Rabbi Garfinkle looked around the crowded room. Nobody else made any effort to speak. The rabbi smiled.
“Now that is a minor miracle,” he said. “Forty Jews in the same room and nobody wants to say anything. I’ll take that as a consensus. The march goes on. I’ll get a message to the attorney general expressing our confidence that the police will be able to protect peaceful marchers from any threats.
“For those of you speaking tomorrow, remember, ten minutes each, no more. For the rest of you, I’ll see you tomorrow at 10 a.m. To quote one of my favorite Jews from another planet, Mork from Ork, be there or be square.”
Shapiro and Aaron Hocksberg returned to the suite at the Renaissance. Shapiro stopped in the hallway to surreptitiously check his cell phone for Sally’s message, feeling guilty that he’d ignored her telephone call during his drive to DC. There were two messages from his office, nothing from his wife. Fuck her, he thought. I know she called. If she won’t leave a message, I’ll be damned if I’ll call her again.
Returning to Hocksberg’s suite, Shapiro found Judy Katz on the balcony engaged in conversation with a short woman. Katz’s face lit up as she spotted Shapiro. When Shapiro walked up to the two women, Katz placed her hand on his arm and left it there comfortably.
“Ben, this is Sarah Goldberg,” she said. “Sarah’s from Portland, Maine. She is going to be speaking tomorrow.”
Sarah laughed. “I’m only going to be speaking if I can figure out what I’m going to say,” she said. “I’d planned on talking about nonviolence. I still could, I suppose. My husband threatened to beat me if I do, though.”
She saw the shocked look on Katz’s face.
“Kidding, just kidding, that was a joke,” she said quickly. “I guess this is no time for jokes. Seriously, my husband was not especially upset by those mall bombings. He’s rather, to understate it, rather militant. To tell you the truth, I think he was jealous of the bombers.”
Shapiro and Katz were silent, not knowing how to respond. Shapiro spoke. He sounded sad.
“Sarah, I understand where your husband is coming from. Look, I’m a lawyer. I believe in the system of laws. But I’ll tell you, I don’t believe the legal system, or even the political system, is going to do the right thing now. No judge is going to stand in the way of this political wave.”
“Especially this Supreme Court,” Katz said. “Most of them have been there since the last time the Republicans ran both the White House and Congress at the same time. They’ll be the first ones waving the flag in front of the detention camps, like the Supreme Court gave its stamp of approval when Japanese-Americans were herded into concentration camps.”
“I can’t disagree with you there,” Shapiro said. “The politicians are even worse. We can’t find a senator willing to sit on the podium tomorrow, much less vote to intervene to save what is left of Israel. No, it isn’t going to happen by either legal or political means. I’ve been tossing around at night thinking that Israel has been destroyed, that maybe a million Jews are in concentration camps run by Arabs instead of Germans, and that this country isn’t lifting a finger to stop it.
“Even worse, what am I doing about it? Filing lawsuits that will get nowhere? Making speeches? As if words are going to save a single life or feed a single child in Israel. No, Sarah, I understand what your husband is saying.”
“And just as bad, now we’ve got our own concentration camp for Jews sitting on Cape Cod,” Goldberg added. “And a president who seems to want to leave his name in the history books by stomping on Jews.”
Judy Katz, standing between the other two, put an arm on Sarah’s shoulder and her other on Shapiro’s back, rubbing him lightly, casually, possessively.
“I don’t think your speech tomorrow is going to make a whole lot of difference,” Katz said. “But why don’t we find a place for some lunch and we can work on the speech anyway?”
Shapiro was silent as they rode the elevator to the lobby. He was shocked by his own words. It was the first time he’d expressed out loud a feeling growing in him for several weeks.
If there is no legal solution and if there is no political solution, what course of action is left? If you know a holocaust is coming, what action is justified to try to stop it? Or, he thought, looked at another way, is there any action that would not be justified if it would help stop a holocaust?
CHAPTER 49
Debra Reuben missed the quiet house on the water in Brooklin even before she left it. She did not expect to return. Ever. Her greatest concern was how she would get in touch with Levi to warn him not to return either. She would have to depend on Abram to reach Levi.
She’d packed what little she had into a suitcase she’d found in the basement, feeling badly about taking clothing from the anonymous owner of the house. I’ll get it back to her somehow, she said to herself.
Reuben had made up her mind about what to do with the object in the wine cellar. She feared that if she left it in the basement, it would be found before she could return to collect it. She mentally kicked herself for using the library computer. The FBI agents were certain to return and discover that somebody in sleepy Brooklin had an interest in handling atomic bombs. There could not be many new people in town besides herself and Levi. The FBI will soon be on the doorstep with a warrant, she thought. And handcuffs.
She looked at the plastic-wrapped cylinder in the wine cellar. Maybe I should let them have the damn thing, she thought. What a relief it would be to just walk away from it. But she couldn’t. The bomb belonged to Israel, which, when reconstituted, might someday need it. If only there was someone she trusted to hand it over to.
Rueben knew she could no longer hide the weapon from Sarah, which also meant that Abram was certain to learn about it. Reuben was disturbed at the thought of Abram Goldhersh and his organization getting the bomb, but she could see no alternative.
She sat on the front porch, waiting for Sarah to arrive, hoping the car that came up the driveway would be Sarah and not the black SUV. While she waited, she sat in a rocking chair and looked at the calm water, an occasional lobster boat roaring by.
I’m going to miss this house so much, she thought. Then she smiled. This is where Chaim and I fell in love. Someday I’ll tell my grandchildren how their grandfather sailed me across the ocean and we lived in a cottage by the sea.
The sound of a car in the gravel driveway woke her with a start. Heart beating furiously, she leaned her head around the end of the porch to glance at the driveway. Sarah’s car, she smiled.
Reuben took one step toward her friend, then froze. The THWAKA-THWAKA-THWAKA of a helicopter drowned out any greeting she could have shouted. FBI, she thought, looking up at the helicopter flying slowly along the shore, seemingly straight toward her. Same one that’s been going back and forth all week.
The sound of the machine faded. Sarah got out of her car and spotted Reuben coming around the edge of the house from the porch.