The Covenant (16 page)

Hadassah Hospital, Jerusalem
Wednesday, May 8, 2002
10:00
A.M.

“P
LEASE, I
’
M AN
old woman, and I’ve been on a horrible ten-hour flight. I’m tired, and my Hebrew isn’t good… “ Leah explained to the Hadassah Hospital security guard.

The man shook his head impatiently. “No, English,” he said in English. “No visiting hour.” He waved his hand.

“Look, mister, I’m not moving until you get me someone to help me. My granddaughter, Elise Margulies, is in the intensive care. She’s having a baby. You understand? Dr. Jonathan Margulies’s wife, Elise…!”

The busy nurse passing by caught the end of the sentence. She stopped and stared. “You are Elise’s—”

“Bubbee
, her
Savta
, as you Israelis say…”

“Can I help you,
Savta?”

“Oh, honey. God bless you. Yes, please, my feet are killing me… these guards don’t understand English. I took a taxi from the airport. I
shlepped
my luggage. They are probably going to blow it up if I leave it here, right? I’m so tired.”

“Please,
Savta
, sit down. I’ll get someone to help you.” The nurse took her over to a chair, then hurried off, filled with excitement, worry and good intentions.

Leah leaned back, exhausted, listening to the discussion in rapid-fire Hebrew that was taking place all around her. She tried to catch a few words, but it was as bad as Puerto Rican Spanish, and as unintelligible to the nonnative
speaker. What a
tzimmisl
Here she was, in only a few hours. Go in one door in New York and come out another in Tel Aviv. Life is like a dream. But, as my mother used to say, a good dream is still better than a nightmare.

“Excuse me, Mrs.—?” The kind nurse was back, smiling at her.

“Helfgott. Leah Rabinowitz Helfgott.” She smiled back gratefully.

“Mrs. Helfgott. This is our hospital administrator. He will help you.”

Leah reached up and caressed the pretty, soft face of the Israeli nurse: a Jewish nurse in a Jewish hospital in a Jewish country. She felt tears well. “Thank you, darling. God bless you.”

The young woman took her hand and squeezed it gently. “God bless your family,” she whispered, her eyes brimming.

“Mrs. Helfgott… Leah, I’m Doctor Gabbay. How can I help you?”

“I’m here to see Elise.”

“Of course. But she’s resting right now, and you look as if you could use a rest too.”

“Look, Doctor, I don’t want to fight. I know you Israelis—you are all soldiers. They let you out after three years, but you go back every year, and when there’s a war, you all go in and fight until it’s over… I’m right?”

Doctor Gabbay smiled. “You’re right.”

“So, I don’t start up with Israeli soldiers. But I must tell you I have a heart condition, and if you don’t let me see my Elise, even just to peek in if she’s sleeping, you might have two intensive-care patients on your hands.”

She folded her arms across her chest and waited.

“Shoshana,” he told the nurse. “Would you be kind enough to take Mrs. Helfgott to see Elise? But please, only for a few minutes.”

The nurse nodded. “Doctor, what about the luggage?”

He looked at the two enormous suitcases, the wig box, the plastic bags… “And call an orderly, and tell him to put all this in my office.”

“Thank you. You’re a nice Jewish doctor. Tell your mother I said so. A
broocha
on your
kepeleh.”

“Come in later if you want to talk.” He nodded, trying to look serious. He
was
going to tell his mother. The first chance he got.

She got up heavily, tucking the young nurse’s arm beneath her own. Slowly, she walked through the crowded hospital corridors, glancing in wonder at the mass of electronic equipment in the lobby, as the media kept its vigil, like vultures, she thought, hoping the hostility pouring out of her veins
at the newsmen would act like the valve on a pressure cooker, and by the time she reached Elise she’d be calm and smiling and encouraging. As she neared the room, she felt her legs drag reluctantly, making her pace even slower.

Walking through the snow in bandaged, swollen feet, the guards with cocked pistols waiting for you to falter. You couldn’t falter, your life depended on it. And so you walked, day after day, hour after hour, when you wanted to lie down and close your eyes, because you wanted to live, to accomplish something for the people you loved.

“At rotza lanuach, Savta?”
the nurse asked.

Leah patted her arm, not understanding a word, but grateful for the concern in her tone. She was already in love with her, this Israeli nurse, who helped sick Israelis get well.

“Shoshana means a rose, doesn’t it?” Leah patted the nurse’s cheeks. “Don’t worry. I’ve got energy. For this, I’ve got energy.”

The nurse spoke briefly to the guard placed outside Elise’s room, who was under strict orders to let no one but authorized hospital personnel pass. He smiled at Leah, opening the door. Elise lay back, her curly hair dripping out of the cloth headscarf that modestly hid it from male eyes. Her eyes were closed, and two dark red spots made her cheeks seem jolly. Or feverish, Leah worried. She stood there looking, holding her breath.

My Elise. My religious granddaughter who went to the homeland, to live in a place where Jews didn’t have to be afraid…

Elise opened her eyes, taking a moment to focus.
“Bubbee?”

“Darling.”

“Oh,
Bubbee!”
She lifted herself up off the pillow, hugging the small, old woman who patted her back as she would a child’s, in long, gentle strokes.

They clung to each other, rocking in a silent paroxysm of grief, love and understanding.

“When did you…?” Elise asked.

“What do you mean? As soon as I heard. You could keep me away?”

“But your heart…”

“It’s pumping. It pumps in Boro Park, it pumps in Jerusalem. My heart knows where it pumps? My
neshama is
here, so my heart better get used to it. Besides, Esther sent me a fancy doctor. He checked. He gave me more pills. He says I’m fine. But tell me, how are you?”

Two big tears ran down Elise’s cheeks.

Leah held her hands. “Don’t,
maideleh.
Don’t. I know what it is, believe me. I know. But you can’t give up hope.
‘Lommir nisht zorgen vos vet zein morgen, lommir besserfarrichten dem beint un dem nechten.’
”

“What does it mean?”

“I forget you are a
shiksa
and don’t know Yiddish.” She smiled. “It means: ‘Don’t worry about tomorrow, better to fix today and yesterday’ You have no control over the universe, only over yourself, and you have to keep hoping and praying to God.”

“I pray all the time. I’m just not sure anyone is listening…”

“Shhh! Elise,
‘Ver es git leben, vet geben tzum leben.’
‘He who gives life, nourishes life.’ He listens, this I can tell you. Whatever happens, He’s listening. He doesn’t always answer right away.” She hesitated. “He doesn’t always say yes. But He’s listening. This much I promise you.”

Elise put her hands on her stomach, glancing at the monitor with its steady green graphs. “No one will tell me anything. The doctors are afraid to let the army talk to me. So I get a briefing once a day. It’s driving me crazy, not knowing.”

Leah pulled over a chair and sat down. “What
do
you know?”

Elise looked at her. “Only that Jon and liana are alive, and that the army is doing whatever it can to get them released. That’s what I know.”

“So, you know what everybody knows. But now I’ll tell you something nobody knows. I’ve called up the Covenant.”

“Your friends from Auschwitz? Oh,
Bubbee, Bubbee.”
She sighed, squeezing the old, beloved hand indulgently, shaking her head. “This is not your problem. There is nothing any of you can do.”

“You don’t know, you don’t know. Four old ladies, you’re thinking… So, you’ll see. They know people… they have connections… Ariana has a nightclub in Paris. Every drek in Europe goes in there… and Esther has a granddaughter married to a Saudi Arabian… and Maria’s grandchild makes movies, he’s going to find out about the videotape with Jon and liana…”

Elise blinked. “Videotape? With Jon and liana? What videotape?”

Leah looked at her, stricken. It had been on all over the place. First on BCN, and then afterward, on every news program, again and again. How could it be she didn’t know? Leah rose slowly. “Oy, you know what, I’m
falling off my feet, Elise. And they made me promise I’d only stay for a few minutes…”

“Bubbee, what tape!?”
She clutched at her grandmother’s skirt, bunching the material fiercely in her hands. “I have to see it!” She pulled herself up and started getting off the bed.

“Elise, Elise,” Leah said frantically. Oy,
gotteinu,gotteinu
, what have I done? “Please, Elise, get back into bed… if anything happens to you and the baby because of what I’ve done, I’ll never forgive myself. Never.” She trembled.

Elise looked at her grandmother. She took a deep breath, then climbed slowly back into bed. “No. Don’t. It’s not your fault,
Bubbee.
I’m fine. I’m sorry. Just, please, tell me—what does it show? Are they alive, well?”

“Alive and well, thank God!” The truth was, after a brief look at Jon and liana—which had made her sick—she hadn’t been able to watch.

Elise slowly exhaled, trying to keep control. She would slam on desks, turn over tables, but she would see that tape. She’d deal with it as soon as her grandmother left. “I’m all right. I know I have to relax. I promised Jon. I want to put a healthy baby into his arms… when… when he comes home. But
Bubbee
, you should go now,” she said impatiently. “You must be falling off your feet. Go lie down.”

“Yes,
maideleh.”
Leah hugged her. “I’ll go. And you remember your promise to Jon. I’m going now. Elise…” She wants to get rid of me. And all she’s going to think about from now on is that tape. And it’s all my fault.

“Thank you for coming. Thank your friends for trying to help… but tell them not to worry. I’ll see you later.”

Defeated, Leah turned to go.

“Bubbee!”

“What?” she turned around, concerned.

Elise rested her head on her grandmother’s shoulder, feeling like a child. “I love you.” The old woman did what she had dreamed of doing high in the air, for thousands of miles: she put her arms around her granddaughter’s fragile young shoulders and rested there.

Chapter Fpurteen

Paris, France
Wednesday, May 8, 2002
12:00
P.M.

M
ADAME ARIANA FEYDER
sat enthroned in her red velvet swivel chair examining her accounts, looking like those photos of a vain and aged Helena Rubinstein. Like Rubinstein, who in her nineties had frightened a burglar in her bedroom so badly that he’d run for his life, she knew that she too made people sweat.

She thought of the tourists marching up and down the Champs Elysees, already in high gear, eagerly searching for a place where later that evening they could become part of the Parisian night for the price of a cheap whiskey or an indifferent glass of wine. None of them would even notice the small cabaret tucked away on an obscure side street, a place never mentioned in mass-produced guidebooks. Indeed, except for a pair of striking, massive oak doors, Chez Ariana gave almost no indication at all of its existence.

Those knowledgable enough to find their way to those doors would find themselves blocked from entering by burly, immense security guards unless they could produce both a membership card and a password. And even then, Madame Feyder had the discretion to decide whether or not to buzz them in. On occasion, they sometimes found their cards had been cancelled or the password changed. And those members who brought guests understood that they would all find themselves waiting out on the street while the guards urgently consulted with her in the back office. None of them could guess in advance what she would decide, her criteria being entirely personal and idiosyncratic.

On the whole, she allowed in rich and famous people who were—or could be—useful to her. But she also let in struggling artists or musicians whose talent she respected; people she felt sorry for, like the balding tourists who had read about her club in
People
magazine; and young college students because she liked the color of their hair, or the way they said a certain word. The criteria for female guests was undeniably their beauty.

Thus, on any given evening one could find starving writers and unemployed saxophone players, high-level cabinet ministers, an insurance salesman from Milwaukee, shadowy underworld kingpins, billionaire arms brokers and the dictators of small Third World countries all intermingling in strange harmony in the charming restaurant and dance hall. Famous actresses, exquisite runway models and up-and-coming young call girls crowded the small dance floor, an important part of the cabaret’s attraction.