A Spy in Exile

TEL AVIV, LIVERPOOL, FEBRUARY 2015

Michael had met up with Ronit late in the evening before his flight to London. Ronit had once been a combatant in the same squad in which Ya’ara had served. So they were friends, but he didn’t know if they were still in touch. As talented and daring as she was, Ronit was also viewed as a strange bird. Maybe that’s what had drawn Ya’ara to her, he thought. She had left the squad and the Mossad, and Michael had heard that she was doing something obscure in the hi-tech field. It took her a few moments to recognize his voice when he called, but she agreed to meet him right away. “But you’ll have to take a walk with me and Nora,” she said.

“Nora? Your daughter?”

“My dog, dummy.” A slight faux pas only, but it flickered in Michael’s head like a warning signal.

They met across the road from Ronit’s house on Be’eri Street. It was dark and wet, and Michael closed his coat. Nora was bounding around them energetically, and Ronit let her off the leash, remarking that it was a quiet street and not a problem. Nora circled around them excitedly and sped off down the empty street, savoring the freedom and space that had opened up to her.

“Is she a purebred dog, or what?”

“No, Michael, she’s not purebred. She’s a mixture of so many kinds that I have no idea what she is. Is this what you called me for after so many years? To talk about my dog?”

“I wanted to ask you about Ya’ara Stein. Are you still in touch?”

“Unfortunately not. I left the squad and two years later Ya’ara went on unpaid leave. Went off to study film. We slowly lost touch. It just happens sometimes. Although I think about her a lot.” She paused for a moment. “She’s okay, right?”

“I have no reason to think otherwise. But there’s something important that I need to clarify. Do you know if she had any connection to the late Yael Ziv?”

“I’m not sure I know who you’re talking about, although the name sounds familiar . . .”

“Yael Ziv was murdered in a terror attack in the central synagogue in Brussels.”

“Ah, right. Of course I’ve heard about her.” They had reached the public park, with the dog right behind them. Tall trees swayed like black shadows against the cloudy sky. “I don’t recall any ties between her and Ya’ara.” She hesitated for a moment, quietly trying to sift through her memory. “No,” she said. “Is it important? Why do you ask?”

“I’m looking into something at the request of Aharon Levin. It would be easiest to try to inquire via the Mossad, but the truth is I don’t want to involve them. Doing so could put Ya’ara in harm’s way, and I want to protect her, if possible.”

“Are you still with the Mossad?”

“No, no. I’ve been out for two years already. I opened a law office. But I get asked to do various things sometimes. I never say no.”

“Maybe it’s time you started. I have to ask: Did anything ever happen between you in the end?”

“Between who?”

“Who are we talking about? Between you and Ya’ara.”

“No. Never.”

“You worked together on several operations,” she said. “And she spoke about you in a manner that got me thinking, and getting information out of her . . . Oh, well, never mind.”

“I value her greatly. She’s an exceptional fighter and an interesting woman. But nothing happened between us.”

“You have paternal feelings toward her, right? A feeling of wanting to shield her.”

“Yes,” he said, impressed by her sharp senses. “Most of all, I don’t want anything to happen to her.”

“She has a tendency to reach into the flames and then wonder how she got burned,” Ronit said. “Fortunately, that doesn’t happen to her much. She’s too smart. But sometimes she’s more hard-headed than smart.”

Michael smiled softly, sympathetically. He felt that she needed to talk, that his role in their conversation was that of a listener to things she wanted to get off her chest.

“I miss her,” Ronit said. “I really do. More than I’d like to admit, in fact. I miss her even though I doubt the feeling’s mutual. I’ll try to find out for you if she had any connection to that woman. Hold on. Hold on. Do you think . . . ?”

Michael realized that Ronit had connected the dots and seen the link between his questions and the reports published about the assassination in Belgium.

“I don’t know anything for certain and there’s no reason to jump to wild conclusions. But now you understand my concern. So a few discreet inquiries on your behalf would be to her benefit. I’m worried about her. Don’t go through any official Mossad channels. I’m going away tomorrow morning, but I’ll call you in a day or two, okay?”

Ya’ara was still sleeping when he called her from the small garden across the road from the hotel.

“Hi,” Ronit said, careful not to use his name, still maintaining the habits acquired during the years she spent as a field operative. You can never know what name the person on the other side of the line is using. “I spoke to her father. He remembered me and was happy to hear from me after so long. I visited her parents’ home with her on several occasions, and was even their guest once at the family’s Passover Seder. It turns out it was her mother who knew Yael, actually. They were very good friends, they shared common interests, and Yael was a big help to Ya’ara’s mother during the family’s initial years in the country. And later, when Ya’ara’s mother fell ill, Yael was her angel, so he told me.

“He got very emotional talking about his wife. Naturally, of course. I apologized to him for stirring such charged memories, but he said that speaking about her allowed him to remember her best. He said that the news of Yael’s murder had left him broken. He went to the funeral, but there were so many people there and he didn’t have the courage to speak to her husband and children. He didn’t really know them anyway. The friendship, he said, was strictly between the two women. A private friendship. Does that help you at all?”

“It’s a big help. Thanks. Don’t discuss this with anyone, okay? Keep it to yourself. There’s no need for people to start telling stories to themselves.”

“Send her my warmest regards if you see her. And tell her I miss her. And when you get back to Israel, perhaps we can get together for a coffee, you and me. Nora’s been asking about you.”

Michael sat down on a bench in the garden. He sighed, took a cigar out of his jacket pocket, and lit it, losing himself in his thoughts as he inhaled the thick, fragrant smoke.