Friendly Fire (32 page)

"So why did you stay till the morning? You fell asleep and didn't realize she had come home, or she's still not back?"

"No, no, what's the matter with you? What a thought! She's here, but asleep. She got back after midnight and begged me not to drive home at night, then was so quick to open up the sofa that I gave in."

"You're also impressed by her aggressive pleading?"

"Why aggressive?"

"Not important."

"Why not important?"

"Forget it, Abba ... it's not important ... keep talking." Ya'ari senses his son's deep disappointment in himself, in his wife, maybe even in his father.

"What's going on, son?" he says softly.

He's sick of it. This inane punishment in the name of solidarity is getting on his nerves. Yes, at first he was a little glad for the enforced detachment from the world, from Efrat, the kids, the office, and, sure, a demanding father too. It was nice to be able to nap in midmorning, or before dinner, without accounting to anyone. But
over the past two days his tranquillity has evaporated. Last night he kept tossing on his smelly army mattress, his mind loaded with nonsense, such as how to save his white queen from the black knights of that harebrained adjutant.

"Ah," Ya'ari says, laughing, "the redhead already drafted you to play chess with him?"

"After I started beating him at backgammon."

"Wait a second, Moran, you want to say something to the children? They're here with me in the kitchen, eating cornflakes. Looking at me."

"No, Abba, not now, there's no time, I'll see them soon anyhow. Just do me a favor, go into Efrat's room and get her out of bed. Because if she doesn't start getting organized to leave, she won't make it here to see me. We're attached to a base of recruits, and visiting hours are strict. Only till early afternoon. Tell her to hurry. The drive won't be so simple; it's been raining cats and dogs for the last few hours."

"In Tel Aviv it's actually like spring, clear blue skies. This country isn't as tiny as people think. So listen, I have an idea. I'll bring everyone to you in my car ... it'll be safer in all respects."

"But will you have patience for all of us after not sleeping all night on the sofa?"

"It wasn't so bad; it even turned into a bed at three in the morning."

Despite the authorization that he received from his son, Ya'ari does not even consider entering Efrat's bedroom, but instead knocks hard on the door. When he is persuaded that she has regained consciousness, he conveys her husband's instructions in a stern no-nonsense tone.

"Oh, Amotz, it would be wonderful if you would drive us."

"And even more wonderful if you would finally get up on your feet."

The two grandchildren are glad that it won't be their mother driving them to their father, but Grandpa, in the big car, and so they don without argument the clothes chosen by their mother, and like two little bear cubs, clumsily bundled in warm coats, they agree happily to help Ya'ari move the child seats from car to car and show him how to strap them into place. Meanwhile Efrat proves that when she wants to, she can be quick and efficient even in the morning hours, and she prepares sandwiches and peels vegetables, spreads hummus inside pitas, adds oranges and little bottles of chocolate milk. And when she comes down to the car with the big cooler, pale and without makeup, wearing clunky sneakers, threadbare jeans, and an old oversize battle-dress jacket that seems intended to obscure her figure, it occurs to Ya'ari that she means to punish herself and join in her husband's confinement.

Even on this wintry Sabbath morning the coastal road is packed. There's no knowing whether it is the children dragging their parents into the nervous traffic or the guilt-ridden parents dragging their children to amusements and shopping on the day of rest. But the northerly rains reported by Moran are now compounded by a stiff wind from the east, which buffets the car with such force that Ya'ari has to hold the wheel with both hands. Since there are no tapes in his car of simple Israeli songs likely to distract the children, Efrat attempts to entertain them with a game of Opposites, and Ya'ari gathers that opposition is well entrenched in his daughter-in-law. Quickly and effortlessly she comes up with nouns and adjectives, confident that each word has an antonym her children will know.

And so the highway slips northward between day and night, hot and cold, dry and wet, summer and winter, smart and stupid, tall and short, ceiling and floor, happy and sad, clean and dirty, straight and crooked, husband and wife, sun and moon, door and wall, dead and alive. And since Neta already knows the answers, she fires them off before her little brother can even come close, and although his mother and grandfather try to make her give the toddler a chance, his sister is incapable of curbing her enthusiasm for opposites, and Efrat apparently doesn't want to deprive her of the pleasure.

In the rearview mirror Ya'ari notices his grandson's mounting fury. If he were able to free himself of the straps that bind him, he'd climb out of the chair and start kicking the car door hard.

"Enough is enough with these opposites," Ya'ari orders Efrat and Neta, "the boy's about to explode."

After the Caesarea exit the traffic gets heavier. It's the first parents' day for the new recruits, and entire families are hurrying to the camp to supplement their food and other needs. The rain has stopped, but the area in front of the base is full of puddles, among which barbecues have been set up and picnic tables unfolded and chairs positioned, and here and there shelters against the rain. And between the charcoal grills and the coolers that spot the scene with orange, green, and blue, are Israelis of every sort, veteran and rooted, immigrants recent and otherwise, Russians and Ethiopians; and the recruits in their new uniforms, sitting opposite their adoring parents, diligently downing the meats and the salads, the home-cooked chicken schnitzels, as if over the past month a great famine had afflicted the military camps.

But where is Moran?

Efrat waits in the car with Neta, and Ya'ari goes off with Nadi in his arms toward the front gate, walks by the checkpost, surveys the tall guard, stares into the camp, but among the recruits going in and out there is no sign of the confined soldier who protects his white queen from the black knights. Until finally someone grabs him from behind, pulls the boy from his arms and lifts him high in the air.

Moran is unshaven, red-eyed. In an old work uniform.

"Abba," says Nadi, fluttering in the air, overjoyed, "you are alive?"

Y
IRMIYAHU STUDIES
D
ANIELA
with wonder as she sits in a puddle of light opposite the dirty breakfast dishes and listens with infinite patience to the geologist, who has broken a rock just for her and out of its fragments is trying to furnish her with a short history of time.

"Very good," he praises his sister-in-law. "I see that the young ones are also making good use of your patience. It's okay if you don't understand the explanations; the main thing is the listening. Just wait, soon the others will come down and arrange a symposium for you. In the meantime, Sijjin Kuang will take the malaria patient to a clinic not far away and be back this afternoon."

"There's another clinic in the area?"

"Not exactly a clinic, more like a sanatorium."

"A real sanatorium?"

"Actual but not real," he says jokingly. "Sort of a health retreat, a rehabilitation or recuperation facility for those who want to get away from the world into the bosom of nature in Africa, at low cost and without the annoyances of modern civilization. Not a sanatorium like the Swiss Alps, but operating on the same principle."

"Is there room for me?"

"Where?"

"With you in the car."

"Why not? But as always, you'll have to sit in the back, and this time you'll need to take up less room, because the patient will be beside you. Nothing to be afraid of, malaria is not a contagious disease. The cause is not a virus or bacteria, but rather a parasite, carried by mosquitoes. And the mosquito that bit Zohara al-Ukbi—it's always female, never a male mosquito—is already gone from this world."

"If you're sure you're not endangering me, then why don't I come along, really? I'm leaving here in two days, so I should finally have some idea of the area where you've decided to hide yourself."

She apologizes to the young men for the time-out she is taking, and secretly hopes that maybe on the way to the sanatorium she'll have a chance to see another breathtaking genetic mutation. As she leaves the kitchen, Sijjin is already revving the car engine, and before
Daniela takes her regular seat in the back, she greets the Sudanese driver, and seeing her sad expression she wells with deep affection for the gentle animist, bends over, and lightly touches her lips to the ebony cheek. And the nurse, surprised by this unanticipated gesture, lays a hand as delicate as a bird's wing on the youthful hair of the older woman and says, it's good that you are coming with us.

The young North African woman, by turns hot and shivering from the parasite in her blood, is also happy to see the passenger wedged alongside her, and from under the blanket that swaddles her she extends a friendly, fevered hand.
Ahalan wa-sahalan, madame,
she whispers to the Israeli, it is good that you, too, are with me.

The Land Rover turns south, where the dirt road is so smooth that the murmur of the tires envelops Daniela in drowsiness despite the early morning hour. Since this isn't the right moment to be interviewing the malarial paleontologist about her profession and role in the research program and expecting answers a layman might understand, the healthy passenger prefers to join the sick one in closing her eyes and basking in the pleasant warmth of the sun that keeps them company.

The ride is short, less than an hour, and when the car arrives at its destination, Daniela has the feeling that although the guilty mosquito is no longer alive, the parasite of indolence has nonetheless sneaked into her blood and jumbled her senses. When her brother-in-law opens the rear door, lifts the young Arab woman in his arms, lays her carefully on a stretcher and covers her, and he and an orderly carry her into the building, the Israeli is overtaken by a strange desire that the same be done with her; since there is no one around who can guess what she wants, she stays frozen in place and waits for the helping hand of the driver.

The sanatorium, too, was once a colonial farm, and on the outside its main building is the base camp's twin, but the interior is very different. Here they are not greeted by a huge kitchen with sinks and stoves but rather by a small lobby, with a reception desk of black wood that looks as if it once served as the cocktail bar. Armchairs of black leather sit in a semicircle with their backs to the counter, facing a large window with a view to a horizon so distant that even in the strong noon sunlight it takes on a gray penumbra.

The elevator that never found a home at the headquarters of the scientific team works nicely here, with an ancient and agreeable rumble. When its grille opens, an affable-looking Indian doctor steps out to welcome the malaria patient, who has not come here to die, heaven forbid, but only to get stronger. While the doctor introduces himself to Zohara, Yirmiyahu brings to his sister-in-law's attention the fact that the senior personnel here are not Africans, but Indians who have crossed the ocean. Europeans, especially elderly middle-class Englishmen, have great faith in the ability of Indians to provide superior care, physical and spiritual, to those who wish to be braced and pampered as they prepare for death.

Through the big window a small swimming pool may be seen, and several wild animals stroll about, maintained on the premises so that their beauty and serenity will offer comfort to the patients' souls as their bodies slowly expire. And while a room is made ready for the malaria patient, she is fed clear chicken broth, routinely kept on a burner that sits among the bottles of whiskey and gin.

The Sudanese quietly speaks in Arabic with the sick woman, whose chills have been eased by the hot soup. And Yirmiyahu, settled deeply into a leather armchair, continues to lecture his sister-in-law about the uniqueness of this institution even as she imagines some sleep-inducing parasite wide awake in her own blood.

Although the building appears modest and does not have a great many rooms, it can't be called a clinic, or a simple pension either. It is a sanatorium, a treatment home, giving medical care to both body and mind. And just as the reputations of convalescent facilities in the rest of the world are measured by the beauty of their settings—snowy mountaintops, hidden lakes—here, too, nature is extraordinary, both for its primal quality and for the wild creatures who move through it without fear of human beings.

But the real test of such institutions is the nature and level of the services they offer to the patients who come and remain of their own free will. Make no mistake: this place, despite its modesty and isolation, acquits itself most honorably when it comes to efficiency and the range of services it offers; it also stands out for its low cost. For who comes here? In general, lonely old people, not affluent, who can no longer rely on the endurance of their relatives and friends. Widowers and widows whose children have grown distant, or elderly couples who never had children at all, or had them and lost them in tragic circumstances. People who are drawn to this place are most often those who spent their lives serving others. Here, they can get at a reasonable price reciprocal service to their heart's content: a young man or woman who will sit at their bedside all night long and hold their hand to ward off nightmares; not just someone to tidy up their room but also someone to sing and dance for them on request, or even an old grandmother who will sit in a corner and knit them a scarf, and a black baby crawling at her feet.

At first glance the place will seem quiet to her, Yirmi continues, or even a bit desolate, yet this, too, is one of its virtues. All in all, this is a cloistered place. But half a kilometer away is a small village filled with men and women, teenagers and children, who may be brought in for any task, so that a guest who is able and ready to submit his body and maybe his soul to the ministrations of others may enjoy services that in the past were enjoyed only by noblemen and princes. And precisely because these are servants who for the most part do not understand the guest's language, there is a limit to the intimacy. Yes, for a very modest fee, acceptable in the region, there are people here willing to provide service that would make the care Amotz's father receives from his Filipinos look meager and boring; the villagers are most eager to cater to the whims of the whites, even to be summoned in the middle of the night. It is almost, if you will, a reversion to slavery, but out of free choice.