Limassol (21 page)

Two of them sat across from me at a simple wooden table of a kibbutz. They came in without knocking. “Get up, get dressed.” I saw a solid look, a sturdy body, house in a village, SUVs and good-looking women—very normal people. They almost didn't use force, just were very cold, didn't ask how I felt, shot questions and I replied. Now and then, they went out for breaks, I heard them whispering, laughing maliciously—as far as they were concerned, I was garbage. They asked a lot about Daphna, about Hani, they questioned me about Yotam. I told everything as it was, I didn't hide practically anything. Afterward, they asked about Cyprus, wanted the whole picture, minute by minute by minute. I tried to sit upright, to answer clearly, not to look broken. I remembered which detainees stirred respect and which seemed like human trash to me. I kept back only one thing, the memory of the night with Daphna. Here I lied to them: No, I didn't sleep with her. They said insulting things about her, and I restrained myself so they wouldn't notice I cared, so they wouldn't put their dirty hands on her. Sometimes, they showed up at night after a whole day of silence, they turned on the light, pulled me out of bed, wouldn't let me brush my teeth, I sat across from them in my underwear—by now it was a bit cool at night, and they wouldn't let me go to the bathroom so frequently . . .

Between the visits there were long hours of nothing, attempts to sleep in sweat and bad dreams, to guess what time it was, to recall the face of the child. Outside, the guards who sat on plastic chairs dressed in civilian clothes were replaced. They had small guns in their belts—students putting themselves through school by guarding the traitor. They looked tranquil, I could surprise them, split the skull of one of them from behind. But what for? Where would I go from here, in that big prison? Once or twice an hour, a patrol car passed along the barbed wire fence. I could smell the sea, pick out the limestone outcroppings in the distance.

The guards didn't come into the hut, they just looked at me from outside through the barred window with the screen. I asked through the bars for permission to call my child. Two of them ignored me completely, the third got up off his chair—he had a cell phone in his hand and chatted and laughed on it all day with his friends—came to the window with firm steps and whispered to me to shut up and not talk to him anymore. I understood. I shut up.

I counted the days between one dawn and another: two weeks had passed. I waited for something to happen. I prepared chapter headings for my defense speeches, for the day they'd bring me up before the judge, but I couldn't compose an orderly argument. Only faces and eyes I saw, and groans and voices of distress, nothing that could be conveyed in words.

On the eve of Rosh Hashanah, they gave me a
kippa
and a prayer book with a special portion of fish whose plastic wrapping said “Carp North African Spicy Style.” At long last I had something to read. I got a lot of sleep because the interrogations had diminished in recent days. All evening and night I read prayers over and over, I got to Sukkot; I tried to decipher signs in them, I saw faces of God—a gloomy and fearsome man. Outside the guard was wooing some girl on the phone; he sounded like a coarse fellow and I hoped she'd disappoint him. Afterward, he stopped guarding and emitted snores that drove me nuts. My fingers itched to break his neck.

After the holiday, they transferred me to a police installation near Ramle, to a real detention cell, without a window, without trees outside, with a thin mattress full of fleas. The interrogations there were more formal, they took orderly minutes. They didn't let me wash or shave. I lay curled up, like a hairy, ugly fetus, and I thought of death.

They released me suddenly, one morning. A pale man sat across from me in the interrogation room and made me sign all kinds of forms. I was forbidden to talk about anything connected with the service, the operations of the service, the things I had done. I was forbidden to leave Israel. Forbidden to talk with journalists. A policeman accompanied me to the door of the station. The sun blinded me when I went out. I had a long beard, and my clothes were filthy and stinking. I had no money. They had also forgotten to give me back my watch. It took a long time to find a taxi that would take me in my condition. The driver asked what had happened to me. I was silent.

 

For three days I slept in my apartment, which was locked and deserted, the home of a family that no longer exists. I left the shutters closed. I couldn't read. There was nothing or no one on the shelves that could talk to a person in my condition. I spoke a few words with the child on the phone; I wanted that conversation so much but I choked up and couldn't continue. “When will you come to me, Papa?” he asked and his voice sounded distant, as if he was in another solar system. Sigi asked where I had disappeared, in a flat and hostile tone. “I've got something serious going with somebody, just so you'll know, I don't want you to hear it from the child. He misses you. Don't disappear like that again. You don't have to punish the child because of me.”

When I managed to get up, I looked in the piles of papers that had accumulated at the door for some reference to Cyprus ,on or around the day we had been there, but I didn't find anything. Once I called Haim; that was stupid because he hung up on me, and about half an hour later, police knocked on the door and asked if everything was all right. They walked around the apartment and rummaged through my things. I had to disappear, be forgotten, buried in the earth in some God-forsaken corner.

When the summer ended, on the last day of October, I left the house for the first time. The boring suburban street, the dull houses, people I don't know. With every step, eyes stuck in my back like arrows. I drove to the city. I hadn't shaved off the beard I grew in prison, and I was pale as death. I missed her street, the beautiful ficus trees that made the sidewalks dirty, the crooked children of the city, the gloom of the staircase. I sought her warmth. I went up the stairs slowly, like the first time I came.

The big window was open and purple spots of sunset blew inside with the wind. We sat in the kitchen. “The
etrog
man returned,” she said and stroked my head. It grew dark outside, but we didn't turn on a light.

“What's with Hani?” I asked.

“Dead,” said Daphna. “A few days after we returned. Died here, in the living room. In his sleep. Yotam called to tell me. I wasn't home.”

“Did he say anything?” I asked.

“He said thank you for saving his son.”

“I don't know if I managed even to do that,” I said.

“You did,” said Daphna. “They were here, asked questions. Put me in jail for two nights. Not a pleasure, especially knowing that you were being held as well. I understand he got out of it wounded, but alive. Not so awful, he probably deserved to do some time.”

“He's a murderer,” I said. “I saw that in his eyes. I should have killed him there, in the cab.”

“All of us are murderers,” said Daphna. She was very thin and her eyes were sad. I went to the windowsill, smelled the plants, listened to the voices in the yard and the street. She sat shriveled up, barefoot, covered with some cloth. She said it was getting cool, but the rain didn't come.

“Where is Yotam?” I asked.

“He's here,” said Daphna quietly. “In his room. He comes out only at night. Takes money from me. Comes back filthy and shaking in the morning.” I looked at the door to the corridor where the monster sits at the dark end.

“You should throw him out,” I said angrily.

“I can't,” she said. “He's my son. He's Hani's son. He's all I've got left now.”

 

He sat drooping on the corner of the bed with his hair covering his face and small bloodstains on the sheet beneath him. It was a child's room and he filled it with the smell of a sick old man. I entered with firm steps and combed through the room. I checked the drawers and the hiding places. I crammed all the stuff I found into a bag. He shook himself and tried to get up and go out, pushed me. I shoved him to the wall. Daphna changed the sheets and cleaned the room quickly with a broom and a rag. He went wild and cursed and spat. I was very strong, I restrained myself, I tightened my hold so he couldn't get away. Daphna put a bowl of fruit and bread and water on the small desk. We went out together and locked the door behind us.

We sat in the kitchen to wait.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

 

 

 

 

Yishai Sarid studied law at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and received a graduate degree in public administration from Harvard University. He works as an attorney and contributes articles to the Hebrew press.
Limassol
is his second novel.