The Shield: a novel (40 page)

“
You are somewhat inconsistent. Why buy engine blocks directly from us but not ceramics? You could let whoever is assembling automobiles buy the engines.”

“
We are hopeful that very soon there will be at least one car factory here, and we are preparing the infrastructure to enable their operation. This is not necessary with ceramics consumers as the infrastructure exists already.”

Ze’ev thought for a moment: “I have no idea who you have in mind to make cars in Israel, but my company would certainly like to be on the short list. Let me know about that as soon as possible. Our response to the rest of the list may well depend on it. Also, I’m not sure I want the government to loan me any money. With a firm order I can
probably arrange private financing at interest rates more favorable than yours. We’ll look into this as well.”

He got out of the office and went to look for his car. He panicked for a moment when he didn’t see it in the spot he remembered. “I’m getting senile” was the thought that passed through his head. Then he remembered, after a couple of seconds, that his wife took his SUV to go shopping with the f
amily and that he had driven her Jaguar to the Ministry in Jerusalem. It was parked right where he remembered leaving it.

***

“Hi, David, this is Ze’ev.”

“
Oh, hi, Ze’ev. How are things going?”

“
Good, though somewhat confusing. I’d like you and the family to come to our house for Shabbat dinner. It’ll be a big crowd. My relatives from Vilnius are here
.
Benjamin will be here, as well as Shoshanna and husband.”

David hesitated
. “We have a transportation problem.”

“
No, no. Don’t worry about that. Shoshanna will pick you up – They live practically around the corner from you. They’ll also take you back, unless you want to stay the night.”

“
In that case it’ll be our pleasure. Thanks for the invitation.”

“
Good. They’ll pick you up at about 4 pm on Friday.”

After he hung up, Ze’ev thought for a minute and made another call, to his son Chaim in Beersheba. Chaim was busy but promised to come for the next Shabbat dinner – when more of the f
amily would have arrived.

“
Listen, son, you won’t be able to postpone meeting your relatives until next Friday,” Ze’ev joked. “I need you at the main office on Sunday. I called a general management meeting to discuss the Ministry’s plan. I would appreciate your input.”

Chaim knew his father well – this was not a
n invitation
.
His father’s polite request was often an order and not complying would have consequences. In Ze’ev’s experience as a company commander in the Army and a veteran manager, people were more willing to accept orders if they were worded politely.

“
I’ll be there.”

“
After we’re done, we’ll go home to meet the new family. See you Friday.”

***

On Friday night with the table set and everyone assembled, the women lit Shabbat candles. Not all of them participated in the traditional ceremony. Shoshanna and young Aunt Sheina excused themselves. The rest lit two candles apiece. It was the first time in Ze’ev’s memory that such a light shone from the table – a sure sign of the size of his new family.

He still had difficulty absorbing the situation, but it did not seem as absurd as it had only a couple of days ago. He even managed the introductions with reasonable decorum, he thought.

Ze’ev said in Yiddish
. “I would like you to meet my daughter Shoshanna, who teaches nursing, and her husband Noam, an architect, also, my cousin David from America, his wife Rachel, and their two boys.” He then repeated the same in Hebrew, just to make sure everybody understood.

The conversation went on in several languages at once. Apparently David Rothstein’s Hebrew was the worst and he did his best to speak Yiddish. To his own surprise he was fairly fluent in it.

Sara shook hands with everyone enthusiastically, and then asked David: “Are you from our side of the family?”

David was confused so Rachel answered for him: “You remember your cousin Bertha? The one that married the crazy Zionist Eliezer Rothstein in 1937 and emigrated with him to Palestine immediately after the wedding?”

“Yes. But we heard nothing from them since.”

“
That’s because after the Arab attacks in 1939 they moved to America, to Boston – Eliezer’s cousin lived there at the time and sponsored them. David is their youngest. They tried writing to you a number of times, but Lithuania was by then under Soviet control and they never received a response.”

Jacob was seated next to No
am and after a while inquired about Noam’s job. “I’m a partner in a large architectural firm. We’re working on the plans for several new cities.”

“
Must be a really big firm.”

“
We have over a hundred employees and are hiring as fast as we can find qualified people.”

“
A hundred people to design several cities and, you said earlier, railroads and such? That doesn’t sound like very many.”

“
Most of the design these days is done on computers - You have seen a couple at the house here, right? We also subcontract some of the detail work to experts – the rail projects, for example, we gave to a small firm that specializes in such stuff.”

“
We saw computers here, but I don’t know how they work or what they can do.”

“
Would you like to come to our Tel-Aviv office on Sunday? I can show you how we use them.”

“
I’d love to,” Jacob responded enthusiastically. “I studied civil engineering in Vilnius. I’d love to see how things are done here.”

“
Do you know anything about surveying?”

“
That was one of the subjects we studied. I can’t claim any great expertise or experience but I am familiar with the techniques used before the war.”

“
I might have a job for you. I’ll pick you up on Sunday at, say, nine in the morning and we’ll see what we can do.”

Ze’ev, who had been listening quietly to the exchange, decided to intervene: “Jacob, don’t be in a hurry to accept the first job offered. I know my son-in-law. He’s a good officer and treats everyone as if they were his soldiers.”

“And who does that remind me of, Captain Ze’ev Hirshson, Sir!?” Linda said from the other side of the table, smiling at her husband.

“
Right, right, just joking,” Ze’ev smiled back at his wife. “What I was saying, Jacob, is that you’ll have many opportunities. The country is experiencing the greatest labor shortage in memory, especially of engineers. You might even want to consider starting your own business.”

“
I would like to eventually, but I’ve a lot to learn first. It may be a good idea to work for somebody else for a while.”

“
Hear, hear,” Noam agreed. “If you plan to work in the construction business, for instance, you have to be licensed and know the laws. We can take care of that. There’s nothing to prevent you from going out on your own later.”

“
Besides going into business I have this idea of enlisting in the Army. I was hoping that somebody could explain to me the options.” Jacob was a bit unsure
.
“The experience we went through at the Ninth Fort was very educational. I have the feeling that nothing is as important as participating in the defense of our people.”

“
Wait, wait,” both Noam and Ze’ev said together.

Ze’ev continued
, “Don’t take what I am going to say the wrong way, but by participating in our economy you will be making the state stronger. If this is the angle you are looking for, consider where you can do the most good.

“
You are almost 21, which is a bit old for a new recruit. They’ll probably take you but I doubt that you will have a chance to do much of anything. If you go into the construction business, where you have some training already, your contribution will be much more significant.”

Jacob just shrugged, unconvinced.

“Jacob, stop talking crazy,” Sara interjected. “Your father went to fight in the Great War and look what he got for his trouble: gas poisoning and early death. I don’t want to lose you.”

“
Mama, papa didn’t go voluntarily. The czar’s army took him and they treated their soldiers badly. If I enlist it will be in our own army to defend our own people. Don’t worry, I’ll be careful.
Ze’ev, is there a chance for me to discuss this with Ephraim?”

“
Probably. I’ll have to find out how to contact him. We exchange email but I don’t know how to call him – he never gave me a phone number for the base and his cell phone doesn’t work in Brindisi
.
”

“
Wait a minute,” Jacob interrupted. “What is email and what is a cell phone?”

“
It will take you a couple of weeks to become familiar with all this. The short answer is that email is a message you send from your computer. Cell phones, or more correctly cellular phones, are phones that connect wirelessly.”

“There’s so much to learn.” Jacob sighed.

***

Ze’ev spent Sunday in his office, pulling up data on the company’s reserves and trying to work out a reasonable plan for expansion. It felt good to be
at the center of activity; the offices were busy with people coming and going. Sunday was usually the busiest day of the week, with weekly coordination meetings for the different plants.

This Sunday meeting surprised him. Ze’ev always remembered his bad experience with a company president that feared the young and energetic. This memory made him do his best to support them. He was sure that t
hey viewed him as “the Old Man” but he didn’t feel old. His creative juices were flowing and he was ready for action.

The surprise
came from his V.P. for Research and Development. “I don’t completely agree with Ze’ev’s idea of starting to manufacture fiberglass cars as soon as possible. It’s true that we have some corporate experience with making plastic body cars, but that was many years ago and a failure. Without government subsidies we wouldn’t be able to sell even one of those monstrosities. If we jump into this immediately, our product will be as bad - or worse - than the originals.”

“
And I suppose that you have an alternative?” Ze’ev was not exactly pleased with this unexpected objection but not very annoyed either. The young man was showing independence and, since he was smart, might have a solution to the problem, which had bothered Ze’ev as well.

“
Well, I have an approach. How much of a solution it is depends on the definition of the problem. If we define the problem as ‘We want to be a major player in the automotive market,’ then I have an idea.”

“
Good. Let’s hear it.”

“
Several background remarks first. It’s good for us to make auto engines. We have most of the machinery and know-how to make small quantities right now. The only thing we’re missing is aluminum casting capability, which, as you know, is necessary to make modern engines and transmissions.

“
There are several small plants that have the ability we need but not the size, and we don’t want to rely on outside suppliers anyway. This leads to another issue: Israel has enough steel scrap to last us a decade, but very little aluminum scrap. We need to develop smelting ability and develop external sources for bauxite ore. This will enable us to make aluminum from scratch and not rely on scrap.

“
I’m not against marketing automobiles immediately as long as we make them different. How about electric cars? Our ceramics and composites division has been supplying computer battery makers with the necessary parts for years. It wouldn’t take much for us to go into the business ourselves. I’m sure that an electric car with a range of several hundred miles and reasonable speed would sell well. It’ll give us a foothold in the market and allow future development of more sophisticated models.”

“
An interesting idea,” Chaim Hirshson nodded, “but I’m a bit worried about the magnitude of all this development. We have limited human resources, which we have to divide between all these projects; assuming of course that capital isn’t going to be a problem. I can’t see us developing both an electric car and a conventional one. We’ll have to decide very soon which approach is best for us as a corporation.”

“
I agree with Chaim in principle,” Ze’ev smiled at the R&D manager, “but he’s not taking into account the new immigrants. There are very gifted engineers and scientist in that crowd. True, they are not up to date on the latest technology, but in some cases it doesn’t matter. For example, we need to double our steelmaking capacity within the next few months. We can’t buy another arc furnace from Europe but we can duplicate the ones we already have. A couple of mechanical engineers working with mechanics and welders can do it fairly quickly and efficiently with 1941 technology. Same goes for the electrical parts the arc furnace needs. It’s also important to budget for and prepare to educate the newcomers. They’ll make an important contribution to our company if we treat them right. Which reminds me: we have a number of very good automotive engineers coming and I’d like to hire all of them.” Ze’ev looked at the Human Resources manager: “Most of these people used to work for Citroen and speak mostly French. I’ll appreciate you being ready for them. They’ll need to learn Hebrew and English as fast as possible.”