Damascus Gate Read Free Page A

oneself. His calling cards impressed new acquaintances as somehow incomplete. Sometimes he felt like a dilettante. And as a freelance he had become less thrifty, less disciplined and more ambitious. Without the constraints of the newspaper format, the stories he wrote went on and on—naturally enough, since things tended to, and things knew nothing of formats or of newspapers, and it was only a beautiful pretense that the daily paper's readers could be informed. A noble pretense, honestly and diligently pretended. Still, there were alternatives, as far as a story went. Fortunately, though the whole world attended the place, there continued to be more people in Jerusalem who liked to talk than liked to listen.
    "It's hard to get a drink in town these days," he told Charles.
    Charles made an unpleasant face and opened a beer for himself. Then he glanced toward the street and quickly touched glasses with Lucas.
    "They say there are more drugs in town," Lucas rashly offered. Charles owed Lucas a few minor favors, mainly having to do with the expediting of American visas for his relatives, and they had an understanding that, within the limits of a strict discretion, Lucas might use Charles as a source.
    "Correct," said Charles.
    "I thought there might be some surprises there. I thought I might write about it."
    Charles gave him a long, dark look and glanced from side to side. "You're wrong."
    "I'm wrong?"
    "You're wrong. Because you know and I know what everyone knows, so it's not a surprise."
    "What's not?"
    "One," Charles said, "no surprise. Two, you can't write about it."
    "Well..." Lucas began.
    "You can't. Who you think you are? Who you got behind you?"
    It was a question much to the point, Lucas considered.
    "Tell me," Charles asked, "do you know Woody Allen?"
    "Not personally."
    "Woody is a good guy," Charles declared. "On account of that he suffers."
    "Is that right?"
    "Woody came to Palestine," Charles said, savoring his ice-cold Heineken. "He is himself a Jew. But he saw the occupation and spoke out. He spoke out against the beatings and shootings. So what happened? The American papers slandered him. They took the wife's side."
    Lucas affected to ponder the case of Woody Allen.
    Charles shrugged with the self-evidentness of it all. "So," he told Lucas, "forget it. Write about Woody."
    "Come on," Lucas said. "Woody Allen never came here." The cold beer made his eyebrows ache.
    "He did," Charles insisted. "Many saw him."
    They let the subject drop.
    "Write about
majnoon,
" Charles suggested.
    "Maybe I will. Can I bring them here?"
    "Bring them. Spend money."
    "Maybe I'll just go away somewhere for a while," Lucas said, surprising himself with his own confiding impulse.
    "I won't be here when you get back," Charles said quietly. "Soon I'm the last Nazareth Habib around. Then, goodbye."
    "
Au revoir,
" Lucas said, and went out and wandered on down the Via Dolorosa, past St. Anne's Church by the Bethesda Pool. It was one place he would not go that day; for several reasons, he dared not. Taxis and
sheruts
waited at the Lions' Gate; he passed them. Across Jericho Road, more pilgrims were descending the Mount of Olives. All at once, Lucas found himself out of energy. The force that had impelled him out into the Easter morning was spent.
    One of the drivers accosted him, and he bargained over the price of a taxi ride to the Intercontinental Hotel up the slope. He had the notion of looking down at the city. When they arrived the hotel seemed closed; its glass surfaces were soapy and dark. He got out anyway and crossed the street and looked across to Jerusalem. From where he stood, he could see down into the Temple Mount and over all the rooftops of the walled town. Bells began to sound again, from every direction, their tolling scattered on the incessant wind.
    The bright onion-domed cluster of St. Mary Magdalen was below him as he went down the steep cobbled road. Turning the corner, he walked along the church's wall and at