The Boudicca Parchments

Chapter 67

Leah Yakarin opened her eyes in the intensive care wing of the hospital.

“What happened?”

There were tubes sticking out of her and monitoring equipment keeping track of her vital signs. It was clear that she was still dazed and weak. But she was out of danger. Sarit spoke gently

“There was an explosion. A suicide bomber. You saw him… you warned us… If you hadn’t warned us… we’d all be dead.”

Leah Yakarin had ducked for cover too. But she had been the nearest to the bomber and she bore the brunt of the explosion. In fact, the last thing she remembered was the bomber looking over at their group just before he detonated the bomb.

“Were there many casualties?”

There was a hint of guilt in her voice, as if she would blame herself for any deaths — even though it was not her fault. Daniel and Ted — who themselves had been mildly injured — knew the answer to the question. But they exchanged a nervous look, as if wondering whether it would be appropriate to let her know about the deaths of others when she was so obviously fragile, emotionally as well as physically.

Finally it was Sarit who answered.

“Four. Four dead and about twenty injured. It could have been a lot worse if other people hadn’t heard your warning. Most of the people ducked for cover just in time… thanks to you.”

Daniel realized that Sarit had called it right. Leah needed the reassurance. For all Leah knew, the casualty toll might have been substantially higher. And she was eating herself up over this. Four deaths was four too many. But it was a lot less than it might have been. This way, Leah had the reassurance that the death toll was low and that she had been instrumental in saving lives.

“He was… looking… at us.”

She was still straining to speak, even though she was now wide awake.

Sarit’s phone buzzed. She took it out surreptitiously and looked. It was a message from Dovi:

Go outside and call me ASAP!

She slipped the phone back into her pocket and said “I’ll be back in a minute.”

Outside she lost no time in calling Dovi.

“What is it?”

“I just saw some intercepts from Urim. Shalom Tikva called a man known to SHaBaK — an Arab with Hamas contacts.”

“When?”

“While you were in transit from Italy.”

“You think there’s a connection?”

“Well before that, he received a call from the Vatican. He has a man on the inside there, believe it or not. The man told him that the three of you were on your way.”

“So it wasn’t random.”

“No. You were being targeted.”

Sarit got irritated at this.

“Why don’t you just arrest him? All of them. Shalom Tikva and that son of his… and anyone else in their organization who might know anything.”

“We’re going to.”

“You should have done it already.”

“The problem is that once we arrest him, he’ll clam up and we won’t get any more.”

“So instead you put us in danger — and damn nearly got us killed!”

“It was a tough call. Anyway SHaBaK are going to pull him in and grill him!”

“That may not stop other members of Shomrei Ha’ir.”

“I know. We’re sending some people over to guard Leah Yakarin and the others, if they’ll cooperate. In the meantime stay alert.”