Four Mothers

by Shifra Horn

  On the Saturday night preceding the redemption the earth trembled. The Turkish cannons thundered without a pause, and with every shell that exploded Pnina-Mazal, clasping Geula to her bosom, became more radiant, murmuring to herself: “Redemption is at hand, redemption is at hand.” And as if the noise of the cannons weren’t enough, the worst storm in living memory chose that day to burst upon the town. The noise of the thunder rivaled the noise of the cannon fire, and fierce flashes of lightning lit up the sky, until it split open and flooded the parched and dusty town. And the louder the noise outside grew, the more the sky shuddered and the earth shook, the more Pnina-Mazal’s heart filled with joy. She pressed her nose to the window shuddering with the blast of the explosions and rattling with the deafening noise of the thunder, and tears of happiness ran down her cheeks and wet the inside of the windowpane as well. Only after midnight did the stillness of death descend on the town, as if the thunder and the cannons had declared a truce.

  Then the sound of the retreating army was heard in a soft shuffle of hasty feet, shod in rags or whatever substitutes for shoes the men could lay their hands on. By morning the sound of the soldiers’ footsteps was stilled, and the rumor spread through the town that the Turkish army had surrendered to the British army on the hill of the village of Lifta. Then the emaciated figures of the population of Jerusalem began to emerge slowly from their houses. First they stumbled out like rats peeping from their holes and blinking their blind eyes in the light of the sun. Then they gathered courage and walked with their heads high down the streets scattered with rags and human remains, growing braver as they made their way to the Turkish government offices in the Kishleh. Like a swarm of locusts they descended on the building. They invaded the rooms, broke down the doors, flung the papers off the wooden desks, tore up the floor tiles, dug into the plaster of the walls, exposed copper pipes and ripped them from their places. When nothing was left and the building was naked and bare, they climbed on the roof and tore up the red roof tiles. After that they clustered in the streets, delighting in their freedom to stand together in a crowd, shoulder to shoulder with their fellows. They were no longer beholden to the Turkish laws, which forbade gatherings of more than three people in the streets of their town. All who defied this law did so at their peril, for the Turkish police would beat them with batons, search their pockets, rob them of their last pennies, and send them with aching backs and empty pockets to jail.

  Leaving Yitzhak in the faithful care of Davida, Sara and Pnina-Mazal with the tiny baby pressed to her bosom joined the crowd at the Jaffa Gate to see the entry of the God-sent English Messiah into the heart of Jerusalem.

  “The General was full of light,” Pnina-Mazal said later. “The sun brightened his hair and the flashing of the bronze buttons on his uniform hurt my eyes. On foot the General entered the gates of the Old City, and there, on the steps of the citadel, he read us our rights in eight languages, and the words he spoke in one language fit the words of the language before it like a glove.”

  And a guard of honor stood around General Allenby. There were dark-skinned soldiers whose white teeth flashed in their black faces, and others wearing short plaid skirts. Soldiers belonging to other regiments wore broad-brimmed hats on their heads, and they all spoke English in different accents, and Pnina-Mazal, straining her ears to hear their whispers, understood them all.

  Happy and content, Sara hugged her daughter and her granddaughter and gazed at the scene in front of her. Suddenly she felt giddy as the world before her eyes was bathed in blue. Overcome by weakness, she leaned on her daughter as a strong hand reached out and gripped her elbow. She found herself gazing into Edward’s eyes as he stood before her armed with his tripod and black camera.

  “I’ve come back,” he said, and then recoiled as he saw Pnina-Mazal and the red-haired baby in her arms. And he immediately resumed his place by the side of the General, leaving Sara with the painful longings that racked her body.

  And when they walked home, they saw lights flickering in all the windows. The first candle of Hanukkah had been lit in all the houses of Jerusalem, the first candle of redemption, and Sara began to believe in her daughter’s prophecies. For with her own eyes she had seen her redemption today, and looked it in the eye.

  * * *

  When the two women came home exhausted from the citadel, they found Yitzhak and Davida sitting on the big brass bed, holding hands, Davida’s green eyes looking deeply into Yitzhak’s blank ones. On his face was an expression of satisfaction, as if he had just polished off a rich repast of chickens dripping fat and mounds of sweet rice. Sara stood in the doorway breathing hard.

  “I’m getting married,” announced Davida in the silence that had fallen in the room, as if she were addressing a hall full of people, and she avoided Sara’s eyes.

  “Congratulations,” Sara said, and a feeling of relief spread through her. “Who’s the bridegroom? Do I know him?”

  Davida giggled. “Yitzhak,” she said without batting an eye, and she planted a kiss on his lips as he tightened his grip on her hand.

  Sara sat down heavily on the bed next to them and looked at her son. His eyes had a strange, different look, and his face was shining. She had never seen him like this before. For a moment it seemed to her that his expressionless face showed signs of animation, and that he was about to engage her in conversation.

  “But he isn’t capable of getting married,” Sara said, with the taste of the dust that had disappeared from the streets of the town on her tongue, as if it had returned to take refuge in her mouth.

  “I’ve chosen him to be my husband,” Davida declared firmly. “And I’ve given the matter a lot of thought,” she added, as if to justify her choice.

  “But he isn’t capable of supporting you,” Sara tried again.

  “I’ve found a solution to that too. Tomorrow I’m going to start looking after the children in the kindergarten, and my salary will be enough to support us both,” Davida said confidently. “And apart from that, I’m sure you’ll be happy to have him continue living here, and me with him.”

  “And the children you’ll have, what will happen to them?” Sara wrung her hands.

  “We’ll worry about that when they arrive,” Davida replied absentmindedly and pressed Yitzhak’s body to hers in a tight hug. Her arms were too short to encompass his great girth.

  Sara looked at them and thought she saw her son closing his eyes and basking in the unfamiliar pleasure spreading through his limbs.

  “And how will he consecrate the marriage?” she asked.

  “With a ring,” Davida replied, and burst out laughing.

  “And what will you talk to him about?”

  “Since when does a wife have to talk to her husband?” she replied with a question.

  Sara, feeling utterly exhausted, called Pnina-Mazal and asked her to talk to her brother.

  “He wants Davida,” she reported to her mother later. “And we should be delighted that he’s found himself a wife.”

  “And from now on I have another mouth to feed,” Sara said resentfully. But she decided not to interfere in her son’s decision.

  * * *

  Davida’s parents were no longer alive, and so Sara found herself making her way through the alleys of the Old City to Mrs. Nahmias’s mikvah. Davida took off her clothes with open enjoyment and without any hesitation and with light, dancing steps hopped into the pool. At the command of the rabbi’s wife she sank several times into the black water, her hair sinking with her, and emerged clean, pure, and ready for her wedding night.

  Under the hastily erected canopy she was awaited by Yitzhak, worn out by the daylong fast imposed on him and muttering the word “food.” His fair hair was combed and parted down the middle of his head, and his new suit lent him the look of a European aristocrat on a slumming expedition. Davida stood festive beside him, a bunch of white lilies in her hands. Her thin body was squeezed into Pnina-Mazal’s wedding gown, despite Sara’s disapproval and protests.<
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  “She wore this dress to marry David, and he’s dead. It will bring you bad luck. I’ll sew you a new one,” she said, trying to dissuade Davida from wearing the dress.

  “I’ll get married in this one and this one only,” pronounced Davida.

  To the sound of sniggers from the few guests gathered round, Davida put the ring on her own finger, repeated the rabbi’s words, and consecrated herself to Yitzhak in a clear, firm voice. Then she took the glass of wine, sipped it, and handed it to Yitzhak. Yitzhak held the glass in both hands, gulped down all the wine with a deafening noise, threw it to the ground, and demanded food. Gently Davida lifted his foot, placed it on the glass, and pressed it down hard until the glass cracked.

  “Mazal tov,” the congregation called weakly.

  When the ceremony was over Davida linked arms with her elegant husband, circulated among the guests, and fed him tidbits from the table like a bird feeding its famished young.

  All that night Sara never slept a wink. Even though she tried to shut her ears, she could not help hearing the heavy grunts of her son and the squeals of delight with which Davida responded to him. The next day they stayed in bed, and Sara brought them breakfast on a tray. Davida noticed Yitzhak’s hand stealing toward the fresh pitas and slapped it lightly. Daintily she split the top pita, broke off a little piece, and popped it into his open mouth, after which she planted a kiss on his lips.

  After spending a week in bed, Davida began making her way weakly to work at her new job, leaving Yitzhak cosily ensconced in bed, waiting for her return. When she came home she would nibble at the food prepared by Sara, take off her clothes, and join her husband in bed. And again Yitzhak’s grunts would invade the house, accompanied by squeals of delight and deep, throaty moans from his wife. Davida’s thin body grew thinner, and black circles darkened the hollows under her eyes, as if someone had maliciously painted them with kohl.

  The day she discovered that she was with child, she stopped sharing her husband’s bed, and he would wait for her in vain, lying on his back between the quilts and the pillows. After she moved her bedding into Pnina-Mazal and baby Geula’s room, he would stand at the closed door, his tongue lolling from his dribbling mouth, with the look of a beaten dog in his eyes. During this period her small breasts grew round and heavy and the sharp angles of her body were padded with flesh.

  And it was as if all the troubles in the world had descended on Davida. Sara would find her dissolved in tears, and when she made her bed in the morning the pillow was soaked. It seemed as if the baby in her womb had breached a dam of tears within her and filled her with an incomprehensible sorrow.

  When Sara tried to talk to her and find out what the matter was, she would shrug her shoulders and snap, “Nothing,” and put an end to the conversation. Tactfully Sara and Pnina-Mazal tried to urge her to return to her husband’s bed, but she stubbornly refused, and avoided any contact with the father of her unborn child.

  * * *

  About six months after Geula’s birth, an event occurred that changed Pnina-Mazal’s life. The polished English officer stood in the doorway as if struck dumb, staring at Sara. Her eyes opened wide in astonishment, blurring the network of fine wrinkles surrounding them. It wasn’t every day that a tall English officer in an elegant uniform knocked at her door. He cleared his throat, straightened his uniform, adjusted the angle of the hat on his head, opened his mouth, and failed to find the right words. Sara invited him to come inside. The officer took off his hat, bowed his head politely, and followed her into the house.

  As if she had been entertaining English officers all her life, she seated him on the sofa in the front room and went to look for Pnina-Mazal, who was hanging out Geula’s diapers in the yard.

  Pnina-Mazal handed her baby to her mother, tidied her clothes, tightened the kerchief over her hair, which had begun to grow, and went into the house. The Englishman, sitting straight and stiff as a ramrod on the sofa, rose hurriedly to his feet when the two women entered the room. Pnina-Mazal greeted him in his language. It seemed to Sara that a look of relief spread over his face, and after drinking a glass of cold water he entered into a long conversation with Pnina-Mazal. Pnina-Mazal had always loved talking English, and the longer he spoke to her the more her face glowed. Every now and then she gave voice to a contented chuckle, and immediately resumed her serious expression. It seemed to Sara that she agreed with everything he said. When the officer parted from them with a slight bow and a click of his heels, Sara stared at her daughter’s exultant face.

  “What did he want with you?” she asked even before he had turned his back and walked out of the door.

  “Edward sent him.”

  At the sound of the name Sara turned pale.

  “He came to offer me work,” Pnina-Mazal quickly explained.

  “Where?” whispered Sara.

  “Edward recommended me,” she repeated slowly, as if the mention of his name had rendered her mother incapable of taking anything in. “They need a translator fluent in English and the local languages.”

  “And what did you tell him?”

  “I told him yes. We need the money, and he said he would pay me generously.”

  “And what about Geula?”

  “We’ll give her to the Arab woman from the village to nurse, the one who gave birth the same day I did. Her breasts are bursting with milk. Esther told me she came back to the neighborhood looking for Jewish babies whose mothers’ milk had run dry, so that she could nurse them and earn a few pennies.”

  “I have no intention of letting my granddaughter roll around in a filthy peasant’s hut together with the sheep and the goats,” Sara heard herself announcing. “And think of all the fleas and the lice the place must be swarming with,” she added.

  “We can ask her to bring her baby here, and in the evening, when I come back, she can go home.”

  Sara made no reply and busied herself with the dough she was rolling out for pitas.

  With Geula clasped in her arms Pnina-Mazal kept at her mother all day, until Sara unwillingly gave in, and together they set out for the nearby village to pay their respects to the Arab woman. The village children, barefoot and filthy-faced, accompanied by swarms of glittering green flies, ran happily in front of them to show them where Fatma lived. The dirt path that led to the house was trodden firm by innumerable footsteps and adorned by the small, pointed hoofprints of the goats and by their round black turds. The two women bent down to go through the door and blinked their eyes. Their pupils dilated to adjust themselves to the chilly darkness of the interior after the dazzling sunlight outside.

  From the dark recesses of the hut a short, fat woman with a pleasant expression hurried toward them. When she saw who her visitors were she wiped her hands on the gray apron tied round her waist, hastened up to Sara, took hold of her hand, and kissed it. Sara’s eyes, having accustomed themselves to the cold darkness of the hut, scanned the room mercilessly. In one corner stood a pile of colored mattresses, set one upon the other with military precision, with a number of noisy, black-faced infants jumping merrily on top of it. They climbed up the mattresses as if they were a soft ladder leading them to their heart’s desire, jumped with suicidal leaps to the floor, and clambered up again. Fatma silenced them with an “Uskut,” which did not appear to make much of an impression on them. They froze for a moment on top of the heap, giggled, and continued their game.

  Sara went on scanning the room with prying eyes. There was not a goat or a sheep to be seen, nor even a broody hen. The floor, which was paved with big stones, had just been washed, and it shone at her with a cool, welcoming wetness. Next to the window stood a baby’s cradle made of iron, which rocked on curved legs. Plump hands poked out of it and waved cheerfully in the air, accompanied by the soft gurgle of a well-fed baby singing a private lullaby to himself before he went to sleep. Fatma hurried to the big clay water jar standing sweating next to the door and offered them chipped tin mugs, cool to the touch, full of cold water. While Pn
ina-Mazal sipped her water and Fatma hurried to the smoking clay oven outside and pulled out thin pitas, Sara examined the thick walls enclosing her, which were painted a fresh turquoise, and sensed the minty taste of the color on her tongue.

  Fatma quickly came back and laid before them on the bench olives, a big, steaming pita that had been folded in four, and a slab of salty goat cheese, apologizing as she did so for the modesty of the refreshments.

  Without beating about the bush Pnina-Mazal turned to her and explained in Arabic the purpose of their visit.

  Fatma’s eyes widened in delight and she kissed the hand of her benefactor.

  “Ever since the death of my husband I have been struggling to support my five children. There is only a year between them, and they are all boys,” she said proudly. Without being asked she hurried to the cradle in the corner of the room and picked up the sleeping baby. Cradling him in her arms in front of the two women, she unwrapped his swaddling clothes and proudly displayed his plump body. Muhammad’s legs kicked in glee at the unexpected nakedness that had fallen to his lot, and Sara felt a pang as she compared his fat, juicy legs to the skinny, transparent limbs of her granddaughter.

  With her sharp instincts Fatma placed the heavy, kicking baby in Sara’s lap and pulled her black dress with its embroidered bodice over her head. The women’s eyes widened in wonder. Above her white cotton bloomers hung two enormous cone-shaped breasts equipped with stiff black nipples, which stuck out in the cool air of the room like two spears threatening to pierce the eyes of the beholder. Smilingly she held out her breasts, like a peasant woman in the market displaying two bursting watermelons to the shoppers. Then she asked Pnina-Mazal to feel her breast. Obediently Pnina-Mazal tried to take hold of the breast looming up in front of her, and found that one hand was not enough to encompass its girth. She enlisted her second hand too, and enviously felt the weight of the Arab woman’s breast.

  “I only finished feeding Muhammad a few minutes ago,” Fatma said, and she retreated slowly to the end of the room with her breasts swaying in front of her, facing them all the time as if afraid they might run away if she turned her broad back to them.