He turned again; now his body was silhouetted against Jerusalem, and David had trouble reading the expression on his face. "…except Jacob Gutman doesn't like leaking toilets. Not that he's so fastidious, you understand. Just that in that regard he's like everybody else. So, good Jew that he is, he knows how to survive. He does what a Jew has always done. Opens up a little shop.
"Now there're all kinds of little Jewish shops. Tailor shops. Dry goods shops. Little grocery stores. Places to buy some lace, some shoes, maybe borrow money on a watch. All those kinds of shops have one goal in common: Sell things for more than you pay out. It's called business. And who's to say who's the sharpie and who's the thief and who's the honest Jewish businessman?
"For a guy like Gutman, those kinds of fine distinctions got blurred along the way. He looks around and thinks: I was one of those few guys who went around occupied Germany in '45 and '46 cleaning things up, doing a little public-service de-Nazification with my pals Gati and Doc Bar-Lev. I actually planned a lot of those missions, the way we'd show up at a guy's house, oh-so-polite in our nicely pressed British uniforms, show him our well-forged summons for interrogation, apologize for the intrusion to his wife, then lead him off politely to our borrowed official truck. Then I'd get in the back with him, pull the canvas flaps shut, and break his neck, quick, the way the Brits taught us in their commando school. Then we'd dump him by the side of the road-no burial necessary because you only take that kind of trouble with a human being. Then on to the next guy the authorities didn't care about. You know, the little guy, the average run-of-the-mill little murderer. And I, who'd done all that, who'd taken upon myself the nasty exterminator's job, find that now that I'mold, my wife's gone, and my daughter's dead, I don't have a marketable skill worth shit in this wonderful meretricious New Society of ours. I look around and what do I see? Everyone stealing, extorting, buying luxuries, getting rich. The country I fought for acting like a harlot running to the Americans for hand-outs every time she overspends. So what should I do? Pretend she's still the same? Hell with that! I'll set myself up in a kind of little Jewish shop. I'll pick up old Torahs, not ask too many questions about where they're from, and sell them to Americans who'd rather buy one cheap than pay a scribe to write one new."
Gati stepped forward, sat down, looked hard at David, and then, for the first time since he'd come into the apartment, he gave a classic Israeli shrug. As if to say: "Well, that's it, my plea, I rest my case." Then, while David stared at him amazed, he took up his water glass, and slowly, carefully wet his lips.
When Anna called from Paris after midnight, he sensed the tension in her voice.
"What's the matter?"
"Nothing. I just wanted to talk. I'll be home soon. Just a couple more days. Can't wait. Oh, David-I miss you so much…"
She sounded, he thought, as if she were about to cry.
His door was open but Rebecca Marcus knocked anyway. "Man on the phone, David. Won't give his name. Insists on speaking to you."
Raskov? No, he'd identify himself "Okay, ask him what he wants -I'll listen in."
Rebecca nodded. David pushed a button and picked up the dead-key on his phone.
"… say it's one of Peretz's old boys and I know about the 'signature.'"
"Can you describe it?" Rebecca asked.
"Sure. Pairs of cuts across the tits."
Silence for a moment, then Rebecca's voice, controlled: "Just one moment, sir. I'll see if the captain's available now."
When Rebecca reappeared at the door her face looked drawn. David signaled her to start a trace. Then he took the call.
"Bar-Lev here. We don't usually talk to people until they tell us who they are."
"And if they have information?" The voice was rough, the accent North African.
"If you're looking for a reward-"
"I'm not."
"So what do you want?"
"Got a list."
"What kind of list?"
"Guys in Peretz's unit."
"Your name on it too?"
"Fuck you, policeman. Why you giving me all this shit?"
"If you want to help us out and you don't want to identify yourself, kindly drop your list to us in the mail."
"Can't do that."
"Why not?"
"You want the list or no?"
David thought a moment. "Okay, I want the list."
"Come to Anna Freud Garden. Givat Ram. Three this afternoon."
"Wait a minute! I didn't say-"
"Don't stall, Bar-Lev. And come alone. Nobody else. Or you don't get the list." He hung up.
"It's just a patch of bushes in the middle of the campus," said Dov. Not isolated at all. At three o'clock there'll be a mob."
"So what kind of a secret meeting place is that?" Micha asked.
"Suppose some kid comes up to David with a slip of paper. Go to X. Then go to Y. Treasure-hunt style. It would be tough to keep him covered."
"Anna Freud-maybe he knows about your father," Shoshana said.
"That's pretty sophisticated. This guy didn't sound like that."
"Suppose he's for real?"
"Fine. We could use a list. And if he's faking, part of the conspiracy, we need to know that too." They all looked at him. Dov seemed worried. "What's he going to do?" David asked. "Shoot me in the head?"
"I don't like it. All of a sudden like this. I mean, now we're way past Peretz."
"But we've been working on a list. Word could have gotten around. We know details on the marks have gotten out. Listen-I know if I don't go we'll kick ourselves tomorrow. So I go. Okay? Everyone agrees?"
He waited in the Anna Freud Garden from a quarter of three. The sun was hot and the bullet-proof vest they'd urged him to wear was uncomfortable and made him sweat. Students lay about on blankets sunbathing, talking, several couples kissing, a few actually reading books. By five he'd had it. He got up, shook his head and stalked off. He met Micha and Dov in the parking lot.
"It was a test, David. To see if you'd show up alone."
"Could be. Hundreds of windows around. I could have been easily observed. Or maybe it was just a stunt. So to hell with it! Guy calls back, I don't want to talk to him. Then we'll see how bad he wants me. Next time he can sweat."
At ten that evening he was listening to one of Anna's records, an old Pierre Fournier recording, when his telephone rang. It was the same caller. "You walked out on me."
"Fuck you," David said, and hung up.
When the phone rang again he sat watching it, letting the rings penetrate the music, echo against the apartment walls. Finally, after fifteen rings, he picked it up. "Yeah? What do you want?"
"Sorry. Got held up. No way to get in touch."
"No big deal. Forget it."
"Don't you want the list? I can give it to you tonight."
"Call my office in the morning. Work it out with someone else."
"Wait! I'm serious."
"Funny, I don't think you are."
"Give me another chance."
"Tell me: Why do you care so much?"
"When we meet I'll tell you everything. Then you'll understand." A pause. "I know you're not afraid, Bar-Lev. What have you got to lose?"
"My sleep."
"Oh come on…" There was something coaxing in the man's voice this time, taunting too, that went beyond mere toughness and made him curious.
"How about a cafe on Ben Yehuda?"
"Uh uh. The Biblical Zoo."
"They lock up at sunset."
"You're a cop. The guard'll let you in."
"What about you?"
"I'll be there."
"So, are you a cop too?"
"Come alone, Bar-Lev. Midnight by the leopard's cage. If I don't show up within ten minutes, go home. Forget me. You'll know I'm just a fake."
Midnight by the leopard's cage-something appealingly melodramatic about that. Stupid, perhaps, to go alone, but even more stupid if anyone tried to harm him. The people who'd done the killings were certain to know that they couldn't stop an investigation by murdering the officer in charge.