“Yes,” Michael said. “The kind of bruises you get when someone places two hands around your neck and presses hard. Both hands, both sides.”
Zadik opened his mouth, then closed it right away. He opened and closed it once again. In the ensuing silence one could hear his heavy breathing and voices on the other side of the door.
“What does that mean?” Zadik asked in a whisper.
“It means,” Michael explained slowly, his eyes fixed on Zadik, “that perhaps what Matty Cohen saw on his way to the roof changes the picture entirely. Only an autopsy will give us the exact time of death, and that’s something we absolutely need to know. I mean, as exact as possible, you know, a lead.”
“But … but he didn’t see anything that … he didn’t tell me … he isn’t even certain it was Tirzah, he said it was dark there … he didn’t—”
Eli Bachar interrupted Zadik. “Sometimes people see more than what they think they’ve seen.”
Zadik intended to say something, but at just that moment Aviva pushed open the door to his office with her shoulder and entered, carrying a tray. “I didn’t want to let Amsalem from the canteen disturb you in the middle,” she explained as she laid the tray on Zadik’s desk.
“I figured you needed your privacy, or …” She smiled sweetly at Michael, placing a glass mug in front of him. “Turkish coffee?” she asked as if she knew the answer already. “Sugar? Sweetener? Cream?”
She was standing quite close to him, her arm nearly touching his shoulder; even Eli caught the scent of her lemony perfume, light and surprising, could see the pores on her cheeks, the fine blond hairs above her upper lip. “Zadik, I forgot to tell you,” she said as she straightened up, “someone called from Sha’arei Zedek Hospital looking for you, wouldn’t say what it’s about. I asked them to call again in an hour. Do you know what it’s about?” Zadik shook his head.
“Two sugars, please,” Michael said, then took two sugar packets from the tray, slit them open, and emptied them into his mug.
“Some people don’t have to worry about their weight,” she said as she placed a mug in front of Zadik. In the tone of a nanny intimately familiar with the idiosyncrasies of her charge, she told him, “I’ve already added one sweetener to yours, and I brought you all some hot bourekas.” Aviva placed a mug in front of Eli Bachar as well.
“Good job,” Zadik murmured. “I wonder why Sha’arei Zedek Hospital is looking for me. That bothers me… . Try to find out what they want.”
“Okay, I’ll look into it. Look at these bourekas, they’re filled with spinach, the good kind,” Aviva said, obviously proud. “They’re straight from the oven, exactly the way you like them, Zadik, because you’ve got a long day ahead of you. Just so you know.”
“What? What are you talking about?” he asked, straightening up.
“Danny Benizri is waiting for you, and Arye Rubin is outside with Natasha, he’s got some urgent matter he needs to discuss with you. He says you promised, and he’s very tense. She is too, but especially him.
He needs to see you quickly because he’s on his way to Benny Meyuhas’s house, because this policeman,” she said, indicating Eli Bachar—suddenly she no longer knew his name—“this policeman wants to talk with Benny Meyuhas, and Rubin has to accompany him.
Did I get that right?” she asked Eli Bachar, who nodded.
“Can’t you see that I’m … they’re going to have to wait until I finish with the police, at the very least,” Zadik said. “And Rubin, well, I’ve already spoken to him once, I thought …” He batted his hand in the air as if to wave away the issue. “Tell him that when I finish with them—”
“I’m leaving the tray here, we’ll take it back later,” Aviva said. She nodded at Eli Bachar and smiled at Michael. On her way out of the office she stopped, looked at Zadik, and said, “People are talking.”
Zadik looked at her expectantly. “They’re saying … they’re saying it wasn’t an accident … Tirzah …”
“That’ll be all for now, Aviva, thank you,” Zadik said, cutting her off. She threw him a hurt look and left the room.
“Where were we?” Zadik asked seconds after the door had closed.
“We were talking about what Matty Cohen did or did not see,” Eli Bachar said.
“That’s just it,” Zadik interjected. “He didn’t see anything, and there wasn’t anything to see, nobody—”
“Zadik,” Michael said, “we need the family’s permission to perform an autopsy. That’s what we’re here for.”
Zadik pushed aside the plate of bourekas and gathered up the sesame seeds that had scattered across his desktop. He did not speak.
Eli Bachar leaned forward to explain. “The pathologist said—”
“I get it, I get it,” Zadik said irritably. “Tirzah’s family is Benny Meyuhas, you’ll have to get permission from him. But in any case, Matty Cohen said that he even—”
“We thought we might have ways of helping him remember,” Eli Bachar said. Michael threw him a look of warning, which made him hasten to add, “I’m not talking about something bad, God forbid. It’s just that sometimes people don’t know what it is they’re seeing, or they don’t remember until someone helps them.”
“What are you planning to do, hypnotize him?” Zadik asked mockingly.
“The truth is,” Michael said slowly as he leaned forward, “we know that the phone call from Sha’arei Zedek Hospital has to do with Matty.
We had planned to—”
“What? Why, what’s happened to Matty?” Zadik asked, distraught.
“He didn’t feel so good while he was telling us what had happened, and we called an ambulance for him,” Eli Bachar explained.
“It’s your fault!” Zadik raised himself in his chair and slid his mug of coffee aside. “You made him totally crazy, what with the night he spent in the emergency room and everything that’s happened with Tirzah!
He needed to—why did you guys mess around with his head, that’s what I want to know. Did you frighten the guy?”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Zadik,” Michael said sharply. “Why would we frighten him? We weren’t even putting pressure on him. We have this memory expert, and he had been working with him for a while when Matty recalled a few details of what he’d seen with Tirzah at night—”
Zadik prodded his face like a man who had gone numb and was trying to revive himself. “No way that … and what … ? Listen, I’ve got to get over to the hospital. Matty is … we’re close, I had a hand in his divorce, and in … I …” He fell silent, kneading his left arm with his hand.
“There’s no reason to go rushing over there at the moment,” Eli Bachar said. “He’s in intensive care. They haven’t stabilized him yet, but they’re saying he’ll be all right. Still, it’ll be a while before they let anyone in to see him.”
“I can’t … ,” Zadik began to say as he stood up, pushing his leather armchair back. “I can’t just sit here while—have you notified his wife?”
Eli nodded. “We did. She’s there with him.”
“What about the kid?” Zadik asked, dismayed.
“He’s fine,” Eli Bachar assured him. “Her mother is with the boy at Hadassah. Everything’s taken care of.”
“I can’t—” Zadik said as he lifted the receiver.
“Just a minute, Zadik,” Michael said, placing a restraining hand on his arm. “I want us to get back to the previous matter. Let’s verify a few things. All that I’m asking is for cooperation on your part and for you to postpone the funeral. Not by days, just by a couple of hours.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Zadik said, returning to
his seat. “Tirzah’s death was an accident!” He wiped his brow. “I don’t want you coming in here investigating things if there’s no good reason. It seems to me you’re just taking advantage of an opportunity. I know you people—how long have you and I known each other?” He squinted at Michael, touching the tip of his ear, then prodding a small scar by his right eyebrow. “After all, we practically grew up together, didn’t we? I remember you before you were even shaving. You were two years behind me at school, you were in the same class as my cousin Uzi, his house was your second home. I remember—so do me a favor, don’t try pulling the wool over my eyes. I don’t want this place to be crawling with police trying to dig things up for no good reason.”
