The Gates of Zion (9 page)

Miriam simply must have put it in a safe place.

Ellie pulled on her shoes and retrieved her camera, no longer bothering to tiptoe.

She locked the front door behind her, smiling broadly at the sounds trumpeting over the housetops from King George Street. She skipped down the steps, worrying briefly that the flashbulbs in her bulging pockets would be smashed if she got trapped in too many joyful embraces. She crossed the street at a slow jog, anxious to rejoin the celebration.

Again she noticed the two men standing opposite her. On impulse she raised the camera and snapped the shutter. The pop of the flash caught a wild and angry expression in the taller man’s eyes, and for a moment Ellie felt a sense of panic. What had she done?
Stick to
happy faces tonight, old girl,
she told herself as she quickened her pace down the dark, deserted street. To her dismay the men fell in step behind her, following through the dim lights and dark shadows of the street like determined hounds through the brush.
They can’t be
following me,
Ellie comforted herself, walking faster toward the light and sound of King George Street. She heard one of the men cough, and the sound of their footsteps quickened to match, then exceed, her own.

Fear welled up inside her. Suddenly the noise and crowds just a few short blocks ahead seemed light-years away from her. Three blocks in front of her a group of women danced on top of a military sedan while the driver roared out the window in frustration.
Only three
blocks.
Ellie ejected the spent bulb and inserted a new one as she walked. She glanced over her shoulder, certain now that her fear was justified; she was being pursued.

Suddenly she whirled to face the men, who were a mere ten yards behind her. “What do you want?” she shouted.

The men stopped in surprise and stood facing her with their hands in their coat pockets. Ellie imagined she could see the outline of a gun in the pocket of the large man.

The smaller man stayed where he was as the large man took a step forward.
“Mazel tov,”
he said in an oily, heavy accent.

Definitely not British,
noted Ellie.

“
Mazel tov
, young woman. We celebrate, no?” He stepped nearer and put a large hand out, palm up in a gesture of harmlessness.

“Leave me alone,” Ellie warned, “or I’ll scream.” Just then a squeal of laughter floated from the celebration and a woman’s scream echoed in the street.

“And who will even notice you?” The man’s voice became harsh and menacing as he took another step. Ellie felt frozen to the pavement, as if she were in the midst of a nightmare. “Give me the camera,” he warned, “and I will not hurt you.”

Ellie clutched her camera to her. “You want the camera?” she gulped, her words pushing past her throat with difficulty.

“Just the camera.” The oily voice returned as he took another step.

He stood now a little more than an arm’s length away, his huge hand still outstretched.

Slowly Ellie raised her camera, and as she did he lunged for her.

She snapped the shutter; the flashbulb popped in the darkness just inches from the man’s eyes. He reeled back and clutched his face as if he had been stabbed. Ellie wheeled around and, holding the bulky Speed Graphix, ran toward the lights and safety of the mob.

It took the big man only seconds to regain his vision. Shouting, “Get her!” to the other man, he ran hard after her. She could hear his tweed overcoat flapping behind him. For her every step he seemed to gain two, the slap of his feet keeping time to the clapping rhythm of the street dancers. The night air stung her nostrils and her chest ached. She stumbled and nearly fell, grabbing at the wall of a rough-sided building. The big man rushed on, closing the distance between them. Only a block and a half ahead was the safety of the mob, but it was too far.

The heavy slap of footsteps on the pavement echoed and drowned out the happy cheers coming from the street. He was three yards behind her now. Ellie whirled and swung the heavy Speed Graphix at his head, and he slammed into her like a lineman in a football scrimmage. She heard him grunt as he hit her full force, knocking her clear around and onto the pavement.

Ellie felt the glass from the flashbulbs in her pockets smash and pierce her thighs. The skin on her hands and elbows skidded away as she tried to brace herself against the fall. The Speed Graphix clattered out of her grasp and littered the sidewalk with broken bits of lens glass.

She had no breath to cry out. Blood was thick in her mouth, and a warm, sticky ooze formed beneath her hands as she lay on the sidewalk among the litter of broken bulbs and small metal cans of film. She remained still as the man picked himself up and walked past her in the darkness. He stooped and picked up the camera; as Ellie watched with half-opened eyes, he ripped the back off and tore out the film.

“You should be careful whom you photograph, Miss Warne,” he said in an amused voice. Then he threw the camera down with a crash and walked back toward her.

“She’s out,” said his companion, sounding frightened. “Leave her.

She’s out.”

The big man stood with one foot on either side of Ellie’s head. She did not move but felt her body tense against further violence.

“The girl is more stupid than they said,” hissed the big man. “Stupid.

And lucky.” He laughed and nudged her with the toe of his shoe. He turned and the two men walked slowly toward the busy intersection.

***

Yacov pushed Shaul down behind the stair railing as the two men approached. The hair on the back of the big dog’s neck bristled, and Yacov heard the threat of a low rumble deep in Shaul’s throat as the men passed, near enough to touch. Yacov nudged his shaggy companion into silence as the small man glanced furtively in their direction.

“It is nothing. Nothing,” said the big man. “We could have killed her.

No one would have seen.”

But Yacov had seen. From his hiding place in the cellar entrance of an apartment, he had watched with shameful excitement first the pop of the bulb, then the pursuit of the pretty American lady by the two thugs. To Yacov, they had not seemed to be ordinary street hoodlums; they had not searched her for money. And strangely, they had seemed to know who she was.

Yacov watched as the men disappeared into the bright lights and clamor of the celebration. Then, seeing the lady stir in the shadows, he bounded up the stairs and jogged toward where she lay. He stopped ten feet from her and watched cautiously as she struggled to pick herself up.

“Dumb,” she muttered between sobs, “dumb. They broke my Speed Graphix.” She knelt amid the shambles, her hands limply at her sides.

Yacov did not know what the American words
Speed Graphix
meant, but this lady had a broken one and was undoubtedly in great pain.

“You need help, lady,” Yacov said. It was more a statement than a question.

The lady looked up at the small, dark figure of the little boy and wailed, “Did you see it? They chased me and beat me up, and―oh!

They broke my Speed Graphix!”

“Yes, lady, I saw them. Very bad fellows. You know them?” He moved toward her to help her stand. Perhaps her leg was a
Speed
Graphix
.

“Know them!” she exclaimed, crunching through the broken glass toward the shattered black box that had seemed to cause all the trouble. She stooped with difficulty and retrieved the camera. “My poor Speed Graphix.” She moaned again.

“It is broken,” repeated Yacov, finally comprehending.

“Smashed. Ruined. Destroyed.” She hobbled toward some steps and lowered herself onto the second step as Yacov and Shaul stood before her, watching in fascination. “You better watch your dog, son, unless he’s wearing combat boots. There’s glass all over the place,”

she said miserably. “Even in me.”

“You should go home, lady.” Yacov picked up the little cans of film.

“They might come back.” Hoping that there might be a reward in it, he picked up the last roll of film and said, “Yacov will help you, lady.” Then he gestured toward his dog. “Shaul will let no harm come to you.”

“Yes, well. Good dog.”

Shaul whined softly and tried to lick her bloody hand.

“I could have used you a few minutes earlier.”

Yacov felt a stab of guilt. He could have easily sent Shaul to help, but he had hung back from the drama, eager to see just what would happen next. “We will take you home,” he said quietly.

The lady stood with difficulty as the boy took the broken camera from her. Then he put his arm around her waist, and she leaned heavily on him.

“You say they did not know you, lady? I thought perhaps the big one said your name.”

They limped along a few paces. “Did he? Maybe he did,” the lady named Miss Warne answered in a puzzled tone. “I’ve never seen them before in my life.”

She was silent for a while, as if replaying the entire event in her mind. Then she said angrily, “Whoever they were, we’ll get them.

I’m going to call the police, and we’ll find them.”

Yacov stiffened at the mention of the word
police.
Panic rose in him at the thought of talking at length with the very constables who had only an hour before pursued him and his dog for petty theft.

“I cannot talk to no policemen, lady,” said Yacov. “I got to take you home and go. Me and Shaul, we have to go to the mayor’s house with a message. In the Old City.”

“You’re a long way from where you’re supposed to be. What is your name?”

“I am Yacov,” he replied. “I wanted to see the party.”

“I’ll pay you to stay awhile. It won’t take long.”

“Pay?” Yacov adjusted his skullcap, which had begun to creep down over his forehead as Miss Warne leaned against him. “Okay, maybe for a few minutes I can stay,” he said, attempting to sound nonchalant.

Everyone knew that Americans were rich and always overpaid for every service and item they purchased. There was a saying in the souks of the Old City marketplace: “Americans pay for one olive when they could have taken the whole tree.” The few Americans whom Yacov and his friends had seen in the Old City were remarkably unlike their British counterparts. The British had an air of detached superiority as they wandered through the Jewish Quarter in search of interesting sights. They gazed upon the ancient dress and customs of the Orthodox Hasidim and muttered things like “quaint”

and “positively medieval.”

Americans, on the other hand, stared with open curiosity and sniffed around for souvenirs, like puppies in search of bones. From them, Yacov had learned important expressions like “oh, boy,” and “jeepers, Fran, what d’ya know!” They were like children, Grandfather said. Most Americans who came were Jewish, but they were somehow very different. The rabbis warned that men who do not study Talmud forget to grow up. Americans must have never studied Talmud. Yet Yacov liked them. Their generosity was rarely condescending, unlike that of the conquering British. They seemed naive, and, for the merchants, they were as amusing as profitable.

So, Yacov decided, he would stay. God provided for him and Grandfather in strange ways, and such a story he would have to tell the old man!

“How much will you pay me?” asked Yacov without pretense.

“You’re no Good Samaritan; I can tell that,” muttered Miss Warne as she limped up the steps to the front door. “A little mercenary, aren’t you?” she asked, a smile in her voice.

“What is this mercenary?” asked Yacov as she unlocked the door and they stepped into the lighted alcove.

And then the lady looked at him. He wondered if she was, for the first time, really noticing his ragged clothes. Yacov looked down.

His long black Hasidic coat was badly patched and two sizes too small. His cuffs were frayed, and the soles of his shoes were beginning to separate from the cracked leather uppers.

“Hmm,” she said thoughtfully. “Mercenary, in your case, means hungry, I think.” She held the door as Shaul padded in after them and sat calmly beside his young master. “Would you like to come to the kitchen and have something to eat while I call the police?”

To stand in the home of a Gentile American for the first time is
enough excitement,
thought Yacov.
To eat the food of the unclean
would be sinful. Who could say if it would be kosher?
Though his stomach rumbled in protest, Yacov shook his head, preferring to stand where he was, poised for flight into the night. He lowered his eyes to the parquet floor, not daring to look at the many pictures that hung on the walls around him. From the corner of his eye he saw the stone statue of a man on a horse. He had indeed stepped into a den of iniquity and impiety! He would not tell Grandfather that he had actually gone into the house.

“Come sit down, anyway, will you, Yacov?” Miss Warne urged with a strained voice. She touched her scraped elbows and winced.

“Thank you no, very much,” Yacov answered, still not looking up.

“Shaul and I will wait here, if you please.”

Miss Warne shrugged and limped away, evidently to call the police.

Yacov stood in the alcove for what seemed an eternity. He could hear the blood pumping in his ears as he waited, careful not to look at the Gentile art. He gazed intently at the top of Shaul’s rugged head, then traced the pattern of the wood on the floor with his toe. Only once did he cast a glance at a painting that hung on the right above him―a pretty redheaded girl in a yellow dress sitting on cushions and reading a book. Yacov squinted and strained his eyes, trying to see the title of the book she was reading. As he moved closer, Miss Warne appeared at the doorway. He noticed her with a start and jumped back.

“You like that, do you?” she asked. “What do you think it’s called?”

Yacov shrugged, his eyes again downcast with shame. He did not want to know the name of the painting.

“It’s called
Young Girl Reading
. Original, isn’t it?”

Yacov shrugged again, feeling very uncomfortable and wishing that he had not seen the young American lady or her assailants, even for money.