He took off his shoes and undressed, preparing to take a bath. It was one of the pleasures of good hotels that there was plenty of hot water, just as there had been in Jerusalem during his childhood, when he bathed once a week on Thursday night. His wife had been so shocked by this revelation that she had all but called off their marriage. “But you have to shower daily!” she had told him. “In bathtubs you just sit in your own filth!” Indeed, even as she lay dying thirty years later, she still didn’t trust him, sometimes sitting up deliriously in bed to ask if he had washed yet. The surest way to her heart was by showering twice a day, a measure guaranteed to win a loving look. Only in hotels was he granted a special dispensation to take baths.
He had already opened both faucets of the tub when he remembered his phone call to the Jewish Agency. After all, he thought, I didn’t come to Vienna to bathe. Still in his underpants, he turned off the water and went to dial the number given him of a certain Mr. Shimoni, whose Israeli secretary answered the phone. Molkho introduced himself, explained that he was representing a Miss Nina Zand, referred to the letters sent on her behalf and to the answers received, and asked to confirm the appointment he had made for the next day in order to obtain the assistance and missing documents still required. “I’m afraid,” said the secretary, “that your appointment has been canceled because Mr. Shimoni is indisposed. He hasn’t come to work for several days.” “You mean he’s sick?” asked Molkho in dismay. He hadn’t taken such a possibility into account. “But we’ve come all the way from Israel just to see him!” “Yes, indeed,” the secretary assured him. She knew all about it. Mr. Shimoni hadn’t forgotten the appointment. In fact, he had taken the file home with him and even telephoned her that morning to ask that Mr. Molkho call him there.
Molkho breathed a sigh of relief, and the secretary gave him the phone number, requesting only that he call later in the day, since Mr. Shimoni liked to take a long afternoon nap. “As one public servant to another,” Molkho told her, “I want to thank you for being so helpful. I must say we don’t deserve our bad name.” “No, we don’t, do we?” answered the secretary vivaciously. “If it’s not too much to ask,” continued Molkho, “what exactly ails Mr. Shimoni?” The secretary wasn’t sure. “It’s probably a diplomatic illness,” she laughed, “because he’s terribly bored being an immigration official without immigrants.” Molkho laughed too and started to hang up, but now it was her turn to question him. When did he arrive in Vienna? And how was his flight? And what was new in Israel? “Nothing is new,” he said. “And how’s the weather?” she asked to make conversation, as bored by her job as was her boss. “It’s been rainy,” said Molkho, “but not very cold, although, of course, not as hot as the summer.” Apparently, however, she hadn’t heard of the hellish summer. How long was he staying in Vienna, she wanted to know. “Oh, just a day or two,” Molkho said. “As long as it takes to find out if the Soviets will repatriate Miss Zand.” “Just a day or two?” She seemed disappointed. “Why not stay longer and enjoy yourself? There’s lots to do here that doesn’t call for any German, all kinds of operas and concerts. Would you like me to suggest something?” Molkho guffawed. “No, thank you,” he said, “I’ve been to enough operas and concerts to last me for a while. But perhaps you could recommend some good ballet.” At once, as if she worked for a ticket office, she listed several performances, even spelling them out for him in Hebrew letters. Clearly, she didn’t want to hang up, and Molkho listened patiently, distressed to see in the large wall mirror that he had indeed put on weight and had even sprouted little breasts.
When he finally got into the bath, he lay for a long while in the deliciously sudsy water with his eyes closed. Then he dried himself, shaved, applied some lotion, ate the last apple in his briefcase, dressed, stepped out into the corridor, and knocked on the little Russian’s door. There was no answer. He knocked harder, but there was still no response. Good grief, he wondered, do I have another Sleeping Beauty on my hands?
9
HE DIALED HER ROOM, but no one answered the telephone either. I shouldn’t have spent so long in the bathtub, he fretted, descending to the lobby to look for her. But she was not there either, nor had she left any message or key at the desk. He searched in vain in the large dining room, where a gypsy band was playing, and stepped out into the broad boulevard, which was now bathed in twilight, peering into shops as he passed them, though the chances of finding her were slim. Could she have gone off to see the sights without telling him? Not that she was under any formal obligation, but it was a matter of simple courtesy. He asked again at the desk, knocked once more on her door, tried phoning her room a second time—but she had vanished into thin air. Could she, he wondered, racking his brain, have unknown friends in Vienna? It was getting dark out. Bright lights came on in the lobby. He sank grouchily into a leather chair that commanded a view of the entrance, ordered some coffee, and was about to ask for a slice of the cream pie on the pastry cart when he remembered his little breasts in the mirror and decided to wait for dinner.
Three veiled young ladies with their arms full of shopping bags entered the lobby with a man who could have been either their father or their husband, a large, swarthy Arab with the mien of a desert prince, no doubt from the Persian Gulf, dressed in a white kaffiyeh and an expensive European suit. Chattering in rapid Arabic, they deposited him and their parcels in a seat next to Molkho’s and darted excitedly out again, off on another spree. The prince, in a state of shock from his purchases, or perhaps from the Western clothes he had been made to wear, tilted his sun-bronzed face toward an invisible horizon and soon sank into such a trance that he did not even notice the cup of coffee brought him by a sedulous waiter. Suddenly, however, sitting up amid the bags of women’s wear and glancing desperately around him, he noticed Molkho, who was sitting a few feet away, and beamed with recognition, as though spying a fellow tribesman. Molkho looked uncomfortably away, yet the big Arab was already leaning toward him with a grin, his dark eyes lighting up. Not wanting to disappoint him, Molkho fled to the telephone booths by the reception desk and dialed Mr. Shimoni’s home number. Mr. Shimoni answered the phone. “Yes, I’m not well,” he declared in an overrefined voice, “but if time is of the essence, perhaps I could receive you at home this evening and see what I can do.” Dictating his address, he insisted that Molkho write it down.
The little Russian’s disappearance was getting to be serious. Molkho hurried to her room and knocked loudly on the door, though not so loud as to attract the attention of the guests descending for dinner, and then went to look for her again in the dining room, sidestepping tray-laden waiters, passing a small, dimly lit bar whose customers were lining up for their first cocktails, and emerging in a garden where some staff was folding chairs. This is no joke, he thought worriedly, stepping back into the street. Might she be in trouble somewhere and in need of help? I shouldn’t have been so standoffish on the plane, he chided himself, returning to the lobby, which he decided to explore in greater depth. Descending some stairs, he opened an apparently locked door and soon came to a floor of large conference rooms, smoke-filled billiard parlors, a gymnasium, and even an empty swimming pool still smelling of chlorine. Peering into dark washrooms, he headed for some lights at the end of a passageway and found himself in an underground shopping center full of little boutiques and cafes, a subterranean world that was shutting down for the night. A few last customers were leaving the shops, in which the personnel was wiping counters and mopping floors before closing. A sixth sense telling him that his white rabbit was near, he quickened his stride. We must have a whistle, he resolved just as he saw her through the window of a small beauty parlor, happily seated beneath a dryer with curlers in her hair. He was about to burst angrily inside when he spied a large, pasty woman in a corner, staring balefully with her arms crossed at the obstinate client whose hair had to be done at the last minute, when the lights were already dimmed and the scissors and combs put away for the day. Relieved to have found her, he stood
watching from a safe distance. Though it was comic to think that a fresh permanent would matter to Mr. Shimoni, he slowly felt his ridicule yield to an odd compassion.
10
AT NINE THAT EVENING a taxi brought them to a baroque apartment building in a middle-class suburb, where a stocky guard met them at the door and took them up to the second floor in a dark elevator. Stepping into a vestibule wallpapered with a forest of gold trees and faded green leaves, they waited for their guide to unlock a door and usher them into an ornate drawing room in which stood a grand piano covered with musical scores. Large windows looked out on a dimly lit park; on the leather chairs and sofa lay piles of newspapers, magazines, and office files; shelves of books and Judaica lined the walls; and the overall jumble was such that Molkho cast a worried glance at his plump Goldilocks while their guide vanished down a hallway to look for Mr. Shimoni, who proved to be a tall, thin, sallow, bald man in his sixties, dressed in a silk bathrobe and high slippers and with a cultivated air. Sucking on a cough drop, he shook their hands formally, the blue veins bulging in his broad, intellectual brow. Yes, he’s even sicker than I thought, decided Molkho, begging pardon for the late-hour intrusion. Mr. Shimoni waved off the apology and sank into a leather armchair, imperiously dismissing the silent guard while inviting his guests to sit down. “Well, then, this is the Miss Zand that I wrote you about,” began Molkho, removing some Hebrew newspapers from a chair and pointing to his rabbit, who teetered on her high heels in a dress slightly creased from her suitcase. “She was processed by you in Vienna nearly a year ago on her way from Russia to Israel. I understand you don’t see many new faces these days, so perhaps you even remember her.”
If he took umbrage, the official gave no sign. Smiling faintly at Miss Zand, who, bright with excitement, was settling into a chair, he began questioning her in a fluent Russian that he evidently kept handy for such occasions. She answered him solemnly, her stiff curls shaking with each emphatic bob of her head. “Then you don’t remember her?” interrupted Molkho, feeling left out. “What difference does it make?” replied Mr. Shimoni brusquely, barely glancing in his direction. “They’re only here for a day or two; their train pulls in from Russia in the morning, and by the next evening they’re on a plane to Israel.” “Well,” said Molkho, discouraged by the patronizing tone, “she wants to go back. She’s been in Israel nine months and doesn’t like it. You don’t like it, do you?” he asked her while Mr. Shimoni stared ironically at the floor. Suspicious at the sudden switch to Hebrew, which no longer seemed quite so amusing, she looked from one man to the other. “Where in Israel did she live?” asked Shimoni, using his divide-and-conquer technique to repeat the question in Russian without waiting for Molkho to answer. Sitting on the edge of her chair, Miss Zand replied to all his queries, pulling out a packet of letters from her handbag and even showing him one from her old place of employment in the Soviet Union declaring its readiness to take her back.
“In Israel she was unemployed,” put in Molkho, refusing to be excluded. It was his duty, he felt, if only to his mother-in-law, to serve as the little Russian’s counsel. “She was enrolled in an intensive Hebrew course, though you can see that she didn’t learn a word.” “But no one at the embassy will take her back,” snapped Mr. Shimoni with sudden irritation. “You’re just wasting your time!” Molkho knew this was true, but startled to hear it put so baldly, he began zealously defending a faith he didn’t share—namely, that if the Jewish Agency would return Miss Zand’s exit visa and give her a letter stating that she had only left the Soviet Union to accompany her old mother to Vienna, all would be well. “But what good will that do?” scoffed Shimoni. “The Finns say it will give her back her refugee status,” answered Molkho. “A lot the Finns know!” jeered the official, putting on his glasses to read the Russian’s letters while continuing his interrogation.
Why argue? reasoned Molkho, growing calmer. The man is right. Why take all her problems on myself? He glanced out the paneled window at the bright lights of Vienna, glimpsing the electric spark of a trolley along the tree line of the park. Mr. Shimoni’s sickly pallor made him appreciate his own good health. Despite his fears that his wife’s illness would turn on him once she died, a year had gone by without a single visit to the doctor. Not even to the dentist, he thought contentedly, reaching into his jacket pocket for his bifocals in order to glance at a newspaper. Yet the little Russian’s musical voice held his attention. Happy to be speaking her own language, she was excitedly explaining something, now pointing to her letters and now to Molkho, as though telling the official all about him. Perhaps there’s more to her than just those pretty eyes after all, he thought, resolving not to be unkind. Though he didn’t understand a word, he felt he knew what she was saying. “After all,” he interrupted, eager to rejoin the conversation, “why shouldn’t they take Miss Zand back? Think of the publicity it will give them.” “They don’t need our publicity,” sniffed Mr. Shimoni, sucking on his cough drop like an elderly infant, his condescending expression unchanged. “And besides, even if they wanted to take her back, it’s not bureaucratically possible.” He grinned, baring decayed teeth. “But why must it be Russia? If Miss Zand is prepared to go to America or Canada, that’s something that might be arranged.” Molkho had no objections, but when the idea was broached to the little Russian, she so tearfully shook her head and heaved her ample bosom that her mettle rather pleased him, though it only made Shimoni crosser.
“Have you ever had such a case before?” Molkho asked. His mouth was dry from the central heating and it was beginning to dawn on him that the official, who apparently lived by himself, was not going to offer them refreshment. “One or two,” Shimoni replied. “They all come to me with their complaints as if it were my fault that they didn’t like Israel.” “You see,” said Molkho with a sympathetic nod at his client, who perhaps understood more Hebrew than she let on, “she couldn’t take the climate either. This past summer was an especially bad one.” And when the official merely snorted, he went on, “Why, she’s more Russian than Jewish. Just look at her! The idea of her having to go through all this is absurd! And don’t talk to me about a common Jewish destiny,” he added heatedly, though Mr. Shimoni had done nothing of the sort, “because there is no such thing! That’s only the slogan of unhappy Jews like us who want more Jews to be unhappy with them.” Sucking bemusedly on his cough drop, Mr. Shimoni rested his long buttery fingers on the leather arms of his chair. Molkho felt unbearably thirsty. “Could you please tell me where the bathroom is?” he asked hoarsely, and Shimoni led him down a long corridor and switched on a light at the end of it.
“You have a big place here,” Molkho said. “Big?” echoed Mr. Shimoni defensively. “Why, it’s huge, to say nothing of far too old! It’s too much for a single person like me, but it was a bequest to the Agency from some rich Jew, and there’s nothing to do about it. Tell me,” he asked Molkho, who wanted only to get into the bathroom, “did you really come all the way to Vienna just for Miss Zand?” “Yes,” Molkho said. “Her mother is an old friend of my mother-in-law’s, and I’m the only other person they could turn to. I didn’t want her to have to come alone, especially since she has heavy luggage, and so I offered to escort her.” “But you can’t even talk to her!” objected Mr. Shimoni. “No, I can’t,” conceded Molkho. “She doesn’t know any English or French either. It’s all terribly uncivilized, but what can I do?” “And you really think the Russians will take her?” asked Shimoni. “To tell you the truth,” answered Molkho honestly, “I don’t. I told my mother-in-law that too. But we thought it best to leave no stone unturned. It was really the Finns who put her up to it.”
Mr. Shimoni’s lips curled in a smile, and Molkho escaped into the bathroom, leaving the door slightly ajar. Taking off his bifocals, he turned on the faucet, bent over the sink, and gulped handfuls of cold water until he had had enough. Then, afraid to risk infection from the towels, he waited for his face to dry, threw a desultory glance at the toilet, and regard
ed the mirror of the medicine cabinet, his bloodshot eyes staring back at him. He had barely begun to explore the cabinet’s contents when he heard the little Russian gasp. I have to help her, he shuddered, thinking warmly of her snowy throat, whose double chin was perhaps only an illusion. I mustn’t be so critical. Every woman has something lovable. He turned out the light and groped his way back up the hallway, peering into the rooms leading off it, in one of which he was startled to glimpse a tiny old woman in a nightgown, crouched on a bed with her bare feet clawing the air.
He was barely noticed when he returned to the drawing room, where Shimoni, his bald, pale head between his hands, was listening intriguedly to Miss Zand, now and then grinning broadly. I must be missing a good story, mourned Molkho, collapsing into his chair, from which he took advantage of the first lull to inquire if Shimoni could lend him a Hebrew-Russian dictionary. “Hebrew-Russian?” marveled the official. “I doubt if we even have one in the office. But you can find English-Russian or French-Russian in any bookstore. Do you want to talk to her or understand her?” “Both,” answered Molkho. “It’s enough to drive a person crazy. Today she disappeared without telling me, and it took me an hour to find her in some beauty parlor.” Shimoni laughed. “It’s no joke,” declared Molkho, laughing too. “Please tell her to let me know where she goes.” The official translated, Molkho wagged an admonishing finger, and the little Russian giggled hotly. “Is that a promise?” he asked, smiling angrily. “Promise,” she agreed, latching on to the Hebrew word. “Promise, promise, promise.”
Five Seasons Page 33
