The Hope

  “Traffic was unbelievable,” he said. “I drove in from out of town.”

  “I’m saved. Five minutes, and my life would have lain in ruins.”

  “You have a ridiculous way of putting things, Emily.”

  “I’m absolutely serious.” She coughed as a cloud of cigar smoke rolled in her face.

  “This is no place to talk,” said Barak. “Come with me.”

  “Where to?” They both stood up.

  “There’s this American I know who has a suite here. He’s gone out of town, and he said I could use it, the concierge would give Monsieur Barak the key. It’ll be quiet, at least.”

  “Sounds lovely,” said Emily Cunningham, picking up her fur-trimmed coat. She wore a rough skirt and a blue shirtwaist that showed something of a barely existent bosom. She took his arm as they left the bar. “Five minutes! I’m so happy that I didn’t give up! Deliriously happy.”

  “Stop talking nonsense.”

  In Lee’s suite, Yael and Kishote had been going at it explosively, and were side by side under the canopy, still breathing hard. Yael lay face down, her head on her arms. He was sitting up, his back against the headboard, his body vibrating with pleasure, his brain in tumult. Now what? He knew about Yael and Pasternak, as so many people did. He had made the remark about the handkerchief in all innocence. He could not tell whether that, or the whole dreamy day financed by Lee’s francs, had brought on Yael’s pass at him, or whatever it had been. Nobody had been seduced. It had simply happened.

  She turned her head and wanly smiled at him. “Wow. I don’t love you, Kishote.” Low husky tender voice. “You know that.”

  “Something to do once,” he said.

  “Well, ah…” She left the rest unspoken, they both burst out laughing, and he swept an arm around her shoulders to pull her close. At that moment they heard the double doors bang open, and the voices of a man and a woman.

  “Oh, l’Azazel,” exclaimed Yael, and she panicked out of the bed and into the bathroom. Zev Barak came into the bedroom and halted in stupefaction.

  “Kishote! What the devil!”

  “Just having a nap,” said Don Kishote airily, though extremely startled. “What are you doing in Paris, Zev? And in Lee’s suite?”

  “Never mind. Your brother’s as feather-headed as you are.

  Where’s Yael Luria?”

  “I guess I bore her. She took off and went shopping.” Barak was heading for the bathroom. “We’ve got tickets for the Comédie Française tonight—I wouldn’t go in there, Zev.”

  “Why not?”

  Yossi had hoped Yael would have the presence of mind to lock the door, but obviously she had not, because Barak was opening it. “Well, I just used it. It stinks in there.”

  “Who cares?” Barak went in, and was starting to unzip when a low female voice half snarled, from behind a thick flowered shower curtain, “Monsieur, monsieur, pour l’amour de Dieu—allez-vous-en!” (“For the love of God, get out of here!”)

  As surprised as he had ever been in his life, Barak hastily closed his trousers and ran out of the bathroom, slamming the door.

  “You mad dog,” he snapped at Yossi, who sat up naked on the bed looking singularly stupid, “why the hell didn’t you tell me you had a French whore in there? By God, you work fast.”

  “She’s no whore,” Yossi said. “She’s the daughter of a Sorbonne professor. He teaches medieval philosophy.”

  “Where did you meet her?”

  “I picked her up in the bar.”

  “You’re a lunatic.”

  “Do you have a whore out there?”

  “What, are you mad? She’s a child.”

  “I caught a glimpse of her. Pretty big child, Zev.”

  Barak closed the bedroom door hard as he went out.

  “Somebody’s here, I gather,” Emily said. She was at the window. The lights of Paris were coming on one by one. The long lines of streetlamps already shone.

  “Yes, that American has a crazy Israeli brother. He’s in there.”

  “Fantastic view, Wolf. Come and see.”

  “Yes, very nice.” He had brought the girl here to talk in peace, but that French trollop might well come popping out for a drink at the bar, possibly stark naked. “Let’s go somewhere else, Emily.”

  “Mother and Dad would usually have tea about this time on the mezzanine.”

  “Now you’re talking. Tea on the mezzanine it is. Come on.” Barak closed the doors noisily on the way out.

  Softly giggling, a towel draped bewitchingly on her, Yael poked a naked shoulder out of the bathroom. “Did I hear them leave?”

  “They’re gone.”

  “Oo-ah! It’s a miracle he didn’t recognize my voice.”

  Yossi repeated, “Monsieur, monsieur, pour l’amour de Dieu…. That was great, Yael. He took you for a French whore.”

  Yael looked disconcerted, then in a burst of husky laughter she cast the towel aside, with the flirtatious flourish of a stripteaser. “A French whore! Well, I’ll tell you something, Don Kishote. In the mood I’m in, that’s almost a compliment.” She leaped back into the bed. “One girl with all her clothes off, you said, can be the greatest thing in life. I’m the wrong girl, I guess, but—”

  “But you’re the one that’s here.” Kishote pulled her into an embrace.

  “Now that’s no compliment at all,” she tried to protest, but “no compliment at all” was smothered in a kiss.

  ***

  The mezzanine was as spacious and quiet as the bar had been small and noisy. One old lady with blue hair, wearing a large hearing aid, was having tea alone, feeding bits of cake to a very fat brown poodle tied up beside her. Barak and Emily sat down at some distance from her, and Emily ordered thé à l’anglaise from a starchily uniformed waitress. She peered at Barak with wide dark-pupiled eyes. “It’s dim in here, and if you haven’t guessed, I’m blind as a bat without my glasses. Mind if I wear them?”

  “Why not?”

  She said, taking a case from her purse, pulling out thick-lensed glasses and carefully putting them on, “Because men seldom make passes at girls who wear glasses.” He looked blankly at her. “Oh, that’s meant to be humorous. It’s a couplet everybody knows in America. By a popular verse writer. I’ve tried to imitate her—Dorothy Parker is her name—and I’ve even sold a few things to magazines, but I’m no good at light verse. Or poetry, either, English or French. I’m finding that out. It’s sad, but also liberating. Writing is torture. I’ll have to do something else with my life.” All this came out in a rush while she looked intently at him. “Hm. Gray hairs, Wolf?”

  “Just a few. They come along.”

  “Are you happy?”

  “Emily, you asked to talk to me. What about?”

  “How do you come to be in Paris, Wolf? Dad says a war is about to break out over the Suez Canal, and Israel will probably be in it.” Barak did not comment. “Well, I know better than to ask such questions. I’m just prattling. I’m nervous.”

  “I have no idea why.”

  “Haven’t you? Well, maybe I’ll tell you. André, by the way, is very impressed with you.”

  “That makes me feel bad.”

  “Why should it?”

  “I’m afraid I’ve been describing him as Hiroshima in a trench coat.”

  Emily scowled and flared. “That’s utterly disgusting.”

  “Sorry.”

  “I mean, aside from the slur on poor André, who’s talented and harmless, it’s in vile taste. Hiroshima is a tragic horror of history. It’s no subject for jokes.”

  “True.”

  “Very cruel and crude, Wolf.”

  “Okay.”

  Her mouth wrinkled, and she gnawed her lips.

  “What’s the matter, Emily?”

  “I’m trying not to laugh.”

  The waitress brought the tea service. Emily ceremoniously poured for Barak, asked how many sugar lumps he wanted, milk or lemon, cakes or bread and butter, serving him
in a prim formal way that scarcely went with her disorderly cloud of dark hair and casual shirt and skirt.

  “You make me nervous,” she said abruptly, “because I’m not sure this is happening. I can’t tell you how strange it is. You know about fantasies. Maybe you have them.”

  “Everybody does.”

  “Well, here goes the probable quenching of any spark in our relationship, but I’m going to tell the truth. Since the night you came to our house—eight years ago now—the night of the fireflies, as I think of it—you’ve been in nearly all my fantasies. This crossing of paths in Paris seems just like one of them, and when you asked me to come up to that suite, I almost had to pinch myself, because I must tell you some of those fantasies have been hot stuff. Now there it is.”

  “And now you’ve made me nervous.”

  “Oh, yes, I’ll bet. You? The strange thing is you’re exactly the way I remember you, the way I’ve been picturing you. Even, in the last few years, to the gray hairs.”

  They looked at each other over the teacups in silence, Emily’s eyes almost all black behind the glasses. Quite at a loss as to how to handle this turn, Barak was sure of one thing. The quirky girl was cutting all the way inside his self-possession, and kindling an electric interest such as he did not remember feeling since his first meeting with Nakhama. How was it happening to him? She did not compare to Nakhama in looks, and scrawny women had never attracted him. He had once read a book of Dorothy Parker’s verse; the last word, he thought, in sophisticated New York wit. This odd twenty-year-old had dashed off and even sold such cosmopolitan poems, and was writing a thesis on Lamartine; very nice, but what did that have to do with sexual magnetism, with the stirring in his whole body?

  “I’m a virgin,” she said.

  At that the lady with blue hair, who sat far down the mezzanine, turned and looked at her before feeding her dog a whole éclair. Emily caught the move and said to Barak, “Did I yell that?”

  “She’s been fiddling with her hearing aid since we sat down. I think she’s heard every word so far.”

  Emily dropped her voice. “Well, I hope she’s amused.”

  “What’s the matter with André? I understood it was a wild love affair.”

  “Oh, nothing’s wrong with André. I’ve had a good Christian upbringing, and it’s stayed with me. I’m repressed as hell, and he can’t do anything but argue and whine. I’ve had no experience. At William and Mary, I was a greasy grind, Phi Bete, all A’s. I joined a sorority, and depledged after the first pajama party when they sneaked the boys in. I’m a total loner. I’ve never met a guy who could hold a candle to my father. Hence, I suppose, fantasies. Very unhealthy, no doubt.” She put a hand on his, and the touch was unexpected and sweet. “If I came to Israel, could I meet your wife? I’m obviously innocuous. I’m very curious.”

  “Nakhama doesn’t speak English.”

  “Oh? Well, that wouldn’t matter much. And I’d like to see your kids.”

  “Emily, you’re not a dumb girl. Your parents hoped I would talk you out of André, or at least try to.”

  “Well, go ahead.” For the first time, Emily Cunningham gave him a whole-souled smile. She had beautiful teeth and her smile had an odd satiric shape to it, better suited to a much older person, perhaps to a man. “I’d love to hear how you do it.”

  “I have a feeling it’s not necessary.”

  The smile vanished. “I’m crazy about André.”

  “For your own reasons, you want to worry your parents. You’ve succeeded. When do you graduate?”

  Emily took a notebook and pencil from her bag and handed them to Barak. “Write your address in Israel, and telephone number.”

  More and more stirred—so much so that he thought for a moment of refusing—he scrawled the information. “I don’t advise you to come to Israel in the near future.”

  “Is my father right?”

  “It’s a beautiful country, and when you do come, Nakhama and I will be glad to show you around.”

  “More tea?”

  “I have to go.”

  She jumped up. “What a date! I do believe I’m cured.”

  “Of André?”

  “That’s my business. Of fantasies.”

  ***

  “Yael,” said Kishote, snapping out of an exhausted doze, “what time is it?”

  She looked at her wristwatch, moving her arm as though it were broken, or coming loose in the socket. “Quarter to seven.”

  “Do we still go to the Comédie Française?”

  “Of course… Oh, no. No. Not again. No!” The double doors into the suite, which tended to stick, were audibly opening. “Not again! I can’t stand it.”

  A man’s voice, cheerful and gravelly, resounding through the apartment: “Well, I call this luxury, Isobel. Your sweetie Lee Bloom has the right idea.”

  “God in heaven.” Yael went rigid, seizing Kishote by the shoulders. “That’s Sam Pasternak.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “He must have come to Paris with Barak,” Yael whispered. “It’s a military mission, of course. Kishote!” It was a frantic hiss. “On your life, get him out of this apartment. On your life.”

  She darted into the dressing closet where she had hung her clothes. Kishote picked up the towel she had flung aside, fastened it around his middle, and walked into the living room, where Sam Pasternak was hugging and kissing Isobel Connors. She saw Kishote over Pasternak’s shoulder. “Eee-eek!” She pulled away, rounding astounded eyes at him.

  “Hello, Isobel,” said Kishote. “I thought you were in Cannes.”

  “Oh, yes. Well, I’m flying there tonight, and—”

  Pasternak exclaimed, “Kishote! What are you doing naked, and where the devil is Yael?”

  “Can I talk to you, sir?” He took Pasternak by the arm and walked a little away from Isobel, who was pouring herself whiskey at the bar, looking very shaken. “Yael’s at a department store, I think it’s called the Lafayette something—”

  “Galeries Lafayette.”

  “That’s it, and the fact is, I’ve got a French zonah in there.”

  Sam Pasternak’s truculent look relaxed in an approving grin. “French zonah, hey? How is she?”

  “I’m about to find out. I’m meeting Yael at the Comédie Française. If you and Isobel care to join us—”

  “No, no, she has to fly to Cannes, and I’m busy. How much longer will you be here?”

  “Say a half hour.”

  “That’s just fine.”

  Isobel Connors said with recovered aplomb, “So, Yossi, having a nap? You see, I missed my plane to Cannes this morning. Mr. Pasternak is an old friend. We just happened to bump into each other in a restaurant, and—”

  “Right, right,” said Pasternak. “Let’s let our young friend finish his nap, Isobel. He’s done a lot of sightseeing today. I’ll buy you a drink in the bar.”

  As soon as they left, Yael came out of the bedroom in a slip, her blond hair wildly tumbled. “Wonderful. How did you do it?”

  “I said you were a French whore.”

  “Again? I’ll begin to believe it. Who was that woman with him, the dirty swine?”

  “I have no idea,” said Don Kishote, on general principles.

  “Poor Ruthie. What a scoundrel he is! Well,” said Yael through her teeth, “I can’t accuse him, obviously, but he’ll pay for this. I have my ways.”

  “I’ve got to shower,” said Yossi, “and are my clothes okay for the Comédie Française?”

  “Doesn’t matter. We’ll go as we are.” Yossi looked down at his towel-wrapped body, and she guffawed. “As we soon will be.” He was standing near the windows, and on a warm impulse of gratified desire she flung herself at him for an affectionate hug and kiss. “Ah, look out there, Don Kishote. Paris is everything the books say it is. Isn’t it? It casts a spell. I’ve been in a dream. You’ve been a nice, nice part of it. I almost wish I loved you, but there’s just no room. And you’ve got Shayna.”

>   “On to Tartuffe,” said Don Kishote, a shade more casually than she might have wished, so soon after their shared raptures. “Who’s first in the shower?”

  16

  Mitla Pass

  The villa where Ben Gurion was staying and meeting with the French and British ministers was a drive of a half hour or so from Paris. Pasternak and Barak arrived there next day close to noon, and found him in an old sweater and an open shirt collar, reading Procopius amid fruit trees losing their yellowed leaves. His cheery aspect, and the serene way he greeted them, suggested to Zev Barak that he had made up his mind, and that the decision was for war. If Ben Gurion were about to turn down his hosts, the French, and return to Israel out of the game, he would be wearing the stern thin-lipped worried look with which he faced unpleasant confrontations.

  “It’s amazing,” he greeted them, brandishing the book, “what I’m reading here. This fellow, look you, wrote the official history of Byzantium under Justinian. Praised his emperor as a giant, a genius, and so on. Then later he wrote a ‘Secret History,’ which is included in this book. In it he attacks Justinian the way our newspapers attack me. Nothing is permanent in history, but nothing changes very much, either—Ah, here’s Moshe now.”

  Dayan appeared eating an apple, followed by aides. Ben Gurion pulled from his shirt pocket and unfolded a yellow paper covered on both sides with his writing. “Moshe, I’ve been thinking overnight about your compromise. Tell me again in simple words what the new plan is and why the British should accept it. And if they do, why I should. Isn’t that tartai d’satrai [a contradiction]?”

  “Sam, did you prepare an operational map?” inquired Dayan. In his hasty review of the change of KADESH plan with Ben Gurion the night before, the Chief of Staff had merely sketched the new strategy on the inside of a cigarette package.

  “Small scale,” said Pasternak, handing him a page pulled out of a history book he had found in the embassy.