Judas Country

'Yes, but they changed their minds.' Would she ask why the change? Would I tell her my guess – a trap?

She didn't ask that. 'What was he… charged with?'

'Espionage.'

'What? And he only got two years?*

'Three with one off for good behaviour. But they call everything espionage over here. We were in the usual business: a load of small arms for Jordan only we landed in Israel instead.'

'That's a habit you can't afford often,' she said dryly. 'Wait -you said we?'

'Uh-huh. We were coming out of the Lebanon into Syria, in thick weather. There's a couple of bloody great mountain ranges around there, Mount Hermon and all, and your safety height's about 11,000 feet. So we lost an engine in between them, and we were overloaded so she wouldn't hold more than six thousand feet on one fan. Couldn't go back, couldn't go on – not unless we could see – so the only place to go was south. And that's the Jordan valley. You know it goes on down and becomes the Red Sea and then the Kenya Rift Valley?'

'But you didn't reach Kenya,' she said gently.

'We nearly made Jordan. But when we came out of cloud over Galilee we found we'd got a fighter escort. Ken put her down on a road just south of the lake.'

'Andyou got away?"

'Israel's got a lot of frontier to guard, and they guard it against an army – not just one man."

So then the TWA crew decided it was takeoff time, but not so urgent they couldn't get a closer look at Eleanor on the way. The captain, a solid man with cropped grey hair, nodded at me and said pleasantly: 'Haven't met here before, have we? You fly?'

He was looking at my shirt, which had the little pen-holders stitched to the outside of the breast pocket.

I nodded back. 'Business and charter.'

'Ah.' His Dow-Jones rating of me slumped several points. 'You do a nice line in stewardesses.'

Eleanor gave him a quick flashgun smile. 'No, I'm his employer.'

The captain sighed. 'And we get Howard Hughes. Come on, boys; it may be the wrong business, but it's the only one we know.'

Eleanor watched them to the door, sipping her drink thoughtfully. 'But Ken got caught?'

'Somebody had to stay and argue, or they'd just have confiscated the whole aeroplane right off. And somebody has to be on the outside paying for defence lawyers. He came close to an acquittal.'

She looked at me curiously. 'How did you decide who stayed? Spin a coin or compare stiff upper lips?'

'No. It was his turn.'

'It was…? You mean you've been in jail, too?"

'Nearly three years, in Persia. Same sort of reason. It goes with the job.'

Then the waiter called:'Mees Travis, telephone for Mees Travis.'

She went to take it. I called for another round, then started scraping out a pipe. I'd just got it packed and lit when she came back. 'Mitzi: she's booked in at a place called the Holy Land, West Jerusalem.'

'Long way out. I suppose things are getting jammed up, there, with Passover and Easter coming on.'

She sipped her new drink. 'How did you get set up as gunrunners?'

'Pleasenot that filthy phrase. We weren't illegal. Well – we were sort of arms-running for the RAF in Transport Command and 38 Group, so we learned something, and then when we came out it was the only cargo on offer for small outfits, so we sort of specialised.'

'But not illegally.'

'Straight government-to-government deals; compared to that, the illegal stuffs peanuts. Britain sold £400 million in arms abroad last year, France did better and God knows what America did. A lot of that's fighters and ships and tanks, but a lot's small stuff: rifles, ammunition, radar bits. High value and always in a rush: perfect air freight. But the big airlines won't touch it: not respectable. So…"

'And if you didn't, somebody else would.'

I lit my pipe again. 'Actually, I believe in the right of small countries to bear arms.'

She was puzzled. 'Who said "small countries"?'

'I see: you think America should scrap its armed services, too. Or did you just mean small countries that have to buy its arms abroad? Like Jordan. Like Israel.'

After a while, she heaved a sigh, and I mean heaved: a nice bra-busting movement. 'I guess that's so. And it's all legal? '

'That rather depends on which side of the o P river Jordan you land.'

'I never knew being a merchant of death was so tricky.'

So then it was my turn to take a phone call, down in the lobby.

*

'It's your loving Uncle Moishe,' said Ken's voice. So we were going to try and play it in code. 'How d'you like our beautiful country? Have any problems on the journey?'

'Our old friend from the race-course turned up again.'

'Didhe? Was he being impetuous?'

'Yes, but I got even more so.'

Tine…" he couldn't expect any more detail, not on the phone. 'Have you heard from your second cousin yet?'

'Who? Oh, yes. At the Holy Land, West Jerusalem. Any contact yet?'

'Yes, but only India Foxtrot.' I suppose 'Instrument Flight' meant not visual contact: he'd only rung Gadulla. 'Looks hopeful. And something eke: I checked with shipping offices in Haifa. Old three-stripes was booked on a tourist boat that got in today. No show, of course.'

'No sign of the gent from… from the Establishment?'

'No, but he wouldn't book on the same boat, just pretend he had, maybe.'

'He'll be on his way. Watch your back, uncle.'

'And yours, nephew. Love to cousin Ellie. Shalom.' When I got back to the table, Eleanor was glooming at the menu. I said: 'Ken, all right. Some progress. D'you want to eat here or go in to Dizengoff?'

'Where?'

'Tel Aviv's Broadway or Bou F Mich'. Or something.' She put the menu down with a slap. 'So why not live a little?'

25

We ate at a small restaurant just up from Dizengoff Circle. Sunday isn't as lively as Saturday, with the Sabbath just out, but the gentle night air had brought enough of a crowd to give it a bit of a swing.

I made coffee-drinking gestures at the waiter. The food hadn't been anything to write home about, not unless your mother knew those sort of words already, but the Israelis take coffee seriously.

Eleanor said: 'You and Ken – you've been together a long time, now?'

'Twenty years or something. We don't actually give each other flowers on the anniversary of that first day I nearly landed up his chuff on the West Mailing runway.'

'You're going to go on?'

'Yes, of course.' Then I stopped to think why 'of course". 'I suppose… you've got a man you can work with, you trust, he's good at his job, you can talk to him but you don't have to… most ofufe is seven to four against, as somebody said, so why change?'

'But don't youlike Ken?'

'Of course I like the crummy bastard."

She looked at me carefully. 'Men.' Then: 'And neither of you ever got married?'

'I did once. Nearly."

'What happened?'

'Three years in a Persian nick."

'Oh. And she didn't wait?'

'I felt bad for a time, but… I'd never promised to give up merchanting death. I suppose a woman wants a man home more than once every three years."

'Most marriage services imply that," she said dryly. 'Are you going to give it up now?"

'I dunno… You've got young outfits coming up, now: kids who can't believe they'll ever land on the wrong side of the river. And past forty, you haven't got the years to spare in jail.'

'I guess I know how you feel…'

The waiter brought our coffee.'Dont tell me your best years were spent in Allentown jail?'

'No. But… when a girl gets to thirty… in her thirties, she can get the feeling the train's done gone.'