The Covenant

  The Covenant

  Also by Naomi Ragen

  Novels

  The Ghost of Hannah Mendes

  The Sacrifice ofTamar

  Jephte’s Daughter

  Sotah

  Chains Around the Grass

  Play

  Women’s Minyan

  The Covenant

  NAOMI RAGEN

  ST. MARTIN’S PRESS NEW YORK

  This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons or events is purely coincidental.

  THE COVENANT. Copyright © 2004 by Naomi Ragen. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y 10010.

  www.stmartins.com

  Grateful acknowledgment is made for permission to reprint the following:

  Excerpt from The Consolation of Philosophy by Boethius, translated with an introduction by V. E. Watts (Penguin, 1969). Copyright © 1969 by V. E. Watts. Reproduced by permission of Penguin Books, Ltd.

  Excerpt from The Masterpiece by Anna Enquist, translated by J. K. Rinjold. Copyright © 1999 by Uitgeverij de Arbeiderspers. Reproduced by permission of Toby Press LLC.

  ISBN 0-312-29119-1

  EAN 978-0312-29119-8

  First Edition: November 2004

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  For all victims of terror, and those who loved them.

  May God comfort all mourners and wipe the tears from all faces.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  When I first conceived of this book, what concerned me most was conveying with accuracy the lives of women who had survived the Nazi concentration camps. It was a daunting responsibility for someone born in America after the war. I tried my very best. I would like to thank all those who helped me to conceive the inconceivable.

  First and foremost, I thank my dear mother-in-law, Shirley Ragen, who spent three of her teenage years with her two sisters as prisoners of Auschwitz. Her descriptions, so painfully and vividly recalled, shared over many years, formed the basis for my understanding. I would like to thank Sara Pecanic, and the other dedicated librarians at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem, for helping me to find dozens of rare memoirs written by survivors. I thank the many authors for their courage, honesty and skill. I thank Lisa A. Goodgame, coordinator, onsite and scholarly access, of the Survivors of the Shoah Visual History Foundation, for facilitating my access to remarkable taped interviews of women survivors of Auschwitz. And I thank Mr. Steven Spielberg, whose vision and generosity created the foundation, and makes its archives an invaluable resource for writers and scholars.

  I would like to thank Ruthie Gillis, wife of the late Dr. Shmuel Gillis, for agreeing to share her story with me. Dr. Gillis, a beloved and respected senior physician in the Hematology Department in Hadassah Ein Karem, was killed by terrorist snipers on the Jerusalem-Hebron highway on February 1, 2001. My meeting Mrs. Gillis, mother of five and a woman of exceptional faith and love, will never be forgotten.

  The story of Dov Kalmanovitch, the first victim of the Intifada, is true. I thank him for sharing it with me.

  I thank Yehuda and Esther Waxsman for many years of friendship and inspiration. It was the heartbreaking kidnap and murder of their nineteen-year-old son Nachshon—an off-duty IDF soldier—by terrorists in October 1994 that triggered the creative process which resulted in the birth of this book.

  For the information on the world of Islamic terrorism, I relied on many books and personal interviews. I particularly thank retired Israeli Secret Service Agent X, who cleared up many questions I had and helped me to make this book as close to reality as possible.

  I thank Asher Ragen for his many valuable insights. I thank Dr. Michael Widlanski, lecturer at Hebrew University’s Rothberg School, for sharing his extensive expertise in Arabic language and culture. I thank Rachel Atlan for sharing her knowledge of Paris and the French language.

  Little did I know when I began writing about a terrorist incident that I would not have to rely solely on research; that my family and I were fated to be present at one of the worst terrorist incidents in Israel’s modern history: the Passover Massacre in the Park Hotel in Netanya in 2002 in which twenty-nine people were murdered by a suicide bomber, and hundreds injured.

  I thank Jennifer Weis, my talented editor at St. Martin’s Press, and my agent, Lisa Bankoff, of ICM, for believing in this book, and supporting me through the terrible year in which I struggled to recover from the reality of a terrorist attack in order to write a book about a terrorist attack.

  As always, my heartfelt thanks to my husband, Alex, for thirty-three years of loving friendship, pioneering a new home in an ancient homeland.

  Naomi Ragen

  Jerusalem

  October 1,2003

  How do people do it, live? And especially; how do they ward off the blow, how do they scramble to their feet after the final blow, how do they find the escape route out of a locked house?

  –Anna Enquist, THE MASTERPIECE

  The Covenant

  Chapter One

  Maaleh Sara, Judea

  Monday, May 6, 2002

  5; 30 A.M.

  IT WAS THE sound of the birds in the morning he loved most, Dr. Jonathan Margulies thought as he lay in the cool early morning darkness. So different from the sounds of his own childhood in Detroit, where hearing a bird sing amidst the traffic, the trucks rolling down the superhighways, could not happen. He closed his eyes, listening to the sweet noises. They were gold-crests, or sylvia warblers, he thought, having once looked them up in a book.

  He breathed in the tangy odor of the slightly damp fig leaves that rested on his windowsill. My own fig tree, he thought with wonder. To own such a thing. To have land in which to plant it, a tree that could grow for a hundred years, a tree that bore fruit that belonged to you. Not the stingy little bags purchased at great price in supermarkets, but bushels, more than anyone could ever eat. Fruit to share with friends and neighbors, to store, to bake, to eat carelessly, greedily. Fruit from God’s own generous, open hand.

  Trees were the thing that connected a person to his space on this earth, he thought. They were like your family. Your rootedness began with theirs. They weren’t movable. They held on to the land, soaking up its goodness, turning it into nourishment whose sweetness dribbled down your chin. Once you experienced that, he thought, you were part of that place.

  What a joy.

  He threw off his light blanket, enjoying the cool breeze that drifted over his thin pajamas. It was only early May, but already the days were growing hot the moment the sun climbed over the horizon, its fierce, abundant light drenching the land, the people, nothing like the thin, tepid rays he remembered back in North America.

  He looked over at his very pregnant wife, listened for the breathing of his young daughter, basking in the peace of his small, pretty house. My own house, my own land. My own family. And a fig tree, he thought, feeling suddenly overwhelmed by the abundance and goodness of his life.

  On such a morning, he thought, it was almost possible to forget the war hanging over everything he loved, everything he’d built.

  He threw his legs to the floor, willing his body to follow: “The throwing off of sleep is the beginning of all salvation,” he whispered to himself, using the same proverb his mother had used in his high school days to pry him out of bed for early morning Talmud classes.

  He was tired. He’d stayed up late the night before poring over case files and consulting with medical colleagues in Boston, New York and London. He glanced at Elise, watching the gentle rise and fall of her chest, the tendrils of honey-colored ha
ir that fell around her rosy face on the white pillow. She looked so young—like a child—he thought, pulling the light summer blanket tenderly over her bare shoulders. But even that feathery touch was enough to wake her.

  “Jon?”

  “Shh. Go back to sleep.”

  She heaved her swollen body up on her elbows. “We left all the supper dishes, the pots . . . Not to mention the floor, which is a swamp.” She started moving her feet toward the edge of the bed. “And this afternoon liana has that ballet recital at the community center. And—oh—it’s my Bubbee Leah’s birthday next week! I’ve got to buy her a present . . .”

  He sat down on the edge of the bed, blocking her. “Here’s the rag. Where’s the dirt?” He offered himself up.

  She poked him in the stomach. “What would your distinguished colleagues and admiring patients say if they knew the learned professor of oncology arrived after a morning of wringing out dirty floor rags?”

  “They’d agree that any treatment that successfully keeps the fetus in the womb until its heart and lungs are fully developed was good medicine, Elise. Especially,” his voice grew kinder and more gentle, “if the mother had a history.”

  She studied her fingers gathering and twisting the material of her nightgown. “You’re bullying me.”

  He smiled. “Is it working?”

  “Yes! But don’t let it go to your head. It’s all those diplomas . . . It has nothing to do with your macho pushiness, believe me.” She folded her arms across her chest, sinking back into the mattress.

  “I believe you. So? Do I have your word? It’s only six weeks, honey. Then we’ll all be home free.”

  “Listen, Jon, I’ll be honest with you. I don’t care if you are a doctor. I just can’t promise to lay here all day long and do nothing. It’s stressing me out.”

  “You can, darling. And you will,” he said firmly.

  End of story, she thought glumly. “Yes, Doctor.”

  “Why don’t you work on your jewelry?”

  It had started as just a hobby, stringing little colored beads when she was pregnant with liana. But encouraged by her success in selling her pieces to boutiques and by word of mouth, she’d taken a course at Bezalel in gold and silversmithing. And she’d never gone back to being a teacher of English to rambunctious fifth graders—who hated the language—again.

  “I can’t really use my tools laying here in bed.”

  “But you were doing such beautiful work with the bead necklaces and earrings . . .”

  “I’m sick and tired of stringing beads . . . I’m sick and tired of everything. I want my body back. I want my life back . . .”

  “Elise, Elise. Be smart. Here you have a man with floor-scrubbing credentials, child care experience and a long, positive relationship with credit cards for purchasing takeout food. All this, he’s laying at your feet—a once in a lifetime opportunity! Take advantage.”

  “Don’t think I won’t,” she warned him. “Just not Chinese or Hamburger Ranch. I’m sick of all that grease. If I could just make some vegetarian risotto, with some pumpkin soup . . .” She sighed. “Okay, I suppose not. And don’t forget, Bubbee Leah . . .”

  “In this I’ll need some advice and guidance. Presents for septuagenarians, especially incredibly fussy ones like Bubbee Leah, are out of my realm.”

  “Why do you say that? My grandmother isn’t fussy at all!”

  “Every single time we send her a present she complains nonstop that we shouldn’t have spent the money . . . that she doesn’t need anything . . .”

  “Oh, do you have a lot to learn! That doesn’t mean anything! That’s just being European. That’s what they have to say. It’s like some ritual. They have this rule book, but no one else is allowed to read it, you know? In the book, it says if you get a present, you have to make the giver feel like an idiot, like he’s wasted his money and you are angry at him for even thinking you might need a gift. But if you don’t get anything, then you should be hurt and miserable and offended for life.”

  “Oh, is that the rule?”

  “Absolutely. Trust me.” She nodded emphatically. “I was thinking, maybe a cookbook?”

  “With her cholesterol and heart problems? Don’t you think she’d find that depressing?”

  “Not at all. She doesn’t do much cooking. But she likes to read and talk about food. That’s what she did in Auschwitz. She’d ‘prepare’ meals, describing the ingredients, the step-by-step preparation. I don’t think she gets to bookstores very often in Boro Park.”

  “You know what? I’ll call you on my cell phone as I browse the shelves in Steimatzky’s, so you can browse with me. You know I love Bubbee Leah. It’s just . . . she’s just such a mystery.”

  “I know. All women are.” She reached out for him. He took her hand, kneeling down beside her, putting his other hand over the unborn child they had both prayed so hard for after two miscarriages. “There are so many dangers out there we have no control over, Elise. This, at least, we can do something about.”

  She twined her fingers through his, their hands tent-like and sheltering over the baby. What a crazy time to bring a child into the world, she thought, a world which overnight seemed to have gone insane. The World Trade Center had been attacked for no reason anyone could figure out, collapsing in rubble, killing thousands before the eyes of an incredulous world. Palestinian terrorists killed children at bar mitzvahs and Passover seders; Indonesian terrorists killed Christians attending church services; Basque separatists blew up beach parties on the Costa Del Sol; and Pakistani Muslims opened fire on nurses in a Christian hospital. People didn’t seem outraged or even surprised anymore, just kind of weary and dumbfounded. And even journalists pretended to no longer be able to distinguish right from wrong, bending over backward to see the murderer’s point of view. Homicide seemed almost a lifestyle choice these days. Like being gay or vegetarian, it had earned a certain respect, even glamour, at least among media types who seemed eager to adopt the terrorists’ own incredibly self-serving and immoral self-image as martyrs and heroes.

  It wasn’t supposed to be this way.

  She looked around at the whitewashed walls, the geraniums spilling over the window boxes. Like every young couple, they’d dreamed of building their own little house with a red-tiled roof and a big garden full of fruit trees and herbs. And so, when they saw the ad in the paper announcing that the Israel Lands Authority was accepting bids for plots of land zoned for one-family homes in Maaleh Sara, they’d jumped at the chance.

  They already had friends living there and had heard good things about the neighborhood. It was only a short ride from Hadassah Hospital. They had wonderful schools, a great number of professional, English-speaking immigrants, great climate and a warm, religious atmosphere. It was also fairly inexpensive. “We can build a great three-bedroom home with a garden for the same price as some cramped two-bedroom walk-up in some crowded Jerusalem apartment building. Besides, smell the air. It’s country air, healthy for kids,” Jon had argued, convincingly.

  She’d needed a little convincing. While Jon had waxed dreamily about how Abraham and Isaac had passed this way on their journey from Hebron to Mount Moriah, how Ruth had kneeled to gather sheaves from Boaz’s fields and how King David had shepherded his father’s flocks through the hillsides, she’d peered nervously at the nearby Arab villages, counting how many they’d have to drive through in their daily commute.

  “Look, I know some of the people in these villages. They come into Hadassah all the time. Some are even my own patients,” Jon said when she expressed her fears. “People are people. It’ll be like moving into any other neighborhood. Some people won’t like us, and some will. We’ll do everything we can to be good neighbors.”

  It was so simple to think of it that way. And in many ways, it had been. Their workmen—plumbers, electricians, gardeners—all lived in nearby villages. Often they’d drive them home to get supplies, meeting their wives and kids. They’d buy cement and plumbing supplies at hu
ge discounts from Arab stores their workmen knew about. In those early days, everyone was so young and hopeful. There were young families everywhere—Arab and Jew—and everyone seemed to be planting trees and adding on rooms to hold new babies. In the deepest sense, they really were neighbors, and sometimes even friends. Looking around at the sparsely populated area of rolling hills and trees, they’d think: there is so much land, enough for everyone to share.

  A few short years later, in the eye of the storm, when people started calling their neighborhood an “illegal settlement” or “occupied territories,” they couldn’t believe how naive they’d been. It was like that Kafka story about the cockroach, Elise told Jon. You went to sleep a person, and woke up a bug. And before you could even understand what was happening, peaceful roads had turned overnight into shooting galleries, terrorists lying in wait around every bend, under cover of ancient olive trees. And innocent people—kindergarten teachers, handymen, students—people she knew—had been gunned down in cold blood. Palestinians too: gunmen from the new Palestinian regime could pick anyone they chose off the streets, accuse them of “collaborating,” and put them in front of a firing squad. There was no trial, no jury, no appeal. It was sickening.

  How can we live this way? she often wondered. Why put ourselves through this? After each attack, they’d sit around the kitchen table fingering warm mugs of soup, talking and arguing deep into the night, bringing up every option.

  “Maybe we should just move,” she’d suggested once.

  Jon had looked at her, surprised, his face pale, the dark shock of hair hanging boyishly over his eyes as he wordlessly took her hand in his. He didn’t have to say it. She understood. When all was said and done, it wasn’t ideology that kept them here: this was their home. They’d pored over the architect’s plans, picked out the floor tiles, agonized over the style of faucets, fixed the leaks and planted the young trees. It was theirs and they loved it.