Chapter 44 – Finale

Rania was looking directly into the barrel of the machine gun.  Wilensky’s finger was on the trigger and he would have pulled it, but he stopped short when he saw who was with her.

“Avi, what is going on?”

“That’s what I was going to ask you.” Avi said.

He moved slowly but deliberately, coming to stand right next to Chloe.  Rania remained a little bit behind them, her gun pointed down at the floor.

“Who is that?” Wilensky demanded, pointing at her with his chin.

“No one you need to worry about,” Avi answered.

“You should not be here,” Wilensky said to Avi.  “You don’t know what you are dealing with.”

“I know enough,” Avi said, maintaining direct eye contact.  He moved to stand in front of Chloe, blocking her with his body.  His chest was less than a foot from the barrel of the gun.

“Go ahead,” he said.  “Kill me just like you killed Nadya.”

This kid had guts, Rania had to concede.  She had never thought she would see an Israeli show that kind of courage, to stand unarmed facing a loaded gun.  They were so used to having weapons at their disposal.

The gesture moved Wilensky too.  Incongruously, fondness crept into his hard eyes.  He relaxed his death grip on the weapon, let it fall to his side.

“I couldn’t kill you, Avi,” he said.  “You’re like my own son.  Besides, it doesn’t matter if you accuse me of killing Nadya.  No one will believe you.”

“They’ll believe me,” Nir Gelenter said.

None of them had heard the car, but when Chloe looked outside the dim hangar, there it was, next to the one Wilensky had driven.

“Shaul Gabi called and said Chloe didn’t get on the plane,” he said to Wilensky.  “He said a colonel came and stopped her flight.”

“I never thought I’d be glad to see him,” Chloe whispered to Rania.

“Are you sure he’s here to help?” Rania cautioned.

The two men were focused on each other now, completely ignoring the rest of them.  The other three moved back, until they were nearly in the doorway.

“How did you know where to find me?” Chloe whispered to Rania.

“We found that captain, Shaul, and he told us an Air Force colonel took you away.  Avi said he knew where you would be.  He came here as a child, with his father and his uncle.”

“How could you do it, Yisrael?” Nir was asking Wilensky.

“She said someone had a copy of the letter,” Wilensky explained, gesturing toward Chloe.  “I needed to find out …”

“I meant Nadya,” Gelenter clarified.  “How could you kill her?  I loved her!”

“She didn’t love you,” Wilensky said.  “She betrayed you.”

“I know,” Gelenter said.  Rania almost felt sympathy for him.  “You told me you were going to pay her.”

“I did pay her,” Wilensky said.  “But she would not give me the paper.”

They were speaking in Hebrew.  Avi translated in a soft voice for Chloe and Rania.

“He says he didn’t mean to kill her.  The day before he left for Italy, she told him she had something that would destroy him.  She said if he didn’t give her ten thousand dollars, she would go to the police.  He told her to forget it.  But then after he was gone, he thought about it and decided the risk was too great.  He called her at the house and said he would pay.  But she said it was too late, she was selling it to someone else.  She said, ‘Tomorrow I destroy your life.’  So he came back to stop her.  He knew she met Fareed in the fields; he had followed her there once.  He waited there for her.  He saw her talking to Dmitri, and then he saw Dmitri walking away.  He intercepted him and demanded the document.  Dmitri said he didn’t buy it, her price was too high.

“He went after Nadya.  They sat in his car and argued.  He demanded she give him the document, but she wouldn’t.  He tried to grab her bag from her, and she ran from the car.  They struggled, and she fell down the embankment and hit her head on a rock.”

Nir was wavering, Rania could tell.  He wanted to believe it.

“Why did you steal the car?” Rania stepped out of the shadows.  She could see Gelenter’s steely eyes glinting in the dark.

“What are you doing here?” he asked through clenched teeth.

“Trying to learn the truth,” she said.  “And what you just heard is not the truth.”

“How do you know?”

“We found fragments of Nadya’s clothes scattered over the land in a lateral pattern.  There was blood on the grass from her head wound, but no rock with blood on it.  Someone dragged her along the creek bed.”

“We already know that the Palestinian kid moved her,” Gelenter objected.

How had he gotten access to the kid’s confession?  How could she imagine that he wouldn’t have?  It wasn’t that important, but it galled her.

“If you know that much, you know that he didn’t drag her, he carried her.”

“So he says.”

“The physical evidence confirmed it.”  She turned back to Wilensky. “If you paid her, what happened to the money?  She had no money when we found her.”

“So the Palestinian kid took it.”

Once again, Fareed was proving a convenient scapegoat.  “If she had fallen down the embankment, she would have dropped her bag and it would not have been next to her when Fareed found her.  I think she ran away, and you followed her, because you could not allow her to live with what she knew.”

“No.  It wasn’t that way.  It happened just as I said.”

“Did it?” she turned to Gelenter.  “Think about my question.  If he did not plan to kill her, why did he go in a stolen car, instead of his own?”

Logic, she could see, told him she was right.  Everything he believed told him not to take the word of a Palestinian woman over his oldest friend’s.

“Nir,” Wilensky said.

Gelenter cut him off with a wave of his hand.  He turned away from them all, wrestling with his own demons for a long few minutes.  When he turned back, he was in command again.

“Avi,” he said, “You cannot tell anyone about this.”

“Fareed is my friend,” Avi said.  “I won’t let him sit in jail for a crime he didn’t commit.”

“You don’t know all the facts,” Gelenter insisted.  “Tell him,” to Wilensky.

“Tell me what?  What are you talking about?”  Chloe and Rania glanced at each other.

“How do you think I got back into Israel and back to Italy, with no one knowing?” Wilensky asked Avi.

Confusion played on the young man’s face.  “I don’t understand what you’re trying to say,” he said.  His eyes scanned one face, then another, finally locking on Rania’s.

“It was your father,” she said.  “He took a plane from Hatserim.”

“My father?”  He looked around for confirmation from the others, and received it.

“You knew too?” he asked Chloe.

“She told me.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“We weren’t sure you didn’t know.”

He sank to the floor, sitting cross-legged, head in his hands.  Chloe stooped next to him, awkwardly patting his shoulder.

“We just didn’t know what to think,” she said softly.  “This country, it screws with your mind.”

“Yeah, well unfortunately it’s my country.”  He sat a few minutes longer, his fingers making designs in the dust.

“My father didn’t know what you were going to do,” he said weakly.

“Who can be sure?” Gelenter asked.  “In your father’s line of work, a person must be completely free from scandal.  Don’t you think this might cause difficulties for him?”

For a long moment, no one and nothing in the old hangar stirred.  Rania thought she could hear blades of grass blowing in the breeze outside.

“What about Fareed?” Avi said.

“If I get him out, will you let this go?” Gelenter asked.

“You will get him out?”

“I promise.”

Rania exhaled.  She was disappointed, but she shouldn’t have been.  People were who they were.  In his place, she would probably have done the same.  Gelenter seemed relaxed now that he had Avi’s agreement.  He wasn’t worried about her or Chloe at all, Rania thought.  It was like they didn’t even count.  But of course, in his world, they didn’t.

She and Chloe headed for the door and no one stopped them.  Avi followed, saying nothing to the two men who were huddled together, Gelenter with one arm across his friend’s shoulder.  They climbed back over the fence where she had cut her hand on the razor wire in the rush to save Chloe.  It took them ten minutes to walk to the place where Avi had stashed his parents’ car.  An hour earlier, they had run the distance in under half the time.

Avi wanted to go through Deir Balut checkpoint, or Azzun gate, to take her all the way to Mas’ha.  She insisted he drop her on the road.

“The checkpoints are closed,” she said.

“Not for a yellow-plated car,” he objected.

“I don’t want anyone asking where I’ve been.”

“Give me the gun,” he said as he stopped the car above Azzawiya bridge.

“Why?  It was my husband’s.”

“Because soldiers are going to be searching your house for it sometime soon.  It can’t be there when they do.”

She handed him the gun.  And thanked him, though it rankled to do it.  Then she ran down the embankment, praying she could find the place where she had left her clothes.  She wasn’t looking forward to explaining to Bassam how her trip to the store had worked out.

*****

The smell of fried cauliflower and fresh bread greeted Chloe before she reached Ahlam’s door.  She could hear lots of happy chatter inside.

It was a double party – Fareed’s homecoming and her leaving.  Rachel had managed to recover her passport, but she had to agree that Chloe would leave Israel within ten days.  The good news was that supposedly, the Ministry of Interior would not stop her from returning at another time.  Rachel didn’t know how good her chances actually were of getting in again, but she emphasized that they would be much better if Chloe left now as agreed.

The living room was full of children and young men, Fareed’s friends from school.  Chloe studied Fareed’s face.  He had already started to lose his prison pallor and gained back a little of the weight he had lost.  He looked older too.  He was telling prison stories now, surrounded by his friends and younger brothers.  Avi sat next to him, listening, not saying anything.  Everything seemed normal again, but Chloe suspected there would never be quite the same easy trust between them.  Nothing would ever be quite the same for Fareed.  He had been through a rite of passage.

Avi would be spending more time in the village in the coming days, so they would have plenty of time to work out their relationship.  The injunction against the construction on Abu Shaadi’s land had been lifted.  Avi had met with Jaber and Abu Shaadi and the mayor that afternoon to plan strategy.  Fareed had gone too.  Before his arrest, he had not had much interest in activism; he had been too busy with school.  The Israeli authorities had created one more radical, Chloe reflected.

Alaa ran to Chloe to be swept up in a hug.

“Imi fi matbach,” the little girl said, and obediently, Chloe followed her into the kitchen.  Ahlam kissed her twice on each cheek, murmuring “Hamdillila assalaam.”

“Allah ysalmik,” Chloe gave the ritual response, her eyes drifting to the figure peeling cucumbers at the sink.  She didn’t think she could stay in here.  She wanted to wrap her arms around those slender hips and plunge her hands places that she couldn’t see.  If she was going to kiss Tina, she didn’t want it to be on the cheeks.  She hoped her face didn’t show her flustration, but she wouldn’t have wanted to take bets.

She put a soft hand on Tina’s shoulder.  Even that little contact made her crazy.  “I’m going outside for a while.”

She made her way back through the mob and stood on the porch, breathing hard.  Shit, she needed to stop acting like a horny teenager.  She needed to stop feeling like a horny teenager.  How was this happening to her, and could the timing be any worse?  Hopefully, she would stop being obsessed with Tina when she was back in the States.  Otherwise, she was going to be buying a lot of batteries for her vibrator.

“Chloe!”  Dilal, the grocer, was walking toward the house with a young girl.  The girl was strangely dressed, in a long denim skirt and a long-sleeved turtleneck.  As they got nearer, Chloe realized it was Malkah.  She walked out into the road to intercept them.

“Shuftha fi tariq,” Dilal explained, I saw her on the road.

“Shukran,” she thanked Dilal and quickly ushered the girl up to her apartment.

“Malkah, it’s nice to see you, but you should have called first.”

“I brought your phone.”  Of course.  Nir’s phone had been taken from Chloe at the airport.  She had gotten a new one, but Malkah didn’t know the number.  Malkah produced Chloe’s old phone from her pocket and held it out.

“Thank you,” she told the girl.  “Why don’t you keep it?  I have a new one now.”

“Really?”

“Sure.  You don’t have to tell your dad.  It can be our secret.”

“Will you give me your new phone number?”  Malkah was already pressing the button to add a contact to her address book.

“Um, Malkah, I have to go back to the States for a while.  But I tell you what.  When I get home, I’ll send you a text message, and then you can text me back sometimes.  Okay?”

Beaming, Malkah carefully put the phone into the front pocket of her backpack.

“Is that the reason you came?” Chloe asked her.  “It was really nice of you, but you know, it’s not so safe for someone who looks like a settler to just walk into a village, with no one knowing they are coming.”

She swallowed her feelings of disloyalty.  Malkah was thirteen and on a learning curve – not so different from her own a few years back.  The girl wasn’t quite ready to understand that international law guarantees the right to resist occupation by force of arms.  She did need to understand that the daughter of a high Israeli military official could not go walking into Palestinian villages on her own.  She would be perfectly safe in Jaber’s house, but on the street, someone might see an opportunity.

“I know,” Malkah said, “but I needed to see you.  Since I met you in Tel Aviv, my father watches me all the time.  The only place he won’t find me is a Palestinian place.”

“That was very smart and very brave,” Chloe said.  “You must have something very important to tell me.”

Malkah opened her backpack and pulled out an envelope.

“After I told Nadya what the letter said, she used my father’s fax machine to make a copy,” she said.  “She asked me to keep for her.”

Chloe pulled out the letter.  “It’s in Hebrew,” she stated the obvious.  She had forgotten that she, like Nadya, wouldn’t be able to read it.

“It is from a soldier named Yuri Shabtai,” Malkah told her.  “It says, I cannot live with what I did.  I killed Arabs in Jenaan?” she looked at Chloe for confirmation.

“Jenin,” Chloe corrected.  “Killed them how?”

“I killed women and children, not terrorists,” Malkah translated.  “I did it on Colonel Wilensky’s orders.  Then I lied to the Knesset and said the Arabs shot the women and babies.”

Malkah’s voice was wobbly.  Chloe thought maybe it would be good for her to cry, but she didn’t want her to be embarrassed.

“Thank you, Malkah.  It was right for you to give me this.  Is there something else?” she asked.  Malkah still seemed close to tears.

“If Nadya died because of this letter,” Malkah struggled, “my father must have killed her because Uncle Israel was in Italy.”

Chloe mentally smacked herself for not realizing long ago that that was Malkah’s big fear.  But what could she say now?

“Malkah,” she said.  “Your father did not kill Nadya.”

“You know that for sure?”

“I know it for positive.”  The girl’s face broke into a happy, toothy smile.  Chloe put an arm around her shoulder.

“Chloe?”  Someone was banging on her door.  She opened it to Tina and Rania.

“Dinner’s ready,” Tina said.  “Everyone’s waiting for you.”

“Tina, this is my friend Malkah.  Malkah, Tina’s phone number is in my phone, and if you need something sometime, something important, you can call her.  Right?”

She could see Tina’s hesitation.  An Israeli settler girl wasn’t her idea of a suitable protégée.  But Chloe was confident that when Tina learned what Malkah had done, she would be happy to be her friend.  As it was, she was too polite to hurt a kid’s feelings.

“Of course,” she answered.

“Hello, Malkah.  It’s nice to see you.” Rania held out a hand for Malkah to shake.

“We’d better find Malkah some transportation,” Chloe said.

Avi drove Malkah home in his parents’ car, and returned just in time to drive Chloe to the airport.  Rania walked to the car with her and Tina.  Rania’s handsome, serious husband watched from the porch while their son ran constantly back and forth from one to the other.  Chloe tried to gauge if Rania understood her relationship to Tina, and if so, what she thought about it.

“I wish I could have gotten to know you better,” Chloe said.

“Inshalla when you return,” Rania said.  She kissed Chloe twice on each cheek.  The one extra kiss meant they were really friends, Chloe decided.

*  *  *

Rania entered the police station and headed straight for the coffee pot.  Cup in hand, she made her way to her desk.  Abdelhakim’s chair was empty, his desk devoid of any traces of occupancy.

“Where is Abdelhakim?” she asked the men who sat nearby.

“Don’t know,” one answered.

“Haven’t seen him today,” said the other.

Captain Mustafa emerged from his office and joined them.  “I suggested to Abu Ziyad that Abdelhakim might be happier working in his office,” he said.

She tried not to look too happy.  She could gloat later, at home with Bassam.  The captain handed her a manila envelope.

“Benny asked me to give you this.”

She waited for him to walk away before she opened it.  She withdrew a folded sheet of paper containing two newspaper clippings.  “Thought you would be interested,” the note read.

The first article was several columns long, from the English edition of the left-wing Israeli newspaper, Haaretz.  It said that an anonymous source had uncovered a letter written by the soldier, Yuri Shabtai, before he committed suicide in April 2003.  The letter, the article continued, charged that Col. Israel Wilensky (Ret.) of the Air Force had ordered his unit to fire on unarmed civilians during the Battle of Jenin.  Wilensky, of course, denied the allegations.

“‘These are very serious charges.  The Ministry of Defense will investigate them thoroughly,’ said Deputy Minister Nir Gelenter.”

The other clipping was barely one inch high, cut from a bottom corner of the Jerusalem Post.

“The murder of Uzbekistan national Nadya Kim remains unsolved, three weeks after her body was discovered in an abandoned olive grove near Elkana.  According to police spokesman Benny Lazar, there are no suspects and no clues as to why the young woman was killed.  ‘Kim was one of thousands of Uzbek and Moldovan women who fall prey to the criminal consortiums bringing women to Israel against their will,’ said Lazar.  Israel’s immigration police have vowed to increase their efforts to locate and repatriate trafficked women.”