I was intrigued by the mechanical puzzle and managed to locate two slightly rusted locks. One was a Yale, the other an Israeli-made lookalike called a Nabob. One evening after dinner, I searched the ground around the kibbutz garage for shards of metal that looked like they might fit into the key slot, and spent the next half-hour or so propped against a tree, trying and failing to coax either lock to open. I realized I would need to discover how the locks worked. But how to get inside to see? Saturday afternoons in Mishmar Hasharon were a quiet time, like the old Jewish neighborhoods and shtetls back in Europe but minus the religious trappings. The next day, I waited until mid-afternoon and walked past the bakery towards the garage. Its roll-down, corrugated door was locked. So was the structure next to it, where the blacksmith and metalwork shop were. But attached to the blacksmith’s was a hut where our scrap metal was dumped. I doubted it would be locked, and it wasn’t. Pausing to let my eyes get used to the dark, I made my way into the metalwork area. I crossed to the cabinet where the tools were kept. I took out a steel jigsaw used for cutting through metal and, hiding it under my shirt, made my way out again. Fortunately, the saw was up to the task of cutting into the softer alloy that made up the body of the locks. Once I’d cut inside them, I saw they shared the same basic construction. There was a series of springs and shafts which, in response to the indentations of a key, aligned in such a way to allow the lock to open. I sneaked back into the metalwork shop five or six times. By trial and error, | managed to shape one of jigsaw blades into a pick tool that seemed like it should do the job. For days, I manipulated it into each of the padlocks. I knew I had the principle right, but I still couldn’t get it to work. Blisters formed on my thumb and fingers. Then, finally, the Yale sprung open! With each successive try I got better at knowing how to put the bl