She misses music; she has been away from her flute for so long. Yesterday, before buckling her suitcase, she contemplated whether to pack it, but it was inconceivable that she would find it in herself to play music. Yet at this moment, so far from home, she knows she’ll attend the concert.

On a map of central Paris, the clerk marks the location of the hotel and points to the icon showing the cathedral of Notre-Dame, several blocks away.

She has four hours before she meets the commander. Sharon walks around the district, taking photos with her camera. There is so much to see in the narrow cobblestoned alleys, where some old walls are kept from collapsing by cables and screws; in the magnificently ornate larger buildings in the wider streets; in the colorful boutiques and street markets. She stops at Place Saint-Michel, awed by its breathtaking marble fountain. But what’s most striking to her are the hundreds of people her age who lounge about on the ground, seemingly carefree. Their attitude is such a contrast to that of Israelis, who are forever steeped in existential worries. Just this past May, the news on TV was filled with images of the French students’ uprising and the violent clashes between them and the police. This plaza was the epicenter of the riotous protests that swelled when the labor unions all over the country joined the students with an all-out strike.

Sharon had felt so remote from the issues at the core of the events. Rebelling against the establishment? She and her generation in Israel had just won the greatest military victory in Western history—they were the establishment. Protesting against consumerism? Not a concern when 70 percent of every Israeli’s income was taxed for the nation’s defense. Enraged by capitalism? Israel was proud of the socialist policies that helped absorb millions of landless Jewish newcomers. Now Sharon watches the much calmer crowd; some sing along with a guitarist, others float in the serenity of hashish she can smell, still others engage in heated debates.

In Intelligence, she learned to be a “listener,” to eavesdrop on conversations in Arabic. Now her training kicks in and she inches closer to a vociferous group and catches a discussion in French about Wilhelm Reich’s book The Function of the Orgasm. With the advent of the pill, one young woman says, it’s time to acknowledge that understanding the intricacies of sex doesn’t come naturally. “An orgasm is politics,” the woman says. “It frees us from the male institutional domination.” Sharon smiles to herself and moves away. She and Alon had never heard of an orgasm and didn’t know where to look for it once it was mentioned. It had taken a book to show them the way. She’s never thought of it as anything but a private matter.

Just then, a young woman with straight blond hair who’s wearing a gauzy white dress floats over, tucks a daisy in Sharon’s headband, and raises two fingers in a peace sign. Sharon thanks her, then locks eyes with a girl nearby, another member of the small universe of girls with daisies in their hair.

*  *  *

The dome of the Notre-Dame cathedral rises above Sharon with its magnificent chiseled stone vaults and stained-glass windows. As people around her settle into their seats, she gazes at the architecture. She catches Danny glancing at her, smiling at her tilted head, and she smiles back to thank him for introducing her to the genius of the architect of eight hundred years ago who knew how to ignite awe in the hearts of believers.

Just then, the string section of the fifty-piece orchestra breaks into a swirling storm. The piano sends up waves of sound, ascending and descending scales, that are answered by the horns’ valiant chords. Sharon closes her eyes as the swell of pure notes fills both the cathedral and her body.

Night has long fallen when she and the commander walk along the Seine, its ebony water sparkling with millions of pinprick lights. The arpeggio of the “Revolutionary” Étude by Chopin is still in Sharon’s head, and looking at the water, she hears the graceful gurgling streams. She regrets having left her flute at home. Home and its sorrow are eons away. Savta was right when she urged her to travel.

Sharon and the commander descend a flight of steps to the quay and sit down on a bench.

“I wish you could spend longer in Paris this first time,” he says, “but there will be other opportunities.”

“Commander—” she begins.

“Danny. We’ll be working closely together—and you’re a civilian.”

“Danny, you know that I will stay only until the Dakar is found.” This also means that she must get to her agenda very soon. She must tread with caution, though, not press him.

“In the short term, we’ll be facing a few crises,” he replies.

“Since there’s an arms embargo, why does the Saars project continue? Won’t we lose the remaining seven boats the same way we lost the fifty Mirages? France didn’t return the money either, which is outright thievery.”

“You know the joke about the Jewish man who was sentenced to death, but pleaded with the king?” Danny replies.

“Which one is that?”

“‘If you give me a year,’ the Jew said, ‘I’ll teach your dog to sing.’ The king was puzzled but agreed to postpone the execution. When the Jew returned home, his wife asked, ‘How can you make such a deal? You can’t teach a dog to sing!’ The man replied, ‘A lot can happen in one year. I may die, the king may die, or the dog may learn to sing.’”

Sharon laughs. “Meaning?”

“New winds may blow. De Gaulle didn’t stay in power his full term. Now Pompidou is distracted by troubles in North Africa. Other problems might pop up. Or his fit of temper against us might subside. Who knows? In the meantime, the ban is not on building our boats, only on delivering them, and even that is unclear, according to some people in his administration. They see this breach of a contract that was signed in good faith by their government as bad for France’s reliability as an exporter of armaments.”

A barge passes by, its cargo covered with burlap, followed by a tourist boat bursting with lights and music. The people on the deck raise champagne glasses at them: “Salut! Salut!”

“Here’s your first real assignment,” Danny says when the jovial sounds roll away. “Tomorrow you’ll catch the ten-ten train from Gare Saint-Lazare to Cherbourg. Arrive at the station forty-five minutes early and look for two Israelis, Oded and Gideon. They don’t speak French, so when you find them, you’ll buy the tickets. Once you’re all on the train, there are a few rules for now and for all future trips: Don’t all sit together, though you can sit with one of them, as if you’re a couple. And don’t read anything in Hebrew or speak it until you reach Cherbourg.”

“How will I recognize these guys?”

“Are you asking how you’ll be able to recognize two bewildered kibbutzniks?”

She laughs. They’ll be wearing the standard-issue biblical sandals of double leather strips and the simple clothes that are sewn and distributed by one clothing cooperative, Atta. Kibbutz members are recognizable in Tel Aviv, let alone in Paris. Not Danny, though. This kibbutznik, again in civilian clothes, dresses impeccably.

“Where will you be?” she asks.

“I have an early meeting with Moka Limon.”

Of course. Everyone knows the retired admiral, now in Paris as a civilian diplomat. Eighteen years earlier, he had been chief of the Israeli navy, then composed of no more than walnut-shell-like former immigrants’ boats.

Sharon is about to ask why Limon is still in Paris when he can no longer procure arms, but then she figures it out: the legendary high-society literary salon his elegant wife has established in Paris. Both are close to the Rothschild family and their vast European connections. No one is better qualified or better positioned to command a spy ring than Limon.

How would Danny or the Cherbourg operation be involved in that?

“Is any of this illegal?” she asks.

“Picking up an electrician and a mechanic at a train station, buying tickets, and riding up to Cherbourg?”

She puffs hair away from her face. “You know what I mean. Anything in this Cherbourg project.”

“The difference between legal and illegal sometimes can come down to a comma in a sentence.” He smiles. “What do you call that comma?”

“What?”

“Chutzpah.”

She likes the idea of chutzpah, although Alon said she had none of that audacious attitude. “What happens when my train arrives in Cherbourg?” Sharon asks. “Where do we go?”

“Cherbourg is the last stop. Someone will fetch you.”

The last stop. One more step toward the unknown.

They walk in silence to the hotel, each deep in thought. Sharon has never sought adventure. She craved the opposite—no drama. She just wanted to belong. Her life path had been dictated by circumstances beyond her control, underpinned by her orphanhood. Her hunger for normalcy could never be fully satiated. Her six aunts and uncles included her in their families’ activities. There she watched enviously as mothers taught their daughters how to jump rope and fathers showed their sons how to climb trees. All she had was the devotion of old grandparents, and she felt guilty for wanting more. When Sharon and Alon got together, when she was thirteen, his love anchored her into his family. She developed an easy banter with his mother, who often gave her small gifts, including the satchel now slung over Sharon’s shoulder.

All this was over. For a split second, Sharon wishes that Danny would take her hand just so she could feel a human touch. She brushes away the absurd need. It’s time to grow up. Sharon had never considered living away from Alon, and to be near him, she forfeited her dream of studying architecture. It would have required her to attend the Technion in Haifa while he studied botany in the Hebrew University in Jerusalem.

Now she’s not only on her own in a foreign country, but tomorrow she will be responsible for two bewildered men.

She wakes up at six a.m. to inquire with the hotel clerk about the Métro subway. Though she is hours away from taking it, she descends the stairs at the nearest station. To her relief, she discovers a large wall map, and when she presses a button for her destination, Gare Saint-Lazare, the route lights up with miniature bulbs. Each of the two lines she should take is marked by a different color. Satisfied with her preparation, Sharon buys herself a French fashion magazine; she’ll bury her nervousness in a light feast of makeup and clothes while improving her language skills.

What she didn’t anticipate, she realizes a couple of hours later at the Gare Saint-Lazare, is how gigantic the station is, and how crowded. Where are her men?

Dragging her suitcase, she wanders for thirty minutes, checking the huge hall under the ornate canopy and then the many exits to the train platforms. Panic rises when she climbs the stairs to a second floor that seems to be a holding area for more waiting passengers. No sign of the two kibbutzniks. The huge clock tolls the half hour when she makes her way down again through people, porters, and luggage carts.

Someone taps her shoulder, and she turns. An old kerchiefed woman is holding a baby swaddled in a blanket, and Sharon is surprised when the woman asks for directions. Sharon is mumbling an apology that she’s only a visitor when she feels the tug of a hand slithering into her satchel.

In a trained hard chop, she brings down the side of her palm on the arm. The woman yelps and retreats, leaving Sharon stunned with the rush of adrenaline.