by Yoram Kaniuk
After Herr Schwabe hung up, Sam said with a calm that drove me crazy: Afterward I left his house and waited until the police car came. And then, after he said that, he fell asleep in his chair. I looked at him and suddenly my headache vanished. There's nothing like the sight of a lost person to cure a headache after such a night of drinking and humiliation. Renate took off his shoes and together we dragged him to the sofa, and the cleaning woman covered him and he slept for five straight hours. And then the evening papers came. When he woke up, we were busy reading. I wouldn't say those were especially thrilling moments. The papers made it clear that, at long last, my real face was revealed. The would-be rightist papers hinted at bitter things about my past and my dubious morals, and the so-called leftist papers explained without a shadow of a doubt that in the war I played much higher roles than had been thought. Of course, it was all formulated so that I can't sue anybody, and if I protested the injustice and the empty charge, I would look even more foolish.
They threatened me by phone, and friends who tried to encourage me said things like: I do understand you. Or: In your circumstances, it's easy to understand why, and so on ... All of them hypocrites and flatterers. I decided to appear in a television interview and at least try to refute some of the charges against me. The producer of our television news is an old friend of mine. We were in school together, we once traveled together to Italy, Greece, and South America. He arranged that interview. It was an act of courage and resolution on his part.
In the television studio, I sat with Sam in the producer's office, the woman who prepared the report looked at Sam with wicked eyes and asked embarrassing questions. When she smiled she looked like a person who has started missing herself. Then I was interviewed and I returned home. I could have been interviewed in my house, but I wanted to be interviewed in the studio to impart much more credibility to my words, as if it wasn't only I who was talking, but the communications media. Sam drank hot chocolate and sat in front of the turned-off television. When the interview with me was broadcast, he turned on the television. We sat and didn't say a word, Renate smiled once and then averted her eyes and looked at Sam watching the program and her eyes suddenly became cold as steel.
And here are some news clippings for you.
... in his television appearance, he chose not to apologize. Nor did he try to cover up. He told candidly, and that candor has to be appreciated, how years ago he met a person who performed in nightclubs and was called the Last Jew, and about a fellow named Samuel Lipker who would lead him. He told how he investigated that person and now that Samuel-the American director Sam Lipp-came to our city, he swept him up into his world of horrors and made him act in his presence the commander who commanded both Sam Lipp and the one he called the Last Jew. Maybe what he said was candid, but equally unconvincing. Candor isn't necessarily a substitute for truth. Candor, like good intentions, is sometimes the road to hell. The poetic license our praised writer permits himself this time went beyond the boundary of good taste ... On the contrary, the amazement about the past was even sharpened, his persistence in writing a book he can never write and doesn't write evokes a sense of intellectual impotence, ideological shallowness, and fear of critical readers, for if the book is so important to him, why did he write his other books? It is hard to accept as logical the fact of the clock set backward, the story about the fellow whose anger justifies disgraceful behavior in a nightclub and hectoring an old man, imprisoned in the past, who lives on a small pension, struck and pestered by a distinguished writer and a guest from America. Virgil (the moderator-A.S.) asked our writer why he had to go to a fortuneteller before his last trip to the United States, and didn't even get a satisfactory answer. Why does a writer try to pretend to be a beautiful person without delusions, when he secretly believes in superstitions of a clock set backward and secretly consults a fortuneteller . . . In his articles, he attacks the ignorance of what he calls worshippers of stars and signs. Our writer is caught here in naked hypocrisy! ... Great amazement ... As for the intellectual integrity of a writer whose past was restored without pangs of conscience, and along with streetwalkers, profiteers, and pimps, he presents a shameful play about the resurrection of the Reich, when in the same week, he writes a trenchant article against performing the Passion in Bayreuth, because as he puts it, it is a basic and profound insult to human moral values and to the Jewish nation.
... sometimes even hypocrisy has to be consistent, even if it concerns shutting one's eyes and tormented candor. Along with his friends, our writer is trying to condemn us, our society, to condemn us for what he himself calls in his articles "Teutonic arrogance, and the lost souls of the patriarchs." For many years he has demanded again and again that we stop making-as he puts it-"tours of exaltation and disgrace in the lost forests of ancient myths, and that along with the other nations of Europe we live the noble majesty of the civil world promised in the future, even if it is bereft of a real past" .. .
Or:
... it is to be believed that he fell victim to a dangerous suggestion ... A person doesn't set people back by an imaginary clock ... His words were incredulous verbiage ..."
Or:
... I was convinced! Convinced that our author was an embezzler in his past, that those great moments of truth he experienced were wasted and he has to apologize for ...
The studio was inundated with phone calls, Henkin. Hundreds of people called in. Most of them didn't scold me for denying my past or for falling victim to it. I was asked if my wife is indeed of Jewish origin, and when I tried to explain, I was flooded with insulting answers in a righteous and disgusting way. I was even asked why there are so many "last Jews" in Germany. When I told the questioner that only thirty thousand Jews live in Germany and most of them are old retirees, I was told that that was thirty thousand too many, I was accused of lying to the authorities of the Reich about my wife's origin, I was accused of being related to the fortuneteller and Sam Lipp. They called me a crazy leftist and a stinking rightist and an intellectual pig and a man of dubious honor ... what wasn't said in those endless conversations. Even my son was conjured up. I was asked if my son was murdered, committed suicide, or died of natural causes, and why he had to be educated to hate his grandfather, and who taught the boy to challenge the grandfather, for after all he was only following orders. Friedrich, said one woman in a shrill and annoying voice, was a charming boy whose parents destroyed him, and he had to die to atone for their sins, but she didn't identify herself and I asked myself where were my three million readers where were the critics and journalists who wrote such nice things about me, and because of them and for fear of their criticism, I hadn't yet written The Last Jew, but they were in hiding, didn't express an opinion, were tranquil and silent. I asked myself where were my books, The Lost Honor of Venus Daedelus? The English Lesson, The Awful Blow of the Soccer Goalie, where are my giant trumpet and the filmgoers, where is all that, but they weren't, they offended my son, they said: The apple doesn't fall far from the tree.
What I didn't know, of course, was that, after the interview with me, a television crew was sent to the club. They filmed the seedy ladies, the stage where they were acting that night, the bartender, and they got unpleasant comments from them. They also went to Lily's father's house and heard his version, and all that was presented to the viewers, as Sam, Renate, and I were waiting in front of the television set that Sam didn't turn on. That was a real bond against me, a bond only I was guilty of.
The next day, I complained to my agent, who apologized and said he had been at the sea. I told him: In the winter? In the ice? And he muttered something and I hung up. Then I hugged Sam and drank tea with lemon and the producer called. He said: I heard you're angry. Sam Lipp sent us to the club and to Herr Schwabe. He said it was your idea! Don't feel guilty and don't get mad at us ... I told him: That's nice. I'm not guilty. You're not. My agent's not guilty. Only Sam Lipp is guilty. If so, how come I know that both you and I are guilty?
And then Renate sa
id in a quiet voice that froze my blood. She said: I want Friedrich to be buried next to Menahem Henkin.
A few days later, Sam called from Marseille. He told me he was waiting for Lionel in Cafe Glacier. Lionel would come interrogate him about his crimes. Then he called from the hotel and said he was calling from Lebensborn. Hotels like that should be erased from phone books, he said. And I did complain at city hall and in the next phone book that name won't appear again. Sam said, I'm waiting for a ship.
Then he called me from the Rome airport. He reversed the charges. He said: The journey has ended, Cafe Glacier isn't what it used to be, sometimes you have to destroy. He asked forgiveness, he asked me to ask forgiveness from Lily's father, from Renate, from everybody. From what he said, it was clear but not explicit, that he was in trouble, but managed to flee. I was freed by a person named Leopold Bardossi, he said, I don't know Italian. I'm flying to Israel in an hour, he said, got to erect a memorial to the greatest Italian poet.
As I write this letter, Sam is surely in Israel. Renate and I will come in a week. Don't tell anybody about our coming. Please find us a room in a hotel near you. The Israeli cleaning woman we recently hired just told me that last night they called about Samuel. I don't know what it is, but I'm in a hurry to send the letter and I'll tell you in person about what's in store for us from this episode.
Yours as always ...
Tape / -
The General Consulate of Israel. Trieste.
Consul: Adam Navon.
Dear Mr. Henkin,
I'm writing you in reference to Samuel Lipker. Among the papers we found in his room was a letter addressed to you and your name also appears in several of his papers.
Aside from you, he had the address of a German writer we have tried to locate, but his Israeli cleaning woman did not understand the issue, and then we learned that he had taken off for Israel and on the way had stopped in Italy, but it is not known where. I hope Samuel Lipker will get in touch with you. If he does, please get in touch with Mrs. Hannah Aharoni, secretary of our department in the Foreign Ministry in Jerusalem. My deputy, who will investigate the episode of Samuel Lipker's visit to the city, writes in his report:
Samuel Lipker was searching for a ship that was to sail for the Land of Israel on January first, nineteen hundred [sic!]. When he did not find that ship (it is now nineteen seventythree [sic! ] ), he tried to burn down the only synagogue in the city. He provoked people, offended passersby, sold stolen goods at the port, and is wanted by the police. The press is going mad to take advantage of that man's behavior to gore Israel. The press says that Samuel was seen in the company of whores, a hashish dealer (the evidence here is confused), etc....
It's not that these are important articles, although they do not indicate a great deal of affection. But on the other hand, when people are hit, gold watches are stolen from passersby who refuse to buy, people are flogged until they bleed, and anybody who tries to intervene-including a policeman who was badly beaten-is punished.... Apparently we must act, since we're the representatives of Israel here and even without all that our work is not easy. Please, therefore, if you hear something, let me know, and I will be grateful.
Yours, Adam Navon
Tape / -
Ebenezer and Fanya R. are walking along the seashore. Fanya is hopping, picking up snails and examining them. Ebenezer is trying to estimate the distance between himself and the turret of the mosque in Jaffa, and says: Jaffa is a rock. Jaffa of sundown. Jaffa of magic. Jaffa of abandoned smells. Let go of the snails, the sea wept them, nothing will influence me anymore. I dreamed a war will break out, I read the dream in a book that hasn't yet been written. That's what they say! The sea will be filled with blood. There's no iodine for blood of the sea.
In the distance a woman stands and yells at a child: Don't go in the water, Boaz. I told you not to. Listen, if you drown, don't you dare come back home.
Tape / -
Henkin reads Germanwriter's letter to Hasha. Germanwriter is going to Italy and from there he'll come. Henkin says: What will we do with Friedrich? And Hasha is silent. Henkin says: How, how, and Hasha says Shhh, Henkin. You're disturbing the rustle of the waves.
Tape / -
Boaz Schneerson: It's not just Noga. I live in a world I wasn't prepared for. And I'm half an orphan. Do you pity me? You're laughing! Jordana is woven of silken death, what are you woven of? They taught you to forget where you came from. At night, before sleep, an old nun read you sayings in Latin. You spat green blood. What exactly happened? Did you really find your dead father? Did you write a letter to the judge? The judge wrote to me. He wrote: In terms of morality, Noga Levin is right. So here you are, proof that you're right! The Last Jew, not our "last Jew," let him go into that sea, when he's thrown out. Let him throw up his hands, let him yell "I was right," and let him drown. What does it help to be always right? I'm not always right, but unlike you, I don't make Boazes miserable. Germanwriter is coming, Henkin's waiting for him. Your father never waited for another daughter, when he waited, he waited for you. The writer comes here to buy guided missiles produced by the military industry, rifles started with clothespins, Jewish genius, plastic tank turrets, dream-penetrating laser beams, water from the Jordan to alleviate material exhaustion-like planes that lost their fighting ability-sea sand to pulverize limbs, Jewish grenades to disperse student demonstrations, a philharmonic orchestra with stainless steel spires, the German leopards are supplied with soap made in Israel and in exchange they send us gas masks. What battle are the lords Herod and Mendelssohn preparing for us? The German command will buy Hebrew tents, go to Henkin, loathe him in my name ...
And Sam Lipp-
Tape / -
Sam Lipp came to the old Ben-Gurion airport. When the plane extinguished its engines, the stewardess woke him up and said to him with a smile: I think we've arrived. He picked up his valise, brushed his hair, and got off. After a short bus trip, he came to customs. A policewoman hidden in a giant wooden basin stamped his passport; he walked slowly to the exit. Except for the valise in his hand, he hadn't brought anything with him. When he went outside, a hot wind blew and the light was still clear. In the distance he could almost love the ugliness surrounding everything like a wreath of thorns.
He got into a cab, stretched out, and said: The Hilton, Tel Aviv. He peeped out and through the windshield, the trees started becoming clear, the narrow road became more familiar, barbed wire fences posted in his mind between houses and boulevards faded away, he recalled that when he slept in the plane he dreamed he was walking on Baron Hirsch Street in Tarnopol carrying two challahs. Now, awake, he seemed to see the roads to Tarnopol. The driver was listening to music and smoking a cigarette. Hebrew words on the radio became familiar. Syllables he didn't know before became a surer texture, for some reason he was afraid of history, the structure of time, the molecules of relative time as opposed to absolute time. He thought: Melissa is waiting for me at the corner.
At the entrance to the hotel, he paid the driver. The exorbitant price didn't surprise him. When he came to the counter and said his name, the clerk dialed and a few minutes later a tall beautiful girl appeared holding a bouquet of flowers. She called a boy, put the one valise on a cart, and said to Sam: Welcome to the Hilton! And she handed him the bouquet with a ceremoniousness that seemed a little clumsy yet practiced. The beautiful girl said she was the representative of the public relations department and that the Hilton was proud to host him. She led him to a small room. He apologized for the delay (she muttered to herself that they had expected him a few days before), and after he signed the guest book studded with the names of the world's great, beginning with the signature of Ben-Gurion and then Frank Sinatra, he asked why it wasn't the other way around and Frank Sinatra didn't come before Ben-Gurion, and she tried to smile, but her teeth were too beautiful to waste on a meaningless smile, and they went up together to the seventeenth floor and he was put into the big suite. In one of the two rooms of the suite were bouquets of flowe
rs sent by the American cultural attache, the national theater, and a telegram from the Minister of Education and Culture on a silver salver.
A basket of apples, flowers, cheese, biscuits, cookies, and crackers stood in the middle of the table. He picked up an apple and bit into it. The beauty put some notes on a big nightstand, opened the closed drapes, and he saw the lights of Tel Aviv. Sam said to the beauty: You're wasted in this temple, and she smiled a professional and polished smile. Then a person phoned and said he was the manager of the theater and was waiting for him at the airport, and he had just heard he had come and he was sorry, but he hadn't been home for five evenings when he had waited for Sam at the airport. Sam apologized; fatigue was leaking out of him in drops of sweat, and they arranged to meet the next day. The beauty checked the bathroom, Sam paid the boy who brought the valise and he wanted to pay her too, but the two of them looked at one another, didn't say a word and he said, Sorry, thrust the money into his pocket, and said: Thanks. She said: If you want anything call me and everything will be taken care of immedi ately. He told her: Everything's confused, something's messed up there, and he pointed toward the seashore where Ebenezer and Fanya R. were strolling slowly. Everything became shadows, his body shook, and she waited, something of the pain that filled him infected her. He offered her a cigarette she lit herself because his hands were shaking too much to light it for her, and she smoked the long cigarette he had apparently bought on the plane before he fell asleep. The room smelled of flowers, aftershave, and apples, and he asked her to sit down and she sat down and dragged on the cigarette and he asked why she was so beautiful, and she said with a modest smile that she had been a beauty queen, and he said That's it, how is it to be a beauty queen? And she said, You see, you work in the Hilton, and he smiled, but something in him didn't smile, wanted to flee, but he was stuck to himself and since he couldn't do anything, his hands waved, his face was pale, and then the beauty recalled that he had to record his personal details and she took a form out of her jacket pocket, and he recorded the details and said I should have filled out the details in Lebensborn, too, and she asked what was Lebensborn, and he told her: A hotel to improve racially pure kingdoms, and he filled out the form, and she took it from his hands and glanced at it, and asked the meaning of the word Gottglaubig he had written next to the word nationality, and he muttered to himself more than to her: One who has a real German faith, and she said, You must be drunk, no? And he said, I drank all the way, did you ever host Heinrich Kramer here, and she said she didn't know, but she could find out, and he said: Never mind, never mind, and then she stood up hesitantly, waited, put out the cigarette in the ashtray, and apologized, it was clear from her face how sorry she was that the crushed cigarette dirtied the polished ashtray, but he smiled at her and she wiggled out, beautiful, and he lay down in bed, looked at the ceiling, time passed, he didn't know how much, an hour, two, five, he munched on the apples, ate cookies, and thought which side does a fish piss on. Then he went to the bathroom and saw toilet paper and thought: That's Jewish toilet paper, and he was proud. Then he wanted to laugh at his pride, but his face muscles were impermeable to his will and not far from him, a plane flew low over Ebenezer's house and landed at the little airport near the big chimney, which he didn't yet know was Reading Chimney, and he said: I've got to be objective, think objectively, formulate, maybe there's also objective faith, objective theater, objective pain and disgrace, and thus he fell asleep for a little while and awoke and called the public relations department and was told that the beauty had gone home and would come back later to a reception for the ambassador of Peru.
