The Collaborator of Bethlehem

“I didn’t say that. But you aren’t in the best shape, are you? I’m just worried about you.”

“If you’re so worried about me, why did you mention the threats to your business first?”

“Because I know you. I know how stubborn you are. If I said they made threats against you, you’d just say ‘Fuck them.’ If I told you the threats affect the rest of your family, I figured maybe you’d think twice.”

“In other words, you’re on their side.”

“No, Dad.” Ramiz sounded exasperated.

“Yes, you are. You’re trying to make sure that I give in to their threats. That’s how they run this town, isn’t it? They turn up at your shop. They look tough. They sound mean. Then you run off and get me to stop investigating.”

“Don’t make me sound so cowardly. It isn’t like that. I’m trying to be realistic.

“Realistic?”

“Yes, and responsible. We have a big clan. It’s big enough that it gives us more protection than most people might have. Tamari doesn’t come directly to you and hurt you, because he’d be starting a war with the Sirhans in Hamas and Fatah, and with the rest of us, too. But the clan can only protect you so much. If you carry on with your detective nonsense, eventually Tamari will act.”

Omar Yussef looked down at his hands and pressed them together. They felt powerful. Maybe he didn’t look strong; perhaps he even seemed a little frail for a man of his age, but he knew that there was a force within him that couldn’t be seen by anyone, even the son who knew him best. He sat up straight. “I went to see George Saba this morning.”

“At the jail? How did you get in there?”

“It doesn’t matter. Anyway, George doesn’t have your option— of being realistic.”

“But we have an option. I have a problem, and I’ve come to you. A problem that threatens everything we have. Most of all it threatens to take my father from me.” Ramiz’s voice caught. “I don’t know how I’d live without you, Dad.”

Omar Yussef put his hand on his son’s shoulder. Ramiz shook slightly and covered his face with his hand. He wiped a fingertip beneath his eyes and tried to smile. He was chubbier than his father. His facial structure made him look like Omar Yussef’s mother. His cheekbones were wide and high, and his eyes had a lazy glibness that concealed his sharp intelligence. The things Ramiz said were the words of a normal, decent man. He’s worried about his kids, about his business, about his own father, Omar Yussef thought. He’s planning for the future by building his phone stores, rather than risking his life for the sake of his legacy, for the way in which people will remember him. I’m trying to find out who killed Dima Abdel Rahman, a person who’s dead and gone, and to save George Saba, a man who’s as good as dead. It’s all so people will look back and see that I was someone who made children into worthy adults. What will they say if I ruin my family in the process?

It was no good, though; that was how he always had been and he wouldn’t change that, even if he could. He only had to look at the expensive cars driven about town by the dumbest of his ex-pupils to know that integrity and knowledge were worthless in the world. But they were precious to him. If he had a soul, he thought, its core would be warmed by the love of his sons and his wife and his grandchildren. But its fringes were insulated against the slime of Bethlehem by his morality and his principles. If Ramiz didn’t see that now, he would understand in the end.

Omar Yussef went to the coat rack by the front door. He put on a beige parka.

“Dad, where are you going?”

Omar Yussef opened the door and felt the freshness of the cold air. “I’m going to talk this over with someone.” He stepped outside.

Chapter 14

Omar Yussef walked up the hill toward the souk. He felt at once furious and calm. These gunmen scum of the Martyrs Brigades threatened him, but they chose not to do so to his face. They went to work on his son, instead. Why was everyone going behind his back? The gunmen went to Ramiz; Steadman connived with the schools inspector. It seemed to Omar Yussef that if anything was to be brought out into the open, it would be up to him to accomplish it. Naturally, he would do so alone.

In spite of his anger, Omar Yussef felt a sense of composure. It was based on the strength of belonging. He belonged in this town more than these gangsters. Hussein Tamari’s clan was living in filthy tents on the periphery of the desert back when Omar Yussef’s dear father was an admired figure whose opinion the leading families of Jerusalem respected. In his father’s world, there was law and gentility. But in the desert, the traditions by which life was lived were as absolute and harsh as the sun. Tamari’s people now congregated in the village of Teqoa, just south of Bethlehem, but they were still as brutal as their nomadic fathers.

“Peace be upon you, ustaz.”

Omar Yussef stopped. “And upon you, peace.”

“How are you?” The greeting was from one of his old pupils who worked now as an architect. Omar Yussef couldn’t remember the name of the man, who was in his mid-twenties.

“I’m as well as can be expected,” Omar Yussef said. “How is your business?”

“Well, not so good. In all this fighting a lot of buildings are being knocked down, but not many are being built.” The man laughed. “Times are bad for architects. And I can’t get into Jerusalem to my office, of course. All the checkpoints are closed and I have no permission to pass through them.”

Omar Yussef parted with the man and savored the friendly simplicity of the exchange. He remembered his name now— Khaled Shukri. His father had been killed in crossfire outside the hospital two years earlier. He wished he had remembered the name sooner, so that he might have inquired about his former pupil’s mother. He had heard that she became chronically depressed after her husband’s sudden death.

The calmness Omar Yussef had sensed in himself, the feeling of belonging in Bethlehem, was overwhelmed by