She presses the play button again and almost misses the robotic time stamp announcing a message from six o’clock in the morning, after she left.
“Hi, Sharon.” Danny’s voice fills the room. “Sorry I couldn’t talk last night. I’m heading out for a rough day. I know what you want to discuss, and I apologize that I can’t allow us to express our feelings yet.” As he pauses, wonder mixed with heat spreads through Sharon. He goes on, “Let’s just get through this tough time together, each doing our part. Okay?”
“Danny,” she whispers, letting herself waken to feelings she’s tried to suppress for so long. Pictures of him flit through her head—the twinkle in his green eyes when he likes her witty comments; his water-dripping body emerging from the sea; his warm voice when he commands, so self-assured that it conveys authority without harshness. That voice has now revealed what she never dared believe. A year and a half ago, she was awkward and inexperienced, scared of venturing out of the familiar. He saw who she was beneath the crust of her youth.
“Yes,” she whispers, her hand over her heart. “Oh, yes.” A window opens wide into a sunny day on the beach. This time it is she who runs into his arms, and they fall into the water with a splash, their bodies intertwined.
The fantasy is halted by the thought of what she’s churned up—and the consequences to him. She must force herself to unknow what is already lodged in her brain.
Rain pelts the metal shutters; it sounds as if clubs were hitting them. Anxiety about Danny and his men at sea gnaws at Sharon. The Saar was designed for the mild Mediterranean, not this ferocious Atlantic Ocean storm. She has seen the sky-high waves hitting the giant boulders enclosing the harbor. What hubris makes men challenge the English Channel time and again?
No more indulging in her emotions. She’s exhausted. It’s only two o’clock in the afternoon. Sharon sips her tea, stretches out on the couch, and pulls the duvet over her head.
The phone rings. Cobwebs of sleep make her want to refuse the call from Châtillon-sur-Indre, but she hears Evelyne say, “Joyeux Noël.”
“To you and your family too.”
“Have you found out anything more about Daniel’s family?”
“Well . . .” Sharon drags out the word. She’s supposed to unknow what she can’t get out of her mind. And Evelyne Niquet is not yet aware that Danny is actually in France; explaining why he is unavailable would be a breach of security. “His birth mother may be alive,” Sharon blurts out.
“That would be incredible. The best Christmas gift!” Evelyne says. “Can you imagine how she would feel if she found him?”
Groggy and still plagued by the dilemma, Sharon describes her visit to Valençay.
“Someone in the markets must know where she and that blind friend live,” Evelyne says.
Sharon winces. Right now, all she wants to do is sleep. Her guard is down. Hadn’t she decided to stop this investigation? “Let’s talk after Noël.”
They hang up, and Sharon drops into deep slumber.
She swims up from the bottom of an ocean to a soft touch on her shoulder and Rachelle’s voice telling her that the Norwegians are in town.
Her ersatz Norwegians from a year ago? How would Rachelle know about them? Their visit was never with the Israeli mission. Their official business was with the French government and Félix Amiot. Sharon sits up, unsure if she heard the words or dreamed them. “What are you saying?” She rubs her eyes.
“We got the scoop at the newspaper.”
“Weren’t you at your parents’?”
“I was called in.” Rachelle takes a deep breath. “The five boats have been sold to a Norwegian company called Starboat. Contracts are being signed right now.”
Starboat. Sharon swallows. “Who’s signing?”
“The French acquisition minister has approved the buyers, an oil-exploration outfit. He’s been pressuring Moka Limon for weeks to relinquish Israel’s rights to the boats, but Limon wouldn’t relent—until now. He finally agreed.” Rachelle’s face falls. “I’m so sorry. I know how much they meant for Israel. Also for my own future there, where I will raise my family.”
“It’s happening now?” Sharon can hardly breathe at the realization that the complex ruse is playing out. People believe it. The fictional sale, which started when she outfitted the “Norwegians” in Paris, is reaching a climax.
“They’re in Hotel Sofitel,” Rachelle says, “signing the contract before Amiot leaves for Christmas in the South of France.”
“I need a moment.” Sharon goes into the lavatory, where she can think. The next step of Operation Noa is about to launch.
Thirty minutes later, she’s in Kadmon’s office. “I know you can’t tell me anything, but I’m part of the team, not merely an outside civilian.”
“Let’s just say that the Israeli government has made a magnanimous gesture toward the French to relieve them of the embarrassment they’ve created for themselves.” Kadmon’s handlebar mustache twitches, and his tone turns sarcastic. “What’s most interesting is that, rather than sailing the boats away themselves, the Norwegian buyers insist that trained Israeli crews deliver them in a month or so.”
“Our guys can’t remain trapped in the boats for another month,” she says.
Kadmon lays his hand on a pile of documents. “First thing, since it’s only a matter of clearing customs, let’s make sure that every single paper is in order.” He pushes a typed list toward her. “Second, we must plan for three thousand meals.”
“Three thousand?” She raises both palms in a gesture of astonishment while her brain calculates what he means: They must feed one hundred and ten men three meals a day for nine days. Not a month from now, but in a couple of days. The schedule of nine days at sea barely allows for delays caused by refueling, an incapacitated boat, or having to ride out a storm in a safe harbor.
“Meat too,” he says. “The men are screaming about their imposed kosher.”
“You’ll need more than one cow.” She runs through all the butchers she knows. Even a hundred steaks will make only one nonkosher feast.
“Salami would be great,” Kadmon goes on. “Christmas is in four days. I’ve rented two more vans and have French-speaking reservists to drive them. You’ll instruct the guys on where to shop. Since it’s holiday time, an overflowing cart in a supermarket won’t be that unusual.”
Sharon digests all she knows. More than one hundred men are here at the ready. The majority must have arrived while she was driving around the countryside. “How come I didn’t pick up new recruits?”
“Each group was led by one of the guys you guided here.” He smiles. “And we made sure they had cover stories—and no identical jackets.”
Outside the window, night has fallen. The rain has stopped. Since it’s Sunday, there are no cars in the parking lot. The night watchman starts his first round.
“Has Golda given her approval for a breakout?” Sharon asks.
Kadmon looks at her for a long minute, his face a mask, and says nothing.
She takes a deep breath. During her time in Intelligence, she witnessed schemes planned down to the last detail, some at great cost, despite the possibility that they might be aborted. None was of the scale of Operation Noa. Now, all these months of preparations, thousands of hours of work, a vast outlay of money, and all the men arriving and hiding here might go to waste. She can’t imagine the staggering price tag of what might come to naught.
