The Jerusalem Inception - By Avraham Azrieli Page 0,77

very well.” He carried her down the hallway. “We’ll write to him tomorrow. It will make you happy, yes?”

Tanya buttoned up her coat, slipped on the wool cap, and left the apartment.

Chapter 29

“I’m not doing this!” Sanani pointed up at a wooden platform affixed to the summit of a giant eucalyptus tree. A thick rope came down from the platform, across a wide gulch, ending in a knot around the trunk of another eucalyptus.

“I need a volunteer,” Captain Zigelnick said, “to show Sanani how to be a man.”

The soldiers looked up. No one stepped forward.

“I’ll show him.” Lemmy raised his hand, and the captain tossed him a bent steel bar.

Short sections of wood were nailed to the trunk, forming a makeshift ladder. He stuck the metal bar in his belt, shifted the Uzi so it rested on his lower back, and started climbing. The trunk was smooth. It had a sharp smell. He climbed one rung after another. His muscles began to ache.

His friends clapped rhythmically. “Gerster! Gerster! Gerster!”

Lemmy paused and looked down. Their upturned faces surrounded the base of the tree, approximately four stories below him. He held on with one hand, his feet planted securely, and pretended to unzip his fly. They scattered, hooting.

A light breeze was blowing from the north, and the tree swung from side to side. The platform was built like a raft of rough-cut logs tied together with wires, the cracks between the logs wide enough to put his hand through. He made the mistake of looking down. Far below, his friends seemed small.

He reached up to the rope, which was tied to the trunk over his head, and slowly rose to stand on the platform. It swayed under his weight, creaking in protest. The rope was as thick as his arm. It dropped steeply about two-thirds of the way then curved in a gradual slope before leveling off near the opposite tree.

Gripping the rope with both hands above his head, Lemmy inched forward until the tips of his boots lined up with the edge of the platform. The chanting below stopped. He heard Zigelnick yell something.

Acting against every survival instinct, Lemmy let go of the rope with one hand and pulled the hooked bar from his belt. Slowly, without disturbing his careful balance, he slipped the hooked bar over the rope, slid his other hand to the opposite end of the bar, and eased forward into the air.

The acceleration was blinding. The friction of the metal bar on the rope produced a high-pitched whizzing. He heard himself howling.

The pressure on his arms and shoulders grew as his slide changed direction and leveled off. The deceleration was as drastic as the initial acceleration, and his vision cleared just in time to see that he was hurtling head-on toward the trunk of the opposite eucalyptus. He let go before colliding with the tree, curled up, and rolled on the ground several times, coming to rest in a cloud of dust.

A moment later, his friends were all over him, and someone emptied a bucket of water on his head.

Cursing and laughing at the same time, Lemmy got up. His knees were weak and his hands trembled, but he knew he could climb all the way up to the flimsy platform and rappel down again right now. But it was Sanani’s turn, and everyone goaded him up the eucalyptus tree.

Elie was summoned to a strategy conference at the King David Hotel. From the top-floor suite, the border with Jordan passed practically under the windows, which offered sweeping views of East Jerusalem and the Old City. A light breeze diluted the smoke of cigarettes.

Minister of Foreign Affairs, Abba Eban, who had arrived straight from the airport, spoke first. “My consultations in Paris left me with an unequivocal conviction that King Hussein has in fact received our non-aggression communiqué through the French consular intermediary.”

“You mean,” Eshkol said, “they told Jordan we don’t want war?”

“Precisely. The French ambassador to Amman personally conveyed our fervent preference for a non-confrontational détente in lieu of Jordanian participation in the belligerent military campaigns currently contemplated by Egypt and Syria.”

“And?”

“The Elysée Palace remains utterly concerned.” Eban’s British accent, usually a cause for chuckles among the sabra generals, somehow seemed appropriate in this opulent hotel suite. “Our diplomatic overtures, notwithstanding their sincerity, have been spurned decisively by the royal Jordanian court. The king’s counselors misinterpreted the message as insidious machinations, contrived merely to lure His Majesty toward injurious inaction while we surreptitiously prepare to launch the