Tongues of Fire by Peter Abrahams Page B

“I am his chief assistant. The deputy prime minister. The cabinet. The Knesset. Everything goes through me.”
    â€œI’m sorry,” Rehv said.
    â€œThen I’m sorry.”
    Rehv felt confusion begin to undermine his resolve. He looked at the woman for some kind of help. She was looking at the floor. He turned again to the man: “But what about the government-in-exile? There must be some sort of procedure.”
    â€œI am the government-in-exile,” the man said. Something in the way he said it made Rehv remember who he was: a right-wing politician who had pushed for the annexation of the Golan Heights.
    â€œIn that case,” Rehv said, “the prime minister will certainly let you know whatever I tell him.”
    The man laughed. “Do you really think so?” He turned to the woman and spoke to her in a voice that was suddenly crisp and unemotional, as if he had tired of sport and was impatient to return to business: “Very well. Let him see the prime minister.”
    â€œHow is he feeling?” the woman asked worriedly.
    â€œTip-top. The prime minister is always feeling tip-top.” The man withdrew into the room he had come from and closed the door.
    The woman sighed. “I hope this is important,” she said to Rehv as she led him down the long corridor.
    â€œIt could be very important.” She sighed once more, as though nothing could ever be important again.
    At the end of the corridor she paused before a closed door, and knocked softly.
    â€œCome in,” a man answered immediately in Hebrew. Rehv had heard that voice many times.
    â€œDon’t keep him too long,” the woman said to Rehv. “He tires very easily.” She opened the door.
    Rehv walked into a room lined with books. A small fire burned in the grate. There was a faded couch along one wall and a worn easy chair by the fire. The old general was sitting in it with a wool blanket drawn over his knees. He seemed to be asleep: His chest rose and fell in slow even rhythm; his face, fleshy in the days when he was planting Jewish settlements on the West Bank, was now thin. And very old. There was no one else in the room.
    Rehv walked quietly to the couch and sat down. He waited as patiently as he could, his idea struggling to burst up through his throat. In the grate a log cracked loudly, shooting a fan of sparks up the chimney. With a little start the old general awoke, and stared directly at Rehv.
    â€œDon’t talk to me about the British,” he said in Hebrew. “I’m finished with the British. The British are a tricky people. Look at the Balfour Report: ‘a home in Palestine for the Jewish people.’ Only tricky people know how to make such trouble with prepositions.” He glared at Rehv.
    â€œI haven’t come to talk about the British, General,” Rehv said. “I’ve had some thoughts about what our course of action might be.”
    The general looked annoyed. “Thoughts. We don’t need thoughts. We need tanks. If we had more tanks we could be on the canal in three days. Tanks are the answer. Nasser is helpless against tanks. Why doesn’t anyone understand that? It’s so simple.”
    Rehv looked out the window at the falling snow.
    â€œWhy?” the general repeated. He had not been putting a rhetorical question.
    â€œI don’t know, General.”
    â€œOf course you don’t. Throw another log on the fire. I’m cold.”
    Rehv went to the wood basket by the fireplace, selected a split birch log and dropped it into the grate. “Is one enough?” There was no answer. Rehv looked at the general. His eyes were closed.
    Softly Rehv approached him. The old man’s chest rose and fell slowly; the thin face was at rest. Rehv pulled the blanket a little higher and left the room.
    There was no one in the corridor, no one in the hall. Outside, the snow still fell heavily, covering the trooper’s car in