They walked over the plateau through a pine forest with relics of Roman, Byzantine, Crusader, and Arab all around. Mosaics, pottery, a wall here, a stone there.
Two abbeys, one Greek Orthodox and one Roman Catholic, stood near the grounds believed to be the place Christ was transfigured and spoke to Moses and Elijah.
Beyond the forest they reached the highest point of Tabor. Ruins of a Crusader fort and Saracen castle occupied the site. They picked their way over the rubble and the walls until they had climbed the eastern rampart which hung over the mountain side and was called Wall of the East Winds. Here the Sea of Galilee came into full view with the Horns of Hattin where Saladin the Kurd demolished Crusader forces.
The wind blew through Kitty’s hair as she stood on the wall and the air began to cool again. They sat for over an
hour with Ari pointing out the countless points of Biblical history. Finally they retreated to that point on the edge of the forest where it met the castles, and changed back to their warmer clothing. Ari spread their blankets and Kitty stretched out and grunted with a weary happiness. “It has been a wonderful day, Ari, but I am going to ache for a week.”
Ari propped himself up on an elbow, watched her. Again he felt a desire for her but he held his silence.
By dusk, parties of threes and fours and fives began reaching the summit. There were dark and olive-skinned Orientals and Africans and there were blonds who had immigrated to Israel. There were many girls, most of them straight and high breasted. There were the sabras with their large mustaches and the stamp of aggressiveness. It was a reunion. Palmach groups had to train in small units in different kibbutzim to remain hidden. This was a chance for both friends from the city and from the same settlements to see each other again and for sweethearts to meet. The greetings were warm, with affectionate hugs and back slaps and kisses. They were a lively bunch of youngsters in their late teens and early twenties.
Joab Yarkoni and Zev Gilboa had come when they learned Kitty would be there, and she was delighted.
David and Jordana came also, and Jordana was provoked by David’s attention to Kitty, but she remained quiet to avoid creating a scene.
By dusk nearly two hundred of the young Palmach soldiers had gathered. A pit was dug near the castle wall, while some of them turned to gathering wood for an all-night fire. Three lambs were prepared and spitted for roasting. The sun plunged down behind the Jezreel Valley, the fire was lit with a single bursting blaze, and the lambs were placed over their pits and couples joined in a huge circle around the fire. Kitty, the visiting dignitary, was forced into the place of honor with Joab, Zev, and Ari around her.
Soon the plateau atop Mount Tabor rang with songs. They were the same songs that Kitty had heard the children sing at Gan Dafna. They told of the wonder of the water sprinklers that redeemed the land and they told of the beauty of the Galilee and Judea. They sang of how haunted and lovely was the Negev Desert and they sang the spirited marches of the old Guardsman and the Haganah and the Palmach. They sang a song that said that David the King still walked the land of Israel.
Joab sat cross-legged with his tambour before him. It was a clay drum with goatskin head. With his fingertips and the heels of his hand he beat a rhythm to a reed flute
playing an ancient Hebraic melody. Several of the Oriental girls danced in the same slow, swaying, sensuous gyrations that must have been danced in the palace of Solomon.
With each new song and each new dance the party quickened.
“Jordana!” someone called. “We want Jordana!”
She got into the ring and a cheer went up. An accordion played a Hungarian folk tune” and everyone clapped in beat and Jordana whirled around the edge of the ring pulling out partners for a wild czardas. One by one she danced her partners down, with her red hair flying wildly in her face, framed against the leaping fire. Faster the accordion played and faster the onlookers clapped until Jordana herself stopped in exhaustion.
A half dozen came to the center and started a hora, the dance of the Jewish peasants. The hora ring grew larger and larger until everyone was up and a second ring formed outside the first. Joab and Ari pulled Kitty into the circle. The circle moved in one direction, then stopped as the dancers made a sudden leap and changed directions.
They had been singing and dancing for four hours and there was no indication of slowing up. David and Jordana slipped away quietly to the Saracen castle and wandered through the rooms until the sounds of the music and the tambour nearly vanished. They came upon a tiny cell set in the Wall of the East Winds and now the sound of the wind from the Jezreel Valley was all that they could hear. David spread his blanket on the earth and they embraced and caressed and loved each other.
“David! David!” Jordana cried, “I love you so!”
The wind died and they could hear wild music …
“David … David … David …” she whispered over and over as her lips pressed his neck …
And David repeated her name over and over.
His hand felt for the smoothness of her body. She took the clothing from her to ea.se his way and they pressed against each other and she asked to be taken and they blended into one.
After their love, Jordana lay in his arms. His fingertips traced over her lips and her eyes and through her hair.
“Jordana.” His whisper thrilled her through her body and soul.
“Do you remember the first time, David?”
“Yes.”
“I am the rose of Sharon and the lily of the valleys… .” she whispered. “For lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone; the flowers appear on the earth; the time of the
singing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in our land.”
It became so still that each could hear only the other’s uneven breathing and the other’s heart beating.
“Take us the foxes, the little foxes, that spoil the vines: for our vines have tender grapes. My beloved is mine and I am his. Oh, David … tell me, tell me.”
David whispered with his lips touching her ear, “Behold thou art fair, my love; behold, thou art fair; thou has doves’ eyes within thy locks … thy lips are like a thread of scarlet …”
She squeezed his hand that rested upon her breast and he kissed her breast … “Thy two breasts are like two young roes that are twins, which feed among the lilies… .”
And he kissed her lips … “And the roof of thy mouth like the best wine for my beloved, that goeth down sweetly, causing the lips of those who are asleep to speak.”
David and Jordana fell into a bliss-filled sleep, locked tightly in each other’s arms.
At four o’clock in the morning the lamb was served, with hot Arabic coffee. Kitty was honored with the first cut. The fervor of song and dance had slowed a little; many of the couples lay in each other’s arms. The lamb tasted wonderful.
Joab played his tambour, and the reed flute behind him made a tune as ancient as the land itself. One of the girls who had been born in distant Yemen sang in a voice filled with the mystic and melancholy of the Hebrew, right from the pages of the Bible. Her haunting voice sang a Psalm of David.
Kitty Fremont looked at the faces in the dying firelight.
What kind of army was this? What kind of army without uniform or rank? What kind of army where the women, fought alongside their men with rifle and bayonet? Who were these young lions of Judea?
She looked at the face of Ari Ben Canaan and a chill passed through her body. An electrifying revelation bit her.