“No, I didn’t know, but the thing that really gets me about Elias is—”
“Can you imagine it used to have a polar climate, fifty million years ago?” Juliette interrupts again.
“We would’ve come in parkas,” Olga giggles, pushing her with her elbow. “I’m a Savoyard from the mountains, so I’m not bothered by the cold.”
As they leave Mitzpe Ramon, Olga hands over a map to reach the Bedouin encampment. Juliette immediately recognizes Elias’s special handwriting, with its delicate letters like black silk thread, set next to each other in an orderly way, and that upsets her so much she can’t manage to be a good copilot. So she lets Olga go past the fork with the trail they need to go on, and they’re forced to go back to where they began. It’s extremely annoying, but Olga doesn’t take it badly at all.
“I love you, you’re totally out of it,” she says, giving her a little smack on the forehead.
“Forgive me, I was mostly looking at Elias’s handwriting, that’s why,” Juliette answers honestly.
“How d’you know Elias is the one who drew this map?”
“Uh, well since we were talking about him just before, I mean… you see, I, um, was assuming. Sorry,” Juliette stammers.
“Don’t apologize, you crazy or what? You’re incredibly intuitive, Juliette, I love it!”
But Olga does take the map into her hands and puts it on the steering wheel before starting up again about Elias. “Did I tell you Elias is working on a book? A big novel, you know. He already filled up dozens of folders with notes.” And she begins to tell her Elias’s story of Amos Kirzenbaum, the last Jew in Tel Aviv, but she interrupts herself often to look uneasily at the side of the road until she finds that half-hidden trail that goes off to the right to the encampment. Then the Audi goes into the rocky trail that leads to the Bedouins, stirring up eddies of opaque dust, when suddenly there’s a white Toyota police car coming at them the other way. As there’s no room for two vehicles, Olga has to go into reverse to let the cops go by, and she backs up all the way to the turnoff.
When they’re alongside the girls, the two policemen get out of the car and lean on both doors of the Audi.
“Hello, ladies,” says the older of the two. “May we know where you’re going?”
“What’s he saying?” Olga asks Juliette.
“We’re visiting,” Juliette answers in Hebrew.
“But what are you visiting? There’s nothing to see around here.”
“Can we talk English?” Olga intervenes in English. “I don’t understand Hebrew.”
“Ah, you’re French?” the cop answers, also in English. “OK. What are you going to do up there?”
“Assist a Bedouin family,” Olga answers firmly.
“Assist how?” the cop asks.
“With money,” Olga replies.
“I thought you were visiting,” the young cop intervenes in Hebrew.
“Well, yeah, since we don’t know the area,” Juliette retorts in Hebrew too. “It’s an excuse to visit at the same time.”
“What’d he say, Jul?” Olga says, worried. “What did you say?” she asks the cop in English.
“Show us this money,” the young cop says, snapping his fingers unpleasantly.
Olga turns off the ignition and grabs the bag containing the two-hundred-shekel bills. She takes out the wad and gives it to the younger one.
“They know you, those Bedouins up there?” he asks, after glancing at the money.
“Not personally, no, but it’s because they… well, I mean they had problems, and Tag Shalom is helping them out financially,” Olga explains in a voice that’s not so firm anymore—quavering, in fact.
“What kind of problems?”
“They need a good lawyer, in fact, that’s why—”
“You have your papers?” the old cop asks in Hebrew. As Olga sees Juliette getting out her ID card, she looks for her passport and unwillingly gives it to the policeman, trying to smile. What bad luck, this chance meeting!
The old one goes back to the car with the IDs, while his colleague stays next to the Audi with the money in his hands, now leaning on the passenger side of the windshield, looking at the girls without saying a word. You’d think he was trying to find something to get them for, something wrong with the car, no doubt, but as it’s an impeccable rental, Olga doesn’t worry about it. Unless he just wants to create a feeling of unease by his insistent, hostile look. Israeli cops are often unpleasant, a bit like the drivers of the Egged bus fleet, who drive at breakneck speeds in the middle of town and take off by slamming the door in passengers’ faces. Not conciliatory at all, and real nitpickers with the slightest offender. The old policeman comes back with their IDs.
“You’re a reporter at H24?” he asks Olga in English.
“Yes, I am… how do you know?” she asks, surprised.
“So you know Elias Benzaquen?” the cop continues.
“Umm, yes,” Olga answers uneasily, beginning to panic.
“How?”
“My… well, a colleague… just a colleague,” Olga pretends, and Juliette can’t help giving her an anxious look. Why’s she lying, dammit? What shit is this girl getting her into here?
“What about you?” the young cop asks Juliette in Hebrew.
“I work in a gallery.”
“No, but you know that guy?”
“I knew him,” Juliette answers in Hebrew, knowing that Olga doesn’t understand.
“And you’re finished with him?” the cop says in a slightly smutty tone, playing on the verb finish, which, in Israeli slang, also means “to come.”
“No, that’s not it, but we—”
“Who are you, to him?”
“Someone he used to know.”
“OK,” says the old one. “Follow us.”
“But why?” Olga protests. “We didn’t do anything wrong!”
“Follow us, please. And don’t try to escape. Can I trust you?”
“Escape?” Olga retorts. “But we’re not prisoners, as far as I know!”
“You are now under arrest, so do not try to get away from us. OK?”
“Right… OK,” Olga answers feverishly, after a moment of hesitation.
The police get back into the white Toyota and start off in a wind of gravel, with their flashing red and blue lights on the roof, while Olga starts the engine of the Audi just behind them.
“Why did you tell them he was just a colleague?” Juliette finally manages to ask.
“Because I… well, you see… it’s incredibly complicated!”
“Exactly what are you hiding from me? What the hell is that money? What trap are you dragging me into here?”
“Oh, look, a coyote!”
Juliette turns her head toward the animal slipping between the rocks, but she quickly returns to the embarrassing question.
“Olga, please! Answer me!”
“I swear it’s not a trap, Jul! It’s just that Elias had a big problem, and I wanted to help him.”
“What problem?”
“You’re mad at me, I can understand,” she finally says to Juliette. “But I swear to God I didn’t want to get you into hot water. You believe me, Jul? Say yes, please. I love you so much!”
Juliette takes out her tobacco and rolls herself a cigarette. “What is Elias’s problem?” she asks coldly, determined to get a clear answer. “Tell me, or I’ll never speak to you again!”
Olga is on the verge of tears. She pours out the whole story while gripping Juliette’s hand, and Juliette doesn’t miss a bit of it. She laps up every word. She expected almost anything except this story. She’s shattered to hear the judicial spiral Elias got caught in with this business. So at last, that’s the cause of his odious behavior, she tells herself. Everything is clear now. Poor Elias! If only he confided in her instead of fleeing her and becoming so cruel! If only he had the humility and the frankness and the simplicity to ask for her help instead of playing the cynical seducer! Of course she would have sacrificed herself for him. A thousand times, even! But how could she have suspected he needed her so much?