The Liberated Bride (28 page)

G
ET A GRIP
on yourself. You're not the only one awake on this long night. So is your eldest son, studying for another pointless exam behind his heavy green door. So, perhaps, is your youngest son, patrolling his mountain fastness to make sure that the signs of war and peace are read correctly. Even your wife—who knows?—may be tossing and turning. You have nothing to complain about. The spark of inspiration, though still not trapped, is flickering closer, and you have heard the Arabs' Song of Paradise and even passed the test of their acceptance—no small achievement for a pedantic Jewish Orientalist.

And now, in the courtyard of the little church, you are surrounded not only by the Abuna and his flock, but by young Muslims who, having heard the music of the Christians, wish to know what the Jews have to say. Why draw boundaries in the first place, they want to know, if the peace they bring is an illusion?

As you try to reassure them, you are approached by Rashid's sister. Before you know it she is on her knees, begging you in Bialik's Hebrew to use your Jewish influence to help her retrieve her ID card so that she can return to her native village.

“
Bas ma'a l-ulad, mish bidunhum,
”
^*
her brother warns her, struggling to pull her to her feet.

But the dark woman strikes her head despairingly and insists:

“Even without them!”

“
Abadan la
!” Her brother loses his patience. “
Kif b'tihki, ya majnuna. Bifsadu aleiki
!”
^*

He yanks her up violently, then regrets losing his temper, embraces her, and compassionately leads her back to her basement at the rear of the church.

The soft, autonomous Palestinian moon vanishes in nebulous folds. A fresh night breeze cools the blood warmed by Paradise. The door is locked on the darkened church. In the parking lot reclaimed by the murky night, Christians and Muslims crowd around the nun, whose bell-like voice has not a trace of faintness. You, too, would like to thank her for a moving experience, but you don't wish to be pushy, a Jewish stranger deep in a long-destroyed kingdom of vanished Israelite tribes. And so while you wait for Rashid to return, you wander off to a fence with a view of the Vale of Issachar. A lone car heads down a dirt road toward a Bedouin encampment, beside which two tall horses graze in profound tranquillity.

The old anxiety has you in its clutches.

Stop! Give it up, you stubborn fool.

Whether he knows or not, understands or not, is stuck or not, protests or not—let him be. Leave him alone. It isn't you who will release him from the net of lost love he is thrashing in.

Yes, Hagit. You knew better than I did.

Set him free even in your thoughts.

See how far I've come tonight to free you, Ofer.

Will you laugh at this story of your father's?

Are we, too, knowingly or not, to blame for the breakup of your marriage?

Five years. What are you protecting yourself from, my son? The disgrace? The humiliation? The error? The betrayal? Look around you. It's a vulgar, shameless striptease of a world that can't wait to confess what never happened even in fantasy.

And you won't give an inch.

Stop! Let him be. . . .

For the thousandth time. . . .

How often did you have to be told? He's his own person. Let him live his own life. Set him free.

Give it up.

You too, Galya. You too, O bride of pain. Set him free, lost bride. . . .

There. It's done. I swear by the stars above. No more imaginary illnesses. No more visits to the hotel. No more inquiries, questions, lies. But you, too, my son, for the love of God, stop being so sad and depressed. I don't want you, wild and wretched, in my dreams anymore.

R
ETURNING TO THE
basement, Rivlin was surprised to find the metal door locked. Rashid had vanished into thin air.

He hurried back to the courtyard of the church. It was empty. The Abuna and the nun were gone. Two sole figures, young men with long hair, remained by the gate. They supposed the Israeli Arab must have gone to see the skit about the Jewish kibblelist.

“About who?”

“The kibblelist. Rabbi Whatsis, that holy man of yours who wears a fez. The one without teeth who's always laughing. Here in the village, we like to laugh with him.”

One of the young men had a pistol strapped to his waist. A bit worriedly, the Orientalist asked the two if they were Christians or Muslims.

“That depends what holiday it is.”

“How about Ramadan?”

“Then we're Muslims. But only at night when we can eat. . . .”

They both laughed.

“Where do you know Hebrew from?”

“Nablus prison.”

Yet they seemed to have taken a fancy to him, for they now insisted that he come see the skit with them. “It will be cool, man. And you don't have to worry about us. Don't worry about your driver, either.
Your Arabs in Israel won't ever leave you.” They chuckled slyly. “Come on, it's not far, man. Nothing will happen to you. After that little tearjerker from Lebanon, don't we deserve a few laughs? The Arabs get theirs, too. Those two Christians, Socrates and Plato, don't give a shit for anyone. They do all the big shots in the PA, even Arafat with his shaking hands and his lips that go
gul-gul-gul-gul-gul-gul.
Just like the comics on your TV. You don't happen to have a hundred shekels on you, do you?”

“For what?”

“Expenses. Costumes and all that jazz. It's a contribution for the actors. No shit.”

And so, parting with a hundred shekels for “expenses,” he let himself be taken captive by two Palestinian hipsters. They walked down the hill from the church, turned into some narrow, deserted streets, and came to a structure that had served, so he was nostalgically informed, as a hideout during the Intifada. Now, it was a warehouse for plastic utensils. A small audience sat squeezed amid various sizes and colors of plastic plates, bowls, and basins, filling the dim room with purplish smoke. Rivlin recognized some of the faces from the church. Most belonged to unemployed youngsters, out of work and out of luck—who, having slept away their despair by day, had turned out for a night's entertainment in front of a small stage concealed by a red curtain.

The Arabs quickly made room for the Jew in the front row. They were so pleased to see him, though they would gladly have cut his throat in this same place several years ago, that they even turned down the Egyptian pop music blasting from an old transistor in order to enjoy his university Arabic. Waving to him from a dark corner in which, no longer droning, they sat smoking and drinking, were Suheir's four accompanists. Perhaps the Abuna was hiding somewhere, too. Yet before Rivlin could look for him, the lights went out, and the curtain was pulled to one side. Holding a candle on a small improvised stage was the kabbalist, Rabbi Kaddouri, the venerable icon of the Sephardic Shas Party. Gigantic in a loud robe and a red Turkish fez, he greeted the audience with a toothless and shyly endearing giggle.

It was Plato on Socrates' shoulders. Together the two pranksters formed a single nonagenarian dotard, who began to harangue, in the down-to-earth dialect of his native Iraq, imaginary Middle Eastern Jews on either side of him. Reproaching those on the left for forgetting they were Sephardim, he attacked those on the right for not remembering they were human, while simultaneously blessing members of the audience who jumped onstage to kiss his hand. But while the old kabbalist's head was Plato's, his arms and legs belonged to Socrates, and an amusing conflict ensued between the mouth that showered his petitioners with good wishes and the limbs that drove them off with kicks and blows.

The Iraqi dialect grew increasingly Palestinian, peppered with private jokes and innuendos served up with Hebrew gibberish and absurd Israeli military commands. Just as the huge but sprightly kabbalist was blessing an aspiring prime minister while handing him a nasty pinch, his robe opened, and out popped two more hands. Breaking into a dance to a raucous Egyptian pop tune, he whirled before the astonished audience with four-handed tai chi exercises. The cheering spectators rose to their feet, copying the Chinese movements.

Nor was this the end. As a stack of plastic basins collapsed in a corner of the stage, an actor jumped out of the disorder in an embroidered robe, a fake beard plastered to his face. Whipping out a pair of dark sunglasses from his pocket, he put them on, intoned the priestly benediction from the Torah, struck the giant kabbalist contemptuously, and cried in Hebrew: “He's innocent! He's innocent!” This was Shas leader Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, whose favorite disciple, the politician Aryeh Deri, had been convicted on corruption charges. Losing his temper, the ancient fez wearer grabbed the rabbi, stripped off his sunglasses, and swallowed him in his robe with one gulp. But this did not go down well with the kabbalist's digestion, for he immediately split into two halves—Plato, the lower half, in the form of a wheelchair, and Socrates as its occupant. He, too, now had a beard, long and unruly behind a colorful silk veil. The kabbalist and rabbi had vanished, their place taken by the crippled Hamas leader Sheikh Yassin of Gaza, who rolled his eyes heavenward and sang a dirty ditty in a squeaky voice.

And so it went. Talented mimics, the two seminarians used a small but well-chosen assortment of props to skip merrily from target to target, now a Palestinian one and now an Israeli one, each turning into and emerging from the others until all finally joined in one monstrous, pitiably conflicted figure—which, mumbling and grumbling in Hebrew and Arabic, sobbed and simpered as it struck and stroked itself and the audience called for more.

I
N THE DARK
, hilarious room, in which plastic plates flew in all directions, Rivlin made out the gleam of his driver's smile. “You're back, Rashid? But where on earth did you disappear to? Come on, let's go home!” “Home? Now?” “When, then? How long do you intend to stay here?” “But it's too early, Professor.” “What do you mean, too early?” “Too early, sir. The workers aren't up yet.” “What workers? What are you talking about?” “Did you forget, Professor, that I have to pick up workers and bring them to Israel?” “Oh, no, Rashid, my friend! I'm not waiting for any workers. You promised to take me home when I wanted. Well, this is it. I want to go home. You can pick up anyone you want to later.” “But it's too late, Professor.” “What do you mean, too late? You just said it was too early.” “It's too late to bring you back to Haifa and return to Jenin in time for the workers. I promised them.” “But why did you disappear?” “
I
disappeared, Professor? Excuse me, but it was you who disappeared. It took a long while to find you here.” “Rashid, I'm disappointed in you. You've been bugging me all day.” “But how have I bugged you, Professor?” “Don't ask me how. You just did. You and Samaher and her mother, all of you.” “But what did we do to you, Professor?” “I don't know what. I only know I'm no longer in my right mind.” “Your mind is fine, Professor. Didn't you enjoy the Lebanese?” “Yes, and now I want to go home.” “Wouldn't you like to see those two clowns do Aryeh Deri?” “For God's sake, Rashid, don't give me Aryeh Deri. Don't give me anyone. I'm tired. I'm old. Do you think we Jews are made of steel?” “Of course not, Professor. But you're not old at all. And you're a good man even if you're not made of steel. Everyone is happy to see
you here. What can I do? That's the way it turned out. The night had a will of its own. Why fight it? You need a little patience, not even very much. Soon the sun will be up, and the partying will stop. If you feel you're wasting your time, I can show you some old Jewish graves that were discovered near here. They're from the time of your Temple, and now there's a little settlement watching over them. It's a good, clear night for seeing them. . . . No? Well, then, it's best to go back to the Abuna. He'll find a place for you to sleep. We'll start out at sunrise.”

Having left the minibus at the church, they had to walk back up the hill. The Abuna, too worried about his Jewish visitor to go to bed, was wide awake. In brightly striped pajamas and a funny green turbanlike nightcap, he looked as if he were dressed for a children's play. “Sweet Jesus!” he exclaimed in English. He was sweating, and his eyes would not stay still in their sockets. “What happened to you? I went to show Sister Suheir to her room, and you were gone when I came back. We were beginning to think the Islamic Jihad had taken you hostage. You need to be careful, Professor. Peace hasn't broken out here yet.”

He led the Orientalist through the dark teachers' room, placing a finger on his mouth to warn him that the nun, a light sleeper, was lying behind a partition, and brought him to a little alcove that was the headmaster's room. There he swept some papers off a desktop and deftly converted a director's chair into a cot.

“Are you planning to fast tomorrow, too?” he asked gently.

The Abuna seemed relieved to hear that there would be no more Jewish concessions to Islam. His night-turban nodding vigorously, he hurried to take out a thick, hairy blanket and a small pillow in a green pillowcase.

You haven't been away from home for twenty-four hours, Rivlin mused, and once again your Israeli fatigue has met with the offer of an Arab bed. By day with Muslims in the Galilee, by night with Christians in Samaria. Off with thy shoes and onto thy cot, O weary Orientalist!

O distant woman, visibly invisible: are not the strange adventures of this day sufficient proof for you? Do you understand now, my sweet judge, that it is not disdain or condescension that you hear in
my voice when I speak of Arabs, but freedom—a freedom burdened neither by feelings of superiority nor by those of hypocritical guilt? Call it a scholar's simple, bluff intimacy with his subject, for the sake of which he is willing to lie down even on a narrow cot beneath a hairy and none-too-clean blanket.

And yet how will you fall asleep when your mind is full of songs and stories—French babies afloat on poisoned horses, Arab moons plunging into seas, enormous dancing tai chi kabbalists with the squeaky voices of fanatical sheikhs? There's nothing for it but to reconvert the cot to a chair, move it to the headmaster's desk, switch on the lamp, take some paper from a drawer, and doodle a big spark of inspiration with an original idea at the center of it and a few supporting facts in its cusp.

It was the naive yet genuine and blameless belief of Algerian soldiers that shedding their blood for France in two world wars would make them French, which belief, ultimately frustrated, gave birth, fifty years later, to an orgy of violence against their descendants.

The veteran scholar quickly jotted down a few chapter headings, added references to historical events, documents, and specific Algerian officers and battalions in the French army, and followed this with a short bibliography. It would all have to be documented later.

His reinvigorated mind at rest, he folded the paper, deposited it in his pocket, switched off the lamp, and turned the chair back into a cot in the moonlight. His only regret was not having thanked the Lebanese nun for her wonderful performance. His infatuation with a woman he would never meet again kept him from falling into a deep sleep despite his tiredness. He drowsed fitfully, the vast night around him penetrating his slumber with the noise of an automobile, the sounds of shots, laughter, someone cursing. And then quiet, and the distant whinny of a horse . . .

The dawn was debating whether to awake the Holy Land when he was roused by a low murmur from the teachers' room. It was a woman's voice, telling a story that would never end. Time to get up, fold the hairy blanket, primp the pillow, smooth and button his clothes, and—still shivering from the morning cold—knock softly on the door to bid the nun an appreciative farewell.

But lying in wait for him in the teachers' room was Ra'uda, who had eluded her brother. To his relief, she did not throw herself at his feet or bang her head on the floor. She simply went on setting the table for his breakfast—which would, she hoped, fortify his resolve to bring her back, with or without her children, to her village in the Galilee. Listening to her troubles was the nun, woken by her in her anguish. The wondrous Lebanese, putting religious duty before an artist's right to a morning's sleep, had hurried from behind the partition wrapped in a blanket and now sat at the table, a small, solitary figure with big, bright eyes, listening to the homesick Muslim—who, removing a towel from a saucepan it had been keeping warm, ladled out a dish of piglet-scented rice and beans. Wordlessly, without resorting to the Hebrew of Bialik, her soft eyes coaxed him to taste her food. Rivlin thanked her and sat down, spoon in hand, across from the nun. In a French perfected from Algerian colonial documents, he carefully said:

“Mademoiselle, I hereby confirm the opportunity to express my gratitude for your marvelous voice. Never before have I looked forward to Paradise, having always feared that, without my body, my soul would be thoroughly bored. Yet if there is singing like yours there, I am willing to reconsider. I only hope it is not too late.”

Her smile slight but sincere, she said in her strong, sure voice:

“
Cher monsieur, il n'est jamais trop tard pour embrasser la vrai religion.'
”
^*

He laughed awkwardly and asked where her next concert would be held. Nowhere, she said. She was leaving for Jordan that evening and would return to her convent the following day. Yet next autumn,
inshallah,
she hoped to be in Ramallah for a Palestinian music-and-poetry festival. And she turned to say good morning to the Israeli Arab driver, who had come to announce the start of a new day.