Scenes from Village Life

by Amos Oz

  So he finished off his last two letters, to Ada Dvash about relocating the post office and to the council treasurer about the pension rights of an employee, filed the contents of his in-tray, placed all his letters in the out-tray, checked the windows and shutters, put on his three-quarter-length suede coat and double-locked the door. He planned to walk past the Memorial Garden, collect his wife from the bench where she was probably still sitting and go home with her for lunch. He turned around, though, and went back to his office, because he had a feeling he might have forgotten to shut down the computer, or left a light on in the toilet. But the computer was shut down and the lights were all switched off, so Benny Avni double-locked his door again and went off to look for his wife.

  2

  NAVA WAS NOT SITTING on the bench by the Memorial Garden. In fact she was nowhere to be seen. But Adel, the skinny student, was sitting there, on his own, with an open book lying face-down on his lap. He was staring at the street while sparrows chirruped overhead in the trees. Benny Avni laid his hand on Adel's shoulder.

  "Has my wife been here?" he inquired gently, as if he feared he might hurt the boy. Adel replied that she had been there, but that she wasn't there anymore.

  "I can see that," Benny Avni said, "but I thought you might know which way she went."

  "I'm sorry," said Adel. "I'm really sorry."

  "That's all right," said Benny Avni. "It's not your fault."

  He made his way home, via Synagogue Street and Tribes of Israel Street. He leaned forward as he walked, as though contending with some invisible obstacle. Everyone he passed greeted him with a smile, because the mayor was a popular figure. He too smiled, and asked how they were, and what was new, and sometimes he added that the problem of the cracked paving stones was being taken care of. Soon they would all go home for their lunch and their Friday siesta, and the streets of the village would be empty.

  The front door was unlocked, and the radio was playing softly in the kitchen. Someone was talking about the development of the railway network and the advantages of rail over road transport. Benny Avni looked for a note from Nava in the usual place, under the vase in the living room, but there was none. His lunch was waiting for him, though, on the kitchen table, on a plate covered with another plate to keep it warm: a quarter of a chicken, with potato purée, carrots and peas. The plate was flanked by a knife and fork, and there was a folded napkin under the knife. Benny Avni put the plate in the microwave for two minutes, since, despite being covered, the food was not very warm. Meanwhile, he took a bottle of beer from the fridge and poured himself a glass. He consumed his lunch hungrily yet barely noticed what he ate, because he was listening to the radio, which was now broadcasting light music, with long breaks for commercials. During one of these breaks he thought he heard Nava's footsteps outside on the garden path. He stared out of the kitchen window, but no one was there. Among the weeds and junk was the shaft of a broken cart and a couple of rusty bicycles.

  When he had finished eating, he put the dirty dishes in the sink and went to have a shower, turning off the radio on the way. A deep silence fell on the house. The only sound was the ticking of the clock on the wall. The twelve-year-old twin girls, Yuval and Inbal, were away on a school trip to Upper Galilee. The door to their bedroom was closed, and as he went past he opened it and peered inside. The shutters were closed, and there was a smell of soap and freshly ironed linen. Gently closing the door, he went to the bathroom. After removing his shirt and trousers, he suddenly recovered his presence of mind and went to the telephone. He was still not worried, but he wondered where Nava had disappeared to and why she had not waited for him, as she always did, for lunch. He rang Gili Steiner and asked if by any chance Nava was with her.

  "No, she's not," Gili said. "Why? Did she tell you she was coming to see me?"

  "That's just it, she didn't say anything."

  "The grocer is open till two, maybe she popped out to buy something."

  "Thanks, Gili. It's OK, she'll probably be back soon. I'm not worried."

  Despite which, he looked up the number of Victor's grocery and dialed it. The phone rang for a long time before anyone answered. Eventually Old Liebersohn's nasal tenor voice spoke, in a liturgical singsong:

  "Victor's grocery, this is Shlomo Liebersohn speaking, how may I help you?"

  Benny Avni asked after Nava, and Old Liebersohn replied mournfully:

  "No, Comrade Avni, I am very sorry to say your lovely wife has not been seen here today. We have not had the pleasure of her charming company. Nor are we likely to, seeing that in ten minutes' time we are closing the shop and going home to prepare to welcome the Sabbath Bride."

  Benny Avni went back to the bathroom, stripped off his underwear, adjusted the temperature of the water and took a long shower. While he was drying himself he thought he heard the door creak, so he called out "Nava?" But there was no reply. Putting on clean underwear and a pair of khaki trousers, he combed the kitchen for clues, then went to the living room and checked the corner where the TV was. He looked in their bedroom and in the enclosed veranda, which served as Nava's studio. This was where she spent long hours modeling figurines in clay, imaginary creatures or boxers with square jaws and broken noses. She fired them in a kiln in the storage shed. He went to the shed, switched on the light and stood there blinking for a moment, but all he could see were contorted clay figures and the cold kiln surrounded by dark shadows cavorting among the dusty shelves.

  Benny Avni wondered if he should go and lie down without waiting for her. He went to the kitchen and, putting his dirty dishes in the dishwasher, looked for clues as to whether Nava had eaten before going out, but the dishwasher was almost full, and he could not identify which plates, if any, Nava had used for her lunch.

  There was a saucepan on the stove with some cooked chicken in it, but it was impossible to tell whether Nava had eaten or not. Benny Avni sat down by the phone and rang Batya Rubin's number, to see if Nava was with her, but the phone rang and rang and no one answered. "Really," Benny said to himself, and went to the bedroom to lie down. Nava's slippers were by the bed. They were small, brightly colored and rather worn at the heel; they looked like a pair of toy boats. He lay on his back for a quarter of an hour or twenty minutes, staring at the ceiling. Nava took offense easily, and he had learned over the years that any attempt to mollify her only upset her more, so he preferred to say nothing and allow the passage of time to soothe her. She contained herself, but she never forgot. Once her friend Gili Steiner, the doctor, had suggested holding a little exhibition of Nava's figurines in the council art gallery. Benny Avni had promised with a smile that he would think about it and let Gili know. In the end he had decided that it would not be proper to hold the exhibition in the council's gallery. After all, Nava was only an amateur artist, and she could display her work in a corridor at the school where she worked, so as to avoid imputations of favoritism and so on. Nava had said nothing, but for several nights she stood ironing in their bedroom till three or four in the morning. She had ironed everything, even the towels and bedspreads.

  After twenty minutes or so Benny Avni got up, dressed, went down to the cellar, switched on the light, unleashing a swarm of insects, peered at the packing cases and suitcases, fingered the power drill, tapped the wine barrel, which responded with a hollow sound, turned off the light, went upstairs to the kitchen, hesitated for a moment or two, put on his three-quarter-length suede coat over his shapeless pullover and left the house without locking up. Leaning forward as though contending with a strong headwind, he went in search of his wife.

  3

  ON FRIDAY AFTERNOONS there was never anybody around in the village. Everyone was at home, resting in preparation for going out in the evening. It was a gray, humid day. Clouds hung low over the rooftops, and skeins of fine mist drifted in the streets, lined with shuttered, slumbering houses. A scrap of old newspaper fluttered across the empty street; Benny stooped, picked it up and put it in a trash can. A big mongrel approached
him near the Pioneers' Garden and started to follow him, growling and baring its teeth. Benny shouted at the dog, but it became angry and seemed likely to leap at him. Benny stooped, picked up a stone and waved his arm in the air. The dog continued to follow him at a safe distance, its tail between its legs. So they both proceeded along the empty street, some thirty feet apart, and turned left into Founders Street. Here too all the shutters were closed for the siesta. They were mostly old wooden shutters painted a faded green. Some of the slats were bent or missing.

  Here and there, in yards that had once been farmyards but were now uncared for, Benny Avni noticed a disused dovecote, a goat shed that had been converted into a storeroom, an abandoned truck overgrown with weeds near a corrugated-iron barn or a kennel no longer in use. Mighty palm trees grew in front of the houses. There had been two old palm trees in front of his house, but at Nava's request they had both been cut down four years previously, because the rustling of their fronds in the breeze outside their bedroom window had disturbed her sleep at night and made her feel irritable and sad.

  Jasmine and asparagus fern grew in some gardens, whereas in others there was nothing but weeds, and tall pine trees whispering in the wind. Bent forward in his usual way, Benny Avni went along Founders Street and Tribes of Israel Street, passed the Memorial Garden and paused for a moment by the bench where, according to Adel, Nava had been sitting when she had asked him to take the note saying Don't worry about me to Benny in his temporary office.

  The dog, too, paused, some thirty feet away from him. It was not growling or baring its teeth now, but staring at Benny Avni with an intelligent, inquisitive air. Nava and he had both been single and studying in Tel Aviv when she became pregnant. She was training to be a teacher, and he was doing business studies. They had agreed at once that the unwanted pregnancy must be terminated, but two hours before the time of her appointment at a private clinic in Reines Street, Nava had changed her mind. Laying her head on his chest, she had begun to cry.

  He had refused to give in, though. He had pleaded with her to be reasonable; there was no alternative, and after all, the whole thing was no worse than having a wisdom tooth removed.

  He had waited for her in a café across the road from the clinic. He had read two newspapers, had even read the sports supplement. Nava had emerged after two hours, looking pale, and they had taken a taxi back to their room in a student residence. Six or seven noisy students were there waiting for Benny Avni. They had come for some meeting that had been arranged long before. Nava got into the bed in the corner of the room and pulled the bedclothes over her head, but the arguments, the shouting, the jokes and the cigarette smoke permeated through to her nonetheless. She felt weak and nauseated. She groped her way through the assembled company, leaning on the wall for support, until she reached the toilet. Her head was going round and the pain was coming back as the effects of the anesthetic wore off. In the toilet she found that someone had been sick all over the floor and the seat. Unable to stop herself, she threw up too. She stood there for a long time, crying, with her hands on the wall and her head on her hands, until the noisy visitors had left and Benny found her, shivering. He put his arm around her shoulders and gently led her back to bed. They were married two years later, but Nava had trouble conceiving. Various doctors helped her with all sorts of treatments. It was another five years before the twin girls, Yuval and Inbal, were born. Nava and Benny never spoke about that afternoon in the student room in Tel Aviv. It was as if they had agreed that there was no need to talk about it. Nava taught at the school, and in her spare time she modeled clay figures of monsters and broken-nosed boxers that she fired in a kiln in the storage shed. Benny Avni was elected mayor, and most of the villagers liked him because he was unassuming and a good listener, but he also had the knack of getting others to do what he wanted, without their noticing.

  4

  ON THE CORNER of Synagogue Street he stopped for a moment and turned to see if the dog was still following him. It was standing by a gate, with its tail between its legs and its mouth open, watching Benny with patient curiosity. Benny called to it softly and the dog pricked up its ears and let its pink tongue loll out. It seemed to be interested in Benny, but preferred to keep its distance. There was not another living soul around, not even a cat or a bird, just Benny and the mongrel, and the clouds that had come down so low they almost touched the tops of the cypresses.

  The water tower stood on three concrete legs, and next to it was an air-raid shelter. Benny Avni tried the metal door and, discovering that it was not locked, went inside and down twelve steps. A damp, stagnant draft touched his skin as he felt for the light switch. There was no power. Even so, he entered the dark space and groped among vaguely identifiable objects: a pile of mattresses or folding beds and some kind of broken chest of drawers. He inhaled the heavy air and groped his way back through the darkness toward the steps, trying the light switch again as he passed it. There was still no power. He closed the iron door and returned to the empty street.

  The wind had dropped, but the mist still billowed and blurred the outlines of the old houses, some of which were indeed more than a century old. The yellow stucco had cracked and crumbled on the walls, leaving dirty bald patches. Gray pines grew in the gardens, and the properties were divided from one another by hedges of cypress. Here and there a rusting lawnmower or a disintegrating washtub could be seen in a jungle of grass, nettles, couch grass and convolvulus.

  Benny Avni whistled softly but the dog continued to keep its distance. In front of the synagogue, which had been erected when the village was founded, back at the beginning of the twentieth century, there was a notice board to which were pinned advertisements for the films showing at the local cinema and the products of the winery, as well as some council notices bearing his own signature. Benny paused for a moment to look at these notices, but for some reason they seemed to him redundant or totally erroneous. He thought he caught sight of a stooping figure at the corner of the street, but as he drew closer he saw only bushes in the mist. A metal menorah surmounted the synagogue, and lions and six-pointed Stars of David were carved on the doors. He climbed the five steps and tried the door, which was not locked. It was almost dark inside the synagogue, and the air was chilly and dusty. A curtain hung in front of the ark, and the feeble light of the Eternal Lamp lit the words I have set the Lord always before me. Benny Avni wandered among the pews in the half light, then went upstairs to the women's gallery. Black-bound prayer books lay scattered on the benches. He was hit by a smell of old sweat, along with an odor of old books. He ran his hand over the back of a bench: it seemed as though someone had left a shawl or headscarf behind.

  When he left the synagogue, Benny Avni found the dog waiting for him at the bottom of the steps. He stamped his foot and said, "Shoo. Go away." The dog, which wore a collar with an identification tag hanging from it, tipped its head a little to one side, opened its mouth and panted, as if waiting for an explanation. But no explanation was forthcoming. Benny turned to go on his way, his shoulders hunched and his shapeless pullover peeking out from under his three-quarter-length suede coat. He took big strides, his body inclined forward like the prow of a ship cleaving the waves. The dog did not abandon him, but still kept its distance.

  Where could she have gone? Maybe she was visiting one of her women friends and had lost track of the time. Maybe she had stayed late at school because of some urgent matter. Maybe she was at the clinic. A few weeks previously, during a quarrel, she had told him that his friendliness was just a mask, behind which there was a frozen wasteland. He had not replied, but merely smiled affectionately, as he always did when she was angry with him. Nava was beside herself with rage. "You don't care about anything, do you?" she said. "Not me and not the girls." He had continued to smile affectionately and had put his hand on her shoulder, but she shook it off violently and left, slamming the door. An hour later, he brought her a hot herbal tea with honey in her studio. He thought she might be developing a cold. She
wasn't, but she took the drink and said gently:

  "Thank you. You really didn't have to."

  5

  PERHAPS WHILE HE was wandering the streets in the mist she was back at home. He considered for a moment whether to go home, but the thought of the empty house, and particularly the image of the empty bedroom with her colorful slippers like toy boats at the foot of the bed, deterred him and he decided to press on. With his shoulders inclined forward he walked along Vine Street and Tarpat Street until he reached the primary school where Nava worked. Only a month earlier he himself had battled with his opponents on the council and even with the Ministry of Education and had succeeded in obtaining funding for the construction of four new classrooms and a spacious gymnasium.

  The iron gates of the school were locked for the weekend. The school building and the playground were surrounded by iron railings topped with coils of barbed wire. Benny Avni circled the site twice before he found a place where it was possible to climb into the playground. He waved to the dog, which was watching him from the other side of the road, took hold of the iron railing and hoisted his body up, pushed the barbed wire to one side, scratching himself in the process, and half jumped, half rolled into the playground, twisting his ankle as he landed. He limped across the playground, dripping blood from his lacerated left hand.

  Entering the school building through a side door, he found himself in a long corridor. Several classrooms opened off it on either side. There was a smell of sweat, food and chalk dust. The floor was littered with scraps of paper and orange peels. He went into a classroom whose door was ajar, and on the teacher's desk he found a dusty cloth and a piece of paper torn from an exercise book, on which a few lines were scribbled. He inspected the handwriting: it was indeed a woman's writing, but it was not Nava's. Benny Avni replaced the paper, now stained with his blood, on the desk and turned to look at the blackboard, on which was written in the same womanly hand: "The calm of village life compared with the bustle of the town. Please finish by Wednesday at the latest." Underneath appeared the words: "Read the next three chapters carefully at home and prepare to answer the questions." On the wall hung pictures of Theodor Herzl, of the President and the Prime Minister, as well as some posters illustrating slogans such as "Nature lovers respect wild flowers."