100 – Portland, Maine
The roundup of the 40,000 Jews living in St. Louis did not go smoothly. President Quaid’s insistence that it begin immediately limited the advance planning. In an age when a clever cartoon can be emailed to a thousand computers the first hour, a million computers the second hour, fifty million the third hour, warnings about soldiers arresting Jews spread instantly among St. Louis’s Jewish population. That warning was all it took to trigger a panicked exodus. St. Louis Jews were well aware their country was already holding nearly half a million Jews in detention camps.
Most American Jews were still struggling with their disbelief at the arrests at the March. Many were waiting for more arrests. Thousands attempted to flee St. Louis. Many were successful. Some were not.
Television news that evening was dominated by reports from St. Louis. Video showing Americans who looked as ordinary as everyone’s neighbors being placed in trucks and buses, to be driven to train stations, was interspersed with breathless broadcasts from reporters at roadblocks talking over video of cars being checked and the occasional attempt to speed away stopped by hails of bullets. This was as close to live battle coverage as had been recorded within the country’s borders since the riots following the assassination of Martin Luther King.
The remainder of most broadcasts showed Army troops setting up barricades around the city, hoping to keep nuclear terrorists out rather than trying to keep people in. Pairs of jet fighters were shown taking off for what was described as “combat air patrols” over the city.
This time, President Quaid remained in the background. The government’s actions spoke for themselves. No speeches were necessary.
The four people huddling in the house in Portland were despondent. They sat in the living room, Abram punching at the TV to switch from one news report to another, searching for some word of the carefully written demand letter and the reasons for the government’s actions in St. Louis.
Finally, he threw the remote across the room and turned to face the others.
“So much for demands,” he said. “I’ve said it before. I’ll say it one more time. Use it or lose it. I’m not ready to lose it. God gave us this thing for a reason. The time has come.”
Before anybody could respond, they heard a pounding at the front door and a muffled voice shouting “Let me in, let me in.”
Sarah screamed. Reuben rose to her feet slowly and stared toward the front door, ready to meet whatever was on the other side and accept whatever punishment was coming to her.
Only Shapiro reacted quickly. He walked to the door, checked to make sure it was locked, then stepped to the side to look through a window to see who was outside. He ran back to the door and threw it open.
A hysterical Judy Katz ran in. She was babbling.
“I’ve never driven so fast in my life but I was afraid the police would stop me and that couldn’t happen because you have to see this you just have to see it,” the words shot from her mouth as if there were no spaces between them.
Shapiro put his hands on both her shoulders and shook her.
“Judy, stop it,” he said. “What happened, tell us what happened.”
She looked at Shapiro, motionless in front of her in the hallway of the Goldberg-Goldhersh house in Portland, at Sarah and Abram standing with Abram’s huge arms enveloping his wife, and at Debra Reuben, frozen like Lot’s wife, just before she was turned into a pillar of salt, uncertain whether to be disappointed that it was not the FBI at the door, coming to take her away and finally punish her.
Katz was comforted by seeing these familiar faces and by knowing she’d arrived at her destination and could deliver her message. She walked into the living room and dropped the black nylon carrying case for her laptop on the coffee table.
“You have to see this,” she said, calming quickly. “Somebody, somebody at the camp must have put it in my computer. Here, look. Its horrible.”
She removed the computer from the case as she spoke, lifted the screen and pressed the power button. The machine ran through its familiar startup routine as the people in the room stared silently at the screen.
“I went to the camp,” she said. “I didn’t see much, but I went. When I got home I was so angry. I took a shower, searched the fridge, then sat down at the table to check email.”
She smiled, then shrugged.
“Old habit, I guess.
“When I turned on the computer, there was an icon on the screen that said “Untitled CD.” I hadn’t put any CD in the computer. I hardly use that drive. So I clicked on it and, and, this happened.”
She slid her forefinger around the mousepad below the laptop’s keyboard and moved the arrow over the CD icon. She tapped the pad twice. A window appeared saying Microsoft Media Viewer, then a video began to play.
It was shot from above, looking down onto a desk. A young woman was lying on the desk, wrapped like a mummy in grey tape. An older woman in a white coat stood at the young woman’s head. Three men, two in uniform, stood around the desk.
Katz pointed at the third man, wearing jeans, who stood at the young woman’s feet.
“I saw him at the camp,” she said. “He took my computer. I wasn’t allowed to carry it there. I think he put the disk in it.”
She glanced at the screen, then turned away.
“I’ve seen it twice,” she said. “I can’t look again.
The sound was fuzzy, but the words could be made out.
The four other people in the room stared at the fifteen-inch screen in fascinated horror. It ended with the young woman being carried from the room. The man in civilian clothes was left alone in the room. The last scene in the video showed him glance up at the camera, then walk quickly from the room.
Katz softly closed the lid on the laptop computer.
“Mengele,” Abram whispered, as if speaking to himself. “Mengele.”
No one else spoke, was able to speak.
Katz’s face was stark white, her eyes wide, darting to her computer. “You, you don’t think this doctor is doing experiments, do you?” she stuttered.
“No, not experiments, interrogation,” Shapiro said coldly.
Abram pounded his hand against the wall to get their attention.
“Enough. How much more do we have to see?” The video and the death of the young Israeli woman touched him deeply. He’d known many strong young women like her, living in West Bank settlements. Goldhersh considered himself a man of action. When he saw injustice, he wanted to shove his way in and make it stop. Watching the young woman’s death made Abram ache to strike back, not just for Tel Aviv, not just for the ships in Boston Harbor, not even for the Jews of St. Louis, but for the young woman.
Debra Reuben remained seated on the end of the sofa. Abram stood over her.
“Did you hear the question that woman, that Mengele asked?” Abram’s voice was strained, his throat tight. “She asked about the bomb,” he said. “The bomb that God gave us. They’ll do anything until they find it. I tell you, use it or lose it.”
“God didn’t give you that bomb,” Reuben retorted. “I did. I got that thing out of the desert. I found a boat to take it to Spain. Chaim and I brought it here. Chaim gave his life to bring that thing here. It was Chaim, not God, who brought that bomb to this country.”
“God directed him,” Abram said calmly. “It was God’s will that it come here. How could it have happened if it were not God’s will?”
Abram looked at the others.
“The Arabs used their bomb. It worked. They won. Now we use our bomb. It will work. Quaid will have to give in. He doesn’t know how many we have. Simple.”
“Enough talk,” Shapiro interrupted. “We have to make a decision. I’ve thought about this long and hard. I’ve come to my peace. Here’s what I think.
“America should be ashamed of itself,” Shapiro began. “This was a great country. But it is not great any more, not today, not with what is happening here, in fact, not for a long while now.
“America once held itself out an example to the world. Now what are we an example of? We’ve lost our way. Just like the Roman Empire, just like the British Empire, just like every great power in history, America’s time has passed.
“There is a right course for America to take and a wrong course. Standing by and watching Israel die is wrong. Standing up to intimidation, saving people herded into concentration camps, reestablishing the State of Israel as a Jewish homeland, those are the right things to do. I’m ready to send a message to America that its time has passed.
“I’m with Abram. We use it or we lose it.”
He stopped. Some time during that speech, he’d risen to his feet, an old habit of a trial lawyer who never addressed a judge and certainly never addressed the jury while seated.
Shapiro sat.
“Debra,” he said. “You brought us this thing. What do you think?”
“For me the decision is much simpler,” she said. “It isn’t even my decision. No, the decision was made years ago, across the ocean.
“If Israel is attacked, if all is lost, use the bomb. History moves on. Jewish history covers 6,000 years. What is that compared to America’s two hundred years? Our time will come again. There will be another Israel as a home for Jews. Some day. When that day comes, that Israel will have enemies. That Israel will survive only if its enemies are absolutely certain that Israel will not hesitate to strike back if it is struck first.
“I already had to make this decision once. Damascus. It’s the same decision. Why should it be more difficult to kill innocent Americans than it was to kill innocent Syrians? They’re all human beings.”
“And they’re all innocent,” Sarah interjected.
“They’re all innocent, I agree,” Reuben said. “I say we use the bomb. Harry Truman dropped two bombs. You don’t burn longer in hell for a second bomb, do you?”
“We gave them a choice,” Sarah Goldberg said, almost to herself. “They could have released the people, they could have done that. What would be the harm from setting innocent people free? I don’t understand them. I hate it. I absolutely hate it, but I understand why we have no choice. I agree.”
She turned to her husband. “We all know what your position is, Abram.”
“Use it or lose it,” he intoned, as if it were his mantra. “And teach that Quaid a lesson.”
Judy Katz opened her mouth to speak but no words could come out. She leaped to her feet and ran from the room, her feet pounding on the stairs up to her room.
“I’ll talk with her,” Reuben said. She followed Katz up the stairs.
Abram looked at the stairs then back to the others.
“Let’s make plans,” he said.