uniforms.
He read it and when next he returned to Malik Street, he asked for more.
She picked them for him, English works at first but then Hebrew, as his
grip upon the language became stronger. They were not religious works
only, but histories and historical novels that excited his interest in
this ancient centre of civilization which for three thousand years had
been a crossroads and a battleground.
He read anything and everything that she put into his case, from
josephus Flavius to Leon Uris.
This led to a desire to see and inspect the ground. It became so that
much of the time that they were free together was spent in these
explorations. They began with the hill-top fortress of Herod at Masada
where the zealots had killed each other rather than submit to Rome, and
from there they moved off the tourist beat to the lesser-known
historical sites.
In those long sunlit days they might eat their basket lunch sitting on
the ruins of a Roman aqueduct and watching a falcon working the thermals
that rose off the floor of the desert, after they had searched the bed
of a dry wadi for coins and arrowheads brought down by the last rains.
Around them rose the tall cliffs of orange and golden stone, and the
light was so clean and stark that it seemed they could see for ever, and
the silence so vast that they were the only living things in the world.
They were the happiest days that David had ever known, and they gave
point and meaning to the weary hours of squadron standby, and when the
day had ended there was always the house on Malik Street with its warmth
and laughter and love.
Joe and David arranged leave of absence from the base for the wedding.
It was a time of quiet, and le Dauphin let them go without protest, for
he would be a guest.
They drove up to Jerusalem the day before and were immediately
conscripted to assist with the arrangements. David laboured mightily as
a taxi-driver and trucker. The Mercedes transported everything from
flowers to musical instruments and distant relatives.
The Brig's garden was decorated with palm leaves and coloured bunting.
In the centre stood the huppah, a canopy worked with religious symbols
in blue and gold, the Star of David and the grapes and ears of wheat,
the pomegranates and all the other symbols of fertility.
Beneath it, the marriage ceremony would take place.
Trestle tables covered with gay cloths and set with bowls of flowers and
dishes of fruit were arranged beneath the olive trees. There were
places for three hundred guests, an open space for the dancing, a raised
timber stand hung with flags for the band.
The catering was contracted out to a professional firm and the menu had
been carefully decided upon by the chef and the women. It would have
two high points an enormous stuffed tuna, again a symbol of fertility,
and a lamb dish in the bedouin style served upon enormous copper
salvers.
on the Sunday of the wedding, David drove Debra to the home of the chief
surgeon of Hadassah Hospital.
