Exodus - Leon Uris [230]
This morning their patience had run out and Ayala began to get the third degree.
“Your play, Freddie,” his partner said across the table.
Fred Caldwell looked at his cards quickly. “Forgive me,” he said, and played a bad card. His mind was on the inspector standing over Ayala and flailing her with a rubber hose. He heard it thud into the girl’s face time and again until her nose was broken and her eyes blacked and swollen almost shut and her lips puffed and distorted. But Ayala would not break.
Freddie considered that he didn’t give a damn if Ayala never broke: the thought of the smashing of her Jewish face delighted him.
An orderly walked up alongside the table.
“I beg your pardon, Major Caldwell. There is a telephone call for you, sir.”
“Excuse me, chaps,” Freddie said throwing his cards face down and walking off to the phone on the other side of the lounge. He picked up the receiver. “Caldwell here.”
“Hello, Major. This is the sergeant of the guard at CID, sir. Inspector Parkington asked me to phone you right away, sir. He says the Maccabee girl is ready to talk and thought you’d best come over to headquarters right away.”
“Righto,” Freddie said.
“Inspector Parkington has already sent a car for you, sir. It will be there in a few minutes.”
Caldwell returned to the card players. “Sorry, chaps. Have to leave. Duty calls.”
“Bad luck, Freddie.”
Bad luck, hell, Freddie thought. He was looking forward to it. He walked outside Goldsmith House. The guards saluted. A car pulled up to a stop and a soldier jumped from behind the wheel, walked to Caldwell and saluted.
“Major Caldwell?”
“Here, boy.”
“Your car from CID, sir.”
The soldier held the rear door open. Freddie got into the back seat and the soldier ran around, got behind the wheel and they drove off. Two blocks beyond Goldsmith House he pulled the car over to a curb at an intersection. In a second the doors were flung open and three men jumped into the car, slammed the doors, and the car picked up speed again.
Caldwell’s throat closed with fear. He shrieked and tried to leap across Ben Moshe. The Maccabee in the front seat turned around and slapped him with a pistol barrel and Ben Moshe snatched his collar and jerked him back into his seat. The Maccabee driver took off the military cap and looked up in the mirror.
Caldwell’s eyes bugged in terror.
“I demand to know what this is all about!”
“You seem upset, Major Caldwell,” Ben Moshe said coldly.
“Stop this car and let me out immediately, do you hear?”
“Shall we let you out the same way you threw out a fourteen-year-old boy named Ben Solomon in an Arab village? You see, Major Caldwell, Ben Solomon’s ghost called out to us from his grave and asked us to make retribution against the guilty.”
The sweat poured into Caldwell’s eyes. “It’s all a lie ... a lie ... a lie ...”
Ben Moshe flipped something on Caldwell’s lap and shined his flashlight on it. It was a photograph of the decapitated boy, Ben Solomon.
Caldwell began to sob for mercy. He doubled over and vomited in fear.
“It appears that Major Caldwell is in a mood to talk. We had better take him to headquarters and let him give out with his information before settling Ben Solomon’s account.”
Caldwell blurted out all he knew about the British army plans and CID’s operations and afterwards signed a confession of the murder of the boy.
Three days after his abduction Major Fred Caldwell’s body was found on Mount Zion at the Dung Gate of the Old City. Pinned to his body was a picture of Ben Solomon and a photostat of Caldwell’s confession and across it were scribbled the words: An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.
Major Fred Caldwell received the same fate that Sisera, the Canaanite, met at the hands of Jael when he fled from the scene of his battle with Deborah and Barak.
Chapter Twelve
THE REVENGE MURDER of Major Fred Caldwell had a shattering effect. No one seemed to question