Free By the Rivers of Babylon by Nelson DeMille Page B

assistants, secretaries, interpreters, and security people. The lounge was quite smoky, Leiber noticed, and the bar was, as usual, empty.
    Yaakov Leiber cleared his throat. “Ladies and gentlemen. Ladies and gentlemen.” He raised his hands.
    The room became quiet in stages. Heads turned. They noticed the small man in the oversized white uniform, who wore bifocals so thick that his eyes looked like oysters.
    Leiber put his back to the bar. “Good afternoon. I am Yaakov Leiber, Chief Steward on El Al Concorde 02.”
    “I’m glad he’s not our pilot,” observed a man in the back. A few people laughed.
    Leiber smiled. “Actually, I used to be a pilot, but once I forgot to bring a telephone book to sit on and I crashed into a hangar.”
    There was laughter and even some applause.
    Leiber stepped closer to the crowd. “I just want to acquaint you with some things.” He spoke about seat selection and the new boarding time for several minutes. “Are there any questions?”
    The mission’s Orthodox Rabbi, Chaim Levin, stood up. “You understand, young man, that today is Friday—and you are confirming for me that we are going all the way to New York and will still land before the Sabbath begins. Is that correct?”
    Leiber held back a smile. It was a peculiarity of El Al flights that there was hardly ever a rabbi on board, even during the week. Some rabbis wouldn’t fly on the national carrier because the El Al crews had all broken the Sabbath at one time or another. They flew on foreign carriers because it didn’t matter to them if those crews broke the Jewish Sabbath or their own Sabbath. The two rabbis on the peace mission, one Orthodox and one Conservative, had decided to make an exception and fly El Al for the appearance of national unity. “Yes, sir,” said Leiber. “Sundown in New York is at 6:08. But we’ll be going a little faster than the sun, so we’ll land at about two P.M. New York time.”
    Rabbi Levin looked at Leiber for a long time.
    “In other words, Rabbi, we’ll land one and a half hours before the time we started,” said Leiber. “You see—”
    “All right, I understand. I’ve flown before, you know.” He regarded Leiber, the Sabbath-breaker, with a stare he usually reserved for pork-eating Jews. “If we land one second after sundown, you’ll hear from me.”
    There were some laughs, and Leiber smiled, too. “Yes, sir.” He looked around. “The meal is pot roast and potato kugel. There will be several movies available if anyone is interested. My wife, Marcia, who is much prettier than I am, will be one of your stewardesses on 01.” Like many couples who flew often, it was the Leibers’ policy never to fly together. They had children. He hoped no one would infer anything from this arrangement. “Are there any questions? Then, thank you for flying El Al—although I don’t see how you could have done otherwise.” He held up both hands.
“Shalom.”
     
    Captain David Becker completed his line check of Concorde 02. He stood in the shadow cast by the drooping nose cone. A squad of infantry stood around the aircraft and glanced at him from time to time. An El Al security man, Nathan Brin, approached. “How’s it going, Captain?”
    “Good.”
    “We’re satisfied. You?”
    Becker looked at the plane and nodded.
    “See you upstairs.” He walked off.
    “Right.” Becker stared up at the craft. This white bird of peace looked like anything but a dove. It was a sea bird of some sort, Becker decided. A stork. A gull, maybe. It sat up high on long legs because of the high-pitch angles you had to use with a delta wing. If it weren’t for the long legs, it would drag its ass on the ground when it took off or landed. God made sea birds with long legs for that reason. The technicians at British Aircraft Corporation and Aérospatiale had come to the same design conclusion. So had the Russians when they built their supersonic airliner, the TU-144. Brilliant. It was good to see that