Israel (9 page)

That afternoon during lunch, Abe once more tried to read the
Forward
. Stefano had disappeared.

Haim? Are you well? Do you prosper? Abe wondered as he perused the articles on Palestine. His hand absently rose to pat the pocket where his money had been. As for me, little friend, I am exactly the same.

The meeting house was a flat-roofed slab of a building with pink stucco walls that made it look like a cream cake. Indeed, viewed from the surrounding sand dunes, the settlement's lemon, lime and white cottages looked less like a town than a baker's display of pastries beneath the strong Mediterranean sun.

Far too many people were crammed into the sweltering confines of the meeting house. Sixty families from half that number of places in Europe and Russia were taking up the rows of wooden chairs, and a pack of cranky children careened around the perimeters. This meeting had been going on—in points of order, adjournments, tabled motions and secret ballots—for the better part of the last year. Today, however, there was going to be a resolution.

“The time has come,” the Old Man decreed, his voice raspy, his pop eyes rolling. “Today we must vote.”

Not quite yet. “Point of order,” somebody—oh, no, Professor Chernak—called out. He rose, unfurled a scroll only slightly shorter than the Torah and began to drone his arguments.

It was too much. Haim Kolesnikoff began to squirm on his straight-backed wooden chair. His legs bounced in an excess of nervous energy. His ceaseless exertions were making the floorboards squeak as if even the mice had an opinion.

The squeak caused Professor Chernak to pause. People began to cast dirty looks in Haim's direction.

The woman next to Haim was also blonde. She was pretty the way unbleached Egyptian linen is pretty. She had a slightly crooked sunburnt nose and wide-set slanted eyes the lustrous hue of sable. When she was happy, her throaty laugh like birdsong could fill the air. When she was angry, her black-brown eyes were as sultry as the evening breezes from the sea. Haim could not decide which way he liked her better. Just now she was angry.

“What? You can't sit still?” she scolded, her tanned hand clamping down on his knee. “Stop, or else go run around with the children.”

It wasn't such a bad idea. “I'm going for a walk.” Haim stood up and began to excuse himself as he sidled past the others.

The Old Man, up behind the podium, called out to him. “I trust you will return to vote, Mr. Kolesnikoff?”

Haim nodded, reached the aisle and hurried out of doors. The evening sky was peacock blue. It was late spring and the temperature was mild enough to be comfortable in one's shirt sleeves.

However, Haim was wearing a suit and tie. He scowled, wandering the wide, hard-packed streets of the settlement, which Dizengoff and his followers had yet to name. Tonight's meeting would finally resolve that issue, or so everyone hoped. Haim would return in time to cast his vote on what to call the town, but he had no patience for further discussion.

He stripped off his tie and jammed it into his coat pocket. The prim and proper Dizengoff—the Old Man, as
he was called out of earshot—had strict rules for dress at meetings. It all had to do with being middle class and respectable, except that Haim had not come to Eretz Yisroel to be respectable.

He made his way through the grove of wind-twisted sycamores that bordered the edge of the new settlement. Here the ragged paths gave way to sand. Haim kicked off his shoes, rolled up his trousers and headed for the beach.

Before him the surf rolled and crashed, shining like molten silver in the moonlight. Between waves Haim could hear Chernak's raucous voice from the open windows of the meeting house.

So walk a little more, Haim advised himself, strolling along the beach, his bare toes luxuriating in the cool, damp sand. Now it was the lights and music of neighboring Jaffa that beckoned. Haim gazed at the ancient Arab city. It was a familiar, even friendly place. How different it had seemed five years ago, the first time he saw it.

After his farewell to Abe, Haim traveled on foot to the rail station near his village. From there he went to Odessa, the port city, which he found crowded with Jews eager to escape the czar's pogroms. Cowed, Haim wandered amid the confusion, homesick and desperately missing Abe. He even considered giving up his dream of Palestine, but encouragement from Odessa's Friends of Zion bolstered his sagging spirits. He was told that he would have no problem leaving Russia. The Turks in Palestine had banned Jewish immigration, but Zionist Agency people at the end of his journey would smooth his entry.

Haim bought his steamship ticket and food to see him through the nine-day journey to Jaffa. He still had plenty of money left, so he gave half of it to the agency for less fortunate pilgrims. He ended up giving away most of the food as well, for he was far too seasick to eat much.

To take his mind off of the surging waves, the stink of the hold and the endless rocking of the crowded steamship, Haim spent endless hours gazing at the precious portrait. Abe's likeness comforted him. Dear, good Abe, off to America on his own adventure.

Today Abe crosses the Austrian border, Haim imagined as his own ship set forth upon the Black Sea. Soon he'll begin to cross the Atlantic.

Meanwhile, his own steamer chugged through the Bosporus to the Mediterranean. Haim imagined that Abe had only another week's travel the day his own ship dropped anchor in Jaffa harbor.

Lithe nut-brown Arab boys rowed out in little boats to ferry the newly arrived to shore. The Arabs wore long white shirts, flowing garments that fluttered like curtains in the warm wind coming off the bay. A halutz was riding in the lead boat of the Arab youths. He was fit-looking and deeply tanned, with a totally bald head and a shaggy salt-and-pepper mustache. Haim was consumed with jealousy and admiration as soon as he glimpsed the pioneer. The man was wearing light cotton trousers and an open-necked shirt, the sight of which made Haim want to tear off his own high-collared tunic and pitch it into the sea.

The halutz shouted that the Arabs would transport them to land. Once they were on the beach they were to say nothing to the waiting Turkish officials. They were to let the comrades on shore do all the talking.

Haim impatiently waited for his turn to board a rowboat. He was ready to dive from the ship and swim to land, so eager was he to taste everything including the warm waters of the Mediterranean. What stopped him was the leather tube containing the portrait. He had not taken it from Abe and carried it all this way to have it ruined by a salt-water soaking.

When he finally got to climb down the rope ladder to
a rowboat, he was surprised and delighted to find himself riding with the halutz. From a distance the man appeared young; this was an illusion created by his vigor. Up close Haim could tell that his mentor was in his sixties at the very least. The man had deep creases around his eyes and the corners of his mouth and brown age spots speckled his strong, capable-looking hands. His clothing was splattered with paint and smelled of turpentine.

The pioneer addressed the immigrants in Yiddish, but Haim knew that since the turn of the century Hebrew was becoming the language of the Jewish homeland. Thanks to Abe and the rabbi, Haim had regularly attended his village's heder and so had a basic knowledge of Hebrew, though there were still great gaps in the language as it was spoken in Palestine. Hebrew, like Palestine itself, was in a state of transition. Many everyday terms had yet to be invented.

“Please, sir.” Haim addressed the guide in a faltering mix of Hebrew and Yiddish. “Where, please, may I buy a gun?”

The man's thick eyebrows lifted in bewilderment. “Boy, why would you want a gun?”

Haim decided the halutz was testing him. He thought back to what he had learned at the Zionist meetings in Russia and proudly spouted off. “Why, to kill the Arabs and Turks and reclaim our homeland, of course.”

The halutz patted him on the shoulder, shaking his head. Indicating the Arab youths bending over the oars, he asked, “Then who would row?”

Haim was dumbfounded. “We could row ourselves.”

The pioneer politely explained that he'd meant his question as a joke. “You won't need a gun here in Jaffa. The fellahin, as you can see, are quite friendly.”

“And the Turks?” Haim asked, worried. He could see several uniformed Turkish officials watching from the beach.

“Ah,” the halutz sighed, “the Turks are the Turks. It won't do to fight them. Baksheesh is what they're after.”

Haim had never heard the term before. The halutz explained that even though the Turkish government had forbidden further immigration, Jews could get past the officials by paying them a bribe.

“Baksheesh stops them far more effectively than bullets could.” The pioneer smiled. “By the way, my name's Erich Glaser.” He extended his hand.

Haim introduced himself and asked Glaser if those were all agency people loudly dickering with the Turkish immigration officials.

Glaser puffed up his chest. “You could say they represent the agency due to me. You see, those are my sons and daughters.”

Haim stared at the beach, and then looked back at Glaser. “All of them?” There were eleven men and women confronting the trio of Turkish officials.

“Six boys and five girls.” Glaser nodded happily. “My three oldest boys were born in England—that's where my wife and I are from—but all the rest were born right here in Jaffa. True children of Zion.”

There was a rough scraping sound as the rowboat beached. The Arab youths hopped out into ankle-deep water to steady the boat while Glaser led Haim and the others to the Turks.

“Remember now,” he told them all in Yiddish, “stay quiet and let us do the talking. These fellows will act fierce, but it's just their way of upping the baksheesh.”

Haim was happy to hang back and let Glaser handle things. The trio of Turks had split up, each officer, resplendent in uniform, scarlet sash, fez and pistol belt, heading off to confront a group of the newly arrived.

The officer facing Glaser kept shaking his head to the halutz's offers, but Haim, who had witnessed more than his share of bribe negotiations back in Russia, could tell
from the Turk's tone of voice that they were not far from a compromise. He looked around, drinking in the sights as he squinted against the strong sun. Five of Glaser's boys were helping some of the immigrants with their bundles of possessions. Haim would have volunteered to help, but he dared not leave his group until Glaser had finished bargaining with the Turk. The halutz's remaining son was just concluding a transaction. Haim watched him pay the Turks, who turned on his heel and began to stride up the beach.

“Welcome to Palestine,” Glaser said. Haim turned to see the halutz winking at him, and behind Glaser, the Turk already catching up with his friend. Both officials looked anxious to get out of the broiling sun now that their money was in their pockets.

“That didn't go so badly.” Glaser nodded contentedly. He nodded at the backs of the departing Turks. “They don't even trust each other. They insist upon each negotiating his own bribe when they would most certainly do better by sticking together, asking one price and then dividing it evenly.”

“That lady is having trouble,” Haim observed.

“Lady?” Glaser spun around. “Where?”

Haim pointed down the beach at a blonde young woman wearing a dazzlingly white cotton sundress that left her slender golden arms bare. Things were not going so well for her. As he watched, she abruptly thrust out her chin to say something in a very sharp tone.

The Turk stiffened with shock. In an instant he was grappling with her.

“Oh, my God,” Glaser murmured. “My daughter—”

Haim was already running toward them. He felt anger building to white-hot as he saw the Turk suddenly slap his opponent across the face with the back of his hand.

Not here, Haim vowed. His mind cast back to memories of women and children savaged by the czar's Cossacks in his Russian village.

He was dimly aware of Glaser begging him to stop. He ignored the halutz, intent upon reaching the pair before the Turk further abused the woman. The slap had sent her sprawling onto the beach.

The officer now unhitched his holster flap and drew his pistol. As Haim approached, the Turk aimed the gun at him, growling out curses in his own language. Haim froze, staring into the bore of the pistol, thinking that his end had come.

Glaser, puffing with exertion, was just reaching them. He stepped between the officer and Haim and began to talk in Turkish, putting his arm around the officer and drawing him away. Whatever Glaser was saying seemed to calm him.

Haim was still staring mesmerized at the Turk's pistol. Now, he thought, while Glazer has him distracted. He tensed himself for a leap.

“Stand very still,” the blond warned him. She was cradling her cheek, which had turned an angry scarlet. “He'll shoot you if you provoke him.”

Swallowing hard, Haim nodded. “Are you all right?”

“Better than you're going to be,” she said, getting to her feet. “Why did you do that?”

Haim glanced at the Turk, who still had his gun drawn but was now pointing it down at the sand while he listened to Glaser.

“It's all right,” she assured him. “The Turk understands no language but his own. Now tell me, why did you risk your life?”

“He was attacking you.”

She laughed. “For a nothing slap on the face you're ready to take a bullet? You'd better go back to Russia. Here in Palestine you won't last, believe me.”

“Don't worry about me,” Haim said, stung by her ridicule. “You need manners, miss. I was coming to help you.”

“Some help! My father just saved your life, mister. We need smart Jews here, not dumb ones.”

“I owe the Turk an apology,” Haim roared. “He showed restraint by merely slapping you—”