The First Lady walked casually with the Secret Service agent to the far end of the balcony, then turned and stood in front of him, uncomfortably close. Her voice took on an uncharacteristically venomous tone that sent alarm bells clanging for the agent.
“Joe, you rat on me again and you’ll regret it for the rest of your life,” she said, glaring, her face inches from his. “What goes on between me and my husband is between me and my husband. You work for me. If you don’t want to work for me, fine; tell me, and I’ll get you an assignment guarding a bucket of frozen moose shit in Alaska.”
The Secret Service agent, trained to throw himself in front of this woman and take an assassin’s bullet in his own body, was shaken by her words.
“Do you know what I’m referring to, Joe?” Catherine Quaid asked. “A little matter involving Air Force One? Does that refresh your memory, Joe?”
She poked his chest with one finger.
“Do you get my point, Joe?”
Another poke, harder this time.
He could barely collect himself enough to answer.
“Yes, ma’am, yes, absolutely, ma’am, I understand one hundred percent, ma’am,” he stuttered.
“Tell me, Joe, what would they do to a Secret Service agent who copped a feel from the First Lady? It wouldn’t be pretty, would it, Joe?”
The poor man’s face was ashen.
“That would be an exceptionally ugly scene, ma’am,” he said carefully.
“So, Joe, may I assume that we have a clear understanding, you and I? No more whispering to anybody about what I’m doing or who I’m doing it with, right, Joe?”
“Yes, ma’am, yes we certainly do,” he answered.
“Wonderful,” Catherine Quaid said. “Now, let me tell you where we are going tomorrow.”
CHAPTER 52
Sarah Goldberg had met Rabbi Garfinkle two years earlier at a conference on youth aliyah to Israel. Aliyah, from the Hebrew word for “ascent,” referred to immigration to Israel. Rabbi Garfinkle was impressed with Goldberg. He contacted her within days of first proposing the march, asking her to serve on the steering committee. Sarah acknowledged to her husband that they were trying to get speakers from all around the country and she was probably the only Jewish Mainer Rabbi Garfinkle knew.
Sarah was asked to speak at the event. She had no idea what to say. Recalling the civil rights struggle and Martin Luther King’s preaching of nonviolence sounded wishy-washy after news of the mall bombings. In the back of her mind, too, Sarah was aware that Abram was planning some violent action of his own, making her feel hypocritical preaching nonviolence.
Sarah and Debra Rueben sat up late into the night crafting an outline of Sarah’s speech. Around eleven that evening, Abram returned from the meeting in Boston. His first words when he entered the house and saw Reuben startled her.
“What happened to Levi?” he asked. “He never showed up. Never called either.”
Reuben’s stomach had been twisted in a knot since she watched Levi drive away.
“The man embarrassed me in front of some very important people. I’d built him up as some big new-day Maccabee warrior and then he never shows up. I got the go-ahead for my boys anyway, so I suppose there was no harm done,” he said, “but the man let me down. I don’t forget that easily.”
“I hope he’s all right,” Reuben said quietly.
Sarah looked at her husband.
“You heard about the mall bombings, I assume?” she asked.
“Heard about it? It’s just about all we talked about in Boston,” he said excitedly. “This is how the war is going to be fought, mark my words. Not by big, coordinated efforts but by small groups of fighters, each acting independently but all for the same goal.
“Sarah, I know you believe that singing the right songs and waving the cleverest signs will get those Washington nudniks to do the right thing for Israel. You’ll see, though, my way works. My way works. Terror works. Nobody wants to admit that, but it is the truth. Terror brings change. We will make life so miserable for these politicians that they will have no choice but to give in; you’ll see.”
“Is that what your secret big shots in Boston told you, Abram?” Sarah asked.
“It certainly is, and it’s what I told them. They had no idea who did those mall bombings, but they were all for them. Sarah, you know what else we talked about?” Abram asked. “We talked about the lesson Israel taught the Arabs with Damascus. They’ll think again about the price they’ll have to pay for attacking Jews. We don’t know who ordered that bombing. Maybe we’ll never know. But I’ll tell you one thing, Sarah. Whoever did that, it was one Jew with giant balls.”
He was puzzled by the knowing looks the two women exchanged. But he was too aroused to stop talking.
“Do you think for one minute the United States would be willing to pay that same price? No way, never. When it comes to a choice between paying a dollar or two more for a gallon of gasoline or losing, say, Chicago or Dallas, don’t you think that would be an easy choice for Mr. President Quaid? Bombs send a message. Enough bombs send enough of a message. We certainly sent a loud and clear message to Damascus, didn’t we?”
Abram was surprised that neither woman responded. He felt perhaps he’d gone too far with his talk about bombs.
“So, how is the big speech coming?” he asked his wife.
“Nowhere at all is where it’s coming,” she said dejectedly. “Somehow preaching nonviolence feels foolish, as if a sit-in at the Capitol is going to get any relief supplies, or Marines, to Israel. I’m not quite that naive.”
“That’s nice to hear,” Goldhersh said, smiling. “Has there been anything on the news about who did the mall bombings? My three young friends are going to be excited about the two men—Hassids, I heard—who beat them to the first punch.”
Abram walked across the room and picked up the television remote, turning on the TV in the kitchen, where they were sitting at a table. The 11 o’clock news was just beginning.
The screen filled with video obviously filmed from an airplane showing a long traffic backup.
“That’s the Hampton Toll Plaza,” Sarah said.
“Hush,” her husband responded. “Listen.”
“Dramatic footage taken from a traffic helicopter shows what the FBI says was a daring escape attempt by a man government sources confirmed was an Israeli military commando,” the announcer excitedly intoned. “The man was detained by the FBI on suspicion of smuggling weapons into this country.
“The New York Times reported on its website minutes ago that undisclosed sources in the Department of Homeland Security hinted that the Israeli had smuggled weapons of mass destruction into this country. The source did not elaborate about the type of weapons, although the source did say that while a small amount of radioactive material was recovered in the man’s car, more of the weapons remain at large.”
The aerial camera zoomed in on a Honda Accord crushed against a tree near the tollbooth.
Debra Reuben screamed. “That’s the car Chaim was in!”
The television news reader continued, “The terrorist, who has yet to be identified, overpowered two armed FBI agents. He was shot and killed attempting to escape.”
“No, no, no, no, no.” Reuben’s head slumped to the table. Sarah placed an arm around her shoulder. Without removing her arm from her friend, Sarah looked up at her husband. She spoke over Reuben’s sobs.
“So much for nonviolence,” Sarah said. She paused in thought. “Abram, the car—whose car was he driving? They’ll trace the car, won’t they?”
The large man did not answer. Despite his career buying and selling death-dealing devices, this was the first violent death that had visited his life, at least so closely. The reality of what he was planning to do settled into his consciousness. But only momentarily. He collected himself quickly and answered, “The car belongs to my Mr. Aleph. It doesn’t matter whether they trace it to him or not. He isn’t going home again.”