policewoman asked, “Is he expecting you?”
as if his first remark hadn't implied exactly that.

T
he
police had a single advantage over him: he wasn't aware of exactly what they
knew. He was almost certain they knew nothing about the phone call, despite his
slip of the tongue on the dunes. Had they known, they would have picked him up
immediately. They certainly didn't know about the letter. When he left for the
station, the letter was still in the Sharabi family mailbox—despite having been
there for more than half the day already, plus the fact that Ofer's father had
passed by the mailbox at least twice—the night before, when, standing at the
balcony window, Ze'ev had seen him returning home; and in the morning too,
because they had met by chance in the stairwell.

There had been something ironic about their
encounter. They had gone down the stairs together and had spoken about the
searches for Ofer, and because their conversation had gone on until they were
outside the building, Ofer's father hadn't had a chance to notice the envelope.
When Ze'ev returned later from school in the afternoon, the letter was still
there.
I could simply take it out
, flashed through
his mind.

Inspector Avraham was waiting for him in a small,
dimly lit room in which there was little space for anything other than the desk
and the pair of chairs on either side of it. Avraham was in uniform, and didn't
get up to shake his hand.

“Is this an interrogation room?” Ze'ev asked as he
sat down, and Avraham said, “It's my office.”

Ze'ev's advantage was that he had spent the past
few days thinking endlessly about the police. He had been observing them at work
since Thursday, first from the window of his living room balcony, and then at
the search site. He had been preparing for the meeting with Avraham ever since
his promise to return to their apartment. He had thought about Inspector Avraham
far more than Inspector Avraham had thought about him—of that he was absolutely
certain. He handed over his ID card, at Avraham's request, and reminded him that
the address had yet to be updated. “But I'm sure you remember the correct
address,” he said and smiled, not entirely sure that the police inspector had
understood the remark.

This was their fourth encounter. The first was on
Thursday, at the apartment. Avraham had chosen to ignore him and had spoken to
Michal in the kitchen. A rank-and-file policewoman was sent to deal with him. He
and the inspector had exchanged a few words at the door. On Friday, they had
ignored each other on the stairs. And they had met on Saturday too, at the
search site, where Avraham was in charge. During all their previous meetings,
Ze'ev had tried to attract Avraham's attention, without much success. This time,
things were different, although the initial questions he faced were formal and
dry, and Avraham did appear somewhat switched off. He was asked how long he and
his wife had been living in the building, but wasn't asked where they had lived
before then. He was asked about his job and its location, but Avraham stopped
him in midsentence.

“What was the nature of your relationship with the
missing boy?” Avraham asked, and Ze'ev said, “I was his private tutor. That's
why I'm here, right?”

“You're here because you asked to be here,” Avraham
said. “You said you had information for us regarding the investigation. I'm all
ears.”

Michal's text message, which had come through
during the break between the second and third classes, had alarmed him for a
moment. She had told him that Inspector Avraham from the police was looking for
him and wanted to arrange a meeting. She had sent him a number to call. He
called during the next break but Avraham wasn't available. When he tried again
later that afternoon, from outside the schoolyard, Avraham invited him to the
station for what he termed “further questioning.” Now he was being told outright
that he had been called in only because he had asked to be. There appeared to be
no reason for any uneasiness regarding his slip of the tongue at the search
site—unless it was all an interrogation ploy.

“Not exactly information,” Ze'ev said. “I simply
wanted to tell you a little about Ofer, to give you a better picture of who he
is. Maybe it will help your investigation. I'm sure you've spoken to his
teachers at school, but I had a very special insight into Ofer's life. I tutored
him privately, in his room, and I am also familiar with the entire context, his
parents, the home environment. That's a big advantage—in my opinion, at
least.”

Avraham asked how he had come to be Ofer's tutor,
and he duly described the circumstances, all the while getting the impression
that his words were sparking some interest in the policeman. At this stage in
their conversation, he was still unable to read and correctly interpret the
facial expressions of the inspector, who glanced from time to time at the modest
digital watch on his right wrist. Ze'ev wanted to ask him why his parents had
named him Avraham; after all, they must have known that his double-barreled name
was likely to attract a degree of ridicule—particularly at a young age, from
among the other children. He would have gladly asked him, too, about his
decision to become a policeman and what he had studied at university. Had he
always known that this was what he wanted to do?

O
fer's
parents had learned that Ze'ev was an English teacher at a Tel Aviv high school.
His wife had probably told them. Ofer's mother had knocked on the door to their
apartment one evening, without Ofer, and had asked Ze'ev if he'd be willing to
tutor him. It was a few weeks into the school year—still September, probably.
The students in Ofer's class had been divided into groups based on their
competency in English, and Ofer had been placed in the bottom group. His parents
wanted him to aim higher. His mother, Hannah, appeared particularly concerned
with the matter. He hadn't been sure about it. He had no experience in private
tutoring. He had consented in the end because they were neighbors, but primarily
because he had been drawn to Ofer's shyness. He had of course seen him in and
around the building. He had offered to begin and see how things went.

“Lessons in return for payment?” Avraham asked, and
Ze'ev said, “Certainly, although I know I didn't do it for the money. I asked
for ninety shekels per hour, a lot less than the going rate. Put it this way,
the lessons didn't make me a wealthy man. I did it for Ofer.”

Avraham remained silent, perhaps waiting for Ze'ev
to elaborate. “Everything's been reported to the Tax Authority,” he added and
smiled.

“How many times a week did you tutor him?”

“Once a week—and sometimes twice before exams. In
the beginning, we worked on grammar. They put an emphasis on grammar at his
school—which is obviously wrongheaded. That's not the way to teach children a
language, and that's not the way I teach students at my school, in Tel Aviv. But
Ofer was a fast learner. He was very organized and systematic in his studies and
progressed well, so we could move on to other things—vocabulary, conversational
English, reading and writing. Those are the important things, as far as I'm
concerned, and he struggled more with them. Would you like me to try to explain
to you why I was drawn to Ofer?”

“Yes. Please,” Avraham replied. “But just remind me
first: I believe you told the policewoman who interviewed you that the lessons
took place at their home, in his room, right?”

The question puzzled Ze'ev. “Yes, I just told you,
a minute or two ago,” he said.

Avraham looked down at the sheets of paper strewn
across the desk in front of him. “True, true, you did,” he said. “Go on.”

It was the moment Ze'ev had been waiting for, the
moment to begin his statement. He was ready with its prepared and polished
opening lines. They had coalesced in his mind already on Friday, when he thought
that his talk with Avraham would take place on Saturday, at the site of the
search he had initiated, almost solely for his own purposes. Ahead of their
current meeting at the station, he had repeated them to himself.

“I've been teaching students of Ofer's
age—eleventh- and twelfth-graders—at Ironi High School in Tel Aviv for five
years,” Ze'ev began. “I don't know if you're familiar with this school; many of
its students were born with silver spoons in their mouths—children of actors and
singers and playwrights and journalists. It's right in the center of Tel Aviv,
next to the Cinematheque, if you know where that is. The school offers studies
in film, theater, and dance, and most of these kids, not all of them, are kids
who are sure that the world belongs to them. They know English—and not only
English—far better than their teachers, or so they think. At fourteen they are
already movie directors. Little Spielbergs. Some are poets and writers; they
form rock bands and work on albums. They derive their confidence not from
themselves but from their environment, from their parents, from society, which
tells them they can do anything and everything, that they excel at everything.
I'm not saying it's a bad thing, although it may sound like it. I'm simply
stating the facts. Ofer comes from a different place and was a different child.
Do you understand what I'm trying to say? Just to look at him for a second was
enough to tell you that this was a boy who didn't believe in himself, who felt
he was worthless. But he was sensitive; he had the vulnerable soul of an
artist.”

Avraham was becoming more and more drawn in by his
words—just as he knew he would be.

“What do you mean by ‘vulnerable'?” the police
inspector asked, and Ze'ev continued: “Every word I said to him had an immediate
effect on him from within,” he said. “If I had a good word for him, praised him
for something he wrote or a grammar exercise he solved correctly, he would glow
from within. He didn't show much on the outside. And the opposite too: if he
made a mistake, or if I criticized something he wrote or said, he'd be
devastated inside. I have to stress that it wasn't anger toward me or an
inability to take criticism that would do it. He'd break down inside, purely out
of anger at himself. It was like every simple mistake had the potential to
overwhelm him with a deep sense of failure and incompetence. And you must
understand, it has nothing to do with his true capabilities. It stems from the
place he comes from. I like to call it the ‘social place.' ”

Avraham listened without making notes—a sign, as
Ze'ev knew from experience, that he had finally captured his interest. When
students put down their pens and lift their heads from their notebooks, you know
they're listening. “Aren't all kids like that?” he asked, and Ze'ev had a broad
smile on his face when he said, “You don't have children, do you?”

Avraham shook his head to confirm.

He took a liking to the police inspector the moment
he saw him from the balcony window, on Thursday afternoon, restlessly scurrying
around the building. And Ze'ev knew he'd be able to capture his attention even
when Avraham had initially ignored him. In the movies they say, “They could have
been good friends had they met under different circumstances.” In their case,
however, it was the opposite. Had they met under different circumstances, Ze'ev
probably wouldn't have taken any interest in Avraham at all. They were unlikely
to have much to talk about. The current circumstances alone had brought them
together and were allowing them to speak like this to each other.

“Not all children,” Ze'ev said. “It's because of
misconceptions like that that I believe policemen—and not only policemen,
teachers too, by the way—should be trained in psychology. With most of the
children at the school where I teach, compliments are taken for granted—because
they're so sure they're the best. Criticize them, and they simply think that
you, and not they, are mistaken. To them, it's crystal clear that you're wrong.
They just never make mistakes.”