Selected Detective
INVESTIGATION I IN THE OLD TOWN

“What have we done to them so that they should come here and tell us how to run this country? Are we not even allowed to defend ourselves now? meshugina's! All them! meshugina!” This old man voiced his Ahronot Yediot with anger, his thin-lipped and sagging mouth snorting with great fury, like a snail that had been sprinkled with salt.

Ben-Roi sipped his beer and observed the object of the man's anger a front-page story about a group of European peace activists who came to Israel to protest the three-hundred-kilometer-long security wall between Israel and the West Bank that the government is building.The photo that accompanies the story is of a British comedian Ben-Roi who has never heard of having ties to a Palestinian group in front of the IDf bulldozer, under the title CELEBRITIES DENOUNCE CROSS “APARTEID”.

“Nazi!” shouted the old man while squeezing the newspaper, as if trying to strangle him. “they called us like this. See these? My brothers died in Buchenwald and they called me a Nazi! They should be ashamed! them, dirty goyim shameless!” He threw the newspaper aside and sat back in his chair. For a moment Ben-Roi thought he was going to say something, telling the man how he also hated these foreign benefactors, the way they came here to call and blame before was flushed back to their safe home in their safe country, congratulating themselves for being such a great caring human being while behind them women and children are slaughtered into trash by poor and colonized, damned Palestinians.

However, he said nothing, worried that if he started to talk about the subject it would incite anger, put him in a blinding darkness so that before he knew what was happening he would scream and get angry and then smash his fist into the table, humiliating himself.

No, he thought, he better keep it to himself. More secure. He held the menorah hanging from his neck, twirled it as if trying and pushing something back inside him, then, remembering the beer, he stood up, he stood up, tucking 20 shekels worth of money into the table and making his way to the street to see what he can dig out about the murdered woman for the fucking Egyptian cop.

JOROK AND LESS EXCLUSIVE THAN other surrounding blocks, Ohr Ha-Chaim is a dim and confined road right at the top end of the Jewish Quarter, near the Armenian sector, and is a, with the floor of the flat court shining by the ceaseless sweep of the feet through the street, and the high-walled housing that besieged from any side was like solid walls.

Number forty-six is about half the way, the building with a hard rock whose top is divided into several empty laundry rooms lanes droop on the parabola of the many windows whose basement floors are inhabited by a yeshiva crammed with its own entrance be separated. As soon as he arrives, Ben-Roi sees a crumpled sheet of note paper containing his notes about the details provided by the Egyptian the previous afternoon, which was, then go up to the main door and squeeze the intercom flat four.

He could have been here earlier but it didn't happen as if he had so much to do in the last twenty-four hours but he didn't like the tone of the Egyptian's voice and not feel like helping him. In fact he thought of letting this matter go any longer, especially after last night when, despite the fact that Ben-Roi had specifically told him that he did not want it, he said, the little needle had sent a facsimile of all the records of the case, which in the process was jamming his fax machine which had been squealing towards him like a little boy whining up to, in maddening despair, he finally pulled the cable from the socket and threw it.

No, he did not feel the furthest urge to help. However, he finally decided that he should also handle the case, before Khediva or any of his names called and harassed him constantly, as he almost certainly did. So he's here now.

He pushed the button again, looking down through the basement window into the rows of young haredi men who shouldered the Talmud, pe’s them swinging like the tail of a spanil dog, and, their faces were pale and sore-looking behind his glasses (Jerusalem, he had heard of, had the highest concentration of ophthalmologists in any city in the world). A raucous voice rang out from his mouth “penguin” the term Gaul used to refer to them and looked up again, he pressed the button for the third time, and the latter finally produced a response.

“Shalom?” A young woman looked out of the window above. Her fat face was framed by the traditional onal sheitel wigs worn by orthodox Jewish wives. Ben-Roi explains who he is and what he's there for.

“We just moved here,” said the woman. “And the person who occupies before us is only here for a few years only.”

“Before them?” The woman shrugged her shoulders, turning her back to shout something to someone who was behind her.

“You want to talk to Mrs Weinberg,” she said while looking down again. “In apartment number two. He has lived here for thirty years. He knows anybody. What too

just.” From her tone it seemed clear that she thought Mrs Weinberg was a person who liked to interfere in other people's affairs.

Ben-Roi thanks him and, while focusing his eyesight on the intercom panel, presses the flat number two button. He had just pulled his hand when the front door opened and showed a petite, wrinkled old woman slightly taller than a child, wearing a simple house dress and cheap slippers. His hands were moving because of rheumatism.

“Mrs Weinberg?” Ben-Roi issued his identity.

“My name is Inspector Ben-Roi from.” He let out a somewhat raucous voice, his hands raised to the chest. “oh Lord! What the hell's going on? This must be about Samuel, yes ‘kan? Tell me what happened to him!” Ben-Roi assures her that nothing has happened to Samuel, whoever he is; he just wants to ask her a few questions. About a woman who once lived in the top flat. For a moment he doesn't seem to trust Ben-Roi. His chest was raised, his eyes were moist with tears of fear. Slowly he calms back down and, with a movement of his hand, lets Ben-Roi enter his apartment on the ground floor of the building, to the right side of the hall.

“Samuel is my grandson,” he explained as they walked.

“The nicest boys in the world.they arrested him in Gaza Lord, help us in his national duty. Every time I see the news, whenever the phone rings. He is just a snot boy, kids.they are all just children.”

The mother took him to a small, crowded and dim living room with a large wooden cabinet at the end of which one and two hand seats were laid out in front of a black-and-white television set, on top of it was a cage containing a small yellow bird. A lot of photos are on display everywhere, and the smell of something sweet and rather unpleasant is certainly what, Ben-Roi does not know.

Bird droppings, perhaps, or cooked fat. He tried not to be too dizzy, out of which direction in the flat he could hear the sound of the Israeli military radio.

The old woman throws Ben-Roi down on one of the armchairs and disappears briefly, turning off the radio before returning with a glass of orange juice he gave Ben-Roi. He did not ask for it but he accepted too, to courtesy and put it on a small table next to his chair. The mother then sat down on another chair, picked up a spaghetti-like thread of blue and white wool from the floor and began to knit. His needle was held in front of his face and his hand moved with astonishing skill to an already stooped and arthritic grandmother like her. It looks like he is making a yarmulke, part of his circle has been seen on the end of both strands of wool, and Ben-Roi is smiling faintly at himself, recalling the old family story of his grandmother, the mother of his father, which during the war of 1967 had knitted a red headgear for every man in his son's artillery company, over fifty, as a result of which the company earned the nickname Blazing Yarmulkes, the title of which was, as far as he knows, they remain in use to this day.

“So, what is the question?”

“hmm?”

“You said you wanted to ask me a few questions. About flat four.”

“Ya, of course.” He looked at the note sheet that remained in his hand, trying to focus his mind.

“What is this about Goldstein women? Because if I say it once, I say it a hundred times it's headed for a bad ending. He was here for three years, and when he went the whole block clapped. I remember once that time, Friday, for God's sake Shabbat.

“It's about someone named hannah Schlegel,” said Ben-Roin interjected.

The sound of the needle clicking slowed down and stopped.

“oh.”

“The lady above said earlier that maybe you know her.” He stared at the knit for a moment, then placed it on his lap and sat back down.

“terrible thing,” lamented. “horrible. Killed, you know. by Arabs. The pyramid's. Ruthlessly.terrible.” He put his two hands together....

“The quiet woman. keeps all about herself only to herself. Always say good morning. He has...” He released his hand and made a tapping motion on the inside of his left arm.

“You know. Auschwitz.” The little bird suddenly sang, then stood still and began pecking with its beak, its head moving up and down like a fishing boat floating on choppy water. Ben-Roi takes a sip of his orange juice.

“Egyptian police are re-investigating the case,” he explained.

“They want us to get a little personal details about Mrs Shlegel. Work, family, that kind of thing. The basic.” The old woman raised her pale, thin eyebrows, then worked on the knitting again. His needles worked more slowly than before, the wool circles of the yarmulke widened under his fingers like a strange algal flower.

“I don't know him well,” he said. “Unlike people who are friends.just say hello once in a while. He prefers to keep it to himself. Most of the time you hardly know for sure if he's there. Not like Miss Goldstein. You'll always know he's there. The storms you used to hear. oy vey!” He scrunched his face. Ben-Roi reaches into his pocket, tries to get a pen, and moments later realizes that he forgot to take it. There was a pen in the glass vase in the cupboard, but he didn't feel good asking for it, worried it would make him look unprofessional. Fuck it, he thought, I'd write a little note when I got to the police station.

“She was already here when we arrived,” said this old woman. “That was 1969. We came from Tel Aviv, me and Teddy.

August 1969. He's always wanted to stay here, I'm alone, not so sure. When I first saw this place, I thought klogiz mir! What can we do in a place like this?

Ruins everywhere by Arabs, half the existing buildings collapsed. Now, of course, I will never live anywhere else. There it is, there.” He pointed with his knitting needle at the photo on the middle shelf of the closet that a short and wacky man was wearing a trilby and tallit, standing in front of the Western Wall. “We were married for forty years. Not like children now. forty years old. How much I miss him!” He lifted his wrist and wiped his eyes. Ben-Roi looks down, stares at the floor, embarrassed.

“He's already here. When we came. Move right after liberation.” Ben-Roi shifts her seat on the chair.

“Before that?” This old woman shrugged her shoulders, returning to her knitting. “I remember he once said he was living with Mea Sharim, but I'm not so sure. He's from France.

Before war. You know, he used to use French words, talking to himself while going down the stairs.”

“And you said that he was at Auschwitz.”

“Yahh, that's what old Dr. Tauber said. You know, Dr. Tauber, from number sixteen.”

Ben-Roi doesn't know at all, but doesn't say anything.

“I saw his tattoo a few times so I knew he had been in that camp. He never said it directly.

Very personal. But then I spoke to Dr. Tauber a good man, who died about four or five years ago, may God accept his soul and he said ‘You know the woman who lives above your flat, she said, Mrs Schlegel,’ and I replied ’Ya,’ then she continued, “Take a try?” he is like that, know not, very good at telling stories, making it exciting ‘Try guessing,’ he said. ’We came together in the same boat. 1946 Years. From europe.’

The British government tried to get them back in the haifa, but they jumped into the sea and swam all the way to shore. More than a mile at night. Twenty years later, they ended up living on the same street! What a coincidence!’”

There were echoes of footsteps from the flat above, as if someone was running around. The old woman looked up, up to the ceiling.

“And this Dr Tauber who told you that he was at Auschwitz?”

“hmm?”

“Hannah Schlegel.”

For a moment he looked confused, then realized what he was talking about.

“oh... Yep, yeah. He said they were talking in the boat. I told you they came in the same boat, didn't I? Two weeks they were on that ship.

With six hundred men. Piled up like sardines. Can you imagine? save yourself from the camp and have to undergo such an experience. She is a beautiful woman, he said.

Very young and very beautiful. Robust. Strenuous. Her brother did not say a word on the trip, just sitting looking out at the open sea. Very traumatic.”

Ben-Roi can't remember that the Egyptian detective once mentioned a brother. He bit his lips for a while, then, putting aside his prestige, he stood up, walked towards the closet and picked up the pen from the vase, raised his eyebrows at Mrs Weinberg as if to say “By ’kan?” He is drifting into his own mind and does not even realize Ben-Roi has moved out of his chair.

“malang once,” he murmured. “Definitely not more than fifteen or sixteen years old. I've had such an experience. What kind of world is this, I ask you? What kind of world is this so that such a thing must happen to a child? On anyone?”

Ben-Roi walks towards his chair back and sits down, scribbling the pen in his palm for his ink to flow through.

“Is he still alive?” Ben-Roi asked. “His brother?”

“And what did you expect? split it like this, insert something, like animals only!”

Ben-Roi. His palm was covered with poor lines of pen running across.

“you mean?”

“Yahh, they're twin brothers, ‘kan? Didn't I tell you? I'm sure I've. Mrs Schlegel and her brother. And you know what they did to the twins in the camp. You must have heard of it.”

Ben-Roi's chest stiffened. He has heard:

how the Nazi doctors had used twins as guinea pigs, making them the most cruel and painful genetic experiments, cutting them, making them sterile, slicing them apart. Pedalling.

“oh Lord,” he tried to mutter.

“We should be surprised if the poor boy is a little...” Again he knocked on the side of his head. “No to the girl. He's so strong, stoic. That's what Dr. Tauber said. Thin as a matchstick, yet strong as iron.take care of her brother, watching him. Not letting him far away in the slightest from his sight.”

The old woman looked at Ben-Roi.

“You know what he said? When they were all on board. ‘I'll find them.’ That's what Dr. Tauber told me. She did not cry, did not complain. simply said, ‘If this thing should I experience for the rest of my life, I will find people who have done this to us. And if I find them, I'll kill him.’ For God's sake, sixteen year old. No child should feel that way. Isaac. That's his brother's name, Isaac Schlegel.”

He stopped knitting and, sighing, put the needle and wool on the edge, stood up and approached the birdcage, tapping his bars with his fingernails.

“Who is beautiful, then?” he said following the sound of birds. “Who is beautiful?”

Ben-Roi had stretched the pages of his notebook all the way to his thighs and was recording something on the spot

the empty is available.

“Do you know that his brother is still alive?” he asked, repeating the question he said a few minutes ago.

“I can't tell you,” he said, as he moved his fingers on the cage trellis, a gesture that made a rhythmic sound, tang-tang-tang. “I've never even met that man.”

“Did he stay with his sister?”

“oh no. The pain is too severe. Last I heard he was living in Kfar Shaul. That's what Dr. Tauber.” says

Kfar Shaul is a psychiatric clinic on the northwest edge of the city.

Ben-Roi writes down a note quickly for himself.

“Actually Mrs Schlegel used to visit her every day. But he never talked about his brother.

At least, not to me. I don't know if he's alive. None of us are getting younger, ‘kan?”

The little bird jumped in swinging at the corner of the cage, swaying itself back and forth. He whistled at her without a tone.

“And earlier you said they were from France!”

“Yahh, that's what he told me. It was our only chance to have a good conversation. In twenty years. Do you believe that? He came with his groceries at that time must have been Pesah time because he was carrying a bag full of boxes of matzah and we were just talking. Right in that hallway there.

I can't remember how we got to that conversation, but it's clear he said he was born in France. And there's something about the farm area and the castle collapsing. Or, am I imagining it? I really can't remember the details. I could still see the box, so clear as if it was here in front of me right now. Very funny ’kan?”

He whistled at the little bird again, and slipped one hand into his jacket pocket.

“Do they have other families you know?” ask Ben-Roi. “Suami, children, parents?”

“Never have I seen it.” He reached into his pocket, looking for something. “live only to himself, poor woman. No family, no friends. Totally alone. At least I have my Teddy, may God accept his soul.Four forty-four years we were together, and never once intersected. I often thought that he would be there.”

He stuck his neck to one side, looking into his pocket, hands still groaning.

“How about work?” ask Ben-Roi. “Do Mrs Schlegel have a job?”

“I think he did something at Yad Vashem. Archive storage, or something like that. He usually leaves early in the morning and comes home late in the afternoon with his hands full of papers and archives. The rest is only God knows. Once, he once left some files, in the hall, and I helped bring them. Something about Dachau, with a Yad Vashem stamp on it. Only God knows why he would bring something like that into his house after everything he did. Ah!”

He pulled his hand, a kind of seed or a small nut sandwiched between his thumb and index finger. He wiggled it in front of the cage as if to say, “See what I have!”

Then, grasping his wrist with his other hand to be steady and steady, he pushed the seed through the trellis. The little bird let out a joyous chirp and jumped from its swing.

Ben-Roi examines his notes, wondering inwardly if there is anything else he should find out. He noticed the name given by the Egyptian detective.

“What name Piet Jansen has a certain meaning for you?” tanyakanya.

The old woman thought for a moment.

“I know Renee Jansen,” said. “He lives on the next street but near us in Tel Aviv. has a replacement groin, and has a boy in the navy.”

“This is Piet Jansen.”

“O him, I don't know.” Ben-Roi nodded and glanced at his watch. He asked a few more questions Does Mrs Schlegel have any enemies she knows? Is there any unusual interest? Are there any other neighbors who know him well?” but the woman could no longer provide more information.

Finally, feeling that he has done as much as he could reasonably expect, Ben-Roi folds his notebooks, put the pen back on his vase in the closet and said that he would not bother him any further.

The woman advised her to spend her orange juice “If you don't drink you will be dehydrated.” drove her home through the flat and out to the building hall.

“You know, I can't even imagine where they buried her,” said the old woman as she opened the front door. “For twenty-one years we lived next door, I don't even know where his grave is. If you find out, will you tell me? I just wanted to say kiddush to her yahrzeit. Poor girl.”

Ben-Roi mutters something vague and, thanking him, then steps towards the path. After a few steps, he turned his back.

“One last thing. You don't know what happened to Mrs Schlegel's estate, ’kan?”

The old woman looked at him. His eyebrows slightly rose as if he was surprised by the question.

“Everything burned, of course.”

“Burned?”

“In fire. You must have heard about the fire.” Ben-Roi.

“On the day after his death. Or two days? Some Arab children climbed water pipes in the back, poured oil on anything and burned it. If old Stern didn't turn on the alarm, the whole block would burn out.” He shook his head. “Poor woman. He had managed to save himself from the camp, and then his life ended in such a way, being killed, his house being vandalized. What kind of world are we living in, I'm asking you. People are being killed, children are being sent to the military. What kind of world?”

He let out a long sigh and, while raising his parting hand, closed the door, leaving Ben-Roi standing on the road, his protruding brows furrowed, frowning deeply and uncertainly, like a dredge mark that scratches the rocky hillside.

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