The Damascus Cover Read online

  There was an uncomfortable pause, the silence broken only be the sound of an electric clock buzzing on the wall behind the Colonel’s desk. Finally, Ari took a deep drag on his cigar and spoke.

  “I was away from my receiver the twelfth of April when the weekly transmission came in from Damascus.”

  “Indeed,” the Colonel said, as if Ari’s words contained information he did not already possess. “A bit unlike you,” he added, lighting a Montecruz for himself.

  “I was following a lead near Kyrenia.”

  The Colonel screwed the top back on the cigar tube; he saved them for his grandchildren. “Did anything come of it?”

  “No, it was a dead end.”

  “I see.”

  “It happens!” Ari said.

  “Yes, it does.” The Colonel nodded understandingly. “Dead ends eventually confront us all.” The Mossad chief placed his glasses on the desk, rubbed his eyes, then looked up. “Ari, I was wondering if you’d had enough?”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “I was wondering if you were worn out, if you wanted to quit spying.”

  He couldn’t believe what the Colonel was saying. “You mean, do I want to stay in Israel?”

  “Yes.”

  There was a long silence, each second seeming interminable.

  “I’d rather not,” Ari said finally.

  The Colonel puffed on his cigar, then allowed the smoke to drift from his mouth. “I thought you’d say that.” He knocked a short length of ash into the wastebasket at his feet. “Ari, I’ve got only three operations that are worth anything, and Hans Hoffmann is one of them. Your work’s been of tremendous value to us, but even the best agents can’t remain out there all the time. Everyone has to come in periodically, otherwise the loneliness—it becomes too strong to fight. Then, inevitably…” The Colonel stopped in midsentence and put his glasses back on. “Maybe we’ve made a mistake, maybe we’ve neglected you for too long. Maybe it’s time.”

  Ari thought about all the airports and train stations he’d been in, the all-night vigils he’d undertaken, the gallons of coffee he’d drunk trying to stay awake and warm while his adversary slept in a heated apartment across the street.

  “Time for what?” Ari said at last. “I don’t understand what you’re saying. What is it you want me to do?”

  The Colonel leaned back in his chair. “I want you to take a few refresher courses—physical exercise, instruction in the use of some of the new explosives, that sort of thing. Ari, I want you to keep sharp. There are a lot of young agents on the way up who are begging for field assignment. I can’t keep them in the background indefinitely.” Ari said nothing so the Colonel went on. “And of course while you’re here I’ll want to make use of your experience; you might think about giving a few lectures and possibly you could spend some time in Operational Planning. I wouldn’t be surprised if you came up with a suggestion or two. Some of those armchair theorists on the first floor have never been out of the country.” Abruptly the Colonel ground out his cigar. “But enough of this for now. You just got in. You haven’t even been home. We can talk again another time.”

  “Does Yael know I’m here?” Ari asked.

  The Colonel nodded. “I had one of the girls phone a while ago and tell her you were due back this week. She’s pretty shaky. I thought it best she had some time to prepare herself.”

  Ari rose. “Is that all?”

  “I should think so.” The Colonel moved across the room and accompanied him to the door. “Take as long as you need; when you’re ready, report to Yehuda Shamir in room 312. He’ll debrief you and arrange those refresher courses I mentioned.”

  “I’ll be in tomorrow,” Ari said flatly. Opening the door, he stepped into the hall, then turned back. “What about the car?”

  “Oh that. Keep it for a week or so—until you’re settled.”

  Ari nodded and moved slowly down the corridor.

  Outside, he pushed up the collar of his jacket and walked along the empty street, listening to the echo of his footsteps. Lights shone from the window of Givat Ram, the dormitories at the back of the Hebrew University campus. Ari wondered what it would have been like to attend a university. He kicked at an empty Goldstar beer can and sent it spinning into the rocks and weeds along the side of the road. Such speculation was pointless; he was only stalling. He shrugged and retraced his steps back toward the Susita. The Colonel had been even vaguer than usual. Ari wondered why.

  Driving down Yafo Road into the heart of the New City, he turned left on Straus Street, passed the Bikur Holim Hospital and headed into Mea Shearim, the orthodox quarter of Jerusalem. Though it was late, and the streets were virtually deserted, while Ari waited at a red light two frail men wearing long black gabardine coats and round fur-edged hats stepped off the curb and crossed in front of the Susita. Strolling arm in arm to lend each other support, they prodded the pavement with their sticks as they walked. Buried from dawn to dusk in the timeless world of books, it was only at night that they ventured out for a breath of fresh air. After they’d passed, Ari eased down on the accelerator. Minutes later the street climbed the steep hill that opened into the northernmost tip of the city—Ramat Eshkol, a fashionable suburb built on land taken from Jordan during the Six Day War. Ari parked the car in front of number 12 Mitla Pass Road and ran his eyes along the rows of five-story stone buildings and manicured flower gardens, so characteristic of the newer sections of Jerusalem. All the streets in Ramat Eshkol: Nahal Zin, Straits of Tiran Street, Mishmar Hagvul, Parran Road, Ramat HaGolan Road, Midbar Sinai Way, were named after the sites of Israeli victories in the 1967 fighting. No street names anywhere in the country commemorate the battles of the Yom Kippur War.

  Ari mounted the stone steps at the base of the building and pushed the red button on the wall to his left. Immediately the dark corridors were bathed in light. He now had sixty seconds to reach his door before the lights automatically shut off. Energy was conserved here. Suddenly the sound of several of Jerusalem’s ubiquitous alley cats rose from the basement, their hissing and shrieking reverberating through the narrow corridors of the building. Ignoring them, Ari climbed the stairs to the fifth floor, inserted the key in the door at the end of the hall, and pushed himself inside—as if he were accustomed to doing so daily.

  Yael was asleep on the couch. A black and white test pattern shone from the television; a half-empty bottle of Carmel 777 cognac lay on its side on the floor. Ari stood motionless at the entrance to the living room, surprised at how old his wife looked. Streaks of gray ran through her once ash-brown hair, and deep lines dug into the soft flesh beneath her eyes. Ari moved into the room and shut off the television set. She stirred groggily. Though he had ceased to love his wife long ago, it pained him to see her like this.

  “Yael,” he whispered as she slipped back into the fog accompanying alcoholic sleep.

  At the sound of her name she opened her eyes. “Ari,” she half cried.

  He bent down and stroked her tangled hair. At the touch of his hand she stiffened, and buried her head in the cushion. He reached across the couch and gently took hold of her shoulder.

  “No.” She pushed his hand away, squeezing it as she did.

  “Yael…”

  “Go away. Why did you have to come back now, after so long?”

  “They want me to stay in Israel—for a while.”

  “What difference will that make?” She turned away and pushed herself deeper in the couch. “I don’t feel well,” she said, her words muffled by the upholstery.

  “Let me make you something hot to drink.”

  He rose and went into the kitchen without waiting for her to answer. Rummaging through the refrigerator, he couldn’t find a bottle of milk. About to close the door and look in the cupboard for a jar of instant coffee he suddenly realized the plastic bag, mounted in the white holder he’d shoved to the side, contained milk. He took it out, warmed some, removed the skin which she hated, and brought a steaming mug in
to the living room.

  Yael lay passed out on the couch, clutching the open cognac bottle in her arms. Ari set the milk down and removed the 777 from her grip. She mumbled something incomprehensible. Lifting his wife’s unresisting body in his arms, he carried her into her room, drew back the bed covers, and slipped her underneath them—noticing as he left that a handful of multicolored pills were scattered over the nightstand.

  Restless, he opened the sliding glass door and stepped out onto the narrow balcony. The night air was cool. Ari looked into the distance and imagined he could make out the ring of lights that surround Jerusalem like satellites: to the east, Jericho; to the north, Ramallah; to the south, Bethlehem. Closer by, atop a high peak to the west, the tower of Nebi Samuel stood silhouetted in the bluish white moonlight. There the prophet who lent his name to the peak sat in judgment over the nation of Israel; followed 900 years later by the Maccabees, who fasted on the same spot before they swept down on the Romans occupying their city. Ari had hiked to Nebi Samuel many times. From there, staring across the Bab el Wad valley, Jerusalem looked like a metropolis cast randomly atop a series of desolate mountains, with no rivers, no sustaining fields, in fact no reason for existing, except the belief in men’s minds.

  Ari stood there for a long time thinking about what the Colonel had said, wondering how long it would be before he was given a new assignment. Finally he went inside and fell asleep on the couch.

  Rising early the following morning, he left the apartment, drove to the Sanhedria Pension in the Bukharian quarter just outside Mea Shearim, and rented a room.

  4.

  MAY, JUNE, JULY

  In the summer of 1947, after being warned that the Zbrojovka Brno arms works in Prague would deal only with the authorized representative of a sovereign nation, a young, virtually untried Haganah intelligence lieutenant managed to acquire eight signed and sealed blank letterheads from the Paris legation of Ethiopia. The desperately ill-equipped provisional Jewish government in Palestine was immediately able to purchase ten thousand Model E-18 Mausers, one hundred MG-34 submachine guns, and several million accompanying cartridges. No one asked where the letterheads came from. Ari did not volunteer an explanation. Then a decade later a mysterious sabotage incident occurred at the outbreak of the Sinai Campaign. At dawn on October 29, 1956, a Soviet Ilyushin with half of the Egyptian General Staff on board plunged into the Mediterranean somewhere off the coast of Lebanon. In its baggage compartment was a small chest bought by an Egyptian general as a gift for his wife. It had been purchased at a discount from a recently opened import–export firm, Hans Hoffman Ltd.

  And now—refresher courses.

  ◆◆◆

  After Ari was debriefed Yehuda Shamir gave him a dog-eared Royal Canadian Air Force Exercise Manual, explaining that it was better than anything they had in Hebrew, and suggested he work out on his own. There had been a time when Ari daily did calisthenics before breakfast, but over the years, he couldn’t remember exactly when, he’d replaced knee bends with coffee and a cigarette. Following the Canadian system he exercised each morning for 20 minutes. After the fifth day he accidentally misplaced the manual. He didn’t ask for another one.

  On the pistol range Ari discovered, much to his surprise, that his aim was way off. He checked out a Llama Model VIII 9-mm automatic pistol, choosing the nine-shot .38 over the seven-shot .45, and began practicing an hour each afternoon. After a few days his accuracy improved considerably, but it never quite matched his old performance levels. His scores were still kept on file in the room on the second floor of the walled police compound directly across from the central post office on Yafo Road.

  Ari was given some instruction in the new uses of explosives. The Colonel was particularly fond of tetryl, a high-power charge made from dimethylaniline and nitric acid, which when inserted in a tobacco pipe or ballpoint pen turned those implements into lethal weapons—but these lessons were occasional and brief. Ari spent most of his time in Operational Planning. Due to his familiarity with London he was asked to evaluate the feasibility of recruiting, as quasi-operatives, a number of the numerous East End Jewish taxicab drivers who regularly made the run to Heathrow Airport. Theoretically at least, he read from a file, it should be possible for them to queue in the ranks outside incoming Soviet and Arab flights, pick up specially targeted passengers, and rifle their briefcases, which normally were placed in the empty space next to the driver, below the rear-riding customer’s field of vision. Ari wrote a lengthy evaluation detailing the positive and negative aspects of the plan, including in it an additional section on the possible consequences to his country’s relations with England should one of the cabdrivers be caught and confess that he was working for the Israeli government. Ari was in favor of mounting the operation, but to protect Israel he strongly suggested the Mossad limit its contact to one carefully selected British Jew, who could then do the necessary recruiting under the auspices of a local fringe movement, possibly the Heirut party.

  Ari wrote his report rapidly in the hope that the sooner he finished, the closer he would be to a field assignment. In actuality his superiors were so pleased at the speed and insight with which he completed his analysis of the projected operation that the case histories of three Egyptian agents, earmarked for study by the Colonel’s administrative aides, were diverted to his desk.

  The weeks bumped into each other. A month passed, followed by another, then another. The paperwork piled up. As soon as he completed one assignment another took its place. Ari began to drink, not a lot, but more than he had before. He firmly believed the solution to personal difficulties was rigorous self-discipline. Knowing exactly how much Scotch he could swallow before his intellectual capabilities diminished, he never exceeded that limit. But recently he’d been reaching it more often.

  Several times Ari spoke to the Colonel, requesting reassignment to Europe. Cordial as always, the Colonel praised him lavishly for the work he done since returning to Israel, but said little else. Growing increasingly restless as he realized he was becoming more than a temporary pencil and paper pusher, Ari pressed for a date when he could plan on going abroad. The Colonel intimated he didn’t have one and didn’t know when he would. In the meantime, he added, the Service must utilize each man where he was most needed. For once Ari fully understood him. Everyone in intelligence life paid homage to that sacrament.

  Unknown to Ari, there was quite a lot of whispering going on about him during his colleagues’ coffee breaks and lunch hours. Everyone seemed to be speculating about the reason for his reassignment to Operational Planning, but nobody could get close enough to him to learn his side of the story. It was rumored he’d made a mistake on Cyprus, that somehow he was connected to the capture of Dov Elon in Damascus, and didn’t even know it. No one was sure of the facts. All agreed, though, that in his time he’d been one of the best field agents the Mossad ever had. And probably still was, many thought.

  ◆◆◆

  From the Bukharian quarter Ari walked toward the center of town. The afternoon was warm and pleasant. Soon he passed the black and white sawhorses drawn across Yehezkel Street by the police at sundown every Friday night to keep vehicles out of Mea Shearim during the 24-hour Sabbath observance. Inside the Orthodox order young men in their white, open-throated shirts and girls in white Sabbath dresses laced with colored embroidery mixed comfortably with the bearded Jews wearing long gabardines and their modestly dressed wives, many of whom were pushing baby carriages through the open streets.

  Ari was hungry. Generally he took his meals at the Restaurant Stark on King George Road, but on Saturdays, when the Jewish restaurants in Jerusalem were closed, he walked into the Old City and patronized the Arabs.

  Crossing toward the police barrier at the end of Straus Street that marked the southern boundary of Mea Shearim, Ari noticed a young woman, partially hidden in the shadow of the massive Histadrut building, pointing a camera with a telephoto lens at the bearded, black-garbed Jew seated on a stone step near t
he corner. Hurriedly he moved toward her.

  “I wouldn’t do that,” he said in English. Her clothing and her expensive Nikon photographic equipment told him that she was one of the numerous American tourists who invaded Israel in the summer.

  “What?” she said, lowering her camera and revealing a striking face.

  Ari pointed toward the old man. “He would consider it a personal affront and a desecration of the Sabbath.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t realize.” Her cheeks reddened. “Thank you for telling me.” The woman, tall, apparently in her late twenties, had blue-gray eyes shaded by dark lashes, and dimples that deepened when she talked. The front strands of her champagne-colored hair, parted down the middle, curled as they fell alongside her face. She wore a V-cut peasant blouse exposing a gold necklace and the upper curves of well-formed breasts. Her nails were long and clear; Ari immediately noticed that she used little makeup.

  “Your accent.” She hooked her camera strap over one shoulder. “Are you British?”

  “Something like that,” he said, anticipating the next series of questions and knowing his pride would prevent him from telling her he was a former spy put out to pasture to attend a flock of papers.

  “That’s encouraging. These Israelis have been driving me crazy. They’re all hands.” She smiled, suddenly seeing his small blue eyes. They were attractive. “My name’s Kim Johnson.”

  “Hans Hoffman,” he said, returning her smile. “And don’t worry about local men, if anyone becomes excessively aggressive just give him a curt bli yadayim. It means hands off. He’ll get the message.”

  “Bli yadayim,” she repeated out loud. “Thank you, I’ll make use of that.” She picked up the leather case at her feet. “You’ll have to excuse me but I must be heading back to my hotel. I didn’t realize the restaurants would be closed and I haven’t eaten since this morning.” She slipped her camera in the case and zipped the top closed. “Thanks again for the advice.” She turned and started to walk toward Yafo Road.