The city—civilized, flourishing in a transparent, caressing breeze, deliciously perfumed, between the glitter of the rocky mountain range and the murmur of the sea—made Teresa smile, even if her strenuous effort not to show it made her face look like a sun-drenched apple. And as an orchestra, which included guitars and a harp played a kind of polka to a clapping, shouting, dancing, handkerchief-waving audience, Alejandro and the children hugged Teresa because they were carried away by an irrepressible joy.
The disembarking passengers were received with hugs and kisses. A well dressed group in the style of the goyim, received the immigrants, waving pennants emblazoned with six-pointed stars. To each newcomer they gave a package of food and clothing. They kissed the strangers as brothers, wept, sang hymns in Yiddish, and moved off into the port. Teresa’s smile inverted into a bitter frown. She shook off her husband and children as if they were dust and was no longer mute: “Don’t start in with this idiocy! Remember, we’re not Jews anymore! We’ve reached Hell, and not a single devil is waiting for us!”
Picking up a suitcase she walked haughtily down the gangplank to go through with the customs formalities. Her family followed her, trying to imitate her painful dignity. No one checked their baggage. Some dark men with black moustaches stamped their passports and, laughing among themselves, pointed towards the exit door.
It was 9:00 a.m. They were in the middle of the street in Valparaíso, the farthest corner of the world, unable to speak a word of Spanish, with no money and no friends. What should they do? Just as she had in Paris, Teresa sat down on the ground, closed her eyes, and said, “Fix things up the best you can. I’m not here.”
Fanny, Lola, Benjamín, and Jaime looked at their father. He responded: “Well, I think she’s asking me to summon the Rabbi again so he can save our skin.”
On this occasion, the Rabbi was unsure. This world was unknown to him. He doubted. “If a wise man is one who knows that he doesn’t know, then at this moment I’m a wise man. Let’s see. Everything revolves around money and death. Look in your pockets, Alejandro; one golden key opens a thousand doors. Perhaps you’ve got one last banknote.”
My grandfather carefully searched his deep pockets. In the fold at the bottom of his leather coat, he found a tiny coin. Half a kopek: worthless.
Alejandro shut his eyes and dropped down to the ground to sit next to Teresa. A jubilant shout from the Rabbi made him jump to his feet. “Mazel tov! Half a kopek, marvelous! Adonai is calling us. Remember Exodus, Chapter 30:
And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying,
12 When thou takest the sum of the children of Israel after their number, then shall they give every man a ransom for his soul unto the Lord, when thou numberest them; that there be no plague among them, when thou numberest them.
13 This they shall give, every one that passeth among them that are numbered, half a shekel after the shekel of the sanctuary: (a shekel is twenty gerahs:) an half shekel shall be the offering of the Lord.
14 Every one that passeth among them that are numbered, from twenty years old and above, shall give an offering unto the Lord.
15 The rich shall not give more, and the poor shall not give less than half a shekel, when they give an offering unto the Lord, to make an atonement for your souls.
16 And thou shalt take the atonement money of the children of Israel, and shalt appoint it for the service of the tabernacle of the congregation; that it may be a memorial unto the children of Israel before the Lord, to make an atonement for your souls.
“Do you understand, Alejandro? A silver coin, half a shekel, half a kopek, the same symbol, rich and poor giving a half, the mortal half, while receiving the totality of eternal life. You thought you’d lost everything, but Adonai left in the darkest corner of your clothing what you really needed, the half shekel of the offering so you can enter the Sanctuary and establish the union that will liberate you from mortality. Courage! God is waiting for us! You, I, your family, we are seven, the golden candelabra, the menorah! Let us arrange ourselves and in proper order climb up to the top of that peak. Do you see the Temple? There we will deposit your obolus and receive from the Eternal One an impulse to the new life.”
Alejandro squinted, trying to see what the Rabbi was talking about, at the top of that peak, itself covered with clusters of houses. He could make out a gray, rectangular house of some size with a chimney that was pouring out white smoke. “The fire of sacrifices.” As usual, my grandfather completely believed whatever the Rabbi said. He knelt and, spreading his arms, made his way to Teresa, who stubbornly kept her eyes shut.
A chorus of crystalline voices accompanied their short, uncomfortable walk. A pack of dark, ragged children, among whom there were two or three blonds and skeletal dogs, surrounded them, begging for money at the top of their lungs: “A penny! A nickel! A loaf of bread!”
Suddenly a rotten peach exploded on Benjamín’s bald head. Everyone laughed and went on tossing garbage.
“Teresa, you know by now that the Rabbi always saves us. If you wish, just go on pretending he doesn’t exist, but do what I’m asking you to do with your eyes closed. Line up in the order he tells us and we will go to the top of that peak. There, God will give us the help we need.”
Teresa, tense, implacable, breathing only slightly, intent on being a statue of salt, neither moved nor answered. Alejandro knew that his wife’s will was inflexible, as did the twins. But when the black pulp of an old banana smashed against her stubborn face, my grandmother opened her ferocious eyes, roared, leapt like a wild beast, smacked the head of one of the dogs with her suitcase, caught the biggest boy, pulled down his pants, and turning him over her knee, slapped his buttocks until they were red. She let him loose when she thought the punishment was enough, so he could catch up to his pals who were fleeing at top speed.
With that terrible face that could stop an army, Teresa stared at her husband, sank Fanny and Lola between her breasts and said, trying to give her words the hardness of stone, “A-le-jan-dro-Jo-do-row-sky, it’s your fault we are where we are. That insanity about the Rabbi has led us to misery. Here, the advice of your ghost means nothing. And I don’t want us to go on living as parasites on the Jewish community. The past is done and gone! New world, new life! This is the last time I’ll ever accept help from that freak. I’ll line myself up as you ask, and we’ll march up to the top of the peak. Let’s see if up there the Most High Villain gives us the help we need in exchange for half a kopek. But I swear on my life that if nothing happens, I’ll leave Jaime and Benjamín with you, take the girls with me, and we’ll go to a bar in the port and be whores forever!”
Alejandro swallowed hard, tried to kiss Teresa’s hand, though she pulled it back in fury, and arranged the family in a line. Next to Teresa, Fanny, and next to Fanny, Lola on the far left. Next to him, Benjamín, and next to Benjamín, Jaime on the far right. The Rabbi stood in the center. “Now we have formed the golden candelabra. Our souls are the seven flames. Now, holding hands, we shall climb up to deposit the half kopek in the Temple.”
“First ask your Rabbi if he’s going to be the one who carries the bags.”
Fanny and Jaime laughed. The Rabbi immediately whispered to Alejandro, “The wise Hillel said: ‘If you wish to possess everything, you must not posses something that is nothing.’ Leave what you have behind!”
“Teresa, sweetheart, as a wise man said, in order to possess everything you must possess nothing. We have to abandon our baggage.”
“Is that what your Rabbi advises you to do? Let people rob the little you have left? Let them throw salt in your eyes, pepper in your nose, and stones in your heart! Let them pull your guts out of your belly, wrap them around your neck, and then hang you with them from a tree! I hope you turn into a bird and he turns into a cat so he can eat you alive, choke, and you both die together!”
“Enough, Teresa! You promised to obey him one last time!”
“It’s pretty certain we’re going to prostitute ourselves. You will ruin
your life and the lives of your daughters. You will die of shame.”
“I believe in him. Let’s go!”
The street snaked upward among small, one- or two-story houses with window boxes filled with geraniums or ferns. Compared with the other hills, where mansions, gardens, and churches were clearly visible, this one had to be the most modest in Valparaíso. The Chileans were not aggressive. From their rooms, they watched the family march up the middle of the street holding hands as if they were part of a parade that had lost its body with only the head remaining. They smiled, held out glasses of water or wine or slices of melon. Teresa, huffing and puffing, forced the twins to accept nothing despite the fact that, under this sun that was stronger than anything she had felt before, she too was parched, her lips cracking.
The gray, rectangular building, with a tin chimney spouting white smoke, turned out not to be a temple but a military barracks, with two soldiers standing guard at its metal doors. Barely hiding his despair, Alejandro looked more carefully and realized that the chimney did not belong to the barracks but was attached to a run-down wooden house with a clay oven and a tavern with chairs. A bald old man showing his last three teeth was offering his merchandise, pointing to two baskets covered with empty flour sacks.
“Have faith,” said the Rabbi. “Nothing is given to us, we have to earn it. God hides so we will search for Him. By learning to see Him in everything, we are born. The temple is a military barracks because obeying the law of God is the only freedom. And this modest shack that has summoned us with the smoke of its purifying oven is a holy place, the altar of sacrifice. Give me the half kopek of ransom so that, in the name of the Jodorowsky family, I can deposit it in consecrated hands.”
When Teresa saw Alejandro fall into a trance, adopting the refined gestures, the high-pitched voice, and the burning gaze of the Rabbi, she began to tear out her hair. “Once upon a time I would have said My God, but now what can I say? I’ll kill myself! It’s better to be a dead lioness than a mangy, living dog.”
The Rabbi, with the smile of one blessed, responded, “If God gave us thirst, he will give us water. If He gave us teeth, he will give us bread. Come to the altar.”
Teresa, overcome with fatigue, followed her husband. The old toothless man took a triangular patty out of each basket and said, “Cheese, meat.”
The Rabbi had no knowledge of empanadas, a Chilean dish made of baked dough stuffed with chopped meat or cheese, but he shouted in astonishment, “Praised be He!” God was speaking to him in symbols. The most sacred sign, the Shield of David, was there before them! He sniffed the meat empanada: “This is the Eternal One manifest in matter.” He sniffed the cheese empanada: “And this is the Eternal One manifest in spirit.” From the hands of the old man he took the two triangles, and placed one on top of the other to form a six-pointed star. The Magen David, the union of heaven and earth, fire and water, body and soul. “God is the food we will never lack. And he asked each member of the family to take a bite at each of the six points. Then he let them eat until the symbol disappeared.
The old priest then began to recite in Spanish a psalm of gratitude, incomprehensible to the others: “Who’s going to pay for the two empanadas?”
The Rabbi asked the family to repeat, in a chorus, the holy words. Their mouths, perfumed by cheese, onion, and meat, sang thankfully.
“Who’s going to pay for the two empanadas?”
The old man stretched out his open hand, shaking it urgently. The Rabbi began to leave. “I’ve completed my mission. Give him the obolus, and the Eternal One will manifest Himself.” The Rabbi disappeared. Alejandro, smiling happily, deposited the half-kopek in the old man’s dried out fingers. The old man stared at the tiny coin. His face turned into an ocean of wrinkles, his mouth transformed into a grimace like a fallen half moon, and he was about to hurl an insult. But before he could open his mouth, the ground began to shake.
The shack’s lantern, hanging on a dark wire covered with fly shit, bounced around furiously. A rain of dry leaves fell; the dogs barked so loudly they seemed to cough up their intestines; out of the ground emerged monsters of dust. Then came a gigantic howl, accompanied by much more intense aftershocks. A few houses collapsed. The human screaming began, a mix of horror and pain. The entire port began to waltz. Immense waves threw the ships against the sea walls. No one could keep his footing. The peaks split open like ripe fruit, showing dark red cracks. Horses fell down the hillsides.
Thousands of citizens blackened the streets, running from one place to another, keeping clear of the falling walls. Gas tanks split open. Explosions and huge flames magnified the hysteria. The shaking began again, even more ferocious this time. The entire harbor leaned to starboard and to port like a ship in a storm. No building was left undamaged. The military structure collapsed. The two soldiers stood at attention until a flying piece of sheet metal cut off their heads.
Alejandro herded the children toward an iron bench, bolted into the ground. There, piled on top of one another, they waited for the earthquake to pass. My grandfather began to recite some words dictated to him by the Rabbi. The disembodied one knew a treatise on magic that could calm the fury of tremors: KADAKAT, ARAKADA, DARENAK, AKESERA, KAMERAD, ADAKARA, TAKADAK. All of them, spun around and trembling with terror, repeated the formula.
Teresa went mad with rage. She stood up on the bench and held her balance with the skill of a sailor. It didn’t matter to her that trees, chunks of cement, windows, pieces of glass, and pieces of pipe as sharp as swords were falling all around her. She raised her fists toward the sky, bellowing, “May all the curses your murderous mouth has poured out since you created this world fall on you! Look at how much you’re destroying just to get me to submit! But you will never make me give in! Make the entire planet explode if you like, it doesn’t matter to me! What can you do to a woman with a withered heart? Kill me once and for all, because not even earthquakes can make me open my soul to you!”
She was foaming at the mouth, her face was as white as a sheet, and she was trembling even harder than the ground. Alejandro grabbed her by the calves and pulled her down into his arms. With the strength of a madman he pushed her under the bench, silencing her with a desperate kiss.
A deafening screech announced that the peak was splitting open. The old man, squealing like a hog, was swallowed by a crack. The iron bench went downhill, still bolted to an enormous chunk of the hillside. The Jodorowsky family gave a strange scream: a mix of Alejandro’s religious fervor, Teresa’s rage, the terror of Lola and Benjamín (both too delicate for these quakes), and the euphoria of Fanny and Jaime. To these two, they were on a toboggan going faster and faster. Their only thought was to get as much fun as possible from the ride down, never considering that awaiting them at the bottom was a collision that would smash them to atoms or sink them in the sea.
They got out from between the feet of the others and stood up on top of the iron seat, balancing as if they were on the crest of a wave. Tons of falling stone destroyed street lamps, crushed dogs and people, and demolished houses, leaving in their wake a trail of ruins and blood. They were nearly spinning out of control as Teresa, under the bench with Benjamín and Lola, who were sheltered under the roof of her breasts, cursed even louder. Alejandro, making a superhuman effort, got up from the bench, took hold of Fanny, and protected her with his own body. Jaime would not allow himself to be caught. He leaped off the bench and ran to the far edge of the sliding peak, shouting triumphantly and dodging large bits of wall, pieces of glass, roof beams, and human body parts all being tossed into the air by his vehicle.
They smashed against a shoe factory. The building, a modest structure, made principally of concrete slabs held up by thin columns, yielded to the chunk of mountain on impact and acted as an elastic brake, capturing the mass as if it were held in a cradle. The bench finally stopped, still perfectly horizontal. During the entire slide downhill, it would have been possible to hold a glass of water without spilling a drop.
&nbs
p; “A Miracle!” said the Rabbi. “Tohu va’Bohu, chaos is an egg from which order is born! The new life begins here!”
Without hearing him, Alejandro remained with his family under the bench for an eternity, the time of the aftershock. It might have been seconds, minutes, or hours. He never knew and never tried to find out. His people had known innumerable catastrophes, and an age-old instinct made him give himself over to true time, the time that cannot be measured, where twenty years pass like an hour and a second can last a thousand years. He knew that the pain and pleasure of an entire life didn’t last more than an instant, but that each step he took on always-foreign lands took an eternity.
When the ground stopped moving, there came a silence that wounded their eardrums and then began to rise, accompanied by the laughter of Jaime, who invited them to come down from the peak by throwing all kinds of shoes at them. There was a braid of sorrow, thousands of human voices in protest, all mixed up with the howls of dogs throughout the country, up mountains and down in valleys, and the presence of death, the invisible tarantula covering Valparaíso.
Alejandro checked on each of them, then came out from under the bench and gave Jaime a slap. It was the first and last in his life, but nevertheless, that slap marked a turn, inching towards a definitive separation. Alejandro dug into the ruins to see if anyone could be saved. He found crushed, deformed, ripped-open bodies. He overcame his intense fascination—something, his animal nature perhaps, impelled him to dig through the detritus and smell the blood, see the mystery of the body, the secret viscera revealing their forms in broad daylight—because he heeded the Superior Will and believed that what God placed within the dark interior of the organism, protected from prying eyes, should be respected.
Where the Bird Sings Best Page 10
