“I am only beginning to learn how to relax,” Azariah apologized with a weak smile. “But if you mean that I should stop boring you, I’m already done talking. Or do you want me to make you laugh some more?”

“No, Azariah,” said Rimona. “We want you to rest now.”

With a small rock, Udi knocked over the empty canteen with a perfect pitch from twenty feet. “Come on,” he said, “let’s go.”

Tia had finished gnawing the leftover chicken bones. They buried their garbage and shook out and folded the Arab Legion kaffiyeh. The girls plucked the stubble from each other’s back.

“Who the hell’s crying?” snapped Yonatan out of the blue, though no one had said a word. “It’s just my goddamn allergy again. It starts up whenever anything starts growing. Azariah is right. I should go live in the desert.”

“Excuse me. I said nothing of the sort.”

“Maybe it was your Uncle Manuel, or whatever the hell his name was.”

“Let’s go!” said Azariah in a most down-to-earth manner. “My Uncle Manuel was killed, and we’re out here today for a hike, not a memorial service. C’mon, let’s go!”

The hikers split into two groups. Anat and Rimona went looking for mushrooms in the woods, while the men and Tia climbed the hill to poke about the ruins of the village. In no time Udi found the patterned neck of what had been a large earthenware jar and presented it to Azariah on the condition that he put an end to long speeches. “Fill it with soil and put a plate under it,” he said. “I’ll give you a cactus to plant in it.” Azariah, in turn, gave him an old whetstone he found. A grindstone fragment that Yonatan came across had to be left for drier weather when a tractor and wagon could be used to haul it back. Suddenly, Azariah started and grabbed onto Udi’s shirt.

“Watch it!” he whispered. “There’s someone around here. I smell smoke.”

“He’s right. There’s smoke coming from somewhere. I think it’s from the mosque.”

“Better be careful,” said Azariah. “On the other hand, it could just be Bolognesi. I saw him leave the kibbutz this morning by himself.”

“Hush up for a minute!”

“Or it could just be someone out for a walk. A nature lover. Or an amateur archaeologist. Or just someone wanting to be alone.”

“I said be quiet! Let me listen.”

But the only sound to be heard was borne on the wind from the far-off kibbutz. Its melancholy tones suggested a grave being dug. There was a rhythmic pounding, a feeble bleat, a faint clink of metal, the hoarse purring of a motor.

“The fact is,” said Udi, “we don’t know who might be skulking around here and we aren’t armed. He could be very dangerous.”

“Who?”