To Know a Woman (Harvest in Translation)

by Amos Oz

  The bedroom with its wide double bed, with the chest of drawers and the two identical mirrors, was inherited by Netta, who adorned the walls with photographs of her favorite Hebrew poets: Alterman, Lea Goldberg, Steinberg, and Amir Gilboa. On the tables on either side of what had been her parents' bed she placed vases containing dried thistles she had gathered at the end of the summer in the empty field on the slope beside the leper hospital. On the shelf she had a collection of sheet music that she liked to read, even though she did not play an instrument.

  As for Yoel, he settled into his daughter's nursery, its little window overlooking the German Colony and the Hill of Evil Counsel. He hardly took the trouble to change anything in the room. In any case, most days he was away traveling. A dozen dolls of different sizes kept watch over his sleep when he was home for the night. And a large colored poster of a sleeping kitten snuggling up to an Alsatian dog, which wore the reliable expression of a middle-aged banker. The only change was that Yoel removed eight tiles from a corner of the floor in the girl's room and installed his safe there, embedded in concrete. In this safe he kept two handguns, a collection of detailed plans of capital cities and provincial towns, six passports and five driving licenses, a yellowing English booklet entitled Bangkok by Night, a small case containing an assortment of simple medicines, a couple of wigs, several toilet kits for his journeys, a few hats, a folding umbrella and a raincoat, two fake mustaches, stationery from various hotels and institutions, a pocket calculator, a tiny alarm clock, plane and train timetables, and notebooks containing telephone numbers with their last three digits reversed.

  Ever since the changes, it was the kitchen that served all three as their meeting place. This was where they held their summit conferences. Especially on weekends. The living room, which Ivria had furnished in quiet colors, in the style of early 1960s Jerusalem, served mainly as their television room. When Yoel was at home, sometimes the three of them would converge on the living room at nine o'clock in the evening to watch the news and occasionally also a British drama in the "Armchair Theatre" series.

  Only when the grandmothers came to visit, always together, did the living room fulfill its intended role. Lemon tea was served in tall glasses on a tray with fruit, and they ate the cake that the grandmothers brought. Once every few weeks Ivria and Yoel made dinner for the two mothers-in-law. Yoel's contribution was the rich, finely shredded, highly seasoned mixed salad that had been his specialty long ago, when he was still a young man on the kibbutz. They would chat about the news and other matters. The grandmothers' favorite subjects of conversation were literature and art. Family affairs were never discussed.

  Ivria's mother, Avigail, and Yoel's mother, Lisa, were both straight-backed, elegant women, with similar hairstyles reminiscent of a Japanese flower arrangement. Over the years they had grown more alike, at least at first glance. Lisa wore delicate earrings and a fine silver chain around her neck, and was made up with restraint. Avigail liked to tie a young-looking silk scarf around her neck, which enlivened her gray suits like a border of flowers beside a concrete path. On her breast she wore a little ivory brooch in the shape of an inverted flask. At a second glance one could see the first signs in Avigail of a tendency to rotundity and a Slavic ruddiness, whereas Lisa looked as though she might shrivel away. For six years they had lived together in Lisa's two-room apartment in Radak Street on the respectable slopes of Rehavia. Lisa was active in a branch of the Soldiers' Aid Association, whereas Avigail did voluntary work with the Committee for Retarded Children.

  Other visitors arrived infrequently. Netta, because of her condition, had no close girlfriends. When she was not at school, she went to the city library. Or lay in her bedroom reading. She would lie and read for half the night. Occasionally she went out with her mother to the cinema or the theater. The two grandmothers took her to concerts at the National Auditorium or the YMCA. Sometimes she went out on her own to gather thistles in the field by the leper hospital. Sometimes she went to musical soirees or literary discussions. Ivria hardly ever left the house. Her delayed thesis occupied most of her time. Yoel arranged for a cleaner to come in once a week, which was sufficient to ensure that the apartment was always clean and tidy. Twice a week Ivria took the car and went on a comprehensive shopping expedition. They did not purchase many clothes. Yoel was not in the habit of bringing booty back with him from his travels. But he never forgot a birthday, or their wedding anniversary on the first of March. He had a discerning eye, and always managed to select, in Paris, New York, or Stockholm, sweaters of excellent quality at a reasonable price, a blouse in exquisite taste for his daughter, white pants for his wife, a scarf or a belt or a kerchief for his mother-in-law and his mother.

  Sometimes after lunch an acquaintance of Ivria's would drop in for a cup of coffee and a quiet chat. Sometimes their neighbor, Itamar Vitkin, came in "looking for signs of life" or "to take a look at my old storeroom." He would stay to talk to Ivria about what life had been like in the days of the British Mandate. Not a voice had been raised in the apartment for several years. Father, mother, and daughter were always attentively careful not to disturb one another. Whenever they talked, they did so politely. They all knew their boundaries. When they met together on weekends in the kitchen, they talked of remote matters of common interest, such as theories about the existence of intelligent life in space, or whether there was some way of safeguarding the ecological balance without forfeiting the benefits of technology. On subjects such as these they conversed with animation, although without ever interrupting one another. Sometimes there was a brief conference about some practical matter, such as buying new shoes for the winter, getting the dishwasher repaired, the relative cost of different forms of heating, or whether to replace the medicine cabinet in the bathroom with a newer type. They rarely talked about music, because of their discrepant tastes. Politics, Netta's condition, Ivria's thesis, and Yoel's work were never mentioned.

  Although Yoel was absent a good deal, he was careful so far as possible always to give notice of his return. Beyond the single word "abroad" he never gave any particulars. Except for weekends, they ate separately, at the time that suited each of them best. Their neighbors in the small block of apartments in Talbiyeh understood, thanks to some rumor or other, that Yoel dealt with overseas investors, which explained the suitcase, and the winter coat that could be seen draped over his arm in summer, and the comings and goings by taxi to the airport in the early hours. His mother-in-law and his mother believed, or affected to believe, that Yoel traveled on behalf of the government to procure military equipment. They rarely asked questions like Where did you catch that cold? or, Where did you get that tan? because they knew well that the only answer they would get would be something offhand, such as "In Europe" or "In the sun."

  Ivria knew. Details did not interest her.

  What Netta understood or guessed was impossible to tell.

  There were three stereo systems in the apartment, one in Ivria's study, one in Yoel's nursery, and the third at the head of Netta's double bed. Hence the doors in the apartment were almost always closed, and the different types of music, out of constant consideration, were played at low volume. So as not to disturb.

  Only in the living room was there sometimes a strange mixture of sounds. But there was no one in the living room. For several years it had been tidy, clean, and empty. Except when the grandmothers came to visit, when they all assembled there from their various rooms.

  4

  This is how the disaster happened. The autumn came and went, and then it was winter. A half-frozen bird appeared on the kitchen balcony. Netta took it to her bedroom and tried to warm it. She boiled maize and fed it the water from a dropper. Toward evening the bird recovered its strength and began to flutter around the room emitting desperate chirps. Netta opened the window and the bird flew away. Next morning there were more birds on the branches of the bare trees. Perhaps the bird was among them. How could one tell? When the electricity went off at 8:30 in the morning
on that day of driving rain, Netta was at school and Yoel in another country. It would appear that Ivria found she did not have enough light. Jerusalem was darkened by low clouds and mist. She went outside and down the steps to the car, which was parked in the open basement of the building. Apparently she was intending to fetch from the trunk of the car the powerful flashlight that Yoel had bought in Rome. On her way down she noticed her nightdress on the garden wall, snatched by the wind from the clotheshorse on the balcony. She went across to pick it up. That was how she came upon the high-tension wire. No doubt she mistook it for a clothesline. Or perhaps she correctly identified it as an electric wire but reasonably assumed that since there was a power cut it would be dead. She reached out to lift it up so that she could cross underneath it. Or perhaps she tripped and stumbled against it. How can one know? But the power cut was not a real power cut; it was only their building that was affected. The cable was live. Because of the humidity it is almost certain that she was electrocuted on the spot and felt no pain. There was another victim too; Itamar Vitkin, the next-door neighbor, the one from whom Yoel had purchased the room a couple of years before. He was a man in his sixties, who owned a refrigerated truck and had lived alone for several years. His children had grown and moved away and his wife had left him and Jerusalem (which is why he had had no further use for the room and sold it to Yoel). It is conceivable that Itamar Vitkin saw the disaster from his window and hurried downstairs to help. They were found lying in a puddle almost in each other's arms. The man was still alive. At first they tried to apply artificial respiration and even smacked his face hard. He expired in the ambulance on the way to the Hadassah hospital. Among the neighbors an alternative version circulated; Yoel took no notice of it.

  The neighbors considered Vitkin rather strange. He would sometimes climb into the cab of his truck at twilight, stick his head and half his clumsy body out the window^ and play the guitar for a quarter of an hour to passersby. They were not numerous, since it was a side street. People would stop to listen, and after a couple of minutes they would shrug their shoulders and go on their way. He always worked at night, delivering dairy products to the shops, and came home at seven o'clock in the morning. Summer and winter alike. Through the party wall his voice could be heard sometimes, lecturing the guitar as he played it. His voice was gentle, as though he were wooing a reluctant woman. He was a fat, flabby man, who walked around most of the time in an undershirt and khaki trousers that were too loose for him. He looked like someone who lived in constant fear of having just accidentally done or said something unspeakable. After his meals he used to stand on his balcony and throw crumbs to the birds. He used to coax them softly too. Sometimes, on summer evenings, he would sit in his gray undershirt on a wicker chair on his balcony playing heartrending Russian tunes that were perhaps originally intended for the balalaika rather than the guitar.

  Despite all these eccentricities he was considered a good neighbor. He never stood for election to the Residents' Committee, yet he volunteered to be a sort of regular duty officer for the entrance hall and stairs. He even bought a pair of potted geraniums out of his own pocket and stood them on either side of the front entrance. If ever anyone spoke to him, asked him the time, a sweet expression would spread over his face, like a child surprised by a wonderful present. All of which merely aroused a faint impatience in Yoel.

  When he died, his three grown-up sons arrived with their wives and lawyers. All those years they had never taken the trouble to visit him. Now they had apparently come to divide the contents of his apartment and to get it ready to be sold. On their return from the funeral an altercation broke out. Two of the wives raised their voices, so loudly that the neighbors could hear. Then two or three lawyers arrived, on their own or with a professional assessor. Four months after the calamity, when Yoel had already begun to prepare to leave Jerusalem, the neighbor's apartment was still locked and shuttered and empty. One night Netta imagined she heard sounds of soft music through the wall—not a guitar but, so she said, perhaps a cello. In the morning she told Yoel, who chose to pass over it in silence. As he often did with things his daughter told him.

  In the entrance hall of the building, above the mailboxes, the notice of condolence from the Residents' Committee faded to yellow. Several times Yoel meant to take it down, but he never did. There was a spelling mistake in it. It said that the residents were shocked and shared the sorrow of the respective families on the tragic and premature oss of our dear neighbors Mrs. Ivria Raviv and Mr. Eviatar Vitkin. Raviv was the surname that Yoel used in everyday life. When he rented the new house in Ramat Lotan he chose to call himself Ravid, although there was no logical reason for it. Netta was always Netta Raviv, apart from one year when the three of them had lived in London in connection with Yoel's work under a different name altogether. His mother's name was Lisa Rabinovich. Ivria, for the fifteen years that she had studied, intermittently, at the university, had always used her maiden name, Lublin. The day before the disaster Yoel had checked in at the Hotel Europa in Helsinki with the name Lionel Hart. However, the middle-aged guitar-loving neighbor whose death in the yard in the rain in the arms of Mrs. Raviv had given rise to various rumors was named Itamar Vitkin. Not Eviatar Vitkin, as the printed notice had it. But Netta said she actually preferred the name Eviatar, and anyway, what difference did it make?

  5

  He was disappointed and tired when he returned by taxi to the Hotel Europa at 10:30 P.M. on the sixteenth of February. His intention was to linger for a few minutes in the bar, drink a gin-and-tonic, and analyze the meeting before going up to his room. The Tunisian engineer on whose account he had come to Helsinki and whom he had met earlier in the evening in the restaurant at the railroad station had struck him as small fry: he was asking disproportionate favors and offering trivial goods in exchange. The material he had handed over at the end of their meeting, as a sample, had been almost banal. Even though in the course of their conversation the man had striven to convey the impression that at the next meeting, if there were one, he would bring along a regular Aladdin's cave. And actually along lines that Yoel had been hankering after for ages.

  But the favors the man was asking in return were not financial. With judicious use of the word "bonus," Yoel had put out feelers for signs of greed, but in vain. In this matter, and this alone, the Tunisian had not been evasive: he had no need of money. It was a question of certain nonfinancial favors. Which Yoel, in his heart of hearts, was not certain they could grant. Certainly not without authorization at a higher level. Even if it transpired that the man was in possession of first-rate goods, which Yoel was inclined to doubt. He had therefore taken his leave of the Tunisian engineer for the time being with a promise that he would get in touch again the next day to arrange for further contact.

  This evening he intended to turn in early. His eyes were tired: they almost hurt him. The cripple he had seen in the street in a wheelchair intruded several times on his thoughts: he seemed familiar. Not so much familiar as not entirely unfamiliar. Involved, somehow, in something he ought to remember.

  But that was what he could not do.

  The desk clerk caught up with him at the entrance to the bar. Excuse me, sir, somebody called Mrs. Schiller has been trying to get hold of you several times in the past few hours. She left an urgent message for Mr. Hart that the moment he returned to the hotel he should get in touch with his brother.

  Yoel thanked him. He gave up the idea of the bar. Still wearing his winter coat he turned and walked out into the snowbound street, where there were few pedestrians and not many cars at this time of night. He headed down the street, glancing over his shoulder and seeing only puddles of yellow light in the snow. He decided to turn right and then changed his mind and turned left, shuffling in the soft snow for two blocks until he found what he was looking for: a public telephone. Again he looked around. There was not a living soul. The snow turned blue or pink like a skin disease wherever the light struck it. He called collect to the office
in Israel. His brother, for the purpose of emergency contact, was the man they all called Le Patron. In Israel it was nearly midnight. One of Le Patron's assistants instructed him to return at once. He added nothing and Yoel did not ask anything. At 1:00 A.M. he flew from Helsinki to Vienna. There he waited for seven hours for a flight to Israel. In the morning the man from the Vienna Station came and drank a coffee with him in the departure lounge. He could not tell Yoel what had happened, or else he could but had been ordered to say nothing. They spoke a little about business. Then they talked about the economy.