important than ever to our country’s well being. You were on the plane, so I guess you didn’t get a chance to read these.”
She held out a bunch of newspapers from all over the globe. “The top one is particularly interesting.”
It was an English edition of the United Arab Republic’s propaganda mouthpiece, Scimitar ’n Feather , with this bannerline:
“ISRAELI LOXFINGER’S PEACE OVERTURES MULLED BY OUR GOVERNMENT.”
Impossible!
He read the lead story. In essence it was straight-away reporting on Lazarus Loxfinger’s “Plowshare Papers” with liberal quotes from them. The story was not favorable, he noted, but more significant, not unfavorable. Something big was in the wind. It had to be. For in the past a peace proposal from Israel would have drawn reams of ridicule, sarcasm and the tired old call for a “jihad,” holy war, to rid the Middle East of “these Zionist bandits, blah, blah, blah.”
Just as eye-opening were the organs of the other Arab nations, all noncommittal, but nonbelligerent.
The non-Arab papers had the freedom of speculation, pointing out that this was the first time Arab journals had ever carried an Israeli declaration without abusive comments.
“BREAKTHROUGH IN MID-EAST AT LAST?” asked the Manchester Guardian . “LOXFINGER PAPERS GET HARD ARAB LOOKSEE”— Chicago Sun-Times . “MID-EAST ACCORD HINTED”— Bombay Bomb Bay , organ of the Indian Air Force. “ARABS HINT END OF HOSTILITY TO JEWS”— Paris Match . And predictably:
“METS’ ROOKIE HAS HANGNAIL!”
“V-DOLL AND COP LINK BARED (AND THAT’S NOT ALL!)”
“COMMIES SEEN THREAT TO RUSSIA”
“Mid-East Talks Peace.”—New York Daily News.
I’ve been an ass, Bond realized. I actually had doubts about a man who might crack the nerve-racking stalemate that has hamstrung my country for seventeen years. Just because he drinks a little, mauls blondes and uses a few foolish ethnic slurs.
And who are you to point a finger, Israel Bond? You, the rake, the womanizer, the dimestore dandy…
“And yet,” thinking he was still talking to himself.
“And yet,” M. chimed in with a knowing smile, “you still have some doubts. Then go to Loxfinger, guard him and while doing so satisfy those doubts. Keep your eyes, ears, nose, and throat open at all times.”
He knew she was about to favor him with one of her proverbs, which would afford him a guidepost to understanding.
“Remember,” she said, purling a difficult hound’s-tooth stitch, “give me the mind of a child until he is eighty-three and I will dominate him.”
She’d hit the nail right on the point again! Good old M.! “I’ll get down there posthaste,” he said.
“I don’t care how you go, as long as you get there fast,” M. said. “You will be working alone ... unless something extraordinary comes up. In that case, you will be contacted by Agent D., only if necessary.”
Agent D.! Again the mention of that shadowy figure behind the scenes.
She anticipated his next question: “Do not ask me about Agent D., Oy Oy Seven. Now go.”
One more stop—the quartermaster’s where he would receive any equipment he needed, reload the mezuzah and requisition an automobile.
He walked into the office of Lavi HaLavi, quartermaster and inventor of diabolical espionage devices. There was a plaque on the wall with one of Mother’s sayings. Each office had its particular favorite. This one read: “ON THE HIGHEST SLOPE OF MOUNT KILIMANJARO IN AFRICA THERE WAS DISCOVERED THE FROZEN, DRY CARCASS OF A PATTERNMAKER FROM A NEW YORK CITY GARMENT CENTER FIRM. NO ONE HAS EVER EXPLAINED WHAT HE WAS DOING AT THAT HEIGHT OR HOW HE GOT THERE.”
HaLavi hardly looked up from a diagram he was sketching.
“Shalom, Oy Oy Seven.”
Behind him was Oy Oy Two, a grizzled veteran of many dangerous missions into enemy territory, testing a powerful new flamethrower. “It works,” he told HaLavi. “The tip of the cigarette is definitely
She held out a bunch of newspapers from all over the globe. “The top one is particularly interesting.”
It was an English edition of the United Arab Republic’s propaganda mouthpiece, Scimitar ’n Feather , with this bannerline:
“ISRAELI LOXFINGER’S PEACE OVERTURES MULLED BY OUR GOVERNMENT.”
Impossible!
He read the lead story. In essence it was straight-away reporting on Lazarus Loxfinger’s “Plowshare Papers” with liberal quotes from them. The story was not favorable, he noted, but more significant, not unfavorable. Something big was in the wind. It had to be. For in the past a peace proposal from Israel would have drawn reams of ridicule, sarcasm and the tired old call for a “jihad,” holy war, to rid the Middle East of “these Zionist bandits, blah, blah, blah.”
Just as eye-opening were the organs of the other Arab nations, all noncommittal, but nonbelligerent.
The non-Arab papers had the freedom of speculation, pointing out that this was the first time Arab journals had ever carried an Israeli declaration without abusive comments.
“BREAKTHROUGH IN MID-EAST AT LAST?” asked the Manchester Guardian . “LOXFINGER PAPERS GET HARD ARAB LOOKSEE”— Chicago Sun-Times . “MID-EAST ACCORD HINTED”— Bombay Bomb Bay , organ of the Indian Air Force. “ARABS HINT END OF HOSTILITY TO JEWS”— Paris Match . And predictably:
“METS’ ROOKIE HAS HANGNAIL!”
“V-DOLL AND COP LINK BARED (AND THAT’S NOT ALL!)”
“COMMIES SEEN THREAT TO RUSSIA”
“Mid-East Talks Peace.”—New York Daily News.
I’ve been an ass, Bond realized. I actually had doubts about a man who might crack the nerve-racking stalemate that has hamstrung my country for seventeen years. Just because he drinks a little, mauls blondes and uses a few foolish ethnic slurs.
And who are you to point a finger, Israel Bond? You, the rake, the womanizer, the dimestore dandy…
“And yet,” thinking he was still talking to himself.
“And yet,” M. chimed in with a knowing smile, “you still have some doubts. Then go to Loxfinger, guard him and while doing so satisfy those doubts. Keep your eyes, ears, nose, and throat open at all times.”
He knew she was about to favor him with one of her proverbs, which would afford him a guidepost to understanding.
“Remember,” she said, purling a difficult hound’s-tooth stitch, “give me the mind of a child until he is eighty-three and I will dominate him.”
She’d hit the nail right on the point again! Good old M.! “I’ll get down there posthaste,” he said.
“I don’t care how you go, as long as you get there fast,” M. said. “You will be working alone ... unless something extraordinary comes up. In that case, you will be contacted by Agent D., only if necessary.”
Agent D.! Again the mention of that shadowy figure behind the scenes.
She anticipated his next question: “Do not ask me about Agent D., Oy Oy Seven. Now go.”
One more stop—the quartermaster’s where he would receive any equipment he needed, reload the mezuzah and requisition an automobile.
He walked into the office of Lavi HaLavi, quartermaster and inventor of diabolical espionage devices. There was a plaque on the wall with one of Mother’s sayings. Each office had its particular favorite. This one read: “ON THE HIGHEST SLOPE OF MOUNT KILIMANJARO IN AFRICA THERE WAS DISCOVERED THE FROZEN, DRY CARCASS OF A PATTERNMAKER FROM A NEW YORK CITY GARMENT CENTER FIRM. NO ONE HAS EVER EXPLAINED WHAT HE WAS DOING AT THAT HEIGHT OR HOW HE GOT THERE.”
HaLavi hardly looked up from a diagram he was sketching.
“Shalom, Oy Oy Seven.”
Behind him was Oy Oy Two, a grizzled veteran of many dangerous missions into enemy territory, testing a powerful new flamethrower. “It works,” he told HaLavi. “The tip of the cigarette is definitely
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