The Butcher's Theatre (24 page)

behind a big Danish teakwood desk and drinking soda water.

An olive-wood tray holding a Sipholux bottle and two empty

glasses sat near his right arm.

“Sit down,” he said, and when Daniel had done so, pushed a piece of paper across the desk. “We’ll be releasing this to the press in a couple of hours.”

The statement was two paragraphs long, stamped with today’s date, and entitled POLICE SOLVE SCOPUS MURDER AND RELATED REVENGE KILLING.

POLICE DEPUTY COMMANDER AVIGDOR LAUFER ANNOUNCED TODAY THAT THE MAJOR CRIMES DIVISION. SOUTHERN DISTRICT, HAS SOLVED THE CASE OF A YOUNG GIRL FOUND STABBED TO DEATH FOUR DAYS AGO ON MOUNT SCOPUS, THE INVESTIGATION HAS REVEALED THAT FATM A RASHMA Wl, 15, A RESIDENT OF SILWAN, WAS KILLED BY ISSA QADER ABDELATIFAL AZZEH. 19, RESIDENT OF THE DHEISHEH REFUGEE CAMP WHO WAS KNOWN TO THE POLICE BECAUSE OF A HISTORY OF THIEVERY AND ANTISOCIAL BEHAVIOR. ABDELATIF’S BODY WAS FOUND IN A GROVE NEAR SILWAN WHERE IT HAD BEEN BURIED BY ONE OF THE VICTIM’S BROTHERS. ANWAR RASHMAWI, 20. RASMAWI, WHO ALSO HAS A POLICE RECORD, CONFESSED TO MURDERING ABDELATIF IN ORDER TO AVENGE THE HONOR OF HIS SISTER. HE IS CURRENTLY IN POLICE CUSTODY.

THE INVESTIGATION WAS TECTIVES FROM MAJOR CRIMES, DANIEL SHARAVI AND SUPERVISED LAUFER.

CARRIED OUT BY A TEAM OF DE-HEADED BY CHIEF INSPECTOR BY DEPUTY COMMANDER

Public relations, thought Daniel. Names on paper.

He put the statement on the desk.

Worlds removed from the streets and the stakeouts. From the Butcher’s

Theater. He put the statement on the desk.

‘So? demanded Laufer.

‘It’s factual.’

He sat back in his chair and stared at Daniel, waiting for more.

‘It’s a good statement. Should make the press happy.’

‘Does it make you happy, Sharavi?’

‘I still have reservations about the case.’

“The knife?”

“For one.” Abdelatif’s weapon was thick-bladed and dull. Not even remotely similar to the wound molds taken from Fatma’s body.

“He was a knife man,” said Laufer. “Carried more than one weapon.”

“The pathologist said at least two had been used on Fatma, which means he would have had to carry three. No others have turned up, but it’s a discrepancy I can live with—he hid the murder weapons or sold them to someone. What really bothers me is the foundation of the case: We’re depending exclusively on the brother’s story. Apart from what he’s told us, there’s no real evidence. Nothing placing Abdelatif near or around Scopus, no explanation for how he got up there—for why he dumped her there. At least twenty hours passed between Fatma’s leaving the monastery and the discovery of the body. We have no idea what they did during that time.”

“He cut her up is what they did.”

“But where? The brother said he bought a ticket for the Hebron bus. The girl went somewhere on her own. Where? On top of that, we’ve got no motive for why he killed her in the first place. Anwar said they parted after a tryst, with no signs of hostility. And there’s the physical context of the murder to consider—the washing of the body, the way it was prepared, the hair combed out, the sedation with heroin. We didn’t find a single fiber, footprint, or fingerprint. It indicates calculation, intelligence—a cold type of intelligence—and nothing we’ve learned about Abdelatif makes him sound that bright.”

The deputy commander leaned back in his chair. Laced his hands behind his head and spoke with deliberate casualness.

“Lots of words, Sharavi, but what it boils down to is that you’re searching for answers to every little detail. It’s not a realistic attitude.”

Laufer waited. Daniel said nothing.

“You’re overreacting,” said the deputy commander. “Most of your objections can be easily understood given the fact that Abdelatif was a thief and a lowlife psychopath—he tortured animals, burned his cousin, and cut up his uncle. Is murder that far removed from that kind of crap? Who knows why he killed or why he chose to dump her in a certain way? The head

doctors don’t understand those types and neither do you or I. For all we know he was intelligent—a damned genius when it came to murder. Maybe he’s cut up and washed other girls and never been caught—the people in the camps never call us in. Maybe he carried ten knives, was a damned knife fanatic. He stole tools—why not blades? As far as where he did it, it could be anywhere. Maybe she met him at the station, he took her home, carved her up in the camp.”

“The driver of the Hebron bus is reasonably certain Abdelatif was on it and Fatma wasn’t.”

Laufer shook his head scornfully. “The number of people they stuff in, all those chickens, how the hell could he notice anything? In any event, Rashmawi did the world a favor by polishing him off. One less psycho to worry about.”

“Rashmawi could just as easily be our culprit,” said Daniel. “We know he’s psychologically disturbed. What if he killed both of them—out of jealousy or to impress his father—then concocted the story about Abdelatif in order to make it sound honorable?”

“What if. Do you have any evidence of that?” “I’m only raising it as an example—” “During the time his sister was murdered, Rashmawi was home. His family vouches for him.”

“That’s to be expected,” said Daniel. Anwar’s confession had turned him from freak to family hero, the entire Rashmawi clan marching to the front gate of the Russian Compound, making a great show of solidarity at the prison door. The father beating his breast and offering to trade his own life for that of his “brave, blessed son.”

“What’s expected can also be true, Sharavi. And even if the alibi were false, you’d never get them to change it, would you? So what would be the point? Leaning on a bunch of Arabs and getting the press on our asses? Besides, it’s not as if Rashmawi will be walking the streets. He’ll be locked up at Ramie, out of circulation.” Laufer rubbed his hands together. “Two birds.”

“Not for long,” said Daniel. “The charge is likely to be reduced to self-defense. With psychiatric and cultural mitigating factors. Which means he could be walking the streets in a couple of years.”

“Could be’s and maybe’s” said Laufer. “That’s the prosecutor’s problem. In the meantime we’ll proceed based on the facts at hand.”

He made a show of shuffling papers, squirted soda from the injection bottle into a glass, and offered a drink to Daniel.

“No, thanks.”

Laufer reacted to the refusal as if it were a slap in the face.

“Sharavi,” he said tightly. “A major homicide has been solved in a matter of days and there you sit, looking as if someone had died.”

Daniel stared back at him, searching for intentional irony in his choice of words, the knowledge that he’d uttered a tasteless joke. Finding only peevishness. The resentment of a drill major for one who’d broken step.

“Stop searching for problems that don’t exist.”

“As you wish, Tat Nitzav.”

Laufer sucked in his cheeks, the flab billowing as he exhaled.

“I know,” he said, “about your people walking across the desert from Arabia. But today we have airplanes. No reason to do things the hard way. To wipe your ass with your foot when a hand is available.”

He picked up the press release, initialed it, and told Daniel he was free to leave. Allowed him to reach the doorknob before speaking again: “One more thing. I read Rashmawi’s arrest report—the first one, for throttling the whore. The incident took place some time before Gray Man, didn’t it?”

Daniel knew what was coming.

“Over two years before.”

“In terms of a Major Crimes investigation, that’s not long at all. Was Rashmawi ever questioned in regard to the Gray Man murders?”

“I questioned him about it yesterday. He denied having anything to do with it, said except for the incident with the prostitute, he never went out of the house at night. His family will vouch for him—an unassailable alibi, as you’ve noted.”

“But he wasn’t questioned originally? During the active investigation?”

“No.”

“May I ask why not?”

The same question he’d asked himself.

“We were looking at convicted sex offenders. His case was dismissed before coming to trial.”

“Makes one wonder,” said Laufer, “how many others slipped by.”

Daniel said nothing, knowing any reply would sound mealy-mouthed and defensive.

“Now that the Scopus thing has been cleared up,” continued the deputy commander, “there’ll be time to backtrack—go over the files and see what else may have been missed.”

“I’ve started doing that, Tat Nitzav.”

“Good day, Sharavi. And congratulations on solving the

case.

On Wednesday night, hours after the Scopus case closed, the Chinaman celebrated by taking his wife and son out for a free dinner. He and.Aliza smiled at each other over plates heaped high with food—stir-fried beef and broccoli, sweet and sour veal, lemon chicken, crackling duck—holding hands and sipping lime Cokes and enjoying the rare chance to be alone.

“It’s good that it’s over,” she said, squeezing his thigh. “You’ll be home more. Able to do your share of the housework.”

“I think I hear the office calling.”

“Never mind. Pass the rice.”

Across the room, little Rafi sucked contentedly on a bottle of apple juice, cradled in his grandmother’s arms, receiving a first-class guided tour of the Shang Hai as she took him from table to table, introducing him to customers, announcing that he was her tzankhan katan—“little paratrooper.” At the rear

of the restaurant, near the kitchen door, sat her husband, black silk yarmulke perched atop his hairless ivory head, playing silent chess with the mashgiah—the rabbi sent by the Chief Rabbinate to ensure that everything was kosher.

This mashgiah was a new one, a youngster named Stolinsky with a patchy dark beard and a relaxed attitude toward life. During the three weeks since he’d been assigned to the Shang Hai, he’d gained five pounds feasting on spiced ground veal pancakes with hoisin sauce and had been unable to capture Huang Haim Lee’s king.

The restaurant was lit by paper lanterns and smelled of garlic and ginger. Chinese watercolors and calendars hung on red-lacquered walls. A rotund, popeyed goldfish swam clumsily in a bowl next to the cashier’s booth. The register, normally Mrs. Lee’s bailiwick, was operated tonight by a moonlighting American student named Cynthia.

The waiter was a tiny, hyperactive Vietnamese, one of the boat people the Israelis had taken in several years ago. He rushed in and out of the kitchen, bouncing from table to table carrying huge trays of food, speaking rapidly in pidgin Hebrew and laughing at jokes that only he seemed to understand. The large center table was occupied by a party of Dutch nuns, cheerful, doughy-faced women who chewed energetically and laughed along with Nguyen as they fumbled with their chopsticks. The rest of the customers were Israelis, serious about eating, cleaning their plates and calling for more.

Aliza took in the activity, the polyglot madness, smiled and stroked her husband’s forearm. He reached out and took her fingers in his, exhibiting just a hint of the strength stored within the oversized digits.

It had taken her some time to get used to it. She’d grown up a farm girl, on Kibbutz Yavneh, a bosomy, big-boned redhead. Her first beaus, robust, tractor-‘driving youths—male versions of herself. She’d always had a thing for big men, the muscular, bulky types who made you feel protected, but never had she imagined herself married to someone who looked like an oversized Mongol warrior. And the family: her motherin-law your basic yiddishe mama, her hair in a babushka, still speaking Hebrew with a Russian accent; Abba

Haim an old Buddha, as yellow as parchment; Yossi’s older brother, David, suave, always wearing a suit, always making deals, always away on business.

She’d met Yossi in the army. She’d worked in requisitions and had been attached to his paratrooper unit. He’d stormed into her office like a real bulvan, angry and looking ludicrous because the uniform that had been issued to him was three sizes too small. He started mouthing off at her; she mouthed back and that was it. Chemistry. And now little Rafi, straw-haired, with almond eyes and the shoulders of a working man. Who’d have predicted it?

As she’d gotten to know Yossi, she’d realized that they came from similar stock. Survivors. Fighters.

Her parents had been teenaged lovers who escaped from Munich in ‘41 and hid for months in the Bavarian forest, subsisting on leaves and berries. Her father stole a rifle and shot a German guard dead in order to get them across the border. Together they traveled on foot, making their way through Hungary and Yugoslavia and down to Greece. Catching a midnight boat ride to Cyprus and paying the last of their savings to a Cypriot smuggler, only to be forced off the boat at gunpoint, five miles from the coast of Palestine. Swimming the rest of the way on empty stomachs, crawling half-dead onto the shores of Jaffa. Avoiding the scrutiny of Arab cutthroats long enough to reach their comrades at Yavneh.

Yossi’s mother had also escaped the Nazis by walking. In 1940. All the way from Russia to the visa-free port of Shanghai, where she lived in relative peace, along with thousands of other Jews. Then war broke out in the Pacific and the Japanese interned all of them in the squalid camps of Hongkew.

A tall, husky theology student named Huang Lee had been held captive there, too, suspected of collaborating with the Allies, because he was an intellectual. Dragged out periodically to endure public floggings.

Two weeks before Hiroshima, the Japanese sentenced Huang Lee to death. The Jews took him in and he evaded execution by hiding in their midst, being passed form family to family under the cover of darkness. The last family he stayed

with had also taken in an orphan from Odessa, a black-haired girl named Sonia. Chemistry.

In 1947, Sonia and Huang came to Palestine. He converted to Judaism, took the name Haim—“life”—for he considered himself reborn, and they married. In ‘48 both of them fought with the Palmah in Galilee. In ‘49 they settled in North Jerusalem so that Huang Haim could study in Rabbi Kook’s Central Yeshiva. When the children came—David in 1951, Yosef four years later—Huang went to work as a post-office clerk.