Selected Detective
YUNIS ABU JISH'S

YUNIS ABU JISH woke up Before sunrise, after several hours of unwell sleep. After cleaning himself on the taps outside their home made of temporary cinder blocks, he returned to his home and began performing dawn prayers, trying to suppress his voice so as not to wake up his four brothers who shared a room with him.

It had been three days after he had received a phone call from Al-Mulatham, and during that time those close to him had noticed a dramatic change in the young man. His already thin face was dry and concave, appearing to shrink away into a skull-like state, as if being sucked inwards from behind. While her heavy eyelids were getting darker, it assumed a color-changing and unfathomable darkness, like water stained with the ground. His horn action had also changed to an unknown extent. Previously he was a talkative, gregarious and open person, but now withdraws, avoids the company of others, spends much of his time alone, drifting in worship and contemplating on his own.

“What's wrong with you, Yunis?” her mother had begged her for more than one occasion, aware of the sudden change in the appearance and actions of her son. “You sick? Need we call a doctor?” He was eager to explain, sharing a little of the burden he was bearing. However, he was forbidden to discuss the matter, and so he simply assured his mother, and anyone who asked, that he was fine, that he was fine, that they have a lot of thoughts but they don't need to worry. In time they will understand.

Yunis finished her prayer, repeated the last rakaat and shahadah, then stood up for a moment, looking at her six-year-old brother Muhammad, sound asleep in his bed on the floor. His breathing was soft and resigned, his thin arms stretched out by his side as if he was reaching for something. Not for the first time in recent days has he been struck by a sharp blow of intense horror at what he was asked to do, against the fact that it will keep him forever from his loved ones. It lasted only a few seconds, and immediately gave him the way to a position that it was because he loved and loved those people that he accepted the offer he was now going to live.

Yunis leaned over and stroked the little boy's hair, whispering to him how much he loved him, how much he felt sorry for all the distress or pain caused by him. Then, he stood up straight and picked up the Quran from the shelf next to his bed, going out of the house in the cold, gray dawn air to continue his preparations.

***

THE ARREST OF LAYLA AL-MADANI

It was over eleven in the morning when Layla finally returned to her flat in East Jerusalem. A hot morning is not usually in a year with a cloudy sky and a heavy atmosphere that makes drowsiness wrap the city like a thin fog attached. He threw his cell phone and backpack onto the sofa, listening to some messages in his usual insulting answering machine, death threats and a demand for the last coffee then took off his shirt and went into the bathroom to clean himself up.

What am I doing now? he thought, while the water splashed his head and face.Where should I go after this? Whatever Hoth had found in Castelombres and in spite of the doubt the old French woman with her mushroom basket was, Layla feels certain that Hoth has found something that seems to have disappeared again during the chaos at the end of World War II. If there were any records he had left regarding his origin, it would have been unpublished. And even if there is, according to Jean-michel Dupont, there are still thousands of pages of files and documents about the Nazis that have not been carefully studied tens of thousands so it will take months or even years to dig up the information that is being sought. If only that information really existed, which is not necessarily certain.

Again, both options seem pointless. Mr. Sergius has insisted that there is no evidence of what De Relincourt has found, while trying to find a Palestinian child would be like looking for a needle in a haystack.

In the hay field. This country is full of fucking things.

In whatever way he looked at the case, he seemed to be facing a dead end. With ****** sad Layla turned off the hot water tap and turned the cold one to the maximum, letting the icy water wash her head and chest. As he was doing that, something flashed across the edge of his mind, a shortcut, a memory, something that was in some way relevant to the problem he was facing, like a shooting star that disappeared as soon as it appeared, leaving him with a feeling of frustration at having lost something important, a momentary beam of light. He turned off the water faucet and closed his eyes, trying to follow his way of thinking back: the Palestinian boy, Mr. Sergius, the church, the stone floor. The floor, yes it is. The stone floor inside the church.Why is it so important? What is he remembering?

“Yalla,” he murmured to himself. “Come. What the hell am I thinking? What the hell? What?”

For a moment his mind remained empty. Then, very slowly, he heard a voice. Crack. Strange-sounding throats, like something knocking on a rock. Clack, clack, clack. What is that sound? A hammer? A chisel? He could not recognize her. He opened his eyes, closed them again, forced himself to remember this, then turned his mind back, as if trying to peek at the voice from behind, catching it before he escaped. Succeeds. Sure oes. It was the sound of the stick, which the old Jewish man had as Mr. Sergius had said. Every day he comes here, routine like working hours.

Believing that De Relincourt had found the Ten Commandments, or the Ark of the Covenant, or the sword of King David I had forgotten which. Some sort of ancient Jewish thing.

At that moment he lightly forgot the man because a group of beguiled freaks seemed to surround the fairy tale of De Relincourt like a laron around a candle flame. Chances are, is that this is what he is. After what he discovered about the Secret of Castelombres, and in particular how he seems to be related to the story of Judaism and Judaism, the, part of him couldn't bear to ask if maybe the man knew something that could help him? It's like trying hard to find something that doesn't exist. With the state that each question seems to be getting weaker and weaker, then willpower is what is left of it.