“I’m flattered you think Shamron would trust me with the keys to his beloved Office, but that’s not the case. The Memuneh has someone else in mind for the job.”

“Me?” Gabriel shook his head slowly. “I’m an assassin, Uzi, and they don’t make assassins the director.”

“You’re more than just an assassin.”

Gabriel looked silently out the window at the orderly yellow streetlights of a Jewish settlement spreading down the hillside toward the flatlands of the West Bank. In the distance a crescent moon hung over Ramallah. “What makes Shamron think I’d want to be the chief?” he asked. “I wriggled off the hook when he wanted to make me chief of Special Ops.”

“Are you trying to drop a not-so-subtle reminder that I got the job only because you didn’t want it?”

“What I’m trying to say, Uzi, is that I’m not fit for Headquarters—and I certainly don’t want to spend my life in endless Security Cabinet meetings in the Prime Minister’s Office. I don’t play well with others, and I won’t be a party to your little conspiracy against Amos.”

“So what do you intend to do? Sit around and wait for the pope to give you more work?”

“You’re starting to sound like Shamron.”

Navot ignored the remark. “Sit around while the missiles rain down on Haifa? While the mullahs in Tehran build their nuclear bomb? Is that your plan? To leave the fighting to others?” Navot took a long look into the rearview mirror. “But why should you be any different? At the moment it’s a national affliction. Fortress Israel is cracking under the strain of this war without end. The founding fathers are dying off, and the people aren’t sure they trust the new generation of leaders with their future. Those with the resources are creating escape hatches for themselves. It’s the Jewish instinct, isn’t it? It’s in our DNA because of the Holocaust. One hears things now that one didn’t hear even ten years ago. People wonder openly whether the entire enterprise was a mistake. They delude themselves into thinking that the Jewish national home is not in Palestine but in America.”

“America?”

Navot fixed his eyes back on the road. “My sister lives in Bethesda, Maryland. It’s very nice there. You can eat your lunch in an outdoor café without fear that the next person who walks by your table is a shaheed who’s going to blow you to bits.” He glanced at Gabriel. “Maybe that’s why you like Italy so much. You want to make a new life for yourself away from Israel. You want to leave the blood and tears to mere mortals.”