Avraham Azrieli - The Jerusalem Assassin

Paula pressed her lips to his, silencing him, and they stayed locked in a passionate kiss until they both ran out of breath. “Wow!” She sighed. “That was nice.”

He played with her hair. “There are parts of my work of which you might not approve.”

“ There’s nothing you could tell me that would change how I feel about you. My father raised me not to ask questions. You think I don’t know how Swiss banks serve dictators, drug dealers, and plain vanilla tax evaders from every country on earth? Those are the clients you must serve, because if you didn’t, someone else would-here in Zurich or in Lichtenstein, Vaduz, or the Antilles. I don’t need to know your professional secrets in order to trust you.”

He put his hand under the sheets and caressed her flat belly. “We’ll start working again when I’m back.”

“ Whether we need to or not.”

“ Really?”

Paula crossed her fingers. “My period is late. I’ll give it another few days before doing a test.”

“ Wouldn’t that be a treat?” Lemmy caressed her cheek. “I’ll call you when I can.”

“ I’ll be in the hospital every day. The doctors say my dad is showing signs of recovery. He’s off the ventilator.”

“ Good. Call Christopher if there’s any news. He’ll know how to reach me.”

Klaus Junior was still asleep when Lemmy kissed him good-bye. He drove the Porsche to the airport and parked it underground. KLM flight 312 to Amsterdam took off at 9:52 a.m., and ten minutes later the pretty attendant brought a breakfast tray and the International Herald Tribune.

Lemmy browsed the headlines. The first page contained the usual mosaic of news pieces from Wall Street and the financial markets in London, Hong Kong, and Tokyo. The second page was filled with photographs of toppled buildings in Beijing after an earthquake that killed hundreds of people. The third page contained summaries of international news, beginning with a report of the Philippine supreme court’s decision to dismiss a challenge to Imelda Marcos’s electoral victory. Another piece told of a brewing conflict in the Israeli parliament over the Rabin government’s ban on construction in Jewish settlements in the West Bank. Likud leader Benjamin Netanyahu, whose poll numbers had recently surpassed Rabin’s, declared: “The Labor government has betrayed Zionism and must be toppled.”

The pilot announced the beginning of their descent. Lemmy watched through the window at the picturesque view of Rotterdam’s harbor. From twenty-five thousand feet, Europe’s largest harbor was a manicured line of fingernail docks on a blue canvas. As the plane descended, the groomed Dutch landscape grew larger, with its tiny canals, grazing cows, and robust green fields. A wide circle over the coastline brought the plane to Schiphol Airport. The weather was nicer than in Zurich-clear blue skies and a bright wintery sun.

The train took him to Amsterdam’s central station, and from there he used the tram. He favored the Hotel de L’Europe on the River Amstel, where bankers and corporate executives walked the hallways in their tailored suits, consummating multimillion-dollar deals. But this time, Herr Wilhelm Horch of the Hoffgeitz Bank was not arriving to negotiate a major currency swap or to solicit a large deposit. There would be no dinners with wealthy clients, no rubbing elbows with colleagues. This time he was playing a different game altogether, a game he could not afford to lose.

“Herr Horch!” The front desk manager rushed to greet him. “Wonderful to have you with us again!”

“Good to be back,” Lemmy said, forcing a smile.

*

The floor-to-ceiling windows of the high-rise apartment filled with the blue Mediterranean. Gideon watched the Tel Aviv beach, alive with bathers, joggers, and windsurfers. Behind him, the maternal housekeeper moved around the place stealthily with her broom and duster.

Agent Cohen showed up with two plastic bags. He took out pita breads stuffed with falafels, humus, and Israeli salad, topped with tahini sauce. He beckoned Gideon to the table. “How do you like this place?”

“ I didn’t know Shin Bet could afford such accommodations for its prisoners.”

“ We like our guests to be comfortable.”

They ate while Arik Einstein sang on the radio, “How did you leave me, friend?”

“Here,” Agent Cohen handed him a bunch of napkins.

“Thanks.” Gideon wiped his lips and chin. “This is yummy!”

“Tastes like home, ah?”

“ It does.”

“ My wife made it. She’s from Yemen-they make the best humus. I told her it’s for a friend who’s been out of Israel for too long.”

“ It’s delicious. Give her my compliments.”

“ I will.” The Shin Bet officer put the last piece of pita bread in his mouth. He pushed the glass of orange juice across the table. “I squeezed it myself. Drink before the vitamins evaporate.”

Gideon sipped the cold juice. “Good.”

“Thought you’d appreciate it.” Agent Cohen sat back and patted his belly. “I hear you want to join Mossad?”

“Who told you?”

“ Mossad is a bunch of snobs. You’re lucky they turned you down-you’d be away all the time, snooping around Europe, paying informants for worthless info.” Cohen bunched up the food wrappings on the table. “Shin Bet is a different story. You could have fun right here in Tel Aviv.”

“ How do you know of my interest in Mossad? Have you eavesdropped on Tanya Galinski?”

“We do whatever it takes to keep VIPs safe.”

“ Including the arrest of agents of other secret services?”

“ SOD is a one-man show, and the curtain just came down on its last performance. However, we could use your skills and experience.”

“I’m flattered.”

“ So?”

“ Why don’t you tell me what’s going on? Put everything on the table. I won’t tell anyone, okay?”

“I’m not worried about that.” Agent Cohen leaned forward, his elbows on the table. “Here’s what we know: Your former boss, Elie Weiss, has active assets in the extreme right wing, some kind of an agent-provocateur operation that has attracted a group of followers. They see themselves as Torah warriors under the acronym ILOT. We’ve had our eye on this SOD operation for a while.”

“ How?”

Cohen shrugged. “A few of them used to serve in our VIP Protection Unit. We’ve kept an eye on them. In fact, the ringleader still works for us-incognito, of course.”

“ How convenient.”

“ At first we liked this ILOT business. The roots of SOD, back in the sixties, were in planting moles in ultra-Orthodox communities, such as Neturay Karta, to watch for signs of brewing militancy against the secular Israeli society. In fact, we copied the methods Weiss had developed for the Shin Bet’s own Jewish Department. But he wasn’t supposed to continue operating in this area. We figured that he was so obsessed with the risk of Jewish civil war that he was keeping his eye on it, basically doing our job for us and paying for it from his secret stash.”

“ So what spooked you?”

“ A couple of weeks ago, Elie Weiss met with Prime Minister Rabin.”

“ You guys eavesdrop on the prime minister also?”

“ We’re his bodyguards. We have video and sound surveillance on him at all times. Our operational assumption is that every meeting could turn into an assassination attempt. Anyone is a potential attacker. Anyone! ”

“ Including his wife?”

“ Especially his wife.”

They laughed, the tension released temporarily.

“ Is Rabin aware of your exemplary diligence?”

“ He’s a big picture kind of a guy. He doesn’t tell us how to protect him, and we don’t tell him how to run the country.” Agent Cohen smirked. “Anyway, Elie made a proposal to the prime minister.”