The windowsill left a film of black soot on her hands. After washing in the bathroom, Elizabeth brushed her hair and applied fresh lipstick. She sat on the bed and flipped through tourist brochures. It was Friday afternoon. What would she do until Wednesday morning? And how would the professor reach her-he didn’t know where she was staying.
She remembered the card Bob Emises had given her and called the number.
He answered instantly. “Miss McPherson?”
“Could you help me track down someone?”
“Sure.”
“Professor Flavian Silver. He’s about seventy years old, a new Israeli citizen, arrived today on my flight.”
“Got it. I’ll call you back.” He hung up.
A taxicab stood in the circular driveway by the main lobby of Hadassah Hospital. Professor Silver got in the back seat. “Ramban Hostel, please.”
The cabby drove fast with his right hand, the left stuck out the window with a burning cigarette. “Gorgeous day, isn’t it? Where are you from?”
“Arizona.”
“Hot!” The driver changed gears. His frizzy gray hair danced over his shoulders, and his bald spot glistened with beads of sweat. “I’m Ezekiel.” He drew from his cigarette and held it out the window. “Twenty-five years in the army. Sergeant major, Maintenance Corps.” He tapped the steering wheel. “I do this to get out of the house. Wife drives me crazy. You married?”
“Not anymore.”
“You’re lucky.” They were going downhill very fast. The driver pointed with his cigarette. “That’s Herzl’s grave.”
“A great man.” Silver covered his mouth and spat.
“Want to visit him?” Ezekiel hit the brakes, swerving to the middle lane.
“Another time.” Silver patted his watch. “It’s late.”
“He’s not going anywhere, right?” He accelerated, forcing his way back into traffic. “You like retirement? I love it. Two years, one month, and three weeks.”
“Where did you serve?”
“Where
One side of the yellow sheet was printed in Hebrew, the other in English:
“Fantastic!” Silver held up the yellow flyer. “Can I keep it?”
“Take more.” Ezekiel pulled a fistful from a box on the floor. “I have plenty.”
“Brilliant.” He was amused. Their bragging, even if justified, was like the last flare up of a dying candle. None of these achievements had gained them a shred of popularity in the world. On the contrary, their self-congratulating aggressiveness was fueling resentment and disgust. The Jews were becoming delusional, just like the zealots who had assumed the Romans couldn’t capture Mount Masada. Like a modern-day Flavius Silva, Abu Faddah had returned to give them a lesson to last another two millennia. “Very impressive,” he added. “We’re ahead of everybody else.”
“So why does America think she can scare us with aid suspension?” The driver flipped his cigarette out the window. “We had a Jewish kingdom here, which stretched from Syria to Iraq, Saudi Arabia, and all the way to Egypt, while America was run by redskins who chased buffalo.”
“Speaking of history,” Silver said, taking advantage of the turn in the conversation, “I’m looking for a distant cousin. She was a big hero in the army.”
“In the Israeli army everybody thinks they’re heroes.”
“She saved some hostages.” Silver couched his words carefully.
“In eighty-two.”
Ezekiel twisted the steering wheel to pass a car and cut off another, which began honking. “Where? Lebanon?”
“On Mount Masada. Does it ring a bell?”
“I need bells to ring? I would remember a hostage situation on Mount Masada in eighty-two, or at any other time. Never happened.”
“Are you certain?”
The cabby lowered the volume on the radio. “Are you
“Maybe my relatives exaggerated. Did anything happen on Mount Masada in eighty-two?”
“It was a busy year. The Lebanon War started.” He used his mobile phone to call a friend. They exchanged a few quick sentences in Hebrew. “My buddy says that the only event on Mount Masada that year was an accident that killed a few kids.” He pressed the phone to his ear. “August nineteen?” He glanced at his watch. “Hey, this coming Tuesday is the anniversary!”
Silver recognized the date. They had climbed the mountain on August 18, 1982. The woman soldier murdered Faddah at dawn on the 19th. “What kind of an accident?”
“They were playing with an old hand grenade.” The cabby shook his head. “Terrible.”
Silver understood. The survivors had been instructed by the military to keep the truth secret, to adhere instead to the official version of a tragic accident. But if he could find those survivors, they may know the whereabouts of the woman soldier. “How sad. Were they from the same school?”
The driver nodded. “A kibbutz nearby.”
“Ah.” He wondered if that’s where the Israelis had buried Faddah. “Perhaps I should visit the kibbutz. Someone could still remember my relative.”
“It’s an hour’s drive, maybe a little more. The lowest human settlement in the world, measured by sea level. The lowest in the world!”
“How interesting.”
“I can take you tomorrow. You wake up early? Seven okay? Better we go before the heat builds up.”
In her room at the Ramban Hostel, Masada lay on the bed, two pillows under her head and a rolled-up blanket under her right knee. She placed the telephone on her stomach and began her search for Colonel Dov Ness.
She called every plausible agency-the Veterans Affairs office at the Ministry of Defense, the Personnel
