My name is Manfred, and I live in a pension in Jerusalem. Dont expect great things from me. Im a merchant of the old sort, and like all merchants, I gamble. Dont worry, not with the whole bundle. Ive divided up my property the way people like us do: a quarter in real estate, a quarter in shares, and the rest is with me. I like to feel the cash on my body. The banknotes and jewels in the lining of my coat soothe me, and I eat my meals in peace.
The meals in the pension arent always calm, especially not in the past months. I prefer to get up early and be the first. At six-thirty no one else is in the dining room. Hannah spreads a cloth on my table and hands me a tray with the meal. Hannah is a good, devoted woman. If you ask her for seconds, she isnt stingy. At this hour my thoughts are settled. I eat without haste, and at the end of the meal I light myself a cigarette. A cigarette after a meal offers an entry into the world that is all good. In the winter I sit there until seven-thirty. At seven-thirty the other tenants swarm in through all the doorways and put an end to my repose. I escape for all Im worth.
By eight Im already on the street. At that hour, at the end of the summer, the street is damp and full of night smells. If it werent for a few restless people roaming in the streets, the morning would be brighter. Those people always arouse gloomy thoughts in me. A gloomy thought, as Ive noticed, isnt easily uprooted.
Sometimes, after a meal, I allow myself to go back to bed and doze off. An hour or two of dozing eases my fears. Once a week I stay in bed until noon. When I go out into the street at noon, it seems to me that everyone is following me. Those are my inconsequential fears. But what can be done? They, too, have power over me. When fears, or whatever we call them, flood me, I return to the pension. Everybody comes on time for lunch, and the tables are bustling. There are hours, I must admit, when that familiar bustle is pleasant for me. It wraps me in an old warmth. At exactly two they clear us out. Sometimes, in the fall or winter, Mrs. Pracht shows kindness to us and lets us sit there until three. But usually she insists on her timetable. Mrs. Pracht is strict, but not without charm. All the men in the pension are in love with her, but no one dares approach her. Shes 50 years old, maybe less. Tall, handsome, very well educated for shes been seen more than once in the company of Scholem and Buber. Her man friend is also apparently very well educated, similar in looks, tall and dressed in a white suit.
Pension Pracht is in a modestly well kept-up centre. At one time only Jews from Germany lived here. But in recent years the population has changed. Now most of us are from Bucovina or Galicia. Mrs. Pracht speaks German and doesnt apologize for it. In the end she decided: I didnt come into this world to stammer. Yiddish, of course, she finds repugnant. Yiddish is not only a sloppy language, it also sounds miserable. The streets of Berlin or Paris would suit her better, but what can you do, like all of us, she ended up here. She was fortunate, and shes wealthy and a householder, and we have to obey her. But dont worry: the standing orders posted on the bulletin board arent observed. True, people only sit in the dining room until nine at night. But theres no lights-out in the rooms. We play cards until after midnight, and sometimes until dawn. Mrs. Pracht sometimes loses her temper, assembles the tenants in the dining room, and gives them a sermon. One thing must immediately be said in her favour: she doesnt interfere in private matters. A tenant who brings a woman into his room at night isnt scolded or punished, and there are women who sneak in at night. In the morning, at first light, they slip away. More than once shes been heard to say: in matters of that kind I dont interfere. Because of that liberality, fleeting loves blossom here, prolonged loves, secret loves, and half-secret loves. Mrs. Pracht knows it all and keeps silent.
Some time ago, the poet Zeidel brought a girl of about 25 to his room. Since then hes hardly been seen in the dining room. If it werent for his hasty outings to the grocery store, his existence wouldnt be felt in the pension. They say hes madly in love with her. In any event, since he brought her, everyone is tense in expectation of an explosion that will rock the corridors. But, as though to spite us, no words escape his room. On the contrary, a thick silence flows there, as though theyd plunged together into deep slumber.
Zeidel is a famous poet. His books were published in Warsaw. Two volumes of his collected poems were published in Tel Aviv. When he turned 60, the pension held a party in his honour. Mrs. Pracht, as I mentioned, is repelled by Yiddish, but she feels fondness for Zeidel, because he speaks French and recites Baudelaire by heart. At memorial evenings, which are held sometimes at the pension, Zeidel reads his poems and those of other poets, but he wont give a speech. He hates speeches. He wrote quite a few poems condemning public speakers who corrupt the language and make it into clichés. At one of the memorials he rose to his feet and shouted to the speaker: "Youll pay for this someday. The God of language wont forgive you. You treat the language like barbarians. Yiddish is a holy language, and everybody who abuses it will be punished."
Since then speakers have been afraid to come to the pension. At the memorials poets read, and soft, introverted women sing folk songs. Mrs. Pracht doesnt take part in those memorials. She claims, not without justice, that the tenants are too immersed in their past and dont understand the point of their coming here. "Weve come here to change," she declares. "To shake off unworthy life and prejudices and to be like the best of nations." If they werent said in German, her words might be heeded more. Her pathos, and in German, drives people wild. Because of her words, not a few tenants left the place. "A pension isnt a church. Were not willing to listen to sermons," they said and slammed the door.
The tenants, to tell the truth, have learned to ignore those sermons. The pension runs at its own pace: most of the people rise late, the rooms are tidied, but not the way Mrs. Pracht laid down. Not even the entrance hall is the way she wants. The erratic spirit of the tenants pours into every corner. Mrs. Pracht sometimes loses her temper, shouts and threatens, but finally she is appeased and calms down.
At the end of that summer it was made known that Zeidel and his beloved Christina had decided to marry. Mrs. Pracht made the hall and the dining room available to the couple, and the date of the wedding was set on the spot. Now we could see Christina up close: tall, pretty, quiet. During the war she was about a year old. Nuns hid her in the basement of a convent, and there, in the thick darkness, she grew up. Without doubt, the silence of the convent still flowed in her. Her head was bent, and her steps, short, and if you asked her something, she blushed.
Rabbi Spiegler performed the marriage. Rabbi Spiegler was close to our pension, and he knew some of its deepest secrets. On the basis of his lineage, he ought to have been a hassidic rebbe, surrounded by followers. At one time some of his fathers believers wanted to place him on his fathers throne, but he refused. He earns his living as a proofreader. But he likes our residence, and when theres a festive event here, he officiates. He celebrates weddings in his fathers manner, saying the blessings without adding or skipping anything, and thats how he held Zeidels wedding.
After the ceremony, the tenants served sandwiches and lemonade, and the cellist Paula Zimmer played old wedding melodies. Zeidel was distracted, spoke in praise of his bride, and didnt move from her side. Strange, no one was joyous, and no one envious, as though it werent a wedding but a drawing of lots.
If some of the tenants hadnt got drunk, the wedding would have ended quietly, but this time some of the tenants overdid it and spread unpleasant embarrassment about the hall. The words of the painter Kirtzl were especially painful. He condemned Mrs. Pracht and called her a Prussian sergeant whose soul had withered and whose head was full of geometric wickedness, and she should be returned immediately to the Germans, to run her pension there and not here. "The Jews have suffered more than enough from German order, and now every Jew is commanded to be an anarchist. Order is our enemy. We wont get up on time and go to sleep at the hour she sets. Order is barbaric. Only in a place where trains are late, and people get up at ten, and they dont make their beds or tidy their cupboards, where dirty laundry is scattered on the floor, only in a place like that is there humanity. Hygiene is an invention of the devil." And he wasnt satisfied until he had said, "We didnt come here to change." He shouted, "We dont want to change. We want to be what we were and what we are. Exactly like the Jews of every generation, without any artifice. Order is a barbaric invention, and it must be declared the enemy of humanity."
The end of the summer in Jerusalem is changeable: streams of dust and sudden breezes. Thats why the pension is often stricken by panic. Sometimes its a bad dream, and sometimes its a gloomy feeling. Its better to sleep less and play cards. Dreams are dictators that return you to the camps and the forests and knead your flesh. You wake up shocked and often wounded. Dreams at the end of the summer are the worst. A bad dream can pain you for a whole week. Pills dont help; its better to be awake and give yourself over to poker. Sometimes a woman can save you. Sleep with a woman is a different kind of sleep, but it happens sometimes that the woman is the source of the disturbance. She wakes up in the middle of the night, flooded with visions. You try in vain to wrest her from her dream. Shes planted in it like a stubborn root.
A year ago I invited a pretty woman into my room, she was quite young, and I was sure she would give me a calm autumn. She was a pharmacist by profession, but soon I realized that she, too, had a load of memories. At first her memories sounded to me like difficult experiences, but restrained. But soon I realized that they were painfully wild. Every night she would wake up with shouts of dread. I tried in vain to draw her out of the horror. Only coffee and a cigarette would calm her down in the morning. All that autumn I struggled with her dreams, but they were more powerful than I. In the end we parted.
Our women are a special nation. The sights of the war have been implanted in them with all their roots, and its better to avoid them. But what can you do? The others, who werent in the war, who were here or in America their softness is so empty that I dont know what to do with them. Their choice of words is like their wardrobe. Everything is ironed and full of cheap perfume. I prefer, in the end, our women. Our women wont tell you about their wardrobe, their diet, or about the films theyve seen. Our women are laden with life and experience. They dont demand assurances, and they dont ask for another trinket every night. They know: you cant buy love for the price of a pair of earrings. All that is well and good, but whats to be done? The potion they give you to drink every night is all bitterness and dread. After a night with one of our women, you come out exhausted, and you are left with only one wish: to flee, as far as possible.
The men are different, it seems. They, too, dream, but they know how to channel their dreams. Shouts arent heard from the mens rooms, but all sorts of heavy snoring. The men, it seems, respond another way. A year ago one of the tenants attacked Mrs. Prachts lover, knocked him to the ground, and in his great rage he stuck his penknife in his neck. If the maintenance man and a few of the tenants hadnt rushed to save him, its doubtful whether he would have come out alive. The attacker, one of the veteran tenants of the pension, a quiet, introverted man, used to sit in his room and drink most of the day. His drinking was inward turned and with no outward signs. In the pension they didnt remember him saying a single violent sentence. A man with no shadow, as they say. By himself, just by himself.
True, he had been seen with a woman several times. They were passing loves that didnt last long. He didnt complain, didnt accuse, lived on the savings he had accumulated in Italy after the war, acted modestly and was addicted to drink and classical music. But in the depth of his heart he was apparently in love with Mrs. Pracht, for when he attacked her lover, he was heard to shout, "Death to the rapists, death to the torturers."
Since that attack hes been living in a sanitarium. People from the pension visit him sometimes, and on holidays they buy him a new item of clothing or a bar of chocolate. In his illness, too, he is quiet and introverted, speaking little and listening a lot. During one of my visits he surprised me and asked whether I eat vegetables.
"Certainly," I answered.
"Youve got to eat a lot of vegetables."
"Who told you that?" I asked stupidly.
"Doctor Schutz," he said with a smile that exposed his small front teeth.
Since that short conversation I havent visited him again. Im not afraid of mad people, I even like to talk with them, but Edward poisoned me with his unrest. As though he wanted to plunge his penknife into me too. I know: theres nothing to be afraid of. In the sanitarium the patients are calm. If they go wild, theyre plied with sedatives. But for some reason Im afraid of him and dont visit him. Every holiday I make my contribution, but I wont go there.
The sanitarium isnt the only place where we have a representative. Tenants have left the pension and moved to Tel Aviv. Some have even left for America, one to Canada, and one returned to Poland. He lives near the cemetery and watches over it. Thus our pension has representatives in quite a few places, and sometimes we get greetings from them. The tenant in America got rich and sends us a package of clothing every holiday. The package arrives a week before the holiday, and its always exciting. The thought that theres a person so far away who remembers us by name is very heartwarming. Even Hannah the cook gets a gift every holiday, because the man didnt forget that she used to serve him coffee and cookies even when it wasnt mealtime.
Still, every one is for himself. In the early morning hours you feel the solitude rise thickly from the rooms. Here every tenant has unfinished business, and some of them have two or three pieces of unfinished business that they drag with them from place to place. Mainly they are dark and complex affairs, and if one of them is resolved, the pension is stunned for a few days.
At the end of the summer, preparations for the High Holydays begin. The memory of the holidays suddenly casts a cloud of gloom upon you. A man remembers his father and mother, his brothers and sisters, and he knows that once, not long ago, he had a house, and he got up early and went to high school every morning, and the air outdoors was fresh and bright, the streets were damp, and from the bakery there arose the fragrance of pastry taken from the oven just an hour ago. The distant memory comes and weakens you all at once, and you lie in bed, pull the blanket over your head, and just one desire throbs within you: to doze off as much as possible.
A week before the High Holydays they turn the reading room into a synagogue. Once Mrs. Pracht objected to that arrangement. She argued that the room wasnt intended for prayer but for reading and listening to music. Anyone who wanted to pray could go to Shaarei Hesed, the nearby orthodox neighbourhood. Mrs. Pracht doesnt like religious people, because they, in her opinion, attract people from Eastern Europe here, with everything thats unsuitable about that. "We came to free ourselves from that distorted and unaesthetic heritage." Quite a few tenants shared her opinion, but thanks to a stubborn and faithful handful, the room is turned into a synagogue for the High Holydays.
At one time Dory Zaum would stand before the Holy Ark and lead the prayers. Dory Zaum was a merchant, and for most of the year he was far from faith and doctrines. Not only that, he had a craving for non-kosher food. After the war he lived in France for eight years, and there he had not only learned French, but also to take pleasure in French delicacies. But during the month of Elul something changed in him. He began to hum the prayers, and he stood in his room and prayed for hours with the devotion of a believer.
Once he told me, "After my parents got divorced, they sent me to grandpa in a village. Grandpa was a cantor, and he took care of my education, because he knew that my parents didnt observe the commandments. I shook off the commandments pretty quickly, but prayer apparently captivated me." Here one might add: the High Holiday prayers wouldnt let go of him, and during the whole month of Elul he was conquered by it, he hardly did any business, not to mention dealings with women.
For many years he was our prayer leader. Then he got involved in something and had to flee to America. Every year a postcard comes from foreign parts. He married a woman, had children, and in recent years he made a fortune in the insurance business. Here we remember him during the High Holydays, because the prayers that he learned from his grandfather were imbued with the scent of the trees of the village, and he left us something of that fragrance.
For years we looked for a prayer leader and couldnt find one. Finally Zeidel found Rabbi Meshulam Bar, an old, blind rabbi whom a peasant had hidden in his barn during the war. Refugees took him in and brought him to Jerusalem. Since then hes lived in Shaarei Hesed, not far from the pension. On the High Holydays we bring him, and he is our prayer leader. Rabbi Meshulam Bar is very old and very blind, but his prayers are young. When he stands before the Holy Ark, he is bound to the God of his fathers without any obstruction. He stands and prays for hours. At the end of the service, hes so weak that you have to hold his arms and lead him to a chair. You dont hear prayers like those of Meshulam Bar anymore. The quivering prayers of cantors, the prayers of the throat, is a prayer that flatters the ear, but its not a prayer of the bones. After Rabbi Meshulam Bars prayers, youre far from yourself and bound to the firmament. Often, afterwards, you remain sitting in your chair and weeping, as if you only had learned just now what you underwent during all those years.
In that way, and not only in that way, the pension is divided into two factions. One faction is close to Rabbi Spiegler, and the other, the smaller one, is close to Rabbi Meshulam Bar. Rabbi Meshulam Bar doesnt study a great deal. He lies in bed most of the day, and if it werent for the prayers, he wouldnt get up. On the High Holydays he shakes himself like a lion and goes forth to worship his Creator. People dont go to Rabbi Meshulam Bar to study Torah, to ask advice. He is distant from people, and most of the day hes sunk in sleep. Only on the High Holydays is he uprooted from his sleep and stood on his feet, and he prays in a whispering melody that seeps into your bones. For several hours we, too, are bound to heaven.
After the High Holydays I go out to visit my daughter Clara. Clara is 21, her eyes are large, and her mouth opens when she listens. She hasnt changed for years: the same vocabulary and the same joy in her eyes. Every time I visit her she comes to me and calls me "dad." She immediately shows me everything new: what shes embroidered, what shes drawn, and what napkins shes sewn. Shes exactly my height. Also her features: the nose, the chin, the neck, not to mention the fingers a true copy of her father. I love her with all my soul. One day Ill come and take her out of the residence, and shell live with me.
She never complains, doesnt ask for a new dress or for paints. What she has on her shelves and in her drawers pleases her. But that satisfaction is especially painful to me. For a little while I sit in her room, and then we go out to the field that belongs to the residence. In the field is a vegetable garden, an animal corner, and fruit trees. I love to survey it with her. Here her big eyes open, and her brow broadens. She tells me with excitement about her work in the garden. This year, it seems, the fruit and vegetable harvest was good, and there was no need to buy anything. In the animal corner she has many friends: a dog that licks her fingers, a young monkey that clings to her like a baby, and doves that eat seed from her palms. In the presence of the animals her life broadens, and her face glows.
Clara doesnt talk a lot, but her face and hands express what is concealed in her heart. Every bush and flower brings excitement with it. Sometimes it seems to me that Clara is very close to mute things and animals, and that she speaks their language. In the winter they planted a row of grape vines. The seedlings took well, and they grew many shoots. "Dad, the fruit trees are pretty, arent they?" I dont know when and where she learned to say, "arent they?" But in her mouth it sounds new, as if she had invented the expression. Her vocabulary is the slenderest of slender, but every word is shaped with the tone of her voice.
"Wouldnt you like to go to town?" I often suggest.
"Why?" she is surprised.
"There are more people in town."
Hearing that sentence she would bend her head, as if I had said something incomprehensible. Sometimes she would squint, and that was a sign that I had made her ill at ease. Many times I was about to take her to Jerusalem, but just as we were about to get on the bus, she would change her mind.
This time she surprised me and said, "Ill go."
Her clear answer confused me, and I asked, "Today?"
"Today."
Within an hour we were on our way. Her thoughts, as I had learned, were simple and clear, and they had a kind of innocence that perplexed me. During one of my visits to her, we stood together next to the fence and watched a group of young people her age, running about wild and joyous. For a long time she looked at them, and finally she said, "Where are they going?"
"Home," I said.
"Dont they have a residence?"
"They have a home."
Upon hearing my words she smiled, as though Id told her a secret.
All the way to Jerusalem she looked out of the bus window in amazement. More than she asked, she smiled, as though no ordinary things were revealed to her, but marvels that you shouldnt ask about.
The pension greeted her with great excitement. Zeidel the poet wanted to seat her between himself and Christina.
Clara was embarrassed and answered most of Zeidels questions with a single sentence, "Very good." Zeidel found a rare tone in the few words she uttered. That pained me.
The whole pension was pleased with her, and on Saturday night they gave her a few presents, among other things, a fancy paint box. Clara was so moved that she hid her face in both hands.
The next day I returned her to the residence. All the way she didnt say a word. I didnt know whether she was sad or indifferent. I tried to get her to talk, but Clara said nothing. I, for some reason, thought to myself that she was angry at me, and she was right to be angry. Why had I pulled her out from her world? The directors opinion was different. She said, "You did a good thing by taking Clara on an excursion. An excursion brings good thoughts." I wasnt so sure about her statement. It seemed to me that I hurt her, and from now on she wouldnt want to leave any more. That sadness gave me no rest, and the next day I went back to her.
I had barely opened the gate before I saw Clara. She was hoeing in the garden. The guard at the entrance pointed with his finger, shes there, shes hoeing. She was bent over and immersed in her work. Her movements had a tempo that affected me so much I couldnt move my feet. The guard pointed again: "Shes there, dont you see her?" I ignored him and approached her. Clara didnt see me, and when she did notice me, she was frightened and said, "You startled me."
"How are you?"
"Thank God." She had acquired that expression here, too.
Now I saw: her posture was slightly shrunken, like a nuns.
When I first came to Israel, Clara and I lived in a small apartment in Tel Aviv. We lived there for two and a half years. Then I still deluded myself that she would change, that shed learn, that shed live her life. She was diligent, devoted, kept the house, and even prepared simple meals. I got used to the thought that her life would be connected to mine. At that time a social worker attached herself to me and urged me to put Clara in an institution. The woman aroused trust in me, and I didnt rebuff her. In time I was sorry that I hadnt done so. If Clara had stayed with me, my life would certainly have been different. I would have stayed in Tel Aviv, promenading with her along the seashore and buying her ice cream in the evening. But that social worker urged me so strongly that in the end I gave in.
When I delivered Clara to the director of the residence, I was sure that the next day Id come back and take her, and indeed I did come back the next day. To my surprise, Clara expressed no desire to return with me. She was content with the bed and the cupboard and the two friends who shared her room. Without urging her to come back, I returned to Tel Aviv. At the end of that week I went back again. Now it was as clear as daylight: she was content, even happy.
Every week I used to return to her in hopes she would say to me, "Dad, I want to come back to you." She never said a single word about the house in Tel Aviv. As though the residence had been her home forever. "Clara," I would ask her repeatedly, "do you feel good her?"
"Thank God," she would say again and again.
I noticed: something about the religiosity of the place had seeped into her. Sometimes she would say: "Ive already prayed in my heart." It is hard for her and her friends to learn to pray, but nevertheless the residence has a small synagogue, two classrooms, and a music room. The synagogue isnt used for prayer, and they dont study in the classrooms, but they sometimes give parties in the music room, and the director plays Israeli songs for them.
I couldnt bear the isolation of Tel Aviv, so I moved to Jerusalem and rented a room in Pension Pracht. Pension Pracht isnt an easy place to live, but there are people around you, sometimes showing affection. There are readings in the evening, and occasionally a woman.
Every visit to Clara weakens me, but this time it was as though I had discovered her anew. She doesnt only look like me; sometimes it seems to me that shes an integral part of me, and that when I die shell take on my character.
"Clara, dont you want to come to live in the pension with me?" I kept asking.
"What?" she kept responding in surprise.
Mrs. Pracht will give us a small apartment in her pension."
Once she said to me, "I like my residence," and I closed my mouth.
After that I stopped tormenting her. In Jerusalem Im involved in a lot of matters. More than once Ive forgotten Clara. Once I forgot about her for a whole month. When I went back to her, she wasnt angry. She greeted me with joy, as if Id visited her the day before. Since then Ive been careful: at least once every two weeks I go to visit her.
How different Clara is from her brother. Her brother is tall and sturdy and can easily pick up a sack of cement, an old cabinet, or a refrigerator. His innocence is as solid as his stature, and from year to year he grows more innocent. He could have been a doctor or an engineer, but his innocence was his undoing. Even in his childhood I noticed that a strange wonderment glowed in his gaze. While the other children in school would plot, accuse each other, and lie, he would tell the plain truth. At first I was proud of him, but in time, when I saw that that quality was rooted in him, suspicion arose in my heart that there might be something in him like Clara, and I stopped talking about his honesty.
His innocence wasnt foolish. That was proven by his mathematics notebooks. The teacher kept praising the neatness of his notebook, the clear handwriting, and the correct solutions. True, he didnt speak up in class to be more accurate, he didnt utter a word but he was very attentive and absorbed everything that was said. He wasnt an outstanding pupil, because he never raised his hand, never asked, never corrected the others. He was taller than everyone else, but his height, for some reason, wasnt noticed in the class. "Arthur the innocent," the nickname stuck to him even in first grade. Sometimes they would tease him and tell him that the principal had called him, or that the nurse wanted to give him an injection. His faith in people was boundless. He fell into the trap every time. He didnt learn from his mistakes, they said. A person who doesnt learn from his mistakes is a fool.
Everybody knew that Arthur was excellent in mathematics. In fourth grade he was already solving equations with two unknowns. But that excellence wasnt seen as a virtue. They said that Arthur had a mathematical mind, but in other subjects he was a fool. "Dont you understand?" I didnt cease saying to him. "Dont you understand that you cant believe in people? You mustnt tell the whole truth." My words were apparently in vain.
This lasted all through elementary school. If he had got angry, responded hastily, or cursed, everyone would have said that he was learning from experience and would change. Arthur didnt get angry, didnt respond hastily, and when people teased or tormented him, a kind of astonishment lit his face. As though it wasnt abuse, but a discovery. That astonishment was widely known in the school. More than once a pupil would boast: I enticed him to come with me, and he came. When he discovered that I had cheated him, he wasnt angry. He was taller than all the boys in the class and had strong, bony fists. He could have dealt some solid blows. But his long arms werent trained for that. They were always held close his body, as though to keep them from doing damage.
Nevertheless Arthur finished secondary school with distinction, and I was sure that from now on his life would be easier. I was wrong, of course. The army doesnt like innocent people. During basic training he already got into trouble and sat in a military prison for a few days. His visible innocence drove people out of their minds.
Arthur was a perfect copy of his mother. Like her, he trusted people and animals. After the war, on the shore in Italy, his mother took lost cats and dogs into the shed. I begged her: "Why are you taking them in?" Her love for animals was boundless. In the end she became infected with a rare disease, was feverish for a week, and died at the age of 26. To this day I tremble when I remember her. The two children she left in my hands are my life. In point of fact I have no other life. Now Arthur works for an insurance company. He earns a good living, but he spends most of his money on needy people, and the rest on abandoned animals.
It hurts me that his life is wasted, but I cant change him. Sometimes he comes to me and asks for a contribution for some needy person or, rather, for a dog that urgently needs an operation. I give it to him without a doubt. His devotion sometimes hurts me more than Claras confined life. What is there to add?
In November its cold in Jerusalem. I sleep late and miss breakfast. My life is scattered in many places. When I was 17 I lost my parents. But I am bound to them to this day by many ties. They have changed over the years. Theyre no longer young the way they were, but some youthful tones are preserved in their voice. I sometimes hear them. I only have two photographs of them left. Father was a successful manufacturer, and mother was a pharmacist. Nothing stood out at home, no decoration or luxurious furniture. Dad ran his business with a lot of verve. Ive apparently inherited my practical approach to life from him. His practicality was quiet and direct. He never pretended. What he had to say, he said, without wasting words and without preaching.
Mother was very different from him: secretly bound to her ancestors. She didnt talk about that, not with me and not with anyone else, but even then I felt that she had a strange discourse with life. She bequeathed to me her love of animals, of the night, and of what is hidden. I dont like to talk about those things either, but Ill say this: if it werent for my love of God, my existence would be more miserable.
Im also bound to my grandparents with my heart and soul. They lived in the Carpathians and traded in lumber. Every summer I used to visit them. There I learned to rest at the foot of tall trees, to listen to the birds, to see foxes in their flight, and to eat malai. Grandma used to bake two kinds of malai: malai filled with cheese and malai filled with prunes. Grandpa was a merchant of the old sort, suspicious and not trustful of people, but when he stood by the window and prayed, his suspicion would dissolve, and he would cling to God with heart and soul. I loved grandma, but I was in awe of grandpa.
There are days when I feel that dad is driving my life, and his thoughts elevate my own. I indeed do not rise up as he did, but I apparently inherited from him my feeling for time, for merchandise, and for money. I usually invest at the right time and get out of a business or a currency before they collapse. In my youth I used to take risks and make a lot. In recent years Ive done everything cautiously, and in my great apprehension I keep too much cash on my person. That way, of course, you dont soar up, but at least you dont fall.
My mother paved the way to faith for me. Its hard for me to talk about that. She wasnt a religious woman, she didnt light Sabbath candles, and she didnt go to synagogue, but her life was bound to mystery. I never asked her about her thoughts, and she never spoke about them, but I felt the secrets hidden in her. More than once in my childhood I wanted to ask her whether she believed in God, but I didnt ask. I knew that there are things you dont ask about, but her whole way of being said that she was connected to heaven, and from there she drew her essence. In recent years Ive become very closely tied to her. Even in my commonplace business affairs I am bound to her. Once I was sure that correct calculation was preferable to a guess. Now I know that a guess, if its bound to the right sources, is much more precise than calculation. Sometimes she would tell dad, "My heart tells me." Dad learned over the years to respect her guesses, but I received that longing for mystery without asking questions.
Five years before the outbreak of the war, she told dad, "My heart tells me that we have to leave this place."
"For where?" dads question was not slow in coming.
"I dont know."
"To leave everything and go?"
Mother didnt insist. It was easier to deny feelings than opinions. Opinions are gripped in the soil, as it were, but feelings are always without a hanger, they are suspended by a thread. My father was then, as they say, at the height of his success. His factories were expanding, and he was involved body and soul in raising capital. Everyone, including dad, was certain that Hitlers rise was merely apparent, and that he would break down and disappear. Mother didnt press him to leave, even after the rumours took on the guise of dreadful sights.
Time flies, and places alternate with each other, but Im bound to my parents day by day. Sometimes it seems to me that my parents were different from one another. Thats an error, I assume. I heard a great deal about dads commercial successes, even in the years after the war. But I never heard a thing about my mother. Two years ago one of the elderly residents of the pension approached me and asked me whether my name was indeed Braunbart, and whether I was the son of Bontsa. When I confirmed that I was indeed her son, her eyes filled with light.
She had studied at pharmacy school with my mother for four years. They had shared a room in the dormitories. Life had separated them from one another. Mother had gone back to her home town, and she had followed her beloved to Budapest. I immediately noticed; something of mother shone in the skin of her face, and I liked her right away. "Your mother," she revealed to me, "was a very special woman. Everyone who knew her loved her. She always found a good side in every one of us. You cant imagine how much she used to help people."
Since people in the pension heard that I was the son of Bontsa, they have looked at me with hidden fondness. Sometimes it seems to me that they expect me to do something special, and that embarrasses me. Not that I dont have a desire to do things. But my life, my habits, have made me a selfish creature. This constriction oppresses me, and I sometimes feel unclean. I have often thought that it would be good if I worked as a volunteer in my daughter Claras residence. I would live a simple and faithful life. What can I do? Im bound up with my assets and my cash as to a stubborn root. My head buzzes day and night. Even in my deep dreams I make calculations. Those calculations havent brought me very far. Im an ordinary trader, retaining what I have and worried about tomorrow. Sometimes it seems to me that, were it not for my fears, I would shake myself, undo my unworthy desires and work for the general good. True, sometimes a clever transaction can raise you up for a moment, but beyond that, nothing. You buy and sell, and in the end your soul is emptied.
Yesterday my son Arthur came to visit me, and I was happy to see him. Sometimes it seems to me that he does exactly what I should do: hes devoted himself to the general good. Im so immersed in my miserable desires, giving little and receiving little, and what there was in me has evaporated. If it werent for Clara, my life would be even more restricted. Clara doesnt ask a thing from me. Every time I bring her a piece of clothing or a box of candy she quickly hides them in the cupboard, as though they were luxuries. When she was a little girl I was sure that she would grow up and be a nurse or doctor. From her childhood she loved animals and liked to help.
Some people pity me. Theyre mistaken. My children give me nothing but joy. If I knew how to love the way they do, my life would leave its wretchedness.
Translated by Jeffrey M. Green