Where the Desert Meets the Sea Read online

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Text copyright © 2008 by Werner Sonne

  English translation copyright © 2019 by Steve Anderson

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  Previously published as Wenn ich dich vergesse, Jerusalem by Berlin Verlag, Berlin, Germany, in 2008. Translated from German by Steve Anderson. First published in English by AmazonCrossing in 2019.

  Published by AmazonCrossing, Seattle

  www.apub.com

  Amazon, the Amazon logo, and AmazonCrossing are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates.

  ISBN-13: 9781542043908 (hardcover)

  ISBN-10: 1542043905 (hardcover)

  ISBN-13: 9781542043915 (paperback)

  ISBN-10: 1542043913 (paperback)

  Cover design by Faceout Studio, Jeff Miller

  First edition

  CONTENTS

  February 15–16, 1947

  February 17, 1947

  February 19, 1947

  February 20–21, 1947

  February 26, 1947

  March 1, 1947

  March 13–14, 1947

  March 15, 1947

  April 3, 1947

  May 1, 1947

  July 15–16, 1947

  August 1, 1947

  November 29–30, 1947

  December 2, 1947

  December 15, 1947

  December 29, 1947

  January 12, 1948

  January 25, 1948

  February 9, 1948

  February 10, 1948

  February 20, 1948

  February 22, 1948

  March 1, 1948

  March 2, 1948

  March 10–11, 1948

  March 13, 1948

  March 15, 1948

  April 1, 1948

  April 3, 1948

  April 6, 1948

  April 7, 1948

  April 8, 1948

  April 9, 1948

  April 13, 1948

  April 24, 1948

  April 27, 1948

  April 28, 1948

  April 30, 1948

  May 12–13, 1948

  May 14, 1948

  May 21, 1948

  May 23, 1948

  May 28, 1948

  June 3, 1948

  June 9, 1948

  June 11, 1948

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  ABOUT THE TRANSLATOR

  February 15–16, 1947

  They have to be out there somewhere, she thought. If they spot us, it’s over.

  The wind surged and the rain whipped at her face, running down her legs, combining with the seawater grabbing at her feet through the railing. It was a moonless February night. The storm had swept in from the northwest and sent temperatures plunging.

  Judith Wertheimer watched the captain as he scanned the horizon with his massive binoculars, again and again, his greasy dark-blue cap pushed far back on his head. The Cypriot’s sharp features, framed by a stubbly gray beard, didn’t betray any concern. But she could make out a subtle clenching in his jaw.

  She, too, stared into the darkness, toward the west, beyond the waves’ white crests and into that dark-gray mountain of clouds that seemed to merge with the churning Mediterranean Sea. Again the thought raced through her head. If they catch us, it’s over. What then? More barbed wire, more barracks, more camps? She couldn’t bear it, not again.

  Judith pulled her old gray wool overcoat tighter around herself. It had once kept a German Wehrmacht soldier warm. Altered by a German housewife, it had changed owners numerous times before a Red Cross nurse pulled it from a pile of worn-out clothes and thrust it into Judith’s hands right before she left. Judith anxiously felt around in the pocket for the postcard, then calmed down once she felt it between her fingers, still safe and dry.

  “You need to live. Come here,” he’d scrawled in old German script. “Come to my home, in Jerusalem. Your Uncle Albert.” In the upper left corner, squeezed in really small, was the address. “Albert Wertheimer, Ben Yehuda Street 112, Jerusalem, Palestine.”

  How old would he be now—sixty-four? No, sixty-five. Her father’s brother, Albert Wertheimer, PhD, had been a lawyer and notary—back then.

  Lost in thoughts of her uncle, Judith didn’t see the huge wave until it slammed against the bow. The ship lurched, then reared up, rising high, and smacked back down, a loud creak coursing through its old hull. The impact ripped the front lifeboat from its mount, and it tipped over the ship’s left side, dangling there a few seconds and banging against the hull until the last chain gave way and the boat was swallowed up by the dark water.

  From below deck came the combined screams of many, then the piercing cries of a child, then nothing. Silence. It took Judith a moment to grasp what had happened. The engine laboring to propel the heaving ship had cut out, for the second time since departing Cyprus. The first time, they’d lost three precious hours firing it up again.

  She knew time was running out. They had to arrive before dawn; otherwise, they’d be caught along the shore. She looked to the captain. He put down his binoculars, pushed his cap forward, and hurried down the short ladder from the bridge, disappearing below deck with a young crewman.

  The Morning Cloud started to lurch out of control, a toy on the waves. An old woman appeared from the hatch; she staggered the few steps across the deck, clamped on to the railing, and threw up. Judith rushed over to hold her up. It was Esther, the little Polish lady who’d lived next to her in the barracks of the British internment camp on Cyprus. She was only fifty-seven but looked much older, emaciated and broken from forced labor in Hitler’s Germany, her narrow back hunched. She stared at Judith with her eyes wide, flashing with fear. She threw up again.

  A dull rumble rose from inside the ship, first stuttering, then growing steadier as the engine returned to full speed. The captain climbed back onto the bridge and resumed scanning the horizon. The Morning Cloud gradually turned its bow back toward the east.

  Judith had Esther by the arm and was holding her tight.

  “Easy, easy! Just a few more hours and we’ve made it,” Judith heard herself shout into the wind.

  Esther squeezed her eyes shut and nodded. Judith led her out of the rain that seemed even heavier now, back to the hatch, back to the nearly 250 exhausted people packed together below deck. The hold stank of fear and vomit, but the passengers seemed to feel that anything was better than exposing themselves to the storm’s fury.

  Judith helped Esther down, then pulled herself back up along the thick, frayed rope railing. She glanced around the deck. Then she saw him, at the rear of the ship. A man in a black leather jacket, dark pants, boots.

  She strained to make out more details. A red glow flickered, apparently a cigarette. His legs had a slight spring to them, balancing on the rolling waves. A realization hit Judith: she had seen him briefly when they’d come on board, together with Ari, the man from the Haganah. She remembered his jet-black hair, his equally dark mustache. About thirty-five, slim, fair. Under different circumstances, his figure might have been called athletic. Even more striking than his hair were his eyes—blue, very blue. Something about those eyes had disturbed her deeply.

  She kept her own eyes fixed on that figure defying the r
ain and smoking in the darkness just ten yards away. She took a deep breath and concentrated. She was more and more certain that she had seen those eyes before, long before coming on board.

  She turned back toward the bow. The wind still whipped at the waves, but the wall of rain had let up for the moment. She believed, or rather guessed, hoped, that she could detect some bright dots far ahead. Lights, she thought, and not on the water—lights on the shore, the lights of Tel Aviv.

  “The ship’s coming.” Uri Rabinovich pressed the binoculars tighter to his eyes. “They’re coming,” he repeated, more urgent now. He waited a moment, wanting to be certain. “It’s them. Give the signal!”

  Daniel Wyzanski sprang up and directed the spotlight at the sea. Three long flashes, two short, three long. Uri held his breath a second. What if he’d gotten it wrong? What if the Morning Cloud had already been intercepted, like so many ships before her? Seconds passed, feeling like minutes. He glanced at his watch. Half past five—they were late, far too late. Soon it would be light.

  “Again,” Uri shouted to Daniel. He squinted through his binoculars. Still nothing. “Goddamn it,” he muttered. But then, there it was: flashing on the other end, three long, two short, three long. He lowered his binoculars.

  “Quick! Prepare the boats.”

  Five young Haganah men sprang up from behind a dune and ran down to the beach where their gray inflatable boats lay. Only two of the five had a motor. The others had to be rowed, roughly three hundred yards out over the roaring surf.

  The Morning Cloud was now clearly in view. Uri reached the beach close behind the others, short of breath after his sprint. Just as he went to jump into an inflatable boat, a glistening light shot up high over the Morning Cloud, illuminating the old ship. Light from a flare. Uri raised the binoculars to his eyes, searching for the source. Then he saw it, far beyond the refugee ship, cloaked by the rain.

  The British were here, and they were closing in fast.

  Judith shielded her eyes, blinded by the light. For a moment, the spectacle fascinated her—the waves rolling, their ship bobbing, the rain now reflecting the white flare, the tattered clouds racing across the sky. Then shock set in. She now could see, barely, its outline against the dark-gray horizon of rain and sea and clouds: a British destroyer.

  She instinctively turned her back, as if she could deter fate by not looking. She clapped her hands to her face, taking deep breaths. The events of the previous forty-eight hours replayed in her mind—their escape from the camp, the Haganah trucks rushing them to the ship, the British in pursuit, the throng of people scurrying up the narrow gangplank, the cramped and overloaded ship.

  Judith knew what would happen if the British caught them. Esther had gone through it already. They’d be returned to the camp on Cyprus where the British had crammed in thirty thousand Jews, all survivors of the Holocaust and all with only one goal: to reach Palestine.

  Suddenly, there was frantic commotion all around her. Three Haganah men were bringing up their human cargo from the belly of the ship. Frightened figures, unsteady on their feet, the crying children holding tight to the adults’ legs.

  “Throw out the ladder!” Ari shouted.

  As the rope ladder splashed into the water, another harsh jolt passed through the ship. The Morning Cloud had hit a sandbank. All eyes turned to the captain, who was trying to reverse course. To no avail—the Morning Cloud was stuck. The crew frantically grappled with the remaining lifeboat and lowered it down over the restless waves. Then they began handing out life vests, but there were only fifty for two hundred fifty passengers.

  “Give them to the children, hurry!” Ari screamed.

  Judith saw Esther put her life vest on a little girl.

  She heard Ari shouting: “Hurry, faster!”

  Judith grabbed the girl and pulled her close to the rope ladder. The girl hesitated.

  “Where’s your mother?”

  The girl gaped at her.

  “Get going already! Go!” Ari yelled.

  “You go with her,” Judith told Esther. “I’ll be right behind you.”

  The Polish woman reached for the girl’s hand, helped her climb over the railing, then reluctantly climbed over herself.

  “I—I can’t swim,” she whispered.

  “Don’t worry, you can do it,” Judith reassured her.

  Judith watched Esther struggle down the ladder, then followed, fighting the waves. Below, she could now make out a gray inflatable boat, where two Haganah men were reaching for the people abandoning ship. About five were already on board. One of them grabbed the girl, now howling in despair, and swiftly pulled her over and handed her to one of the women.

  Next was Esther. She clung to the rope ladder, unable to move, frozen with fear. A hand reached out for her, but the Morning Cloud rocked wildly back and forth atop the sandbank. Esther hung with both hands clamped to the ropes, her face to the hull. A man finally grabbed her by the right leg, but she panicked, flailing. Then suddenly, unable to fight him anymore, she let go. Her leg slipped from his hands. She tumbled down headfirst.

  Seeing Esther disappear into the waves, Judith didn’t shout, didn’t even think. She pushed off from the rope and dropped feetfirst into the depths. The shock of the cold water only hit her when she came back up spluttering, kicking to stay afloat. She frantically peered back and forth, searching for Esther. For a moment she thought she saw the woman’s head in the crest of a wave. She immediately began paddling in that direction, but her progress was painfully slow, damned from the start by her heavy coat and the ice-cold water.

  “Esther,” she screamed. “Esther!”

  Judith’s arms kept thrashing, yet she couldn’t gain even a yard. Her movements slowed. When the next wave crashed over her head, she swallowed a huge mouthful of water, then coughed it back up, retching.

  “Esther,” she gasped.

  Suddenly, she felt someone roughly grab the back of her neck, an arm wrapping around her torso. She flailed and fought, trying to free herself.

  “Stop it,” said a male voice. “Stop, there’s nothing you can do for her.”

  Yet she kept fighting, more violently now. The man tightened his grip.

  “Hang on, the boat’s coming!” he shouted.

  “Esther,” she muttered. Then she was right up against the gray rubber of the boat. Hands reached out to her, a face hovering, framed by jet-black hair. Blue, very blue eyes. More hands seized her overcoat. The man in the water released his grip and pushed her forward. Gradually, as if in slow motion, they pulled Judith on board.

  Esther, she kept thinking. The woman had survived the German labor camps, the death marches, those uncertain days after the war, the British camp on Cyprus, and now she was dead. Drowned, only a few hundred yards from the shore of Tel Aviv. Judith’s eyes slid closed, and she passed out.

  When she came to, she was lying between wool blankets, among sand dunes. The black of night had given way to the gray of daybreak. The rain had stopped. Several trucks waited on the sand with motors running. People were crammed on the cargo beds, their faces weary and drained. Mothers held their children tight.

  A face leaned over her. She perceived what resembled a smile. It belonged to a man in his midtwenties. Short, dark-brown hair, dark and determined eyes, and a gentle mouth that didn’t seem to fit him.

  “How are you doing?” he asked.

  She sat up. It was a simple question to which she had no answer. Reflexively, she replied, “Um, fine, thanks.”

  The man kept smiling. He held out his hand. “We already met in the water. Uri. Uri Rabinovich.”

  She accepted his hand, shaking it gently.

  “Judith Wertheimer.” Only now did she notice that she was wearing nothing but panties under the wool blanket. Her wet clothes lay next to her. She realized how silly their formal introduction was under the circumstances, and turned red. Yet Uri had already turned his eyes away and was waving over a young woman.

  “This is Yael,” he sai
d. “She’ll look after you.”

  Yael smiled broadly at her. She was Judith’s age, with dark-blond hair, khaki shorts, and a dark wool sweater. She looked athletic, nearly tomboyish. She pulled some clothes from a paper bag: khaki pants, khaki shirt, and a sweater like hers.

  “Put these on; it’s the kibbutz uniform.”

  She gathered up Judith’s wet clothes and was about to stuff them in the bag when Judith stopped her. She reached for her overcoat and searched its right pocket. The postcard was more like a wet cloth now, the ink running. But the picture on the front was still discernible. A photo of the Wailing Wall, the Dome of the Rock above it.

  Uri had been watching her. Now, he lit a cigarette, then offered the pack to Judith and Yael. Yael took one out, letting Uri light it. Judith just shook her head. From a distance came the sudden howl of sirens. Uri’s face hardened.

  “Shit, the Brits. The destroyer must have radioed them.”

  He tossed his cigarette in the sand and waved at the trucks.

  “Go, go!”

  Yael pulled Judith to the rearmost truck. She was barely on the truck bed before the driver hit the gas pedal. Judith watched Uri run over to a dark car. She could make out the contours of a figure in the back seat. It was the man with the jet-black hair and mustache. Uri slammed the door, and the car sped off.

  February 17, 1947

  A banging on the door jolted Uri from his sleep. He heard a woman softly call his name.

  “Uri, Uri, open up.”

  He threw off the bedsheet, which left Yael lying naked and exposed. She muttered in her sleep. He tossed a blanket over her, then wrapped the sheet around his hips, pulled out his revolver from under the pillow, and rushed over to the door. Few people knew his address in Tel Aviv. He turned the key with his left hand and opened the door a crack.

  Before him stood a full-figured woman in her late twenties, with bleached blond hair. Her shapely lips were painted red, and her blouse was open one button too many. Uri lowered the revolver and opened the door a little wider. She brought her face close to his.

  “The Brits,” Hilda whispered. “They’re heading to the laundry today.” Her gaze wandered over his shoulder. “Sorry, I see you have a visitor.”