90

THIS IS HARDLY THE main highway to Tel Aviv, but Alex is a local. She has traveled this route many times on the way back from Ben Gurion Airport, where immigration always stops her to compare the male visage on her passport with that of the demure figure holding it. The immigration clerks are mostly young girls bored with the endless lines of tired faces and the need to check the identity of every one of them—tourists, returning Israelis, foreign diplomats, Israeli consular officials on home leave. Each passport must be checked electronically against a computer memory of wanted criminals, suspect aliens, draft dodgers, Israeli Arabs, and foreign troublemakers whose names match those in the database. At one time this was done through the visual scanning of lists, but now the computer has taken over, digitally reading the name and face on each passport and comparing it instantly with names and faces in a database.

When Alex flies on a commercial flight, the drill is always the same.

“This is your passport?”

“Yes.”

“It doesn’t...look like you.”

“Bad hair day.”

“It’s a picture of a man.”

“Also the lighting...”

In a moment, two Border Police lead Alex to an interview room. “There’s a note in my file,” she tells them.

Nothing doing. In a minute, a senior immigration official comes in. “Alex, what’s the word?”

“Inflexibility.”

“Yes, well, that’s the way we are.” He stamps her passport. “I told you the last time, just ask for me. Epstein, David. Remember? I gave you my card. How was Paris?”

“Gay,” Alex says. “Entirely too gay.”

“You’re not...?”

“Just a guy who likes to dress up, David. You?”

Now, standing by the side of this tertiary road that if one knows where to turn will eventually reach north Tel Aviv, Alex is confronted with another kind of immigration barrier as, decked out in his Egyptian officer’s uniform, he stands beside the olive-green Cadillac and hears the unmistakable sound of a pistol being cocked.

Without moving anything but his head, he glances behind him to see two Bedouin, both armed. One is about twenty, the other might be his father. Tethered to a stunted mulberry tree beyond them are two laden donkeys.

“Do you mind if I finish?” he says in Arabic.

“Go ahead, Egyptian. It may be your last. Enjoy.”

It is a long piss. Alex’s mind is racing. He has several hundred Egyptian pounds in the pocket of his military trousers, courtesy of the previous occupant—the fat colonel carried nothing: in Arab armies senior officers have no need for cash—plus the adjutant’s watch, a Seiko, and the colonel’s, a gold Omega. Alex’s own watch, along with other gear, is hidden under the driver’s seat. Ever the pilot, he considers evasive action, but the two Bedouin are at point-blank range, so by the time he gets out his own pistol, the colonel’s pistol, he will be many times dead. But he can’t piss forever.

“Less than friendly,” he says, giving his business a good-luck shake, then stops before zippering his fly. He doesn’t want to do anything with his hands but keep them at his side. One suspicious move is all it would take. “What is it you desire? Money?”

Abed offers a theatrical sigh. “Why must everything always be about money?”

“I have a watch. Gold. Not plated.”

“We’ll start with your uniform.” He turns to Cobi, and in Hebrew says, “When the moment comes, make sure not to get blood all over it.”

“What the fuck? Why are you speaking Hebrew?”

Cobi looks hard at the Egyptian colonel. “Why are we speaking Hebrew? Why are you speaking Hebrew? I have to say, it’s pretty good.” In one second, Alex has gone from preparing to die to a state of swollen indignation. “It should be, you twat. You’re hijacking an Egyptian staff car already hijacked by a downed Israeli pilot.”

This time it is the turn of Cobi and Abed to be confused.

“Will you please put those guns away before I get really bitchy?” Cobi is unsure. “How do we know you’re real?”

“Schmuck, your friend’s Arabic is better than mine. If you assholes will allow me to reach into this borrowed uniform, you can check my ID. There’s a photo.”

The two examine Alex’s Israeli military ID card, guns still pointed in his direction.

“Air Force major, it says.”

“You want my unit number?”

Cobi shakes his head. “I wouldn’t know if it’s real, or the ID. You could be some sort of spy.”

“Oh, yeah, a regular Mata Hari,” Alex says, realizing immediately that the two are unlikely to know the name, or its gender. Worse, if they did, it might confuse the issue further. “Look, will you point those guns away? I am an IAF pilot. F-16s. You know, big bird, go fast, save Jewish lives?”

“You really Israeli?” Cobi says.

“No, I’m a fucking space alien. Ask me a question—anything.” Cobi looks to Abed, who shrugs. “Name the starting lineup for Maccabi Tel-Aviv.”

Alex shakes his head wearily. “I’m not, you know, big on sports. That’s basketball, right?”

“You’re from Tel Aviv?”

“Stupid question, kid. Everyone is—now.”

“Starting from the south, name all the roads crossing Dizengoff Street.”

“Including Buki ben-Yogli? Because that’s really small.”

Abed shakes his head. “A spy would know that. He’d have the whole city memorized.”

“Sing Jerusalem of Gold”

“With my dick hanging out?” He sings the Naomi Shemer song, Jersualem of Gold, that is practically a second national anthem.

The mountain air, clear as wine,

And the perfume of the pines

Carried on the breeze at twilight

Along with the sound of bells.

And in the sleep of tree and stone,

Captured as in a dream,

The city stands alone,

And at its heart—a wall.

Jerusalem of gold

And of bronze, and of light

Am I not a lyre for all your songs?

How the cisterns have dried.

The marketplace stands empty

There are no visitors to the

Temple Mount in the Old City.

And in the mountain caves

The winds wail, and no one

Descends to the Dead Sea

By way of Jericho.

Jerusalem of gold

And of bronze, and of—

“Enough,” Cobi says. “What’s with the falsetto?”

“A long story.”

Abed keeps his gun leveled. “He could have learned that. I mean, this is what spies do, no?” He takes a step closer to the Egyptian officer.

“Schindler’s List,” Cobi says.

It’s a movie.

“What was the scandal about Schindler’s List and Jerusalem of Gold?”

Alex laughs. “That you call a scandal? It wasn’t a scandal, just a fuck-up. A joke.”

“I saw it,” Abed says. “Good movie. But from my perspective, too Jewish.”

“So tell me,” Cobi says. “What was the...fuck-up?”

“At the end of the movie, when these people, Jews—you know, from the camps—are leaving, for Israel eventually, the song is played. Israeli audiences howled.”

“Why?”

“Because, my young friend, the scene takes place in 1944 or 1945, and Naomi Shemer didn’t write it until 1967.”

Cobi decocks his pistol. “No spy could know that. Where you headed?”

“Not Cairo.”

Cobi and Abed break into broad smiles.

“Kindly put your dick back in your pants,” Abed says. “You’ve got passengers.”