Tanya tried to sit up. “Am I dead?”
“Not at all,” the woman said matter of fact, as if responding to a normal question. She pointed to an embroidered logo on her coat: Saint Antoine Hospital.
The pain appeared suddenly, as if someone hit her head with a hard object. Tanya groaned and touched a bandage on her right temple.
“Careful.” The nurse held her hand. “You had a concussion. Do you remember?”
It took a moment for the memory to surface. “The synagogue!”
“Yes, terrible. The detectives would like to speak with you when you’re ready.”
As soon as the nurse left, Tanya got out of bed. She was dizzy from the pain in her head, but this was no time for self-pity.
The cabinet doors were not locked. Her dress, which was dark enough to hide the bloodstains, was draped over a hanger, and her shoes rested on a shelf next to her purse, which contained false identification papers and a credit card that could not be traced. Tanya got dressed, rinsed her face in the white basin, let her hair down over the bandage, and left.
*
Sunday, October 22, 1995
Prince Abusalim spent the night in a sparse room with only a prayer rug to cushion the concrete. At dawn, he was brought to his father’s chamber, and they prayed together. No words were exchanged, and Abusalim figured this was his punishment-a night of seclusion, discomfort, and repentance.
Within an hour of sunrise, the air was already warm and dry, the palm trees still, and the servants hushed with dread. Sheik Da’ood az-Zubayr kneeled, his forehead on the carpet, and completed his prayers. Hajj Ibn Saroah helped him rise.
Prince Abusalim touched his forehead down once more and got up. The long galabiya covered him as a cloak, reaching down to the plain sandals. He could smell his own body odor and longed to soak in a foam bath, sit on the balcony in view of the Eiffel Tower, and sip chardonnay while browsing the Wall Street Journal. He took his father’s hand and kissed it. “Thank you for making me realize my errors-”
The sheik pulled his hand away and left the room with the hajj.
Prince Abusalim followed, puzzled by his father’s behavior. Two limousines waited at the foot of the marble steps. The first had already departed when Prince Abusalim got into the second. It drove in silence down the road toward the airstrip. He twisted his face at the bittersweet smell of smoke and animal manure that drifted over from the tribesmen’s huts.
They climbed into the Boeing 747, and the doors were shut. The front sitting room was paneled with gold and thick cushions. He went upstairs to the miniature mosque on the upper-deck and sat with an open Koran. The carpeted floor floated on a swivel to allow it to turn toward Mecca no matter where the plane was heading.
The engines roared and the pilots began taxiing. The plane was less than two years old, equipped with state-of-the-art flight instrumentation, including a live link to the command center at the main Royal Saudi Air Force, enabling the pilots to view air traffic in every part of the region, including neighboring Kuwait, Iran, Iraq, and the Gulf Emirates.
After takeoff, they turned west toward the Red Sea. The prince pushed aside the silk curtain and looked out the window. The yellow desert was vast, stretching through the horizon, its monotony disrupted only by an occasional nomads’ encampment, a handful of camels and sheep grazing on a faded stain of greenery.
The hajj appeared at the door. “Your father wishes to see you.”
On the main level, in the rear suite, a large TV was playing. At first the screen was red. Then the camera zoomed out from a man’s open chest and shifted to his face, which was twisted, mouth open in a last scream. It moved across a demolished hall, resting briefly on a shattered body, a severed hand on a bed of charred prayer books, a woman kneeling by a boy who sat upright, his head slumped forward, unresponsive to her pleas. In the background, a recording of a short conversation was played:
“ Paris-Une. Oui? ”
“This is the Abu Yusef group.”
“Yes?”
“We attacked the synagogue on Rue Buffault. Our freedom fighters committed this brave attack under the command of our leader, Abu Yusef, the future president of Palestine.”
“Wait a minute! Who are you?”
“Our leader is Abu Yusef, the future president of Palestine. We will continue our struggle until Palestine is free again! Long live Palestine!”
The TV screen again filled with red, focusing on a stained sheet over a dead body.
Prince Abusalim felt his knees go soft. This was the reason his father had ordered him into seclusion last night! He kneeled and bowed, his forehead to the carpet. He remained in this position until the plane landed near Mecca.
Two Mercedes sedans waited at the end of the runway. Again the sheik and the hajj went in the first, Prince Abusalim in the second. The sun was high already, the yellow desert surrounded by dark peaks-in the east, Jabel Ajyad and Jabel Qubays, in the northeast, Jabel Hira, where Mohammed had once found seclusion. They drove down the Al-Mudda’ah Avenue, which was crowded with pilgrims. Ancient Mecca had been the oasis on the caravan route connecting the Mediterranean coast with Arabia, Africa, and Asia. But since Mohammed had returned here in 630 AD, it had become a city of religious fervor. How he missed Paris! But not the bloody sights from Abu Yusef’s synagogue attack. What unfortunate timing, just as his father was going to forgive him!
Prince Abusalim knew he must convince his father that the attack was part of a holy jihad. The Jews had brought it upon themselves. Unlike Arafat, Abu Yusef had the stomach to continue fighting. One day the Jews would tire of death and sorrow, leave the Middle East to its rightful Arab owners, and go to America or Canada, where many of them already lived safely among the Christians. And Abu Yusef would rule Palestine, with the power to appoint the new mufti of Jerusalem.
Confident in his grand plan, Prince Abusalim was ready to grovel before his father in this holy place and put on a show of solemn penitence-a small price to pay for the glory awaiting him down the road.
The cars stopped at the gates to the vast courtyard of the el-Harem Mosque. They were greeted by a group of az-Zubayr tribesmen, who led the way across the huge courtyard, through the noise and dust, toward the black Ka’abah.
The sheik stood in front of the giant singed cube. He looked up at the holiest shrine of Islam-the building that Ibrahim and Ishmael, his son by Hagar, had built together as a replica of God’s house in heaven.
Hajj Vahabh Ibn Saroah beckoned Prince Abusalim to his father’s side. The prince knelt in the dust. He prepared to bow for prayers, but paused. Something was wrong.
The sheik nodded at the hajj, closed his eyes, and began whispering verses from the Koran.
The hajj drew his crooked blade. “Extend your hand forward, thief!”
Prince Abusalim froze with fear. He could not comprehend this terrible turn of events. He had expected his father to demand that he prayed, maybe even crawled in the dust to beg forgiveness. But to suffer the fate of a common thief? “Father! I beg you!”
“You stole. You pay.” Hajj Vahabh Ibn Saroah raised his shabriya, its blade pointing to the sky. “Your right hand!”
“ No!” Prince Abusalim tried to rise, but two of the men held him down. “I need my hand,” he cried. “Father! Don’t do this to me!”
The only response from the sheik was more verses, recited in a louder voice.
The hajj reached down, grabbed Prince Abusalim’s wrist, and pulled it forward, holding it tightly.
The prince could barely breathe. He imagined his severed hand dropping to the yellow sand, twitching with remnants of life. “Father! No!”
The sheik’s voice grew even louder, the verses uttered in quick succession, drowning out his son’s pleas.
The sun reflected in the crooked blade as Prince Abusalim felt his wrist pulled forcefully, extended before him, his open palm facing up, pale as a fearful face.
*
Tanya stood at the window while a group of Mossad agents searched the apartment on Rue Buffault. Elie and his two agents must have departed in a hurry, leaving behind food, towels, linen, and a few audio books. The street below was quiet. The synagogue forecourt had been cleaned up, but orange tape still blocked access to the building. A police car parked at the curb with two officers inside.