Fima

by Amos Oz

  ‘But you said that the inside of the world is fire, so why isn’t the ground hot?’

  And the grandfather:

  ‘First you must study, Yossel. The more you learn, the more you’ll understand that the best thing for us is we shouldn’t ask questions.’

  Fima remembered that when he was a child, there was an old huckster who went round the streets of Jerusalem wheeling a squeaky, broken-down handcart, with a sack on his back, buying and selling secondhand furniture and clothes. Fima remembered in his bones the old man’s voice, which sounded like a cry of despair. At first you would hear it a few blocks away, indistinct and ominous, ghostlike. Slowly, as though the man were crawling on his belly from street to street, the shout grew closer, raucous and terrifying – al-te za-chen – and there was something desolate and piercing about it, like a desperate cry for help, as if someone were being murdered. Somehow this cry was associated in Fima’s mind with the autumn, with overcast skies, with thunder and the first dusty drops of rain, with the secretive rustling of pine trees, with dull grey light, with empty pavements and gardens abandoned to the wind. Fear would seize him, and it sometimes invaded his dreams at night. Like a final warning of a disaster that had already begun. For a long time he did not understand the meaning of the words al-te za-chen, thinking that the terrifying broken voice was addressing him, saying in Hebrew, Al tezaken, ‘Do not grow old.’ Even after his mother explained to him that alte zachen was Yiddish and meant ‘old things’, Fima remained under the spell of the bloodcurdling prophecy that advanced through the streets one by one, getting closer and closer, knocking at the garden gates, warning him from afar of the approach of old age and death, the cry of someone who has already fallen victim to the terrible thing and is warning others that their time will also come.

  Now, as he remembered that ghost, he smiled and comforted himself with the words of the sacked clerk from Mrs Scheinfeld’s café, the man whom God had forgotten: ‘Never mind, we all dies.’

  Going up Strauss Street, Fima passed the garish window of an ultra-pious travel agency named Eagles’ Wings. He stood for a while contemplating a brightly coloured poster picturing the Eiffel Tower set between Big Ben and the Empire State Building. Nearby, the Tower of Pisa leaned towards the other towers, and next to it was a Dutch windmill, with a pair of plump cows grazing blankly below. The wording on the poster read: ‘With G-d’s help: COME ON BOARD – TRAVEL LIKE A LORD!’ Underneath, in the characters normally reserved for holy books: ‘Pay in six easy instalments, interest free.’ There was also an aerial photograph of snow-covered mountains, across which was printed in blue letters: ‘OUR WAY’S POSHER – STRICTLY KOSHER.’

  Fima decided to go inside and ask the price of a bargain ticket to Rome. His father would surely not refuse to lend him the fare, and in a few days’ time he would be sitting with Uri Gefen and Annette’s husband in a delightful café on the Via Veneto, in the company of bold, permissive women and pleasure-loving men, sipping a cappuccino, discoursing wittily about Salman Rushdie and Islam and feasting his eyes on the shapely girls walking past. Or else he would sit alone by a window in a little albergo with old-fashioned green wooden shutters, staring at the old walls, with a notepad in front of him, and occasionally jot down aperçus and pithy musings. Maybe a crack would open in the blocked-up spring, and some new poems gush forth. Some light, easy encounters might take place, lightheartedly, with no strings attached, weightless relationships of the sort that are impossible here in this Jerusalem teeming with dribbling prophets. He had read recently in a newspaper that religious travel agents knew how to fiddle things so that they could sell flights for next to nothing. Over there in Rome, amid impeccable palazzos and stone-paved piazzas, life was carefree and gay, full of fun and free from guilt and shame, and even if acts of cruelty or injustice occurred there, the injustice was not your responsibility and the suffering did not weigh on your conscience.

  An overweight, bespectacled young man, with clean-shaven pink cheeks but with a broad black skullcap, raised his childlike eyes from a book that he hastily hid behind a copy of Hamodia’ and greeted Fima with a smug Ashkenazic accent:

  ‘And a very good day to you, sir.’

  He was only about twenty-five, but he looked prosperous, supercilious, and eager to please.

  ‘And what might we do for you, sir?’

  Fima discovered that in addition to foreign travel the shop also sold tickets for the national lottery and various other draws. He leafed through a brochure offering ‘holiday packages’ in splendid religious hotels in Safed and Tiberias, combining treatment for the body under the care of qualified medical staff, with purification of the soul by means of devotions ‘at the Holy Tombs of Lions of Torah and Eagles of Wisdom’. At that moment, perhaps because he noticed that the young travel agent’s starched white shirt was rather grubby at the collar and cuffs, just like his own, Fima changed his mind and decided to postpone his trip to Rome. At least until he had had a chance to talk to his father about it and consult Uri Gefen, who was coming back today or tomorrow. Or was it Sunday? Nevertheless he took his time, leafed through another brochure with pictures of kosher hotels in ‘splendiferous Switzerland’, hesitated between the national lottery and the football pools, and decided to buy a ticket for the Magen David Adom draw so as not to disappoint the agent, who was waiting patiently and politely for him to finish making up his mind. But he had to make do without even this, because all he could find in his pocket, apart from Annette’s earring, was six shekels, the change from his meal in the flyblown cafeteria in Zephaniah Street. He therefore accepted with thanks some illustrated leaflets containing the itineraries and minutest details about organised tours for groups of Torah-True Jews. In one of them, written in Hebrew, English, and Yiddish, he found that by the grace of Almighty G-d it was now once again possible to make one’s devotions at the tombs of ‘aweful saints’ in Poland and Hungary, to visit ‘Holy Places destroyed by the persecutors, may their name be blotted out!’ and to enjoy ‘the mind-broadening beauties of Japheth – and all in an atmosphere of real yiddish-keit, strictly kosher under the auspices of qualified, pious, and seemly guides, and all with the blessing and recommendation of Leading Giants of Torah.’ The travel agent said:

  ‘Maybe you will change your mind and come and see us again when you have had a chance to think it over, sir?’

  Fima said:

  ‘Maybe. We’ll see. Thank you anyway, and I’m sorry.’

  ‘Don’t mention it, sir. Our honour and pleasure. And a very good Sabbath to you.’

  As he walked on up towards the Histadrut building, it occurred to him that this obsequious, overfed young man with the sausagelike fingers and starched shirt that had a grimy collar and cuffs was more or less the same age as the son that Yael had got rid of two minutes away from here at some clinic in the Street of the Prophets. And he smiled sadly to himself because, apart from the skullcap and cantorial tenor voice, it was possible that an impartial observer might find a certain resemblance between you and that podgy, grubby, smooth-talking young travel agent who was so eager to please. And in fact it was hard to be certain about the cantorial tenor voice. Could Yael feel any maternal affection for that bloated creature, with his murky blue eyes behind thick glasses and his porky-pink cheeks? Could she have sat and knitted him a blue woollen bonnet with a pompom bobbing on top? Could she have linked arms with him and let him choose spicy black olives for her in Mahane Yehuda Market? And how about you? Would you really feel the need occasionally to tuck a folded banknote in his pocket? Or get the decorators in for him? Which goes to prove that Yael was right. As always. She was born being right.

  However, Fima thought wryly, it might have been a girl. A miniature Giulietta Masina with soft bright hair. She could have been named after his mother: Liza, or, in its Hebrew mutation, Elisheva. Although it is fairly certain Yael would have vetoed this.

  A cold, bitter woman, he said to himself with surprise.

  Was it really only your fa
ult? Just because of what you did to her? Just because of the Greek promise that you didn’t keep and could not have kept and that no one could have kept? Once, next to Nina Gefen’s bed he saw an old translated novel, in a shabby paperback edition, called A Woman Without Love. Was it by François Mauriac? Or André Maurois? Or was it Alberto Moravia? He must ask Nina sometime if it was about a woman who did not find love or a woman who was incapable of loving. The title could be taken either way. Though at that moment the difference struck him as all but insignificant. Only very rarely had he and Yael used the word ‘love’. With the possible exception of the period of the Greek trip, but at that time neither he nor the three girls had been particular about their choice of words.

  Wains curled. And vanished.

  As he crossed the road, there was a squeal of brakes. The van driver cursed Fima and shouted:

  ‘You there, are you crazy?’

  Fima considered, shuddered belatedly, and muttered sheepishly:

  ‘I’m sorry. Really. Very sorry.’

  The driver screamed:

  ‘Bloody half-wit: you’ve got more luck than sense.’

  Fima considered this too, and by the time he reached the other kerb he agreed with the driver. And with Yael, who had decided not to have his son. And also with the possibility of being run over here in the street this Sabbath eve instead of running away to Rome. Like the Arab child we killed two days ago in Gaza. Be switched off. Turned to stone. Reincarnated. As a lizard perhaps. Leaving Jerusalem to Yoezer. And he decided that this evening he would call his father and tell him firmly that the decorating was off. In any case he would be getting out of here soon. This time he would not give in or compromise; he would see it through, and get Baruch’s fingers out of his pockets and out of his life once and for all.

  Near the Medical Centre at the corner of Strauss Street and the Street of the Prophets a small crowd had gathered. Fima approached and asked what had happened. A small man with a birdlike nose and a thick Bulgarian accent informed him that a suspicious object had been found, and they were waiting for the police explosives experts to arrive. A girl with glasses said, What do you mean? It wasn’t like that at all. A pregnant woman fainted on the steps, and the ambulance is on its way. Fima burrowed towards the centre of the crowd, because he was curious to know which of these two versions was closer to the truth. Although he bore in mind that they might both be mistaken. Or indeed they might both be right. Imagine if it was the pregnant woman who had discovered the suspicious object and fainted from the shock?

  From the police patrol car which drew up with flashing lights and siren blaring, someone with a megaphone told the crowd to disperse. Fima, with a good citizen’s reflex, obeyed at once, but even so he was pushed roughly by a sweaty middle-aged policeman whose peaked cap was tilted back at a comical angle.

  Fima was furious.

  ‘All right, all right, no need to push, I’ve dispersed already.’

  The policeman roared at him with a rolling Romanian accent:

  ‘You better stop being clever, quick, or you’ll get it.’

  Fima restrained himself and moved off towards the Bikur Holim Hospital. He asked himself whether he would go on dispersing until one day he too collapsed in the street, or expired at home like a cockroach, on the kitchen floor, and was only discovered a week later, when the smell wafted out onto the landing, and the upstairs neighbours, the Pizantis, called the police and his father. His father would no doubt be reminded of some Hasidic tale about instant, painless death, often called ‘death by a kiss’. Or he would make his usual remark about man being a paradox, laughing when he ought to cry and crying when he ought to laugh, living without sense and dying without desire, frail man, his days are like the grass. Was there still a chance to halt this dispersal? To concentrate at long last on what really mattered? But if so, how to start? And what in God’s name was it that really mattered?

  When he reached the Ma’ayan Shtub department store on the corner of the Jaffa Road, he absent-mindedly turned right and walked towards Davidka Square. And because his feet hurt, he boarded the last bus to Kiryat Yovel. He did not forget to wish the driver a good Sabbath.

  It was a quarter to four, close to the beginning of the Sabbath, when he got off at the stop in the street next to his. He remembered to say thank you and good-bye to the driver. The early evening twilight had begun to gild the light clouds over the Bethlehem hills. And suddenly Fima realised sharply, with a vague pain, that another day was gone forever. There was not a living soul to be seen in his street apart from a swarthy ten-year-old child who pointed a wooden submachine gun at him and made him raise his arms in surrender.

  Thinking about his own room filled him with disgust: that arid expanse of time stretching from now till tonight, and in fact till Saturday night, when the gang might be getting together at Shula and Tsvi’s. Everything he’d meant to do today and hadn’t, and now it was too late: shopping, the post office, the telephone, cash from the bank, Annette. And something else that was urgent but he couldn’t remember what it was. Added to which, he still had to get ready for the decorators. Shift the furniture and cover it. Pack away the books and kitchen things. Take the pictures down, and the map of the country with the compromise borders pencilled in. Ask Mr Pisanti to dismantle the bookcases for him. But first of all, he decided, he must call Tsvi Kropotkin right away. Explain to him tactfully, without offending him this time, without being sarcastic, how his article in the latest issue of Politics was based on a false and simplistic assumption.

  Provided the telephone had recovered in the meantime.

  Right in front of the entrance to his building, inside a white car with the windows closed, Fima noticed a large man sitting bent over, his arms resting on the steering wheel and his head buried in his arms, apparently dozing. What if it was really a heart attack? Murder? A terrorist attack? Suicide? Gathering his courage, Fima tapped lightly on the windowscreen. Uri Gefen straightened up at once, lowered his window, and said:

  ‘So there you are. At last.’

  Startled, Fima tried to respond with something witty, but Uri cut him short. He said softly:

  ‘Let’s go upstairs. We have to talk.’

  Nina has told him everything. That I had it off with her. That I didn’t. That I humiliated her. But what’s he doing here anyway? Isn’t he supposed to be in Rome? Or has he got a secret double?

  ‘Look here, Uri,’ he said, the blood leaving his face and draining into his liver, ‘I don’t know what Nina’s told you, but the fact is that for some time now …’

  ‘Hold it. We’ll talk when we get upstairs.’

  ‘The fact is, I’ve been meaning for some time …’

  ‘We’ll talk inside, Fima.’

  ‘But when did you get back?’

  ‘This morning. Half past ten. And your phone’s not working.’

  ‘How long have you been waiting for me out here?’

  ‘Three-quarters of an hour or so.’

  ‘Has something happened?’

  ‘Just a minute. We’ll talk when we get upstairs.’

  When they were in the flat, Fima offered to make some coffee. Although the milk seemed to have gone off. Uri looked so tired and thoughtful that Fima was ashamed to bring up the question of dismantling the bookcases. He said:

  ‘I’ll put the water on first.’

  Uri said:

  ‘Just a moment. Sit down. Listen carefully. I’ve got some bad news.’ And with these words he laid his big, warm peasant hand, which was rough like the bark of an olive tree, on the back of Fima’s neck. As always, the touch of this hand on his flesh made Fima shudder pleasurably. He closed his eyes like a stroked cat. And Uri said:

  ‘We’ve been looking for you since lunchtime. Tsvi’s been here twice and left a note on your door. Because your clinic’s closed on Fridays, Teddy and Shula have been rushing around for two hours trying to locate your doctors. We didn’t know where you’d got to after you left Yael’s. And I just dropped my lugg
age off and came straight here to catch you as soon as you got back.’

  Fima opened his eyes. He looked up at Uri’s towering form with an anxious, pleading, childlike expression. He did not feel surprised, because he had always expected it would be something like this. With his lips only, without any voice, he asked:

  ‘Dimi?’

  ‘Dimi’s fine.’

  ‘Yael?’

  ‘It’s your father.’

  ‘He’s not well. I know. For several days now …’

  Uri said:

  ‘Yes. No. Worse.’

  In a strange and wonderful way Fima was infected with Uri’s habitual self-possession. Softly he asked:

  ‘When exactly did it happen?’

  ‘At midday. Four hours ago.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘At home. He was sitting in his armchair drinking Russian tea with a couple of old ladies who had come to ask him for a donation to some charity or other. The Blind Society or something. They said he was just starting to tell a joke or a story, when he suddenly groaned and passed away. Just like that. Sitting in his armchair. He didn’t have time to feel anything. And since then we’ve all been searching for you.’

  ‘I see,’ said Fima, putting his coat back on. It was strangely sweet to feel his heart filling not with grief or pain but with a surge of adrenalin, of sober, practical energy.

  ‘Where is he now?’

  ‘Still at home. In the armchair. The police have been. There’s some sort of a delay about moving him – it doesn’t matter right now. The woman downstairs, who’s a doctor, was there within a couple of minutes, and she checked that it was all over. Apparently she was a close friend of his too. Tsvi and Teddy and Shula are supposed to be waiting for you there. Nina is going straight from her office as soon as she’s finished making all the arrangements and dealing with the formalities.’