The Theatre - Kellerman, Jonathan

He walked toward the activity. The transport attendants sat in their van. The uniformed policemen were talking to an older man in a Civil Guard uniform. Daniel gave him a second look: late sixties to early seventies, thin but powerfully built, with close-cropped white hair and a bristly white mustache. He seemed to be lecturing the policemen, pointing toward a gully off the west side of the road, gesticulating with his hands, moving his lips rapidly.

Laufer stood several yards away, seemingly oblivious to the lecture, smoking and checking his watch. The deputy commander wore a black knit shirt and gray slacks, as if he'd lacked the time to don his uniform. In civilian clothes, bereft of ribbons, he looked pudgier, definitely less impressive. When he saw Daniel approaching, he dropped his cigarette and ground it out in the dirt, then said something to the driver, who walked away. Not waiting for Daniel to reach him, he moved forward, paunch first, in short, brisk steps.

They met midway and shared a minimal handshake.

"Horrible," said Laufer. "Butchery." When he spoke his jowls quivered like empty water bladders. His eyes, Daniel noticed, looked more tired than usual.

Laufer's hand fumbled in his shirt pocket and drew out a pack of cigarettes. English Ovals. Souvenirs from the latest London trip, no doubt. He lit a cigarette and blew the smoke out of his nose in twin drafts.

"Butchery," he said again.

Daniel cocked his head toward the Hagah man.

"He the one who found it?"

Laufer nodded. "Schlesinger, Yaakov."

"This part of his regular patrol?"

"Yes. From Old Hadassah, around the university, down past the Amelia Catherine, and back. Back and forth, five times a night, six nights a week."

"A lot of walking for someone his age."

"He's a tough one. Former palmahi. Claims he doesn't need much sleep."

"How many times had he been through when he discovered it?"

"Four. This was the last pass. Back up the road and then he picks up his car on Sderot Churchill and drives home. To French Hill."

"Does he log?"

"At the end, in the car. Unless he finds something out of the ordinary." Laufer smiled bitterly.

"So we may be able to pinpoint when it was dumped."

"Depending on how seriously you take him."

"Any reason not to?"

"At his age?" said Laufer. "He says he's certain it wasn't there before, but who knows? He may be trying to avoid looking sloppy."

Daniel looked a the old man. He'd stopped lecturing and stood ruler-straight between the policemen. Wearing the M-l as if it were part of him. Uniform pressedaand creased. The old-guard type. Nothing sloppy about him.

Turning back to Laufer, he lifted his note pad with his bad hand, flipped it open, and pulled out his pen.

"What time does he say he found it?" he asked.

"Five forty-five."

A full hour before he'd been called. He lowered the pen, looked at Laufer questioningly.

"I wanted things quiet," said the deputy commander matter-of-factly. Without apology. "At least until we can put this in context. No press, no statements, a minimum of personnel. And no needless chatter with any personnel not on the investigating team."

"I see," said Daniel. "Dr. Levi's been here?"

"Been and gone. He'll do the necropsy this afternoon and call you."

The deputy commander took a deep drag on his cigarette, got a shred of tobacco on his lip and spat it out.

"Do you think he's back?" he asked. "Our gray friend?"

It was a premature question, thought Daniel. Even for one who had made his mark in administration.

"Does the evidence fit?" he asked.

Laufer's expression made light of the question. "The site fits, doesn't it? Weren't the others found right around here?"

"One of them-Marcovici. Farther down. In the woodlands."

"And the others?"

"Two in Sheikh Jarrah, the fourth-"

"Exactly." Laufer cut him off. "All within a half-kilometer radius. Perhaps the bastard has a thing for this area. Something psychological."

"Perhaps," said Daniel. "What about the wounds?"

"Go down there and look for yourself," said the deputy commander.

He turned away, smoking and coughing. Daniel left him and climbed nimbly down into the gully. Two technicians, one male, one female, were working near the body, which was covered by a white sheet.

"Good morning, Pakad Sharavi," the man said with mock deference. He held a test tube up to the sunlight, shook it gently, and placed it in an open evidence case.

"Steinfeld," acknowledged Daniel. He ran his eyes over the site. Searching for revelations, seeing only the gray of stone, the dun of soil. Torsos of olive trees twisting through the dust, their tops shimmering silver-green. A kilometer of sloping rocky field; beyond it the deep, narrow valley of Wadi el Joz. Sheikh Jarrah, with its jumble of alleys and vanilla-colored houses. Flashes of turquoise: wrought-iron grills painted in the hue the Arabs believed would repel evil spirits. The towers and steeples of the American colony meshing with tangles of television antennas.

No blood spatter, no trail of crushed foliage, no bits of clothing adhering conveniently to jutting tree limbs. No geographical confession. Just a white form lying under a tree. Isolated, ovoid, out of place. Like an egg dropped out of the sky by some giant, careless bird.

"Did Dr. Levi have anything to say after his examination?" he asked.

"Clucked his tongue a lot." Steinfeld picked up another test tube, examined it, put it down.

Daniel noticed several plaster casts in the case and asked, "Any clear footprints?"

"Just those of the Hagah man," the technician said disgustedly. "If there were others, he obliterated them. He also threw up. Over there." He pointed to a dry, whitening patch a meter to the left of the sheet. "Missed the body. Good aim, eh?"

The woman was a new hire named Avital. She knelt in the dirt, taking samples of leaves, twigs, and dung, scooping them into plastic bags, working quickly and silently with an intent expression on her face. When she'd sealed the bags she looked up and grimaced. "You don't want to look at this one, adoni.'

"How true," said Daniel. He got down on his knees and lifted up the sheet.

The face had been left intact. It lay tilted in an unnatural position, staring up at him with half-closed, clouded eyes. Horribly pretty, like a doll's head fastened to the carnage below. A young face, dusky, roundish, lightly sprinkled with pimples on forehead and chin, wavy black hair, long and shining.

How old could she have been? he thought. Fifteen, maybe sixteen? A hot anger kindled in his abdomen. Avital was staring at him and he realized he was clenching his fists. Quickly he relaxed them, felt the fingertips tingle.

"Was the hair like this when you found it?" he asked.

"Like what?" asked Steinfeld.

"Clean. Combed."

The technicians looked at each other.

"Yes," said Avital.

Steinfeld nodded and paused expectantly, as if waiting for another question. When none came he shrugged and went back to work.

Daniel leaned in closer and sniffed. The stench of death had begun to issue from the corpse but through it he made out the clean, sweet scent of soap. Someone had washed her.

He raised his head and continued examining the face. The mouth hung slightly agape, revealing a hint of white but widely spaced teeth. The lower ones were crowded and chipped. An upper canine was missing. Not a rich girl. Pierced ears but no earrings. No tribal tattoos, scars, birthmarks, or blemishes.

"Any identification?"

"Life should be so easy," said Steinfeld.

Daniel stared a bit longer, then ceased his inspection of individual features. Shifting his perspective, he regarded the face as an entity and searched for ethnic characteristics. She appeared Oriental, but that meant little. It was a rare Jerusalem face that told a definite ethnic story-Arab, Ashkenazi, Druze, Bukharan, Armenian. Each had its prototype, but the overlap was substantial. He'd seen too many blond, blue-eyed Arabs, too many swarthy Germans to be confident about racial guesses. Still, it would have been nice to find something, somewhere to start