The Oath (20 page)

“Moshe,” said the Prefect, “I’d like to ask you a question.”

Questions, more questions. Is it the same in heaven? Evidently yes. Thus there will never be an end! No sooner is the grave sealed than an angel comes and knocks: You there, the deceased, tell me your name and that of your mother. If he remembers, he may enter the world of the dead. Three days later the interrogation resumes: Have you been honest in the performance of your trade? Have you lived in the expectation of the Messiah? What have you done with your life, with your solitude?

“I am alone, I have no accomplice,” said Moshe, and his jaw was set. “Stop asking me questions, that’s enough!”

Up above, facing the Tribunal, a soul may decide to challenge the questioner: You have questions? So do I. And mine are as good as yours. And then the angels, led by Matatron, cry sadly: Wretched soul, you are blaspheming, you are incurring eternal damnation. As for the Judge, He recommends clemency: Let them bring me The Book, let them consult The Law. Every situation is listed. Virtues and sins, punishments and rewards; everything is spelled out. The Law encompasses every human category: the just and the miscreants, the ascetics and the fools, the liars and the patrons, the misers and the poor who ridicule avariciousness.

But the madmen? What is the fate of madmen in heaven? Look well, the Judge commands, check it closely; I want a
precise and thorough examination. The embarrassed scholars and specialists throw themselves into The Book and its commentaries, then into the commentaries on the commentaries. They are shamefaced, for the result is nil. The madman’s fate has not been foreseen up above. Moses is summoned and so are the prophets and their disciples, and so are Rabbi Yohanan ben Zakkai, Rabbi Akiba, Rabbi Yishmael and Rabbi Yehuda. They question Rabbi Yitzhak, the Lion of Safed: And the madmen, didn’t you think of them? Is it possible? Well, yes, so it seems. Nobody thought of the madmen. Meanwhile the mad soul, the rebellious soul awaits the long-delayed verdict. An angel—Matatron? he again?—dares to suggest a kind of solution, a compromise: all the Tribunal has to do is to solemnly proclaim that the madman is not mad. A wise solution that the court would be inclined to view as equitable were it not rejected by the soul protesting vehemently: During my earthly existence I claimed my madness as my own, I accepted it, I made it my home—what right have you to deny it now?

Two members of the Court seize the opportunity to shift the debate onto a strictly judicial plane, but the Judge interrupts them and addresses Himself to the soul at once responsible and irresponsible for the uproar: Your argument is valid; true madmen are as worthy as true saints. What counts is the weight of truth in man. Still, considering the special aspects of your situation, for which, as a result of a regrettable omission, no precedent exists, I am forced to send you back into the world of the living. Applause in the hall. Next case? No, not so fast. The soul protests once more: You may send back only that sinner who must expiate this violation or that transgression of the Law; you have nothing to reproach me for; madmen move inside a system all their own, where they alone can pass judgment.
The Judge deliberates at length and reiterates the verdict: You must go back down, we have no choice, neither you nor we. But this is unfair, cries the soul, this is illegal! Indeed, says the Judge, but there is no other solution … if you insist on maintaining your status of madman. And then, the soul has an idea: Very well, it says, I am going down again, but on one condition—that I be granted permission, every time I consider it appropriate, to remind you that injustice reigns even in heaven!

“What is happening to you is unjust,” said the Prefect. “Martyrdom is always a result of injustice.”

“What difference does it make?” Moshe was becoming annoyed. “Even God is unable to solve this problem.”

An unsatisfactory reply, he knows that: God has nothing to do with it. God is God and man is not human. The strength of the one does not necessarily apply to the other. God cannot help but be, but find, but win. Man cannot help but lose, but seek, but die, but live his death.

“Make an effort, Moshe,” said the Prefect. “Try to listen to me well. Try to answer. Do you hear me?”

“I hear you.”

He would have liked to see too. A curtain of flames separated him from the Prefect. At times he would catch a glimpse of a figure folding and unfolding its arms.

“You are sacrificing yourself,” said the Prefect. “That is beautiful, even commendable. And foolish too. Are you certain it will serve its purpose? I confess that I am not. I respect you and admire you. And I feel sorry for you. You see, I no longer know whether this will stop the wolves from howling.”

The pain. Here it came again. It struck his temples, his chest. Only now will I suffer, thought Moshe. Yet he must not allow
himself to collapse. “Don’t you remember?” he shouted. “They wanted a culprit, and now they have one!”

“Will it be enough? That is the question.”

“What more can they want?”

“More culprits.”

Only now am I really going to ache, Moshe thought. My head, my heart, only now are they going to burst. Hold fast? What for? Speak? Convince? “I am alone, I said that. I have no accomplice, I said that too. I am solely responsible, I said that. I have said nothing else. I have incriminated no one. What do you want of me—what else? Haven’t I done enough?”

“More than enough. But events are overwhelming us. The wolves are howling and the prey seems slight to them. They are voracious, these wolves from around here, they want bigger game.”

Moshe was listening, conscious of his failing strength. He did not even try to repress the sob forming in his chest. “This is unjust, terribly unjust. This was your idea, wasn’t it? You gave it to Davidov, didn’t you? Davidov informed the Council … you needed a culprit—just one—and preferably a Jewish one, didn’t you?”

“I don’t deny it. The idea was mine, I thought it was good. It was meant to help me gain time. Unfortunately, I am like you in this affair: alone and without accomplices. And the mob across the street is growing by the hour. Once it starts to move, nothing will hold it back.”

For the first time since his arrest—that morning? only that morning?—Moshe experienced total, all-encompassing pain, overflowing and reaching into his consciousness. Thinking was as painful as breathing, as moving, as speaking. “The mob, you, me. What do you mean? That the ordeal is useless? My sacrifice
in vain? That I am of no use living or dead? I am sent back and forth from one world to the other, from one role to the other—and every time it’s for nothing? Is that what you mean?”

There was such sorrow, such despair in his voice that the Prefect, moved more than ever, leaned over him. He touched his shoulder and said reassuringly: “Nothing is lost as yet, the game is not over …”

But Moshe stopped him. “The truth, I demand the truth, I deserve it! I don’t want to be soothed or pitied. I want the truth, only the truth!”

The Prefect came closer, and at last Moshe could see him: his eyes, his chin, his high forehead. Anguish mingled with kindness. The Prefect meanwhile stood in the semi-darkness contemplating that bundle of flesh that wanted, that demanded. The truth. Which truth? The mob’s or the prey’s? The truth of the living or the truth of the dead? He smiled weakly.

“Very well, Moshe. I have too high a regard for you to lie to you or spare you. You want to know everything? All right. The situation is bad. The beast is baring its fangs. The mob is screaming about plots and ritual murder. I fear the worst—I fear a pogrom. When? No idea. In a day, a week. A little more, a little less. The capital has been alerted, but it turns a deaf ear. The militia will not obey me. How can I protect you? You can count on no one. Let us hope that God remains on your side. He seems to be your only hope.”

“Hope?” said Moshe. “Don’t speak to me of hope.”

The pain crept over his skin, penetrated his flesh, his bones, touched the exposed nerves and transmitted a series of tremors of blinding force and violence to his brain. He had never guessed that he could feel such pain. Thus, at the end of pain, there waited greater, more intense, more naked pain.

The Prefect gone, Moshe cowered in a corner, as though to offer the enemy the smallest possible surface. Then he lay down on the ground, half rose, lay down again. It was no use. There was no shelter anywhere.

To restore circulation in his fingers, he tried to run them through his beard. Impossible. The blood had dried. His beard was as hard and cold as stone.

“Woe unto me, wretched mother that I am! They have murdered him, those degenerates, they have killed him, those enemies of Christ. I feel it, I know it, my body tells it to me, my heart repeats it, I swear it. I swear it on the head of our Saviour. My little boy, my lamb. So sweet, so gentle, so respectful. Always ready to help me in the fields, at the stable. Mothers of this town, grieve with me …”

The stableman’s wife was lamenting from morning till night, mostly in public, acting out to perfection the role of mourning mother. She roamed the streets, the marketplace, arousing wrath, indignation, the instincts for vengeance.

“Woe to the poor mother of this poor martyr. Yes, he is a martyr, my lamb. He died for Christ, my little one. Killed by their common enemy. Christ has taken him back to heaven, body and soul …”

So as better to be heard, she stood in front of the church, wrapped in her black shawl, and harangued the passers-by. Her husband, meanwhile, was at home drinking himself into a stupor.

“You who suffer for the Saviour’s holy mother, weep for me …”

The priest, shrewd and extremely punctilious in matters
relating to Christian history, thought it best to appease her: “Don’t say that, my child.”

“Why shouldn’t I? I’m suffering!”

“I understand your sorrow, woman. But please leave Christ alone!”

“Leave him alone? Did they leave him alone? And my only son, my lamb, did they leave him alone?”

“Have you been drinking? Or have you taken leave of your senses? You dare pronounce Christ’s name and that of your worthless offspring in the same breath?”

“If my son were not a Christian, they would not have killed him, right? So am I not entitled to shout that they murdered him because of Christ?”

The priest grabbed her by the shoulders and tried to take her home, but she wouldn’t let him. Finally, seeing them holding on to one another, one was left with the impression that they were visiting the public places together and for the same purpose.

“We have sent out appeals,” Davidov said calmly. “There has been no response. The various steps we’ve taken have been in vain. Friends cannot be reached, associates pretend disbelief.”

In the course of the day the president had been admitted to see the Count. He had reminded him of the kindnesses and promises of his father, who had considered himself indebted to the Jews. Now that the latter lived in fear, they were requesting his hereditary protection. Any sign of friendship on his part would be helpful. A determined stand could result in a complete turnabout of the situation. Well? Would he follow in his father’s
footsteps? The question, which remained in suspense, marked the end of his plea.

The Count had listened patiently, courteously; they had drunk a toast. But in the end he had limited himself to advising the Jews of Kolvillàg against seeing the situation in too bleak a light. “I find your pessimism disconcerting,” he had remarked good-naturedly. “You try so hard to prevent disaster, you end up provoking it. What an odd people you are.”

“You reproach us for our pessimism, Your Excellency. Others find fault with our optimism. In fact, we are the most optimistic and the most pessimistic people in the world. A matter of perspective: we are long-range optimists, but pessimists for the immediate future. History has proved us right in both instances.”

The castle, situated on Uncle George’s Hill, dominated the villages of the valley. From the window overlooking the forest one could see the pointed steeple of Kolvillàg’s church in the distance.

“Let us remain in the present,” the Count had said, comfortably settled in an armchair covered with yellow and orange tapestry interwoven with blue. “A Jew admits to having killed a young Christian. If one were to believe you, you are about to be taken to the slaughterhouse, all of you, to the last man.”

“Moshe is not guilty. He has killed nobody. Nobody has killed.”

“Not guilty? But hasn’t he confessed …”

“The poor man is mad. Raving mad. He aspires to martyrdom: to suffer and die in style, in holocaust.”

“One does not exclude the other. Homicidal lunatics are not uncommon.”

“Moshe is not mad like the others. If you knew him …”

“I wouldn’t mind … But it’s too late for that, or am I
wrong? Perhaps after the tribunal has ruled on his case. You tell me he is innocent, and I would like to believe you. But then he has nothing to fear. And neither do you. He will be tried and acquitted. You see? You cannot keep yourself from painting too dark a picture.”

Having made his point, he had accompanied the visitor to his coach waiting in the courtyard.

“I am petrified” was Leizerovitch’s comment. “I know him and I can interpret his most insignificant statements. Now I understand why he has refused to see me. It all makes sense. He can’t use rhetoric on me. I know him too well.”

“Let’s call a spade a spade,” Yossel the representative of the Young Workers cried out. “The Count is lying. He is lying like a horse trader five minutes before closing time. He is in cahoots with the mob. Under the knightly mask hides the grimacing face of the assassin.”

Davidov motioned to my father. “This comment of our friend Yossel will have to be softened somewhat.”

“What?” My father was indignant. “Distort the truth? Falsify testimony?”

My conscientious father seemed outraged. I was watching him proudly from my corner.

“Suppose the Book falls into
their
hands?”

“They wouldn’t understand a word.”

“Proceed,” said Davidov, resigned.

The Council had been in session since early afternoon. The threat of a pogrom seemed imminent.