Israel (64 page)

Foster opened the door for Herschel, who stepped inside and saw three men lounging on canvas cots. One stood up and approached Herschel, his hands outstretched in welcome. He was a swarthy man with thick black hair, wide-set eyes and a broad, fleshy nose.

“I have been looking forward to meeting you,” the man said in Hebrew. “I am David Raziel.” He paused as the door slammed shut and the padlock was fitted into place. Raziel grinned. “Welcome to the kennel, Herschel Kol.”

The mission, it turned out, was delayed in the hopes that some peaceful way could be found out of the deadlock between the British and Iraqi governments. However, compromise
became extremely unlikely when Air Officer Smart sent his squadron of trainer aircraft fitted with makeshift bomb racks to attack the Iraqi positions overlooking the base.

The Iraqis responded with antiaircraft and artillery fire. One British plane was shot down and the base itself was pounded. The Iraqi shells fell for a week. Herschel and the others spent their days digging trenches and hauling aircraft as far as possible from artillery range.

They received a daily briefing from Major Lemon on their mission, which was indefinitely postponed. They received no training and would receive none, the major told them. Weapons practice was out of the question. They would be supplied and armed just before departure. Guards with submachine guns watched them all day, and at night they were locked into the kennel.

It was just like prison to Herschel, except that in prison nobody had been trying to kill him. Habbaniyah had undergone periodic air attacks since Hitler recognized Rashid Ali's government, and now the tired Iraqi Gladiators were being replaced by sleek, lethal Messerschmitts. The planes carried Iraqi insignia, but from the way they were flown it was painfully obvious that experienced Luftwaffe pilots were at the controls. The twin-engine ME-110 fighter bombers came infrequently to Habbaniyah in an almost desultory fashion, but when they did come they chewed the base to pieces.

“This is the proof. To the British we are merely useful animals,” Raziel fumed one night during an air attack.

He, Herschel and the others—a Pole and a pair of dusky-skinned Sephardim chosen by the British because they spoke Iraqi—were huddled inside the kennel. It was torture to be locked inside the flimsy building while all around them bombs exploded and incendiary machine-gun fire set similar structures ablaze.

“We are just like their guard dogs,” Raziel was muttering, “like the Alsatians that patrol the fence. We are kept chained until it is time for us to be turned loose to bite somebody, and then back on come the chains—”

The rest was lost in a nearby explosion. Herschel snuffed out their one candle as the blackout curtains were jarred loose from the window moldings. They sat in the dark, listening to the whine of the planes swooping over the base in the night, and told each other that with any luck this would be their last such attack.

The silver lining was that Command had been jarred into putting their mission back on rails. They would be starting out any day now, according to Major Lemon's latest briefing.

Since Herschel had the best English of the team, he would accompany Raziel to the villa tomorrow morning for an intelligence report on the oilfield's defenses. They would also receive their maps.

Raziel guessed they woud depart tomorrow night.

It was a few hours before dawn. The air attack had ended and only Raziel and Herschel remained awake. At Raziel's request Herschel explained how he came to be an lrgun member. Without meaning to he found himself talking about his father and growing up at Degania, about those heavenly first years living in Jerusalem with his mother and then his brief, intense affair with Frieda Litvinoff.

He spoke intensely and sincerely of all of his passions and his grief over Frieda's death.

Raziel listened intently. He was deeply interested in Herschel; he was interested in all his men as commander in chief, but the cream of the crop of Palestinian manhood merited special attention.

Raziel said as much. Whatever path had led Herschel Kol to the lrgun was a path Raziel wanted to know about.

Finally Herschel was finished talking. His throat dry, he stared at Raziel.

“What?” the lrgun commander coaxed.

“I don't know how to ask. I don't want to appear disrespectful, but—” Herschel shrugged. “We could be dead a couple of days from now.”

“See how things improve?” Raziel chuckled. “A little while ago we might have been dead last night. Come, Herschel, I have no secrets from a fellow fighter. Ask me.”

Herschel nodded and nervously cleared his throat. “When the British came for me at the prison, I was ready to go back to solitary rather than help them. Then they said you were involved, and that settled it for me, and here I am.”

“I am flattered,” Raziel said dryly.

“No you're not. You don't respect my decision, and frankly, neither do I. What I want to know is why you're here. It's been years since you made your truce with the British, and still they keep you locked up, guarded all the time, like—”

“Like their patrol dogs.”

“Yes. That they cannot trust Jews is obvious, but why do you help them? Merely because the Germans are worse enemies?”

“That they are against the Nazis is a good reason. Chasing the British out of Palestine will not bring about a Jewish homeland if it is the Nazis who do the chasing.” Raziel paused. “But I have a more personal reason for helping the British despite the way they treat me. I simply don't want to hate.”

“I don't understand.”

“The lrgun Z'vai Leumi was not formed out of hatred but because of a difference of opinion with the Zionist Socialists.”

“That I understand.”

“Do you understand why Abraham Stern is not here with us?”

Herschel swallowed hard. “You've read my mind. In prison I thought to desert the lrgun and join the Stern group.”

Raziel nodded. “Every man must follow his own conscience. I declared a truce, while Stern declared war. I will not judge my old comrade's actions.” He pondered Herschel for a moment. “Do you remember when you were defending Degania in '29, how the Arabs attacked impulsively, lacking all strategy; mere mobs?”

Herschel grinned. “They were easy to defeat.”

“They were—and are—like that because they believe the glory of battle is diminished by too much preparation. Concerning oneself with mundane details is an aspect of ordinary life, not of warfare. To the Arabs fighting is like lovemaking: too much prior thought makes both the will and the ability vanish.”

“That is why we will ultimately win.”

“Win the war, but at what cost?”

“Lives will be lost.”

“Lives, yes, but souls as well?”

“I don't understand.”

Raziel sighed. “I see that you don't. Be comforted. Stem does not understand either. This is the reason I asked the British to recruit you. There was much publicity surrounding your case. Imagine, the grandson of the renowned Erich Glaser, a terrorist. I was curious about you and wondered what conclusions you had come to concerning the struggle for a homeland.”

“I'd like to know your conclusions.” Herschel began to feel uneasy. He wanted—needed—Raziel's strength and certainty, just as he had once needed Frieda Litvinoff's.

“Mine, eh? Very well.” Raziel shrugged. “I've come to believe that the very qualities that make the Arabs weak will ultimately allow them to prevail. They do not brood
the way Jews do. They somehow remain lighthearted and pure while we grow bitter and spiritually stunted as we apply ourselves to the art of killing as we once might have pursued careers. I think about the combat manuals Stern and I wrote. I have seen former Yeshiva boys memorize every word the way they once might have studied the Talmud—”

“Well, they—
we
—have to,” Herschel argued. “Guns are what we need these days.”

“Of course you are right.”

“You don't sound so happy about it.”

“That's because I've seen Jews take delight in killing. We have always excelled as students. Now we shall advance to the head of the class in violence, and we shall see what God will have to say on the matter.”

At nine o'clock that morning Sergeant-major Foster called for them by car. He sat up front beside the driver. In the back seat Herschel and a guard flanked Raziel.

“I imagine you boys are looking forward to being off,” Foster said over his shoulder as the car pulled away from the barracks. As they sped past the villa and through the main gates, Foster told them there had been a change of plans. “The Iraqis have blown the dikes on the Euphrates. The bloody main road to Baghdad is flooded. The briefing is going to be held at the RAF Boat Club. Major Lemon thought that you two ought to get a look at the skiffs available during daylight so as to chose the one you'll be using come nightfall.”

“So we are leaving tonight?” Raziel asked.

“Looks like it, old boy.” The sergeant-major wagged his finger. “But you didn't hear it from me, right? I expect you'll take one of those skiffs across the river, float across the flood area and end up in the town of Falluja, halfway to Baghdad. From there reportedly the roads are dry.”

“Boathouse just ahead,” the driver warned.

“Right.” Foster reached down to the floor of the car and came up with two pairs of handcuffs. “Sorry about this, chaps. Major's orders, seeing as how we're off base. He wanted me to fetter you for the whole trip, but I didn't—”

“I understand,” Raziel said calmly. He held out his wrists.

The guard sitting beside him made a face. “You hear a plane?” he asked the sergeant-major, rolling down his window. He stuck out his head, trying to get a look at the sky.

“No more chains,” Herschel said angrily. “You ask us to risk our lives and now you insult us—”

“None of that, Kol,” Foster scolded as he snapped the cuffs on Raziel's wrists.

“They will have their way no matter what,” Raziel whispered in Hebrew, leaning toward Herschel. “There is no point in giving them the satisfaction of manhandling you.”

Foster tugged experimentally on Raziel's handcuffs. “Right. Your turn, Kol. Get your bloody head in the car and give me a hand,” he ordered the guard. “Kol is being stubborn—”

The guard jerked his head inside. “Messerschmitt!”

Herschel was staring at Raziel as the rear window of the car imploded. There was a sound of myriad angry hornets and the driver's head suddenly splattered against the windshield. Foster was screaming and then he stopped and quietly slumped forward out of Herschel's sight. The driverless car was swerving, and Raziel, apparently off balance, fell against Herschel, who bent beneath the weight. Herschel's door sprang open. He tumbled out of the car in time to watch it slam into the back of Major Lemon's automobile, which was parked in front of the boathouse. The car's hood flew up and steam or smoke began rising from the engine. The horn began to blare.

Herschel was sprawled on his belly. His palms were raw and his trouser knees were torn, but he was otherwise unharmed. He lay still, pressing himself into the dirt. The landscape was flat and the boathouse itself afforded little protection. Herschel did not want to attract the attention of the circling Messerschmitt.

A stunned and appalled Major Lemon and his two men were outside the boathouse and saw the attack. His two soldiers threw down their rifles and scrambled up a ladder to the flat roof. Herschel saw the fear distorting their faces as they struggled to bring a machine gun to bear on the enemy.

The soldiers' efforts were hopeless. Their machine gun was a World War One vintage drum-fed Lewis. It managed to loose one short, stuttering burst before the German plane opened fire, shredding sandbags and men and sending the Lewis gun somersaulting into the lake.

Major Lemon was running along the edge of the lake, away from the boathouse and the Messerschmitt and toward Herschel. Clearly the major was panic-stricken; he would only draw fire on himself.

The ME-110 had streaked past the major before the pilot could react, but the plane also carried a tail-gunner. He zeroed in and water spouts began erupting all around the panicked major.

“Get down! Fall down,” Herschel shouted. The major was still heading toward him, and so was the machine gun fire nipping at Lemon's heels.

Finally the gun caught up with Lemon.

Herschel lay paralyzed as bullets kicked dirt in his face, and then the enemy plane was past him. It made a final run over the boathouse to shoot apart the skiffs along the pier, and then it flew off.

Herschel unsteadily got to his feet and made his way to the car. Its engine had stopped smoking, but the horn
was still blaring. He went around to the engine compartment and yanked out a handful of wires.

The noise stopped. Now there was nothing to break the stillness but the sound of the water lapping against the pilings.

Raziel's body was dangling half out of the car. Herschel knelt over him, though he knew he was beyond help. He'd been hit at least six times. Herschel glanced at the guard who'd first spotted the plane; he was dead as well.

He noticed Raziel's handcuffs and went around to the passenger side of the car and opened the door. Sergeant-major Foster spilled out, just as bullet-riddled as everyone else.

Except me, Herschel thought, thanks to Raziel falling on top of me and absorbing my share . . .

He patted down Foster's corpse until he found what he was looking for. He took the handcuff key and removed Raziel's manacles, which he hurled into the lake.

“You are free now,” Herschel told the body, and then he wandered over to Lemon's automobile. The rear trunk area was fairly bashed in, but the car still looked sound enough. He got in behind the wheel and pushed the starter. The engine caught. Herschel put it in gear and drove it clear of the accident.