The Pure Page 18

  Uzi hesitated. ‘It’s Daniel.’

  ‘Daniel?’

  ‘Yes, you know. From – from school.’

  ‘The security guy?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  A pause, a hesitant intake of breath. ‘Where have you been?’

  ‘I . . . you know, I have a different job now. I moved to a different part of town.’

  ‘You’ve got a new number, too.’

  ‘Yeah, new number.’

  ‘You could have called, you know.’

  ‘I want to see you. Tonight.’

  ‘I’m studying. I have exams.’

  ‘I’m going to see you.’

  ‘You should have thought about me before. You should have called.’

  ‘Are you at home?’

  ‘I’ve told you. I’m studying.’

  ‘And I told you. Fuck studying.’

  Another pause, another breath. But she didn’t hang up. Uzi felt a rush of energy. ‘Tonight,’ he said.

  ‘If I fail, my parents will kill me.’

  ‘I’ll be with you in half an hour.’ He hung up, swung his car around and switched the sound system on loud. Hadag Nahash began to boom through the speakers: people, you don’t really have an excuse, you know the suits don’t give a damn, you lean on them like a broken wicker chair, they know this is the countdown to the explosion . . . He nodded to the beat, trying to lose himself in the music, that aggressive groove. The tune went round and round, churning up the conflict in his head. The dissonance was too much. He turned the music off and drove on in silence.

  Twenty minutes later he parked outside Gal’s house and killed the engine. It was a quiet night; the house looked comfortable and secure, a little nest of warmth in the darkness. He dialled her number. It rang off. He cursed and dialled again; again, no answer. A prickling irritation rose within him, spreading its tendrils across his scalp. He started to compose a text message but he couldn’t concentrate. There’s nothing for it, he thought; parents or no parents, I’m going in.

  Just as he was about to get out of the car, the door of the house opened. For a moment there was only a slim rectangle of light. Then a silhouette appeared and slipped out. The door closed. The irritation in Uzi’s body transmuted into something else, something equally potent. Gal looked young, sexy, reckless. Her hair was still raven-black, slightly longer now. She glanced up and down the street without seeing him. He opened the car door and caught her eye. She approached.

  ‘I can’t be long,’ she said in Hebrew. ‘I’ve got a lot to do.’

  ‘So have I. Get in.’

  ‘Is this a real sports car?’

  ‘No, kid, it’s a camper van. Get in.’

  She walked slowly through the parallel beams of the headlights. Then she was in the front seat, half an arm’s length away, her legs stretching out in two sleek lines to her trainers. The worried face of Gal’s mother appeared in the upstairs window. Uzi started the engine and started to drive. He turned the corner.

  ‘Where are you taking me?’ said the girl.

  ‘Out. I don’t know. I wanted to see you.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I felt like it.’

  ‘Is this your car?’

  ‘No, I stole it.’

  ‘It’s nice. You must be making money now.’

  ‘I must be.’

  ‘What’s your new job? Anything to do with Israel?’

  ‘You ask a lot of questions, you know that?’

  ‘So?’ she said testily.

  A pause.

  ‘Did you tell your parents about me?’ he said.

  ‘What’s to tell? That this random security guard came round for a smoke and left without saying goodbye?’

  ‘I thought you said I was an Israeli hero.’

  She laughed. He took a spliff from the glove compartment and tossed it on to her lap. She lit it and inhaled noisily. He was starting to realise why he had wanted to see her, and it was making him feel uncomfortable. Something about what she had said was creeping under his skin. But still he felt warm, energised.

  ‘Look,’ said Gal after a time, ‘enough with the bullshit. I can’t stand bullshit. If you want to fuck me just say so.’

  Uzi hesitated. ‘And if I did, what would you say?’

  ‘Who knows?’ said Gal. ‘I’d see what I felt like.’

  ‘You’re just a kid,’ said Uzi.

  Gal rolled her eyes. ‘I’ve got to be back in an hour.’

  The Porsche had found its way to Hangar Lane, and Uzi steered it on to the A40 towards Oxford. The traffic thinned and the car picked up pace, the speedometer ticking higher and higher. The engine settled into a comfortable purr. Gal smoked, looking out the window. Finally Uzi broke the silence.

  ‘OK,’ he said, ‘start by sucking me off.’

  ‘What, now?’

  He pressed the car to go faster. She looked at him through a roll of smoke, lights streaking past behind her, then she shrugged moodily and leaned into his lap, releasing her seatbelt as she did so. She was clumsy in loosening his trousers. He saw a little crescent of skin where her shirt pulled away from her skirt. Unblemished, pure skin. What a shame, he thought, what a shame. The motorway tunnelled past in chains of red lights, white lights, traffic cones, darkness. She found his penis and took it into her mouth; he felt lava welling within him, slipping down to his groin. The speed slipped past ninety. His fingers tightened on the wheel.

  Gal’s head was moving up and down now. Who knows what secrets her little skull contained? She had asked about his new job. She had asked whether it was anything to do with Israel. He adjusted his shoulders in the seat as she found her rhythm, the steering wheel behind her like a halo. Anything to do with Israel. Why would she have asked that? This wasn’t spy syndrome, he thought. This was real. The fact that she was sucking his cock so readily only confirmed his fears. After all, he had been at her house when the Office broke into his flat. And by the time he got home, they had been waiting for him.

  He reached into the glove compartment and took out a hypodermic needle. The Office might be watching, but there was always going to be that risk. The speedometer crept past a hundred. She moaned but didn’t break her rhythm. He raised the syringe then hesitated. The lava was pooling in his groin, starting to overtake his thoughts. How old was this girl? Seventeen? Would the Office really recruit a girl of seventeen? Perhaps she was older, posing as a schoolgirl. But age was very difficult to disguise. What if she were innocent? An image of Anne-Marie flicked into his mind, followed by the other Office assassinations, followed by Nadim Sam Qaaqour and Ram Shalev, followed by the battered death mask of the Russian, Abelev, a bullet hole gaping in his forehead. What if he were wrong about Gal – was it worth taking her life just to make his own safer by several degrees? His mission was more important than hers could ever be, and she was getting in the way. But did she really deserve this?

  He paused for what seemed like an age, caught between two worlds; then he put the needle back in the glove compartment. The Porsche was cruising at a hundred. I’ve saved her life, he thought. I’ve saved her life. His whole body was tingling now, the pressure becoming unbearable. Gal was making little noises in the back of her throat and for some reason this aroused him unbearably. With a low moan he came into her mouth, his body convulsing in wave after wave, the girl pressing him deep into her throat, receiving him. The car, the night, the darkness, hummed on and on around them.

  27

  ‘Adam? Adam?’

  Suzi Feldman rested her hand gently on her son’s shoulder, expecting him to react at once. But he continued to stare into the bowl of ice cream in front of him. Then, as if experiencing a delayed reaction, he gave a small start and looked up at her.

  ‘Darling, you’re miles away,’ she said. She was about to say something else but stopped herself. ‘Eat your ice cream, before it melts.’

  Adam mustered a smile, dipped his spoon into the snowy peaks and ate. His tongue tingled with cold, awakening his
senses, as if life itself were being infused into his system. He swallowed another spoonful, and another, imagining that each one was transporting him step by step into the past; when the bowl was empty, he would be fully awake, a child again.

  ‘Well,’ said his father, breaking the silence that had crept into the room, ‘needless to say, we are both very proud of you. We are all very proud of you, the whole family. But we didn’t want to make a song and dance about it. It’s classified, right? We thought it best to celebrate quietly, just us.’

  ‘Yes,’ said his mother, ‘we wanted to celebrate since you first got the news, but you’ve just been so busy.’

  The glass doors on to the balcony were open and a cool breeze was blowing in from the Mediterranean. The floor tiles, too, were cool against Adam’s bare feet. But the air itself was hot and still and humid. He wiped a glassy layer of sweat from his brow and moved uncomfortably in his chair. Then he ate another spoonful of ice cream.

  ‘What I don’t understand,’ his mother continued, ‘is why they don’t give you more leave. Every military unit is supposed to give proper leave. We haven’t seen you since you started at Shayetet 13. It’s been months.’

  ‘The boy’s been training,’ said his father in a gravelly voice. ‘The Navy does what it needs to do.’

  ‘That’s right,’ said Adam. ‘Training, then my first operation. They don’t give you leave until you’ve completed your first operation.’

  ‘You’re doing a wonderful thing for us, for your people, for the land,’ said his mother. ‘I just wish we could see more of you. It can’t be good for you, to work every day for weeks on end. Coffee?’

  Adam looked out the window, out to sea. It all looked so beautiful from this distance. By the time he turned back, his ice cream had melted; he hadn’t managed to finish it in time. He turned a spoon in the painty sweetness. His mother disappeared into the kitchen and returned with a pot of coffee. Then she went back for the cups; then, as if remembering for the first time, went back for the spoons and sugar. Beside the open window was an easel displaying her latest painting, a seascape in luminous turquoises.

  ‘You look tired,’ she said as she poured the coffee. ‘Look at the colour of that. A perfect brown. A shame to spoil it with milk.’

  ‘Of course he’s tired, Suzi,’ said his father, ‘he’s just got back from operations.’

  ‘I know,’ his mother retorted sharply, ‘I was just saying. A woman can say things, can’t she?’

  Haim shook his head and slurped up the dregs of his coffee. ‘Come, my boy, let’s talk in the garden. I want to hear all about it.’

  ‘But I want to spend time with my Adam,’ said Suzi.

  ‘You have something to say about soldiering?’ said Haim.

  ‘What do you think the housework is?’ she replied. ‘The cleaning, the cooking, the washing? It’s worse than any battle.’

  ‘A war of attrition,’ said Haim.

  ‘Exactly,’ said his wife, ‘a war of attrition. I’m an artist. I’m a slave.’

  ‘Come,’ said Haim, ushering his son to his feet. ‘There’s still an hour of sunlight left. Mother will leave you the washing-up. You can do it later.’

  ‘My son is not doing the washing-up tonight. He’s exhausted. Haim?’

  He beckoned his son out of the apartment and closed the door behind them.

  It had been only three days since the completion of Adam’s latest mission, off the coast of Libya. The objective had been simple enough: to blow up a ship carrying a cache of weapons. He had not been told where the shipment had originated from, or where it was headed. He did not need to know. The Office lay several years in the future; now he was nothing but a fresh-faced commando, and his only responsibility was his missions. Intelligence was not yet his concern.

  This was Adam’s virgin operation for Shayetet 13, and he was anxious to prove himself. He set off as part of a team of four at dusk, in a SAAR-5 missile vessel, wearing diving gear and night-vision equipment, and armed with limpet-mines. The sun sank into a bloody pool on the Mediterranean horizon, and before long they were cutting through the darkness, through the water, in silence, each man concentrating on the job in hand as the regular crew worked the ship around them. They had all been fully briefed before setting sail. Now they needed to go through the plan in their minds, repeatedly, so that when the time came to act, they would do so as second nature.

  The black Egyptian shoreline melted into the rocky coast of Libya, and the tension on board increased. All the lights were killed, then the engine, and the vessel drifted the last few miles with the current. Finally they reached the drop-off point, several miles perpendicular to the small port of Darna in eastern Libya. Through a pair of binoculars, Adam could see strings of lights twinkling in the hills beyond. The harbour itself was quiet, as it was only open during the hours of daylight. Nevertheless, patrol boats could be seen churning through the black waves, their cockpits illuminated in a yellow light. A disproportionate number of patrol boats. For a moment he caught sight of an unshaven, tired-looking Libyan soldier at a helm, smoking a cigarette. He could see the acne scars on his cheeks.

  They waited, drifting, bobbing, for what seemed like an age, hoping they would not be spotted. Listening. Finally a succession of explosions could be heard, and the boat bucked in the shock-waves in the ocean. That was the signal. The Libyan forces had thrown hand grenades into the water to mitigate the risk of hostile frogmen; according to the intel, they did this at two-hourly intervals. Now the grenades had exploded, and the clock was ticking. It was time for the commandos to act.

  Adam and his ‘buddy’ pulled down their masks, pressed the regulators into their mouths and slipped into the shadowy water, followed by the other pair. As the new world pressed in on him, and a liquid chill crept across his skin, Adam began to feel safe. The water had always had that effect, ever since he was a child. His feet dragged pleasantly in their fins against the salty weight of the ocean. A torpedo-shaped object plunged over the side of the boat, bejewelled with bubbles and strings of foam. The frogmen swam after it, took hold of it, strapped themselves on. Then the engine fired, the propeller spun and the ‘wet sub’, with its saboteurs, bored through the murky water in the direction of the Libyan port.

  To begin with, all went according to plan. It took forty-three minutes to reach the whale-like hulls of the ships, and the target vessel was located in another nineteen. From time to time patrol boats appeared overhead; the Israeli frogmen were using ‘rebreathers’, which recycled the air they exhaled, meaning no giveaway trails of bubbles. So the patrol boats didn’t spot them. Periodically searchlights cut into the water, but still they remained unseen. Luck was on their side tonight. So far.

  The plan had been so ingrained into their minds that the frogmen didn’t hesitate for a moment. They spread out along the hull, each pair fitting a limpet-mine: two muffled clunks. Then they regrouped, mounted their wet sub once more, and set about making their escape. As they hummed through the water towards their rendezvous point, Adam was filled with a sense of jubilation. It had all been so easy, so straightforward. He breathed deeply, the sucking sound loud in his ears. Mission accomplished, he thought.

  The first sign of trouble was when the pitch of the wet sub’s engine dropped to a throaty groan, and it began to lose speed. Then it cut out altogether. Adam investigated: inexplicably the battery had failed. The sub would have to be abandoned. But it would take over an hour to swim out to the rendezvous point, and they had only thirty minutes of submergence time left. There was no way they could make it to safety before their oxygen ran out.

  They sent out a coded distress signal, tied the wet sub to a buoy – another team would retrieve it later – and swam at top speed away from the harbour. Their first priority was to get out of range of the Libyan grenades. The operation was collapsing around him, but Adam’s emotions were under control. His survival instinct had been activated and was being channelled in the most efficient direction. His heartbeat
was slowing, not speeding up; his breathing was more regular, not erratic; his senses were heightened but had lost none of their accuracy. He was determined to survive, to win. This was what he had been trained for.

  And then the explosions started. Far away at first, they crept closer and closer, and the shock waves spread towards the frogmen, causing them to pitch and roll in the water. The Libyans had started bombing early. Then, suddenly, a grenade exploded nearby and Adam spun over and over, losing all sense of orientation, his regulator ripped from his mouth. Desperately he groped after it, blinded by the sediment that had been kicked up in great clouds around him. His mask was full of water; his eyes were stinging. The night vision, what had happened to the delicate night vision? Breathe out, he had to keep breathing out, or the pressure would destroy his lungs. He forced himself to be disciplined. Thirty seconds was all he had – thirty seconds between him and unconsciousness. He stopped flailing, lay still on his side, allowed himself to be buffeted by the ocean until it began to calm. Ten seconds. The regulator, he hoped, would soon be dangling below him so that he could retrieve it with a sweep of his arm. Unless it had been ripped clean off the tank. Don’t panic, he thought, keep calm. Panic would mean certain death. He waited, waited, breathing out, then arced his arm – and there was the regulator. He gathered it up, activated the ‘purge’ button to clean it, and pressed it into his mouth. The air was sweet. He couldn’t see a thing. He pulled his mask away from his face, blew into it through his nose, clearing it. The night vision flickered, then awoke. He looked around. Where was he? The explosions had stopped but the water was still cloudy. He waited for the sediment to settle, making his breaths as shallow as possible, knowing that his air was in limited supply. Eventually some shadowy silhouettes appeared through the watery gloom; his comrades. The relief was palpable. There was no time to waste. Together they swam out to sea.

  Their air ran out just as they were leaving the harbour, and they agreed – through sign language – to perform the ‘sunflower’ manoeuvre. At the press of a button their buoyancy control devices inflated and their wetsuits ballooned, providing buoyancy and thermal retention. They floated to the surface, removed their regulators, breathed deeply the cool night air. The SAAR could be anywhere by now; it was in stealth mode and they had missed the rendezvous. This was dangerous. They were visible above water, and could be spotted at any moment. But there was nothing for it. The most important thing was to keep as still as possible. They tied themselves to a length of rope and slept, changing lookouts every fifteen minutes, trying to conserve their energy for whatever lay ahead, hoping that they would be rescued before the limpet-mines went off and all hell, inevitably, broke loose.