The Extra

by A. B. Yehoshua

  “I know,” he snaps, “but still.”

  “In general,” she insists, “the female womb is far stronger and steadier than men imagine, and pregnancies have survived wars, poverty and famine, even concentration camps.”

  Now he is irate, but remains calm.

  “Yes, I also sometimes pay attention to what goes on in the world, but Christine is not in good health and not young, and it was not easy for us to get pregnant.”

  Although Noga is rebuffed at every turn, she believes that the fate of the sea is in her hands alone.

  “You should also know, sir,” she says, sitting down next to him on the bench, “that in our orchestra there are women who have given birth to children and have a lot of experience, and we have a violinist and an oboist who are grandmothers and were present at the births of many babies.”

  With an ironic gesture he salutes the mothers and grandmothers, but does not yield.

  “I have respect for them all, but what can they do if she starts to bleed, or if to save the pregnancy she has to stay in bed for a long time, and in a strange and foreign country?”

  “Why strange? Maybe foreign in culture and language, but otherwise everything in Japan is modern and rational, often more so than here in the West.”

  “You have been there?”

  “No, but everyone knows that about Japan. Besides, Christine will not be alone. We will all be with her, look after her.”

  His patience runs out.

  “But there will be visits to temples and flights to Hiroshima and other cities. Christine is a fragile woman and not young, and this pregnancy is important and precious for us. We cannot take chances.”

  But Noga won’t give up. She has not played a concert for three months, and she is desperate to perform in front of an audience.

  “Excuse me, sir, can you tell me your name?”

  “Saharan.”

  “May I ask where you are from? Where you were born?”

  “In Iran, in—”

  “Tehran?” She tries to be helpful.

  “No, in a place you never heard of.”

  “Then please,” she implores, “please, sir, trust me. I personally pledge to be with Christine at every moment of the trip. You were at the rehearsal, and perhaps you noticed the dialogue between the two of us, two harpists who have not only a professional partnership but also a human one, so it’s natural for me to take personal responsibility for her well-being.”

  “Who are you, anyway?” He tries to get to the root of her stubbornness.

  “What do you mean, who am I?”

  “Am I allowed to ask a question?”

  “Of course.”

  “You speak with such confidence—how many children have you given birth to?”

  “How many children?” She smiles uneasily and gets up from the bench. “How is that relevant?”

  “Why not? After all, you are asking me to trust you.”

  She shudders.

  “I haven’t yet given birth, but . . .”

  And to her surprise, he is not surprised, as if he anticipated her answer, but instead of puncturing her arrogance, he studies her with interest and asks gently, “Why? Because you couldn’t?”

  “No. I could, but I didn’t want to.”

  Now he won’t let go, as if her promise to watch over his partner’s pregnancy has exposed her to the same blunt challenge voiced by Elazar, the eternal extra, at their first meeting, though now in a foreign language: “How do you know you could, if you didn’t want to?”

  “I know . . . I know.” She holds on to the scene that is disintegrating in her hands. “If I want to, I can have a child.”

  “Of course, and we shall all pray for his health,” he graciously promises, in his name and in the name of his partner, who at the moment is being badgered by her bosses. “Meanwhile, until your wish for a child is awakened, respect our wishes, for we need our child, and no music has the right to stand in the way.”

  As he speaks, his fist springs open and flakes of tobacco scatter like sand. Since he is loath to kneel down before her and pick them up, he stands and brushes them aside with the toe of his shoe. And to indicate that the conversation is over, he strides to the end of the corridor, opens wide a small window, lights a fresh cigarette and expels the smoke into the world.

  Forty-Eight

  BEFORE THEIR DEPARTURE, the orchestra played a farewell concert for the residents of Arnhem, with tickets for sale at a token price. As a replacement harpist had not yet been found, a frantic request was dispatched to Kyoto to find a musician who could assume the part of second harp in the work by Debussy, but since no reply had arrived, the orchestra held an urgent rehearsal of Schubert’s Ninth Symphony, the “Great,” a piece they’d played dozens of times, so if necessary they could plug the gaping hole in the program. Noga’s trip, and that of her harp, was assured, but it was not clear whether she would have the chance to perform. Will she be reduced to a mere extra in Japan too? She asks Herman to take from his drawer the score for the Sacred and Profane Dances for harp and string orchestra, hoping a way might be found to compensate her with a public performance of this work.

  On the morning of the concert Noga tried to decide what to wear onstage. Should it be the black silk dress, whose hem nearly reached the floor but which left her neck, shoulders and arms bare, or should she go with a delicate black pantsuit, purchased in Israel, which she felt accentuated her slenderness and flexibility? She was tilting toward the elegant black silk, befitting the formality of a concert to which notables had been invited. But her shoulders seemed bulky to her compared with the younger women players’, so she combined the two outfits: to hide her shoulders and arms, she will wear the jacket of the pantsuit over the long silk dress.

  But is the black of the two outfits the same black? She didn’t feel herself competent to judge this, so she enlisted her landlady, a great admirer of her tenant, to view the combination and render an opinion. And the landlady, whom Noga had invited to the concert, was adamant. Even if the Dutch black does not clash with the Israeli black, Noga must wear only the long dress and leave her shoulders and arms exposed. Yes, she too noticed that they had thickened a bit during her vacation in Israel, possibly the result of hearty meals and juicy fruit, yet at the same time, perhaps from the desert sun, they have a rosy golden sheen not easily acquired in the Netherlands. So why conceal an attractive body that will blend with the beauty of the harp?

  It was impossible to exclude Christine from the farewell concert, despite the anger directed at her, and she too turned up that evening in a long black dress, albeit of slightly threadbare wool. The appearance of the two harpists in their long dresses encouraged interest in a complex piece of music.

  During the intermission Noga asked the conductor if there had been an answer from Japan. “Not yet,” said the maestro, but with cheerful optimism promised that the entire Japanese army had been deployed to find a substitute. “We will not give up the sea after we polished every one of its waves.” Indeed, the Debussy was received with surprising warmth and enthusiasm at the farewell concert, even though it was not an audience of the usual music lovers, but of municipal workers and members of trade organizations, including transit employees and industrial workers, plus excited high school kids and German students from across the border. And since the printed program, distributed free at the door, explained why La Mer had been selected for the Japanese tour, the Dutch were flattered that such a large and strong nation as Japan, whose technology had conquered the world, was in need of inspiration from a small, modest people in a spiritual and artistic contest with a cruel sea.

  Knowing that the farewell concert would be attended by the general public, some receiving free tickets, Dennis van Zwol asked the musicians to play the Haydn symphony at an especially sprightly tempo, but with the Debussy he would allow no compromises. During the many exhausting rehearsals, the orchestra had perfected various refinements, and any deviation from them would ruin the musical flow.r />
  Having gotten past her torment over leaving the tour, Christine was newly serene. She no longer bothered to hide her pregnancy, and under the long wool dress that smelled slightly of camphor, the bulge that would force the Belgians to grant full European citizenship to her partner was clearly visible.

  The dialogue between the two harps was executed flawlessly in the concert’s second half. Sometimes the first sang out and the second answered, sometimes they sang in unison, till the second subsided and the first went on to trill another phrase. The breathtaking glissandi played by the two evoked the sparkling foam of the waves, cresting and ebbing. The conductor was focused on them, and they felt his constant presence. Since the harpists sat on a riser above the other strings, the eyes of the audience were fixed on them even as they rested, waiting for the moment when the two women, with perfect timing, would tilt their gilded, regal harps toward their hearts and spread their fingers on the strings.

  The cheers at the conclusion of the Debussy were loud and long. Backstage, a chattering crowd of friends and relatives said their goodbyes to the musicians. Christine was upset and parted from Noga in tears. She too had yearned to travel with the orchestra instead of returning this very night to a small apartment in Antwerp with the knowledge that perhaps until the birth of her child, and perhaps thereafter, she would have no opportunity to perform. Moreover, it was reasonable to assume that an orchestra that had been dealt so severe an inconvenience would never again invite her to play. The father-to-be showed up at the concert not in overalls but in a suit and tie, and interpreted the musical struggle between the wind and the waves in his own fashion, perhaps as a port worker.

  He studied Noga with a friendly look, and at the moment of parting dared to hug her, feeling the chill of her bare shoulders. She sensed he bore her no grudge over the words they had exchanged, and thought of telling him about the dear father who feared the death of his daughter in childbirth. But was this man the right audience for such a strange confession?

  Forty-Nine

  ONLY AFTER SHE RETURNED from the concert to her apartment did Noga begin to fear that the following day, amid the rush of preparation for the long journey, she would not have time to say a proper goodbye to her mother. It’s late now in Israel, but she knows that the lonely mother would be pleased to wake up and hear her voice. But the phone rings in Jerusalem with no reply, giving rise to a new worry. Were we too hasty to rule out assisted living? She calls her brother, a sound sleeper, and her sister-in-law Sarai, who tinkers with her eccentric paintings into the wee hours, answers and reassures her: “Your mother hasn’t vanished. She’s here, sleeping in the kids’ room. She arrived two days ago, supposedly because she missed the children, but it’s really because she’s worried.”

  “About whom and what?”

  “Hard to know,” Sarai says. “Maybe herself, maybe you.”

  “Me? About what?”

  “Not clear. Maybe your trip? I’ll wake her up. She’ll be happy to hear your voice, and you can find out what’s eating her.”

  “No, no, don’t wake her,” says Noga, flustered. “I only wanted to say goodbye, but if she’ll still be there tomorrow morning . . .”

  “She’ll be here, she’ll be here. She doesn’t seem in any hurry to go back to Jerusalem.”

  “In that case, I’ll call before we leave for Japan.”

  “Japan . . . Japan . . . ,” sighs the sister-in-law. “Wonderful. I envy your freedom.”

  “Don’t exaggerate. It’s not about freedom, it’s just a path to the music I’m starving for.”

  “But you at least have an orchestra to help you satisfy your hunger. I’m all alone here, wrestling at night with my unfulfilled artistic ambition.”

  “But you have your children to make you happy.”

  “They don’t always make me happy, and even when they do, they’re not relaxing.”

  Noga is sorry that her work as an extra didn’t leave her more time to spend with her sister-in-law.

  “Maybe after we get back from Japan you can come for a little vacation here and leave Honi and Ima to look after the children.”

  “Thanks. But so long as your mother doesn’t let go of Jerusalem, she won’t really be able to help us.”

  After she hangs up, Noga finds it hard to fall asleep. Lacking an extra bed to seduce the elusive slumber, she swallows a sleeping pill, hoping to awake refreshed, ready for the trip to a distant land where she may or may not be called upon to perform.

  Under the influence of the pill she plunges into solid sleep, and in the depths she meets her father, who since his demise has appeared in none of her dreams, but here he is, lying innocently in the electric bed, unaware that it was built after he had died. But is this the childhood apartment she had been assigned to protect? The waves of the dream wash over familiar furniture and kitchenware, lingering on the cumbersome television that won the hearts of the little boys. Yet the flat has undergone a major upheaval: the living room has expanded and her childhood bedroom has shrunk, and a thick, tangled tree she has never seen thrusts its branches through a window that never existed.

  The father is pale and silent, and though he slowly turns the pages of a newspaper, it would seem that death discourages reading. Nevertheless, he doesn’t look pained or depressed, as if death had been a difficult but successful surgery, and is relieved because further death will not be necessary. Would it be right, wonders the dreamer, to exploit the gift of his resurrection to bid farewell to him too before her trip? She heads into the kitchen to ask her mother whether saying goodbye to a living-dead person would add to his pain, except the kitchen has relocated to some unknown corner of the apartment, and in its place is a small, dark bathroom, its window bolted shut. A pale woman, immersed in reddish foam, lies in the bathtub, her eyes closed, not her mother but a total stranger. The eyes of the woman open wide. She is young, though apparently the owner of the apartment.

  In the morning her mother phones, apologizing for calling so early.

  “You were looking for me last night, so I’m calling before you vanish in the distance.”

  “You did well. It’s time for me to get up. But what’s going on? Only a few days in Jerusalem and you’re back in Tel Aviv. Do you actually regret not sticking with the assisted living?”

  “Regrets are also part of life,” says the mother evasively. “But not to worry, my daughter, we won’t draft you again for any experiment.”

  Noga provides her mother with details of the orchestra’s trip to Japan. She spells out the names of the cities letter by letter and, for emergencies only, tells her how to get through to her cell phone with an entry code, and of course reminds her of the high cost and the time difference. But she doesn’t mention the second harpist who dropped out at the last minute and the possibility that the whole trip might be in vain.

  “Good,” says the mother, “this way I’ll be able to keep track of you at all times.”

  Now the daughter wants to know how old she was when they moved from the apartment where she was born to the one where she grew up.

  “How old?” her mother asks. “Why?”

  “No reason.”

  “You know me, no reason is not a reason.”

  “Let’s say because of a dream.”

  “You have time to dream before a trip like this?”

  “It was a dream that didn’t ask permission.”

  “How can I give you an exact answer if I’m not sure how old you are now?”

  “You’re not sure? Ima!”

  “Yes, it is odd, but I just want to confirm you’re forty-three.”

  “Why three? Where’d you get three? Not even two, and that’s two months away.”

  “Not even two? So why do you think of yourself as a hopeless woman?”

  “Hopeless? In what sense hopeless?”

  “I apologize. In no sense. I already told you that the Uriah story is eating me up inside. But I’m not saying anything. Okay, forty-two. So if we do the simple math, wh
en we moved from Ovadiah Street in Kerem Avraham to Rashi Street in Mekor Baruch—in other words, from the apartment where you were born to the one you grew up in—you were all of five, five and a half. When we moved I was already pregnant with Honi, who was born in the new apartment, which by the way was never new and never will be. But why are you digging into the past? What happened in the dream?”

  “You and Abba always refused to show me the apartment where I was born, even though you described it as beautiful and special, with a view.”

  “Yes, a wide-open view, from more than one window. But I’m sure that with so many births and so much new construction in the area, nobody has a view anymore. Yes, it was a very nice apartment, in a neighborhood that changed since then, became blacker than black, the usual story.”

  “If it was such a nice apartment, why did you move?”

  “Why, why, all these whys because of a dream?”

  “Why not?”

  “All right—we moved because your father insisted.”

  “Why?”

  “Again why? What was in that dream that upset you so much?”

  “Abba was in it, for the first time since he died.”

  “Ah . . . Abba . . . It’s about time. In my dreams, this week alone he appeared three times.”

  “And said something?”

  “No. He can only speak if we give him something to say. So far in the dreams he’s only an extra, standing up.”

  “An extra in a dream? Good one.”

  “You see? Sometimes I also have great ideas.”

  “Absolutely. Sometimes too many. But still, why did you leave the lovely apartment?”

  “You really insist on knowing.”

  “Because you’re avoiding the answer.”

  “All right. The young landlady, who lived on the same floor, died suddenly, and the husband quickly remarried, so the new wife could take care of the baby.”

  “There was a baby?”

  “I just said, she died in childbirth.”

  “You didn’t say that.”