Hardly anyone owned a car in Israel. Only the very rich could afford one. Even during the day, privately owned cars were a distinct minority of the vehicles in Tel Aviv. Most of the traffic consisted of trucks and buses and government-issued cars, such as police cruisers and army vehicles. Horse-drawn wagons were not an uncommon sight. At this time of night, traffic was almost nonexistent.
I drew a long breath. The heat of the day had broken and a nice breeze was blowing from the south, freshening the air. I began walking north toward my apartment and was in the process of extracting a cigarette from its pack when I caught a fast movement from the corner of my eye. A large shadow had detached itself from the darkness pooling in a recessed doorway and was hurtling across the two meters that separated it from me. It swallowed the distance in one quick bite. In the split second before it was upon me, my mind registered that it was a man, very tall and broad, and that one of his huge hands was bunched into a fist that was flying at my head. I didn't have time to duck or sidestep or bring up my hands to block his blow. All I managed to do was turn my head a little, so that instead of on the mouth, his blow caught me behind the ear.
It was like being hit with a hammer. A supernova of hot white pain burst in my head, and all sense of solidity drained from my body. My knees gave way and I crashed sideways against a lamppost. Then I melted to the pavement.
And then everything went dark.
I must have been out for no more than a couple of seconds, because when I came to, I was still lying on that same strip of sidewalk on Allenby Street, and my assailant was standing over me. He grunted something I couldn't make out and leaned down. One of his hands curled itself into my hair, pulling hard, making my scalp scream. His other hand grabbed a fistful of my shirt. The son of a bitch was as strong as an elephant. He easily dragged me along the sidewalk, into the recessed doorway where he had waited to ambush me.
He hurled me against the door. My head banged painfully against the wood, making me feel like my brain was being rattled inside my skull. The side of my head throbbed where he had hit me, and my ribs hurt where I had banged them against the lamppost. I thought about crying for help, but worried that Greta would hear and come out to investigate. What could she do against this man? He would crush her like a bug.
I could hear him breathing fast and heavy above me. Then, through eyes that were sending me blurry, unfocused images, I caught him shifting his weight and saw his foot rushing toward me. I could do nothing to defend myself. My arms were limp and useless. I couldn't even brace myself for the kick before his foot drilled itself into my stomach. I let out a choked grunt and folded in half, retching violently. Bile rose to the base of my throat, clawing to get out. Breathless and in agony, an incongruous, panicked thought shrieked in my mind.
"You been filling my wife's head with poison, you little shit. Telling her all sorts of lies about me and Esther Kantor." He had a rough voice, hard and merciless. I could make out his outline. Elena was right, Alon Davidson was not a man you were likely to mistake for another. Massive, both in height and width—though exactly how tall I could not determine from where I lay. He shifted his feet, the soles of his shoes scuffing against the pavement. Then he kicked me again, in the lower stomach, right where one of the bullets I'd taken in the war had left a scar. All the air went out of my body. I couldn't draw breath and my vision turned dark.
He said, "I'm going to make you hurt." Then came a click and the smell of sea salt and fish close to my nostrils, followed by the awareness that he had crouched down beside me. He grabbed my hair again, pulling my head up, and if my eyes were open, they weren't sending my brain any signals, because all I saw was black. I knew that pain was coming, bad pain, like the time a sadistic prison guard in Auschwitz had whipped me a few dozen times and I thought I would die from agony.
I tried bracing myself for the pain, for that was the only thing you could do when you were helpless and about to be hurt. You could suffer through it with as much dignity as you could muster so that later, if there was a later, you could stare at yourself in the mirror and not drown in shame and self-loathing.
