“Interesting you should mention Christian. He’s quite a guy.”
“Christian? Christian who?”
“Cunningham. You must meet him. Counterintelligence guy in OSS, big wheel now in this new Central Intelligence Agency—”
“Look, Sam,” Barak broke in, “what are you doing here? What happened in Prague? Why’d you drag me out here, really? What have I got to do with intelligence?”
“Later. Chris Cunningham is important, believe me. I’ll be out front in Perlman’s white Lincoln.” Pasternak grinned, crinkling his Tartar eyes. “There may be other white Lincolns. There’s a lady in this one. A nice lady, in a red dress. You don’t mind?”
“I like red dresses. Nakhama wears them a lot.”
“Ah, Nakhama! How is she?”
“All right.”
“You think I forgive you for stealing Nakhama?” Pasternak shook a thick finger at him. “I’ll be revenged yet.” Pasternak half winked one eye and walked off.
***
As Barak waited at the baggage chute, remembrance flared of his first encounter with Nakhama. Just back from North Africa on leave, he had run into Sam Pasternak in a sidewalk café, and with that same one-eyed half-wink Sam had told him about “the most beautiful girl in Tel Aviv,” a waitress in an amami eating place; he was taking her to the birthday party of a classmate of theirs from the Herzl School, and he persuaded Wolfgang to drop in on the party. One look at the waitress, and Barak forgot about driving to Tiberias to join his girlfriend Tamar there.
He was not the only one struck by Nakhama at that fateful party. Without trying, the seventeen-year-old girl caused a commotion in her plain red dress, simply moving here and there and smiling. She had the looks, the voltage, and the unaffected presence to make the fellows stare and the girls narrow their eyes, though they were mostly a university crowd, and this dark daughter of Moroccan immigrants was hardly their sort. When Barak walked next day into the place where she worked she seemed a lot less fetching in her apron and kerchief, rushing here and there to serve the food her parents cooked or to remove dirty plates. But he was past noticing the difference, and when she threw him a casual but heated welcoming smile, that was that. In the few minutes they had talked at the party, she too had been snared.
…First kiss, walking on the Tel Aviv beach at midnight, Nakhama gasping, “Oh, no! Me and my weakness for British uniforms! No more!” But there were many more. Proposal, one week to go in his leave, very late at night at a table in the empty eating place; her parents cleaning up and pretending not to take notice, but careful not to interfere. “So Nakhama, when do we get married?” The first mention of marriage by either of them. The words burst from him; from Wolfgang Berkowitz, level-headed British lieutenant, serious promising chemist, betting his life on one cast of passion’s dice.
“Did you say when, Wolfgang? When? That’s all? I must be too easy. Tomorrow?”
The miserable wedding in a Moroccan rabbi’s apartment, the two sets of parents hardly looking at each other, his mother’s dreadful last-minute sobbing… and from her viewpoint, why not? Tamar Rubenfeld, clever pretty daughter of the rector of Hebrew University, a former professor in Berlin; discarded for this—this waitress?
And then, the incandescent honeymoon by the sea in Ashkelon…
Down tumbled his valise in a pile of bags, and Barak seized it.
***
As Pasternak’s consolers went, the woman in the red dress at the wheel of the creamy Lincoln was by no means notable. Whatever that squat ugly fellow lacked in life it was not for pretty women. He was estranged from his wife, who had gone to London with their two children when the Arab riots broke out after the partition vote; but attractive ladies abounded to cheer him. This one was in her mid-thirties, dyed blond, elegantly groomed, scrawny from dieting rather than naturally slim, with bright starved eyes. “This is Mrs. Shugar,” said Pasternak. “Ellen, this is Zev. Ellen is coordinating the Perlmans’ parlor meeting.”
“Lot of excitement among the girls about you, Zev,” said Mrs. Shugar, with a hungry glint over her shoulder at Barak in the back seat. “The word is that you’re electrifying.”
“Oy, vay,” said Barak, as she started the car, “electrifying? If I don’t get some sleep, I’ll go into that meeting with dead batteries.”
“It’s not till tomorrow afternoon,” said Mrs. Shugar. “You’ll be marvellous.”
All the way to the hotel she chattered brightly about the parlor meeting. Betty Grable was a big draw, but the word of mouth about the handsome Israeli officer, Mickey Marcus’s aide, was really crowding up the guest list, even though the minimum pledge was a thousand dollars. As the Lincoln wound through Beverly Hills, Barak was distracted from her trickle of talk by the eye-filling mansions arrayed cheek by jowl along the palm-lined streets; ranch house, Tudor house, French chateau, Swiss chalet, all enormous, all with barbered lawns and sculptured trees, no two alike in architecture, and none with any breathing room on either side. Uncle Harry’s Kings Point plantation house would be dwarfed here, he thought, but at least Uncle Harry would not be trespassing if he yawned and stretched.
“Is that all right, Zev?” asked Mrs. Shugar anxiously over her shoulder.
At a venture, Barak replied, “Absolutely.”
“Oh, super! She’ll be so pleased.” Leaving them off at a rambling pink stucco hotel, Mrs. Shugar twiddled her fingers at them. “Take it easy, boys.”
“Who’s paying for all this?” Barak exclaimed, as they entered a cottage set amid lushly growing palms and flowering trees, and then passed into a broad living room with a fireplace, a bar, a grand piano, and masses of fresh flowers.
“Dave Perlman’s firm leases this villa by the year for visiting big shots—movie stars, directors, and such. It happens to be free now. So? Go take your shower.”
“Immediately.” Barak went into the bathroom and came out holding a lacy red negligee. “This was hanging on the shower head.”
“That Ellen!” Pasternak shrugged and laughed. “Nice lady, but a rattlebrain. I’ll get it to her.”
Barak dropped in a chair by a dining table, took a huge yellow pear from a crystal bowl of fresh fruit, and bit into it. “Such fruit! California! Sam, be straight with me, what’s going on here? What was that ten thousand dollars for?”
“Oh, you know about that? Well, I’ll explain, but if you’re dining with Betty Grable you’d better get some sleep.”
“Dining with Betty Grable? Me?”
“Weren’t you listening to Ellen? You agreed to go. Small dinner party.”
“Both of us?”
“Just you. The Los Angeles Times had a big write-up on Marcus’s funeral. You were mentioned. Right now you’re hot stuff.”
“Why aren’t you in Czechoslovakia?”
“Airlift problem.” Pasternak sat down beside him and ate grapes from a purple cluster, crunching and swallowing the seeds. “Now that we can buy in quantity, B.G.’s ordered our lift capacity expanded. Our guys over here lined up six army surplus Constellations. For a new Panamanian airline, their story was. These Connies are giants, Zev, they can lift ten tons at a crack. Ten tons! But the State Department got wise and the ceiling fell in. Civil Aviation Administration, the FBI, the CIA, customs—equipment unsafe, embargo violated, papers confiscated, planes impounded—they gave us the works! Still, our guys did manage to fly one Connie out to Panama before the shutdown. I’m here to get it to Czechoslovakia, and that’s where Christian Cunningham comes in. The money I got from Perlman is for grease in Panama. I had to have it in hand—you’re falling asleep on me.”
Barak was in fact nodding over the half-eaten pear. “I’ll shower later. Betty Grable… wake me when it’s time.”
“B’seder, and I’ll get your lovely uniform pressed. It’s all wrinkled.”
Yawning and standing up, Barak said, “Sam, tell me something. How did you know about the Altalena, when Yadin and Allon didn’t?”
Pasternak replied with a half
-wink as he peeled a banana.
***
Edward G. Robinson greeted Barak on Betty Grable’s grandiose flagstone patio, overlooking the spangled spread of Los Angeles under the moon. “Hi. Ani ohaive Yisroel.” (“I love Israel.”) He was smoking a long cigar, and even in black tie he looked just like the film gangsters he played. The Hebrew words, growled in an American accent, took Barak aback. Robinson went on, “Ani no-sane har-bay kesef.” (“I give much money.”)
“That’s very nice,” Barak said.
Robinson lapsed into English to tell Barak about his Hebrew schooling, and then about his art collection. He talked at some length, the dinner being delayed because the main course had been ham, and Betty Grable had switched to roast beef upon receiving the thrilling last-minute news that the Israeli major was coming. “I hope that’s all right,” she said, resplendent in a strapless clinging evening dress and batting big blue eyes at Barak. “That’s a magnificent uniform. We can’t wait to hear about Mickey Marcus and the Burma Road.”
She sat him at her right hand. He gathered from the small talk around the table that most of the men were film producers or agents. The women were all very pretty, though none rivalled the hostess, and their clothes and hairdos tended to the grotesque, which Barak supposed was California high fashion. It was a while before the conversation turned to him. He answered a few questions about Marcus, then found himself being consulted on the prospects of the Berlin airlift, the impact of television on the movie industry, the preference in Israel for Truman or Dewey, the probable outcome of the massacres in India, and the comparative roles of America and the Soviet Union in winning World War II. “You can settle a bet here,” said a tall man called Shorty, who was Betty Grable’s agent. “Is Palestine north of Syria, or south of Syria?”
“South of Syria.”
“You owe me a yard,” Robinson growled. Shorty gave him a hundred-dollar bill from a money clip, saying he would win it back that same night at gin rummy.
“A-ni no-sane zeh l’Yisroel [I’m giving this to Israel],” Robinson said to Barak.
“That’s very nice,” said Barak.
Next day Barak, in slacks and a short-sleeved shirt, sat with Mrs. Perlman in a two-story wood-panelled library which she called “Dave’s den.” The balconied room was lined with leather-bound sets of standard authors, shelves of large art volumes, and mint-condition best-sellers; also festooned with inscribed photographs of movie stars and various plaques and scrolls praising Perlman’s philanthropies. There were framed letters from Franklin Roosevelt and Henry Morgenthau, thanking him for his war bonds efforts. Two Oscar figurines under glass flanked a special case of Winston Churchill first editions bound in red morocco. Mrs. Perlman showed Barak these things with frank pride, before settling down to talk over coffee about the parlor meeting. A gray-haired motherly woman in a light orange sundress, she reminded him of his Aunt Lydia.
“I get so fucking mad!” Into the den burst a man in a black suit and black homburg, which he flung across the room. “If there’s anything I hate, it’s rabbis. I get so fucking mad!”
“Dave, dear,” said his wife hastily, “this is Major Barak. You know, of the Israeli army.”
Barak stood up to shake hands. David Perlman’s manner changed to pleasant cheeriness. “Oh, yes, you’re the fellow who’s going to give the speech. Glad to meet you.” His aspect reverted to angry gloom. A tanned fleshy man with slick grizzled hair, Perlman produced extravagant musical films. “I get so fucking mad,” he said to his wife. “I need a drink.”
“Was the temple crowded?” She poured whiskey from a crystal decanter at a wheeled bar.
“Standing room only. Sid was forty-two years old, Selma. Did you know that? The rabbi said so. A kid! He was bald and fat, so it was hard to tell, but that’s all he was! He had three films in production. Probably what killed him. Christ, he was somebody in this town. And poof! That goddamned rabbi, spouting all this crap about how Sidney didn’t die, he lives on in his movies, blah blah, and old Sid lying right there in the open coffin, a frightening dummy in a tuxedo and pancake makeup, with his eyes closed. Selma, I played gin with Sid at Hillcrest last Saturday!” Dave Perlman was gnawing at his nails. His wife handed him the drink. “Thanks. I get so fucking mad!”
“Pardon me, Mrs. Perlman.” A maid in a starchy costume looked in. “Mrs. Shugar is on your private line.”
Perlman was lighting a large cigar. “Dear,” his wife said as she got up and started out, “not so early in the day.”
“The hell with it. I’m damned upset.” He took a deep swallow of whiskey. “Major, Sid Feller was never sick a day in his life. A real talent. Poof. Well!” He brightly smiled at Barak. “Quite a story in the L.A. Times about your boss Marcus. Real hero, eh? Have some more coffee? Or a drink?”
“Thanks, no. This is a splendid house. Very nice of you and Mrs. Perlman to give a parlor meeting here.”
Perlman waved his cigar in deprecation. “To be honest, I’m no Zionist. Selma fools around with that stuff. I’m interested in Jewish hospitals and such. There’s an old folks home in Yonkers named after my father, I paid a bundle for that. He’s still alive, and it gave him a big kick. Your Uncle Harry is the Zionist. Terrific guy, he gave me my start, and I don’t forget such things. Maybe I’ll hang around for your talk.”
“Well, I hope you do.”
“I guess the Jews should have a country, why not? I’ve never given it much thought. That Burma Road story could damn near make a movie. With Marcus and all. Except that nobody in the audience knows where Jerusalem actually is, or gives a shit about it or about the Jews. That’s really the problem. Bible movies are different, of course.”
Mrs. Perlman came in looking perturbed. “Betty Grable isn’t coming to the meeting.”
Perlman slammed down the glass he was putting to his lips so that whiskey splashed. “What? Who told you that?”
“Shorty Goldfarb called. Betty has a stomach flu, he says. Anyway, she’s out.”
Perlman jumped up. “I’ll talk to Shorty.”
“Dave, dear—”
“God if that isn’t the END! I ask you!” Perlman turned to Barak. “We deliver you to Grable, because the French ambassador pulled out on her, and now she pulls out on us! If that isn’t this fucking town for you! Well, Shorty Goldfarb’s balls are going into the meat grinder right now!”
“Honey, don’t take on, please!” The death of Sidney Feller appeared to be much on Mrs. Perlman’s mind. “We’ll do fine without her. We’ve got Major Barak. Betty isn’t even Jewish.”
But Perlman was through the French doors, shouting, “You’re not having a flop meeting in this house!” His wife followed him into another room, where his voice could be heard, shouting on the phone and sounding fucking mad. At this point Sam Pasternak walked in unshaven and yawning. “Zev, I just got a call from Dayan. I thought I’d better come right over here.”
“What now?”
“The printer delivered that truckload of currency a day early. Dayan’s leaving.”
“Leaving? Leaving when?”
“Clearances will take a few hours. Sometime tonight. The Arabs are rejecting the extension of the truce, and Ben Gurion sent him a cable to rush back and take over Jerusalem Command.”
Convulsively Barak extricated himself from a deep blue leather armchair. Bye-bye, the thought of visiting Cal Tech! “I’ve got to get back to New York. I’ll check the flights.”
“Hold on.” Pasternak put a restraining hand on his arm. “I already checked all connections. You can’t make it.”
“Well then, I’ll call Dayan and tell him to hold the plane.”
“Hold the plane? When he has B.G.’s orders to take off?”
“Sam, I’ve got a battalion command waiting.”
“You’re committed to talk here today, and Zev, we owe this guy Perlman. I’ll get you back to your battalion, maybe even ahead of Dayan’s plane, that old Dutch clunker.”
“You? How?”
> “On the Constellation out of Panama. Those Connies travel like bullets.”
“Hello there, Sam.” Perlman picked up his glass as he came in, poured more whiskey, and said to Barak, “Goldfarb swears Grable has a temperature of a hundred and five. Maybe she does, maybe she doesn’t. I know this, if it was an Academy Award dinner, she’d show up if she was dead. And do a tap dance if she won.” He gulped his drink. “Well, it’s no skin off our nose. We’ve got you. You’re a million times better than Grable. You’re for real. Just wear that uniform, I hear it gives all the ladies a temperature of a hundred and five.” He laughed hoarsely and coughed hard.
***
Making the Marcus speech again, Zev Barak felt like a dancing bear doing his tricks for carrots. Afterward the women swarmed around him. Ellen Shugar held on to his arm with self-important possessiveness, explaining that the major had to fly to Washington at once on an urgent secret mission, and so the ordeal was cut short. Dave Perlman walked them out to the white Lincoln, where Pasternak already sat. “I tell you what,” he said. “I’m going to put a couple of writers on that Marcus story. It’s a toughie, but you got me interested. Gentile writers. Jews might get subjective.”
At the TWA departure entrance Ellen Shugar stopped the white Lincoln, rolled a self-conscious glance at Barak in the back seat, then hugged and kissed Pasternak. “Sammy, take care of yourself.” Barak saw tears roll down the tanned starved cheek.
“Nice lady. Sort of sad,” said Pasternak as they went inside. “She has two no-good kids. The girl bums around on motorcycles, and the boy dropped out of school and surfs. Her husband is a contractor, earth moving. They were religious till they moved from Long Island to California. I’ll check us in, and see you at the plane gate.”
As Barak slipped through the terminal crowd with his suitcase, he heard a loud call: “Adon Barak, shalom!” On a nearby airport bench, in an ill-fitting gray suit and stringy tie, there sat Don Kishote! But on a second look no, not Kishote, but his brother. The last Barak had heard of this fellow, he had been in an army prison. “Blumenthal, what the devil are you doing here?”