Tzili (3 page)

And as the light rose higher in the sky, Tzili heard the trudge of approaching feet. One of the blind man’s daughters was leading her father to his place. He was grumbling. Cursing his wife and daughters. The girl did not reply. Tzili listened intently to the footsteps. When they reached his place on the hillock the girl said: “With your permission, father, I’ll go back to the pasture now.”

“Go!” He dismissed her, but immediately changed his mind and added: “That’s the way you honor your father.”

“What shall I do, father?” Her voice trembled.

“Tell your father the latest news in the village.”

“They chased the Jews away and they killed them too.”

“All of them?” he asked, with a dry kind of curiosity.

“Yes, father.”

“And their houses? What happened to their houses?”

“The peasants are looting them,” she said, lowering her voice as if she were repeating some scandalous piece of gossip.

“What do you say? Maybe you can find me a winter coat.”

“I’ll look for one, father.”

“Don’t forget.”

“I won’t forget.”

Tzili took in this exchange, but not its terrible meaning. She was no longer afraid. She knew that the blind man would not move from his place.

H
OURS OF SILENCE
came. Her oppression lifted. And after her weeping she felt a sense of release. “It’s better now,” she whispered, to banish the remnants of the fear still congealed inside her. She lay flat on her back. The late summer sunlight warmed her body from top to toe. The last words left her and the old hunger that had troubled her the day before came back.

When night fell she bandaged her loins with her shawl, and without thinking about where she was going she walked on. The night was clear, and delicate drops of light sparkled on the broad cornfields. The bandage pressing against her felt good, and she walked on. She came across a stream and bent down to cup the water in her hands and drink. Only now did she realize how thirsty she was. She sat calmly and watched the running water. The sights of home dissolved in the cool air. Her fear shrank. From time to time brief words or syllables
escaped her lips, but they were only the sighs that come after long weeping.

She slept and woke and slept again and saw her old teacher. The look in his eye was neither kindly nor benign, but appraising, the way he looked at her when she was reading from the prayer book. It was a dispassionate, slightly mocking look. Strange, she tried to explain something to him but the words were muted in her mouth. In the end she succeeded in saying: I am setting out on a long journey. Give me your blessing, teacher. But she didn’t really say it, she only imagined saying it. Her intention made no impression on the old man, as if it were just one more of her many mistakes.

Afterward she wandered in the outskirts of the forest. Her food was meager: a few wild cherries, apples, and various kinds of sour little fruits which quenched her thirst. The hunger for bread left her. From time to time she went down to the river and dipped her feet in the water. The cold water brought back memories of the winter, her sick father groaning and asking for another blanket. But these were only fleeting sensations. Day by day her body was detaching itself from home. The wound was fresh but not unhealthy. The seeds of oblivion had already been sown. She did not wash her body. She was afraid of removing the shawl from her loins. The sour smell grew worse.

“You must wash yourself,” a voice whispered.

“I’m afraid.”

“You must wash yourself,” the voice repeated.

In the afternoon, without taking off her dress, she stepped into the river. The water seeped into her until she felt it burn. And immediately drops of blood rose to the surface of the water and surrounded her. She gazed at them in astonishment. Afterward she lay on the ground.

The water was good for her, but not the fruit. In these early days she did not yet know how to distinguish between red and red, between black and black. She plucked whatever came to hand, blackberries and raspberries, strawberries and cherries. In the evening she had severe pain in her stomach and diarrhea. Her slender legs could not stand up to the pain and they gave way beneath her. “God, God.” The words escaped her lips. Her voice disappeared into the lofty greenness. If she had had the strength, she would have crawled into the village and given herself up.

“What are you doing here?”

She was suddenly startled by a peasant’s voice.

“I’m ill.”

“Who do you belong to?”

“Maria.”

The peasant stared at her in disgust, pursed his mouth, and turned away without another word.

A
UTUMN WAS ALREADY
at its height, and in the evenings the horizon was blue with cold. Tzili would find shelter for the night in deserted barns and stables. From time to time she would approach a farmhouse and ask for a piece of bread. Her clothes gave off a bad, moldy smell and her face was covered with a rash of little pimples.

She did not know how repulsive she looked. She roamed the outskirts of the forest and the peasants who crossed her path averted their eyes. When she approached farmhouses to beg for bread the housewives would chase her away as if she were a mangy dog. “Here’s Maria’s daughter,” she would hear them say. Her ugly existence became a byword and a cautionary tale in the mouths of the local peasants, but the passing days were kind to her, molding her in secret, at first deadening and then quickening her with new life. The sick blood poured out of her. She learned to walk barefoot, to bathe in the
icy water, to tell the edible berries from the poisonous ones, to climb the trees. The sun worked wonders with her. The visions of the night gradually left her. She saw only what was in front of her eyes, a tree, a puddle, the autumn leaves changing color.

For hours she would sit and gaze at the empty fields sinking slowly into grayness. In the orchards the leaves turned red. Her life seemed to fall away from her, she coiled in on herself like a cocoon. And at night she fell unconscious onto the straw.

One day she came across a hut on the fringes of the forest. Autumn was drawing to a close. It rained and hailed incessantly, and the frost ate into her bones. But she was no longer afraid of anyone, not even the wild dogs.

A woman opened the door and said: “Who are you?”

“Maria’s daughter,” said Tzili.

“Maria’s daughter! Why are you standing there? Come inside!”

The woman seemed thunderstruck. “Maria’s daughter, barefoot in this frost! Take off your clothes. I’ll give you a gown.”

Tzili took off her mildewed clothes and put on the gown. It was a fancy city gown, flowered and soaked in perfume. After many months of wandering, she had a roof over her head.

“Your mother and I were young together once, in the city. Fate must have brought you to my door.”

Tzili looked at her from close up: a woman no longer young, with frizzy hair and prominent cheekbones.

“And what is your mother doing now?”

Tzili hesitated a moment and said: “She’s at home.”

“My name is Katerina,” said the woman. “If you see your mother tell her you saw Katerina. She’ll be very glad to hear it. We had a lot of good times together in the city, especially with the Jews.”

Tzili trembled.

“The Jews are great lovers. Ours aren’t a patch on them, I can tell you that—but we were fools then, we came back to the village to look for husbands. We were young and afraid of our fathers. Jewish lovers are worth their weight in gold. Let me give you some soup,” said Katerina and hurried off to fetch a bowl of soup.

After many days of wandering, loneliness, and cold, she took in the hot liquid like a healing balm.

Katerina poured herself a drink and immediately embarked on reminiscences of her bygone days in the city, when she and Maria had queened it with the Jews, at first as chambermaids and later as mistresses. Her voice was full of longing.

“The Jews are gentle. The Jews are generous and kind. They know how to treat a woman properly. Not like our men, who don’t know anything except how to beat us up.” In the course of the years she had learned a little Yiddish, and she still remembered a few words—the word
dafka
, for instance.

Tzili felt drawn into the charmed circle of Katerina’s memories. “Thank you,” she said.

“You don’t have to thank me, girl,” scolded Katerina. “Your mother and I were good friends once. We sat in the same cafés together, made love to the same man.”

Katerina poured herself drink after drink. Her high cheekbones stuck out and her eyes peered into the distance with a birdlike sharpness. Suddenly she said: “The Jews, damn them, know how to give a woman what she needs. What does a woman need, after all? A little kindness, money, a box of chocolates every now and then, a bed to lie on. What more does a woman need? And what have I got now? You can see for yourself.

“Your mother and I were fools, stupid fools. What’s there to be afraid of? I’m not afraid of hell. My late mother never stopped nagging me: Katerina, why don’t you get married? All the other girls are getting married. And I like a fool listened to her. I’ll never forgive her. And you.” She turned to Tzili with a piercing look. “You don’t get married, you hear me? And don’t bring any little bastards into the world either. Only the Jews, only the Jews—they’re the only ones who’ll take you out to cafés, to restaurants, to the cinema. They’ll always take you to a clean hotel, only the Jews.”

Tzili no longer took in the words. The warmth and the scented gown cradled her: her head dropped and she fell asleep.

F
ROM THE FIRST DAY
Tzili knew what was expected of her. She swept the floor and washed the dishes, she hurried to peel the potatoes. No work was too arduous for her. The months out of doors seemed to have taught her what it meant to serve others. She never left a job half done and she never got mixed up. And whenever it stopped raining she would take the skinny old cow out to graze.

Katerina lay in her bed wrapped in goat skins, coughing and sipping tea and vodka by turn. From time to time she rose and went to stand by the window. It was a poor house with a dilapidated stable beside it. And in the yard: a few pieces of wood, a gaping fence, and a neglected vegetable patch. These were the houses outside the village borders, where the lepers and the lunatics, the horse thieves and the prostitutes lived. For generations one had replaced the other here, without repairing
the houses or cultivating the plots. The passing seasons would knead such places in their hands until they could not be told apart from abandoned forest clearings.

In the evening the softness would come back to her voice and she would speak again of the days in the city when she and Maria walked the streets together. What was left of all that now? She was here and they were there. In the city a thousand lights shone—and here she was surrounded by mud, madmen, and lepers.

Sometimes she put on one of her old dresses, made up her face, stood by the window, and announced: “Tomorrow I’m leaving. I’m sick of this. I’m only forty. A woman of forty isn’t ready for the rubbish dump yet. The Jews will take me as I am. They love me.”

Of course, these were hallucinations. Nobody came to take her away. Her cough gave her no rest, and every now and then she would wake the sleeping Tzili and command her: “Make me some tea. I’m dying.” At night, when a fit of coughing seized her, her face grew bitter and malign, and no one escaped the rough edge of her tongue, not even the Jews.

Once in a while an old customer appeared and breathed new life into the hut. Katerina would get dressed, make up her face, and douse herself with perfume. She liked the robust peasants, who clutched her round the waist and crushed her body to them. Her old voice would come back to her, very feminine. All of a sudden she would be transformed, laughing and joking,
reminiscing about times gone by. And she would reprimand Tzili too, and instruct her: “That’s not the way to offer a man a drink. A man likes his vodka first, bread later.” Or: “Don’t cut the sausage so thin.”

But such evenings were few and far between. Katerina would wrap herself in blankets and whimper in a sick voice: “I’m cold. Why don’t you make the fire properly? The wood’s wet. This wetness is driving me out of my mind.”

Tzili learned that Katerina was a bold, hot-tempered woman. Knives and axes had no fears for her. At the sight of an unsheathed knife all her beauty burst forth. With drunks she was gentle, speaking to them in a tender and maternal voice.

Although their houses were far apart, Katerina was at daggers drawn with her neighbors. Once a day the leper would emerge from his house and curse Katerina, yelling at the top of his voice. And when he started walking toward her door, Katerina would rush out to meet him like a maddened dog. He was a big peasant, his body pink all over from the disease.

Winter came, and snow. Tzili went far into the forest to gather firewood. When she came back in the evening with a bundle of twigs on her shoulders bigger than she was, Katerina was still not satisfied. She would grumble: “I’m cold. Why didn’t you bring thicker branches? You’re spoiled. You need a good hiding. I took you in like a mother and you’re shirking your work. You’re like
your mother. She only looked out for herself. I’m going to give you a good beating.”

Of Katerina’s plans for her Tzili had no inkling. Her life was one of labor, oblivion, and uncomprehending delight. She delighted in the hut, the faded feminine objects, and the scents that frequently filled the air. She even delighted in the emaciated cow.

From time to time Katerina gave her significant looks: “Your breasts are growing. But you’re still too skinny. You should eat more potatoes. How old are you? At your age I was already on the streets.” Or sometimes in a maternal voice: “Why don’t you comb your hair? People are coming and your hair’s not combed.”

Winter deepened and Katerina’s cough never left her for an instant. She drank vodka and boiling-hot tea, but the cough would not go away. From night to night it grew harsher. She would wake Tzili up and scold her: “Why don’t you bring me a glass of tea? Can’t you hear me coughing?” Tzili would tear herself out of her sleep and hasten to get Katerina a glass of tea.