Текст книги "Eagle in the Sky"

Автор книги: Wilbur Smith

Соавторы: Wilbur Smith
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handsome beast, David told him.

Piss off, Morgan, Joe grinned at him, crammed his cap on to his head and

glanced at his watch.  Let's go, .  he said.

The Chief Rabbi of the army was waiting with the Brig and the others in

the Brig's study.  The Rabbi was the mild-mannered man who had

personally liberated the Tomb of the Patriarchs in the war of 67. During

the advance on Hebron, he had driven a jeep through the disintegrating

Arab lines, shot open the door to the tomb with a submachine-gun and

chased the Arab guards screaming over the rear wall.

Joe sat at the Brig's desk and signed the ketubbah, the marriage

contract, then the Rabbi handed him a silken cloth which Joe lifted in a

formal act of acquisition to a chorus of congratulatory Mazal toys from

the witnesses.

The bridegroom's party trooped out into the crowded garden now to await

the arrival of the bride, and she came accompanied by the chief surgeon

standing in for her dead father, and a party of festively dressed women,

including Debra and her mother.  They all carried lighted candles.

To David, Hannah had never been particularly attractive, she was too

tall and severe in body and expression; however, in her white bridal

dress and veil she was transformed.

She seemed to float cloudlike upon the billowing white skirts, and her

face was softened by the veil and by the inner happiness that seemed to

glow through her green eyes.  Red-gold hair framed her cheeks, and the

freckles were disguised under make-up applied by Debra's cunning hand.

She had used it to mute the rather harsh lines of Hannah's bony nose,

and the result was that Hannah was as near to beautiful as she would

ever come.

Joe, looking big and handsome in his airforce tans, went forward eagerly

to meet her at the gate to the garden and to lower the veil over her

face in the ceremony of bedeken dikafle.

Joe moved to the chuppah canopy where the Rabbi waited with a taffit

over his shoulders.  After Joe the women led Hannah, each of them still

carrying a burning candle, and the Rabbi chanted a blessing as the women

and the bride circled Joe seven times in a magical circle which in olden

times would serve to ward off evil spirits.  At last bride and groom

stood side by side, facing towards the site of the Temple with the

guests and witnesses pressed closely about them and the ceremony proper

began.

The Rabbi spoke the benediction over a goblet of wine from which bride

and groom both drank.  Then Joe turned to Hannah, her face still veiled,

and he placed the plain gold ring upon her right forefinger.

Behold you are consecrated unto me by this ring, according to the law of

Moses and Israel.  Then Joe broke the glass under his heel and the sharp

crunch was a signal for an outburst of music and song and gaiety.  David

left Joe's side and worked his way through the joyous crowd of guests to

where Debra waited for him.

She wore a gown of yellow and she had fresh flowers in the dark sheen of

her hair.  David smelled their perfume as he hugged her surreptitiously

about the waist and whispered in her ear, You next, my beauty!  and she

whispered back, Yes, please!  Joe took Hannah on his arm, and then went

to the improvised dance floor.  The band began with a light bouncy tune

and all the younger ones flocked to join them, while the elders spread

out at the tables beneath the palm-decked trellis.

Yet amongst all the laughter and the gaiety, the uniforms added a sombre

touch; almost every second man was adorned with the trappings of war,

and at the garden gate and the entrance to the kitchens were uniformed

paratrooper guards each with an Uzzi submachine-gun slung at his

shoulder.  It was easy to pick out the secret service men.  They were

the ones in civilian clothes who moved without smiling, alert and

vigilant, amongst the guests.

David and Debra danced together, and she was so light and warm and

strong in his arms that when the band paused for breath he resented it.

He led her to a quiet corner, and they stood together, discussing the

other guests in the most disrespectful terms until Debra giggled at some

particularly outrageous remark and struck his arm lightly.

You are terrible.  She leaned against him.  I'm dying of thirst, won't

you get me something to drink?

A glass of cold white wine?  he suggested.

Lovely, she said, smiling up into his face.  For a moment they studied

each other, and suddenly David felt something dark welling up from

within him, a terrible despair, a premonition of impending loss.  It was

a physical thing and he could feel the chill of it enclose his chest and

squeeze out all the happiness and the joy.

What is it, David?  Her own expression altered in sympathy with his, and

she tightened her grip on his arm.

Nothing.  Abruptly he pulled away from her, trying to fight off the

feeling.  It's nothing, he repeated, but it was still strong in his

belly and he felt a wave of nausea from it.  I'll get you the wine, he

said and turned away.

He made his way towards the bar, pushing gently through the throng.  The

Brig caught his eye and smiled bleakly across the garden at him.  Joe

was with his father and he called to David, laughing, with one arm

around his bride.  Hannah had her veil pushed up and her freckles were

beginning to emerge from under the makeup, glowing vividly against the

snow-white lace.  David waved at them but went on towards the open-air

bar at the end of the garden, the mood of sadness was still on him and

he didn't want to talk to Joe now.

So he was cut off from Debra at the moment when, with a flourish, a

procession of white-jacketed waiters came in through the iron gate of

the garden.  Each of them carried a huge copper salver from which, even

in the warm sun, rose tendrils of steam, and the odour of meat and fish

and spices filled the garden.  There were gasps and cries of

appreciation from the guests.

A way opened for them towards the high table on the raised terrace which

led to the kitchen doors and the house.

The procession of waiters passed close to David, and suddenly his

attention was drawn from the display of fine food to the face of the

second waiter in line.  He was a man of medium height and ark

complexion, a mahogany face with a thickly drooping mustache.

He was sweating.  That was what had drawn David's attention, his face

was shiny with sweat.  Droplets clung in his mustache and slid down his

cheeks.  The white jacket was sodden at the armpits as he lifted the

gigantic platter on high.

At the moment that he drew level with David their eyes met for an

instant.  David realized that the man was in the grip of some deep

emotion, fear, perhaps, or exhilaration.  Then the waiter seemed to

become aware of David's scrutiny and his eyes slid nervously away.

David felt suspicion begin to chill his arms as the three figures

climbed the stone stairs, and filed behind the table.

The waiter glanced again at David, saw that his gaze was still locked

upon his face, and then he said something out of the corner of his mouth

to one of his companions.  He also glanced at David, and caught his

stare, and his expression was sufficient to send alarm flaring urgently

through David's chest and brain.  Something was happening, something

dangerous and ugly, he was certain of it.  .  Wildly he looked about for

the guards.  There were two of them on the terrace behind the line of

waiters, and one near David beside the gate.

David shoved his way desperately towards him, mindless of the outraged

comments of those in his way.  He was watching the three waiters and so

he saw it begin to happen.

It had obviously been carefully rehearsed, for as the three waiters

placed the salvers upon the table to the laughter and applause of the

guests crowded in the garden below them, so they drew back the sheet's

of plastic on which a tin display of food had been arranged to cover the

deadly load that each copper salver carried.

The brown-faced waiter lifted a machine pistol from under the plastic

sheet, and turned swiftly to fire a traversing burst into the two

paratroopers behind him at point-blank range.  The clattering thunder of

automatic fire was deafening in the walled garden, and the stream of

bullets slashed through the bellies of the two guards like a monstrous

cleaver, almost cutting them in half.

The waiter on David's left was a wizened monkeyfaced man, with bright

black berries for eyes.  He, too, lifted a machine pistol from his

salver, and he crouched over it and fired a burst at the paratrooper by

the gate.

They were going for the guards, taking them out first.

The pistol shook and roared in his fists, and the bullets socked into

human flesh with a rubbery thumping sound.

The guard had cleared his Uzzi, and was trying to aim as a bullet hit

him in the mouth and snapped his head back, his paratrooper beret

spinning high into the air.

The machine-gun flew from his arms as he fell, and it slid across the

tiles towards David.  David dropped flat below the stone steps of the

terrace as the Arab gunners turned their pistols on the wedding crowd,

hosing the courtyard with a triple stream of bullets, and unleashing a

hurricane of screams and shouts and desperate cries to join the roar of

the guns.

Across the yard, a security agent had the pistol out of his shoulder

holster and he dropped into the marksman crouch, holding the pistol with

both arms extended as he aimed.  He fired twice and hit the monkey-faced

gunman, sending him reeling back against the wall, but he stayed on his

feet and returned the agent's fire with the machine pistol, knocking him

down and rolling him IJ across the paving stones.

The yard was filled with a panic-stricken mob, a struggling mass of

humanity, that screamed and fell and crawled and died beneath the flail

of the guns.

Two bullets caught Hannah in the chest, smashing her backwards over a

table of glasses and bottles that shattered about her.  The bright blood

spurted from the wounds, drenching the front of her white wedding gown.

The centre gunman dropped his pistol as it emptied, and he stooped

quickly over the copper salver and came up with a grenade in each hand.

He hurled them into the struggling, screaming throng and the double

blast was devastating, twin bursts of brightest white flame and the

terrible sweep of shrapnel.  The screams of the women rose louder,

seeming as deafening as the gunfire – and the gunman stooped once more

and his hands held another load of grenades.

All this had taken only seconds, but a fleeting moment of time to turn

festivity into shocking carnage and torn flesh.

David left the shelter of the stone steps.  He rolled swiftly across the

flags towards the abandoned Uzzi, and he came up on his knees, holding

it at the hip.  His paratrooper training made his actions automatic.

The wounded gunman saw him, and turned towards him, staggering slightly,

pushing himself weakly away from the wall.  His one arm was shattered

and hung loosely in the tattered, blood-soaked sleeve of his jacket, but

he lifted the machine pistol and aimed at David.

David fired first, the bullets struck bursts of plaster from the wall

behind the Arab and David corrected his aim.  The bullets drove the

gunman backwards, pinning him to the wall, while his body jumped and

shook and twitched.  He slumped down leaving a glistening wet smear of

blood down the white plaster.

David swivelled the gun on to the Arab beside the kitchen door.  He was

poised to throw his next grenade, right arm extended behind him, both

fists filled with the deadly steel balls.  He was shouting something, a

challenge or a war cry, a harsh triumphant screech that carried clearly

above the screams of his victims.

Before he could release the grenade, David hit him with a full burst, a

dozen bullets that smashed into his chest and belly, and the Arab

dropped both grenades at his feet and doubled over clutching at his

broken body, trying to stem the flood of his life blood with his bare

hands.

The grenades were short fused and they exploded almost immediately,

engulfing the dying man in a net of fire and shredding his body from the

waist down.  The same explosion knocked down the third assassin at the

end of the terrace, and David came to his feet and charged up the steps.

The third and last Arab was mortally wounded, his head and chest torn by

grenade fragments, but he was still alive, thrashing about weakly as he

groped for the machine pistol that lay beside him in a puddle of his own

blood.

David was consumed by a terrible rage.  He found that he was screaming

and raging like a maniac, and he crouched at the head of the stairs and

aimed at the dying Arab.

The Arab had the machine pistol and was lifting it with the grim

concentration of a drunken man.  David fired, a single shot that slapped

into the Arab's body without apparent effect, and then suddenly the Uzzi

in David's hands was empty, the pin falling with a hollow click on an

empty chamber.

Across the terrace, beyond range of a quick rush, the Arab's face was

streaked with sweat and blood as he frowned heavily, trying to aim the

machine pistol as it wavered.  He was dying swiftly, the flame

fluttering towards extinction, but he was using the last of his

strength.

David stood frozen with the empty weapon in his hand, and the blank eye

of the pistol sought him out, and fastened upon him.  He watched the

Arab's eyes narrow, and his sudden murderous grin of achievement as he

saw David in his sights, and his finger tightening on the trigger.

At that range the bullets would hit like the solid stream of a fire

hose.  He began to move, to throw himself down the stairs, but he knew

it was too late.  The Arab was at the instant of firing, and at the same

instant a revolver shot crashed out at David's side.

Half the Arab's head was cut away by the heavy lead slug, and he was

flung backwards with the yellow custard contents of his skull

splattering the white-washed wall behind him and his death grip on the

trigger emptied the machine pistol with a shattering roar harmlessly

into the grape vines above him.

Dazedly David turned to find the Brig beside him, the dead security

guard's pistol in his fist.  For a moment they stared at each other, and

then the Brig stepped past him and walked to the fallen bodies of the

other two Arabs.  Standing over each in turn he fired a single pistol

shot into their heads.

David turned away and let the Uzzi drop from his hands.  He went down

the stairs into the garden.

The dead and the wounded lay singly and in piles, pitiful fragments of

humanity.  The soft cries and the groans of the wounded, the bitter

weeping of a child, the voice of a mother, were sounds more chilling

than the screaming and the shouting.

The garden was drenched and painted with blood.

There were splashes and gouts of it upon the white walls, there were

puddles and snakes of it spreading and crawling across the paving, dark

slicks of it sinking into the dust, ropes of it dribbling and pattering

like rain from the body of a musician as he hung over the rail of the

bandstand.  The sickly sweetish reek of it mingled with the smell of

spiced food and spilled wine, with the floury taste of plaster dust and

the bitter stench of burned explosive.

The veils of smoke and dust that still drifted across the garden could

not hide the terrible carnage.  The bark of the olive trees was torn in

slabs from the trunks by flying steel, exposing the white wet wood.  The

wounded and dazed survivors crawled over a field of broken glass and

shattered crockery.  They swore and prayed, and whispered and groaned

and called for succour.

David went down the steps, his feet moving without his bidding; his

muscles were numb, his body senseless and only his finger-tips tingled

with life.

Joe was standing below one of the torn olive trees.  He stood like a

colossus, with his thick powerful legs astride, his head thrown back and

his face turned to the sky, but his eyes were tight-closed and his mouth

formed a silent cry of agony, for he held Hannah's body in his arms.

Her bridal veil had fallen from her head, and the bright copper mane of

her hair hung back, almost to the ground.  Her legs and one arm hung

loosely also, slack and lifeless.  The golden freckles stood out clearly

on the milky-white skin of her face, and the bloody wounds bloomed like

the petals of the poinsettia tree upon the bosom of her wedding-gown.

David averted his eyes.  He could not watch Joe in his anguish, and he

walked on slowly across the garden, in terrible dread of what he would

find.

Debra!  he tried to raise his voice, but it was a hoarse raven's croak.

His feet slipped in a puddle of thick dark blood, and he stepped over

the unconscious body of a woman who lay, face down, in a floral dress,

with her arms thrown wide.  He did not recognize her as Debra's mother.

Debra!  He tried to hurry, but his legs would not respond.  He saw her

then, at the corner of the wall where he had left her.

Debra!  He felt his heart soar.  She seemed unhurt, kneeling below one

of the marble Grecian statues, with the flowers in her hair and the

yellow silk of her dress gay and festive.

She knelt, facing the wall, and her head was bowed as though in prayer.

The dark wing of her hair hung forward screening her and she held her

cupped hands to her face.

Debra.  He dropped to his knees beside her, and timidly he touched her

shoulder.

Are you all right, my darling?  And she lowered her hands slowly, but

still holding them cupped together.  A great coldness closed around

David's chest as he saw that her cupped hands were filled with blood.

Rich'red blood, bright as wine in a crystal glass.

David, she whispered, turning her face towards him.  Is that you,

darling?  David gave a small breathless moan of agony as he saw the

blood-glutted eye sockets, the dark gelatinous mess that congealed in

the thick dark eyelashes and turned the lovely face into a gory mask.

Is that you, David?  she asked again, her head cocked at a blind

listening angle.

Oh God, Debra.  He stared into her face.

I can't see, David.  She groped for him.  Oh David I can't see.

And he took her sticky wet hands in his, and he thought that his heart

would break.

The stark modern silhouette of Hadassah Hospital stood upon the skyline

above the village of Em Karem.  The speed with which the ambulances

arrived saved many of the victims whose lives were critically balanced,

and the hospital was geared to sudden influxes of war casualties.

The three men, the Brig, Joe and David, kept their vigil together all

that night upon the hard wooden benches of the hospital waiting-room.

When more was learned of the planning behind the attack, a security

agent would come to whisper a report to the Brig.

One of the assassins was a long-term and trusted employee of the

catering firm, and the other two were his cousins who had.  been

employed as temporary staff on his recommendation.  It was certain that

their papers were forged.

The Prime Minister and her cabinet had been delayed by an emergency

session, but had been on their way to the wedding when the attack was

made.  A fortunate chance had saved them, and she sent her personal

condolences; to the relatives of the victims.

At ten o'clock, Damascus radio gave a report in which El Fatah claimed

responsibility for the attack by members of a suicide squad.

A little before midnight, the chief surgeon came from the main theatre,

still in his theatre greens and boots, with his mask pulled down to his

throat.  Ruth Mordecai was out of danger, he told the Brig.  They had

removed a bullet that had passed through her lung and lodged under her

shoulder blade.  They had saved the lung.

Thank God, murmured the Brig and closed his eyes for a moment, imagining

life without his woman of twenty-five years.  Then he looked up.  My

daughter?

The surgeon shook his head.  They are still working on her in the small

casualty theatre.  He hesitated.

Colonel Halmin died in theatre a few minutes ago The toll of the dead

was eleven so far, with four others on the critical list.

In the early morning the undertakers arrived for the bodies with their

long wicker baskets and black limousines.  David gave Joe the keys of

the Mercedes, that he might follow by the hearse bearing Hannah's body

and arrange the details of the funeral.

David and the Brig sat side by side, haggard and with sleepless bruised

eyes, drinking coffee from paper cups.

In the late morning the eye surgeon came out to them.

He was a smooth-faced, young-looking man in his forties, the greying of

his hair seeming incongruous against the unlined skin and clear blue

eyes.

General Mordecai?

The Brig rose stiffly.  He seemed to have aged ten years during the

night.

I am Doctor Edelman.  Will you come with me please?

David rose to follow them, but the doctor paused and looked to the Brig.

I am her fiance, said David.

It might be best if we spoke alone first, General.  Edelman was clearly

trying to pass a warning with his eyes, and the Brig nodded.  Please,

David.  But– David began, and the Brig squeezed his shoulder briefly,

the first gesture of affection that had ever passed between them.

Please, my boy, and David turned back to the hard bench.

In the tiny cubicle of his office Edelman hitched himself on to the

corner of the desk and lit a cigarette.  His hands were long and slim as

a girl's, and he used the lighter with a surgeon's neat economical

movements.

You don't want it with a sugar coating, I imagine?  He had appraised the

Brig carefully, and went on without waiting for a reply.  Neither of

your daughter's eyes are damaged, but be held up a hand to forestall the

rising expression of relief on the Brig's lips, and turned to the

scanner on which hung a set of X-ray plates.  He switched on the back

light.

The eyes were untouched, there is almost no damage to her facial

features, however, the damage is here he touched a hard frosty outline

in the smoky grey swirls and patterns of the X-ray plate, – that is a

steel fragment, a tiny steel fragment, almost certainly from a grenade.

It is no larger than the tip of a lead pencil.  It entered the skull

through the outer edge of the right temple, severing the large vein

which accounted for the profuse haernorrhage, and it travelled obliquely

behind the eye-balls without touching them or any other vital tissue.

Then, however, it pierced the bony surrounds of the optic chiasma, he

traced the path of the fragment through Debra's head, and it seems to

have cut through the canal and severed the chiasma, before lodging in

the bone sponge beyond.  Edelman drew heavily on the cigarette while he

looked for a reaction from the Brig.

There was none.

Do you understand the implications of this, General?  he asked, and the

Brig shook his head wearily.  The surgeon switched off the light of the

X-ray scanner, and returned to the desk.  He pulled a scrap pad towards

the Brig and took a propelling pencil from his top pocket.

Boldly he sketched an optical chart, eyeballs, brain, and optical

nerves, as seen from above.

The optical nerves, one from each eye, run back into this narrow tunnel

of bone where they fuse, and then branch again to opposite lobes of the

brain The Brig nodded, and Edelman slashed the point of his pencil

through the point where the nerves fused.

Understanding began to show on the Brig's strained and tired features.

Blind?  he asked, and Edelman nodded.  Both eyes? 'I'm afraid so.  The

Brig bowed his head and gently massaged his own eyes with thumb and

forefinger.  He spoke again without looking at Edelman.

Permanently?  he asked.

She has no recognition of shape, or colour, of light or darkness.  The

track of the fragment is through the optic chiasma.  All indications are

that the nerve is severed.

There is no technique known to medical science which will restore that.

Edelman paused to draw breath, before going on.  In a word then, your

daughter is permanently and totally blinded in both eyes.  The Brig

sighed, and looked up slowly.  Have you told her?  and Edelman could not

hold his gaze.  I was rather hoping that you would do that.  Yes, the

Brig nodded, it would be best that way.  Can I see her now?  Is she

awake?  She is under light sedation.  No pain, only a small amount of

discomfort, the external wound is insignificant, and we shall not

attempt to remove the metal fragment.  That would entail major

neurosurgery.  He stood up and indicated the door.  Yes, you may see her

now.  I will take you to her.  The corridor outside the row of emergency

theatres was lined along each wall with stretchers, and the Brig

recognized many of his guests laid out upon them.  He stopped briefly to

speak with one or two of them, before following Edelman to the recovery

room at the end of the corridor.

Debra lay on the tall bed below the window.  She was very pale, dry

blood was still clotted in her hair and a thick cotton wool and bandage

dressing covered both her eyes.

Your father is here, Miss Mordecai, Edelman told I her, and she rolled

her head swiftly towards them.

Daddy?  I am here, my child.  The Brig took the hand she held out, and

stooped to kiss her.  Her lips were cold, and she smelled strongly of

disinfectant and anaesthetic.

Mama?  she asked anxiously.

She is out of danger, the Brig assured her, but Hannah Yes.  They told

me, Debra stopped him, her voice choking.  Is Joe all right?

He is strong, the Brig said.  He will be all right David?  she asked.

He is here.

Eagerly she struggled up on to one elbow, her face lighting with

expectation, the heavily bound eyes turned blindly seeking.

David, she called, where are you?  Damn this bandage.  Don't worry,

David, it's just to rest my eyes.

No, the Brig restrained her with a hand on her arm.  He is outside,

waiting, and she slumped with disappointment.

Ask him to come to me, please, she whispered.

Yes, said the Brig, in a while, but first there is something we must

talk about, something I have to tell you.

She must have guessed what it was, she must have been warned by the tone

of his voice for she went very still.  That peculiar stillness of hers,

like a frightened animal of the veld.

He was a soldier, with a soldier's blunt ways, and although he tried to

soften it, yet even his tone was roughened with his own sorrow, so that

it came out brutally.  Her hand in his was the only indication that she

had heard him, it spasmed convulsively like a wounded thing and then lay

still, a small tense hand in the circle of his big bony fist.

She asked no questions and when he had done they sat quietly together

for a long time.  He spoke first.

I will send David to you now, he said, and her response was swift and

vehement.

No.  She gripped his hand hard.  No, I can't meet him now.  I have to

think about this first.

The Brig went back to the waiting-room and David stood up expectantly,

the pure lines of his face seemingly carved from pale polished marble,

and the dark blue of his eyes in deep contrast.

The Brig forestalled him harshly.  No visitors.  He took David's arm.

You will not be allowed to see her until tomorrow.

Is something wrong?  What is it?  David tried to pull away, but the Brig

held him and steered him towards the door.

Nothing is wrong.  She will be all right, but she must have no

excitement now.  You'll be able to see her tomorrow.

They buried Hannah that evening in the family plot on the Mountain of

Olives.  It was a small funeral party attended by the three men and a

mere handful of relatives, many of whom had others to mourn from the

previous day's slaughter.

There was an official car waiting to take the Brig to a meeting of the

high command, where retaliatory measures would certainly be discussed,

another revolution in the relentless wheel of violence that rolled

across the troubled land.

Joe and David climbed into the Mercedes and sat silently, David making

no effort to start the engine.  Joe lit cigarettes for them, and they

both felt drained of purpose and direction.

What are you going to do now?  David asked him.  We had two weeks, Joe

answered him.  We were going down to Ashkelon, his voice trailed off.  I

don't know.  There isn't anything to do now, is there?  Shall we go and

have a drink somewhere?  Joe shook his head.  I don't feel like

drinking, he said.  I think I'll go back to base.  They are flying night

interceptions tonight.

Yes, David agreed quickly, I'll come with you.  He could not see Debra

until tomorrow, and the house on Malik Street would be lonely and cold.

Suddenly he longed for the peace of the night heavens.

The moon was a brightly curved Saracen blade against the soft darkness

of the sky, and the stars were fat and silver and gemlike in their

clarity.

They flew high above the earth, remote from its grief and sorrow,

wrapped in the isolation of flight and lost in the ritual and

concentration of night interception.

The target was a Mirage of their own squadron, and they picked it up on

the scanner far out over the Negev.

Joe locked on to it and called the track and range while David searched

for and at last spotted the moving star of the target's jet blast,

burning redly against the velvety blackness of the night.

He took them in on a clean interception creeping up under the target's

belly and then pulling steeply up past its wing-tip, the way a barracuda

goes for the lure from below and explodes out through the surface of the

sea.

They shot past so close that the target Mirage broke wildly away to

port, unaware of their presence until that moment.

Joe slept that night, exhausted with grief, but David lay in the bunk

beneath him and listened to him.  In the dawn he rose and showered and

left Joe still asleep.  He drove into Jerusalem and reached the hospital

just as the sun came up and lit the hills with its rays of soft gold and

pearly pink.

The night sister at the desk was brusque and preoccupied.  You shouldn't

be here until visiting hours this afternoon, but David smiled at her

with all the charm he could muster.

I just wanted to know if she is doing well.  I have to rejoin my

squadron this morning.  The sister was not immune either to his smile or