My Michael (20 page)

T
HE DREARY SAMENESS
of the days. Autumn will come. In the afternoon the sun beats through the west-facing window, engraving patterns of light on the rug and on the covers of the armchairs. With every rustle of the treetops outside the patterns of light break into a gentle swaying. The movement is restless and complex. The topmost branches of the fig tree burst into flame afresh each evening. The voices of the children playing outside suggest a distant wilderness. Autumn will come. I remember my father saying once when I was a child that in autumn people seem quieter and wiser.

To be quiet and wise: how dull.

One evening Yardena, Michael's friend from his student days, came to our house. With her she brought an overpowering cheerfulness. She and Michael had begun studying at the same time, and now hard-working Michael had got so far, and here was she, she blushed to tell, still struggling with some wretched paper.

Yardena was heavy-hipped and tall, and she wore a short, tight skirt. Her eyes, too, were green, and her hair was blond and rich. She had come to ask Michael's help: she was having difficulty with her paper. She had always known how clever Michael was, from the first day she had met him. He must rescue her.

Yardena affectionately called Yair "little brat," and me she addressed as "Sweetie":

"Sweetie, you don't mind if I abduct your husband for half an hour or so, do you? If he doesn't explain this Davis to me right away, I swear I'll jump off the roof. It's driving me crazy."

As she spoke, she stroked his head as if he were hers. With a large pale hand she stroked his head, with sharp-nailed fingers adorned with two huge rings.

My face darkened. Instantly I was ashamed of myself. I tried to answer Yardena in her own language. I said:

"Take him. He's all yours. And your Davis, too."

"Sweetie," Yardena said, and a cruel smile flitted across her face, "Sweetie, don't talk like that, or you'll be very sorry afterwards. You don't look to me like one of those bold women you're trying to sound like."

Michael chose to smile, and as he smiled the corners of his mouth quivered. He lit his pipe and invited Yardena into his study. For half an hour or an hour he sat at his desk with her. His voice was deep and serious. Her voice was perpetually stifling little giggles. Their heads, one blond the other graying, seemed to be floating on clouds of smoke when I wheeled in the trolley to serve them some coffee and cakes.

"Sweetie," Yardena said, "you don't seem to be a bit excited about catching yourself a little genius. If I were in your place I'd gobble him up alive. But you, Sweetie, you don't seem to be the greedy type. No, don't be frightened of me. I may be a bitch, but my bark's worse than my bite. Now if you wouldn't mind excusing us and letting us get on with our lesson, so that we can give you back this clever, spotless lamb. Little brat, that child of yours—standing there quietly in the corner like that and staring at me, just like a little man. He stares just like his dad, shy but sharp. Take that child out of my sight before he drives me wild."

I went out into the kitchen. There were blue curtains on the window. There were flowers printed on the curtains. On the kitchen balcony hung a large washtub. This was the washtub I was doing our washing in, until we got a washing machine. Next summer. On the ledge stood a dead potted plant and a sooty paraffin lamp. There are frequent power failures in Jerusalem. Why did I have my hair cut short, I mutter to myself. Yardena is tall and flashy, her voice is warm and loud. Time to get supper.

I dashed out to the greengrocer. The Persian greengrocer, Elijah Mossiah, was about to close up shop. If I had come two minutes later, he said cheerfully, I would have found him gone. I bought some tomatoes. Cucumbers. Parsley. Green and red peppers. The greengrocer laughed and laughed at the hopeless confusion of my movements. I picked up the basket with both hands and ran home. Suddenly I stopped dead in a cold panic: No key. I've forgotten to bring the key.

But so what? Michael and his visitor are at home. The door isn't locked. And besides, we've left a spare key to the apartment with the Kamnitzers upstairs, in case of emergency.

My haste had been unnecessary. Yardena was already standing on the stairs, repeating her farewells to my husband. She rested a sculpted leg against the bars of the bannister. A confused smell of sweat and perfume filled the staircase. I was short of breath from running and from my panic about the key. Yardena said:

"Your shy husband has cleared up in half an hour a problem that's had me stymied for half a year. I don't know how to thank—you both."

As she spoke she suddenly shot out two well-manicured fingers to pick a flake of skin or a stray hair from my chin.

Michael took off his reading glasses. He smiled calmly. I suddenly took hold of my husband's arm and stood leaning on him. Yardena laughed and left. We went inside. Michael turned on the radio. I made a salad.

The rain held off. A biting chill passed through the city. The electric heater burned all day in our flat. The sun was swathed once more with damp mist. My son draws shapes on the windowpane with his finger. I stand behind him sometimes looking, but I can never make anything out.

On Sabbath Eve Michael got out the stepladder and brought down our winter clothes. He put the summer ones away. I hated all my clothes from last year. The dress with the high waistline seemed to me like an old woman's now.

After the Sabbath I went into town to do some shopping. Hysterically I bought more and more things. I spent a month's earnings in a single morning. I bought myself a green coat, a pair of fur-lined boots, suede shoes, three long-sleeved dresses and a casual cardigan in orange with a zip fastener. For Yair I bought a warm sailor suit of Shetland wool.

Then, as I walked westward along Jaffa Road, I passed the electrical goods shop which had belonged to my father years before. Inside the door I put down my parcels. I stood blindly in front of a strange man. The man asked me what I wanted. His voice was patient, and in my heart I thanked him for that. Even when he was forced to repeat his question the man did not raise his voice. In the dim recesses of the shop I could see the entrance to the low back room which has two steps going down to it. In that room my father used to carry out simple repairs. There I used to sit and read children's books meant for boys, on the days when I visited my father's shop. In that room my father used to brew himself a cup of tea twice a day, at ten o'clock in the morning and at five in the afternoon. For nineteen years my father had brewed his tea there twice a day, at ten and at five, in summer and in winter.

An ugly little girl came out of the back room holding a bald-headed doll. Her eyes were red from crying.

"What can I do for you?" the stranger asked for the third time. There was no surprise in his voice. What I want is a good electric razor, to spare my husband the agony of shaving. My husband shaves like a young man; scraping his skin with the razor till the blood flows, yet leaving bristles under his chin. The best and most expensive electric razor there is. I want to give him a very big surprise.

I stood counting the money I had left in my purse, and suddenly the ugly child's face lit up: she thought she recognized me. Wasn't I Dr. Kopperman from the clinic in Katamon? No, my dear, you've made a mistake. My name is Miss Azulai and I play on the tennis team. Thank you, and good day to you both. You ought to put the heat on. It's cold in here. The shop is damp.

Michael was shocked when he saw all the parcels I had brought home.

"What's got into you, Hannah? I can't understand what's got into you."

I said:

"Surely you remember the story of Cinderella. The prince chose her because she had the tiniest feet in the kingdom, and she wanted him so as to spite her stepmother and the ugly sisters. Don't you agree that the decision of the prince and of Cinderella to set up home together was based on vain and childish considerations? Tiny feet. I tell you, Michael, that prince was an utter fool and Cinderella was out of her mind. Maybe that was why they suited each other and lived happily ever after."

"That's too deep for me," Michael complained with a dry smile. "It's too deep for me, that parable of yours. Literature isn't my subject. I'm not good at interpreting symbols. Please say what you were trying to say again, but say it in simple words. If it's really important."

"No, my dear Michael, it wasn't really important. I'm not sure exactly what it was I was trying to explain. I'm not sure. I bought all these new clothes to be happy and enjoy them, and I bought you the electric razor to make you happy."

"Who says I'm not happy?" Michael asked quietly. "And what about you, Hannah, aren't you happy? What's got into you, Hannah? I can't understand what's got into you."

"There's a pretty nursery rhyme," I said, "in which a girl asks, 'Little clown, little clown, will you dance with me?' And somebody answers 'Pretty little clown will dance with anyone.' Do you think, Michael, that that was a good enough answer to the girl's question?"

Michael began to say something. Changed his mind. Kept silent. He untied the parcels. Put each thing away in its place. He went out to his study, then came back a few moments later, hesitantly. Thanks to me, he said, he would have to ask one of his friends, perhaps Kadishman, for a loan, to enable us to get through the month. And what for, that was what he was trying to understand. What was the reason? Surely somewhere, in heaven or on earth, there must be some reason.

"People ought to be very careful when they use the word 'reason.' Wasn't it you yourself who taught me that, Michael, less than six years ago?"

A
UTUMN IN
Jerusalem. The rain is late. The color of the sky is deep blue, close to the colors of the calm sea. A dry cold bites into the flesh. Stray clouds scud eastward. Early in the morning the clouds come down and roam among the houses like a silent cavalcade. They burst out to darken the freezing stone arches. Early in the afternoon the mist descends on the city. By five, or a quarter past, darkness reigns. The street lamps are not numerous in Jerusalem. Their light is yellow and feeble. In the alleyways and courtyards fallen leaves dance. An obituary notice in flowery prose is pasted up in our street:
Nahum Hanun, father of the Bokharian community, has gone to his eternal rest in the fullness of years
. I found myself brooding on the name Nahum Hanun. On fullness of years. And on death.

Mr. Kadishman appeared, dark, agitated, and wrapped in a Russian fur coat. He said:

"There is going to be a war. This time we shall conquer Jerusalem, Hebron, Bethlehem, and Nablus. The Almighty has wrought justly, in that, while He has denied our so-called leaders common sense, He has confounded the wits of our enemies. What He takes away with one hand, as it were, He restores with the other. The folly of the Arabs will bring about what the wisdom of the Jews has failed to achieve. There is going to be a great war, and the Holy Places will once again be ours."

"Since the day the Temple was destroyed"—Michael repeated a favorite saying of his father's—"since the day the Temple was destroyed, the power of prophecy has been granted to men like you or me. If you want to know my opinion, the war we are about to fight will not be over Hebron or Nablus but over Gaza and Rafah."

I laughed and said:

"Gentlemen, you are both out of your minds."

Stone-strewn yards are carpeted with dead pine needles. The autumn is stiff and thick. A wind sweeps dry leaves from yard to deserted yard. Towards dawn in the district of Mekor Baruch the sheets of corrugated iron on the balconies play a melody. The movement of abstract time resembles a substance sizzling in a test tube: pure, radiant, and lethal. On the night of the tenth of October, towards morning, I heard in the distance the roar of heavy engines. It was a low thunder, which seemed to be violently stifling some mounting energy. Tanks started up inside the walls of the Schneller Barracks near where we live. They rumbled dully on their tracks. I imagined them as filthy, angry hounds straining furiously at their restraining chains.

The wind is also in it. The wind picks up scraps of garbage, makes a dirty vortex, and hurls them at the ancient shutters. It lifts up pieces of yellowing newspaper and forms ghostly shapes in the darkness. It clutches at the street lamps and sets sickly shadows dancing. Passers-by walk stooped against its harsh gusts. Now and again the wind catches an abandoned door and bangs it until breaking glass tinkles in the distance. Our heater burns all day. We even leave it on at night. The radio announcers' voices are stern and solemn. A bitter, prolonged restraint on the verge of bursting into violent fury.

In the middle of October our Persian greengrocer, Mr. Elijah Mossiah, was called up. His daughter Levana ran the shop in his absence. Her face was pale and her voice was very soft. Levana was a bashful girl. Her shy efforts to please pleased me. She was so nervous that she chewed her blond plait. The gesture was touching. In the night I dreamed of Michael Strogoff. He stood before shaven-headed Tartar notables, whose faces bore an expression of brutish cruelty. He endured his tortures in silence and did not betray his secret. His mouth was tight-shut and magnificent. Bluish steel glinted in his eyes.

At lunchtime Michael commented on the radio news: There is a well-known rule, established—if his memory did not deceive him—by the German Iron Chancellor, Bismarck, according to which, when one is faced by an alliance of enemy forces, one should turn and crush the strongest. So it would be this time, my husband declared with conviction. First of all we would scare Jordan and Iraq to death, then we would suddenly turn round and smash Egypt.

I stared at my husband as if he had suddenly started talking Sanskrit.

A
UTUMN IN
Jerusalem.

Each morning I sweep the dead leaves from the kitchen balcony. New leaves fall to take their place. They crumble to dust between my fingers. They crackle drily.

The rain held off. Once or twice I thought the first drops had begun to fall. I rushed downstairs to bring the washing in from the line. But no rain came. Only a damp wind which ruffled my skin. I had a cold and a sore throat. My throat was most painful in the mornings. A certain tension had made itself felt in the city. A new stillness took hold of familiar objects.