(Then why don’t you start now?)
“Don’t say anything about another woman or a baby. Don’t talk about the past or even about me. Talk about principles. I’m glad Tsvi isn’t with us… God only knows what he thinks. Kedmi can stay out of it too, there’s no need for him. The four of us will sit and talk quietly… it’s all up to you. What will you say, have you decided?”
“More or less.”
“We’ll hear her out first, and then we’ll do some explaining. I want you to know, though, that I’m not at all dependent on her. She’s the one who will have problems if she doesn’t agree. I’ll manage, there are all kinds of ways… if necessary, the child can be legally adopted by me. Don’t let her feel that I need her… it will only bring out the cruelty in her. She still can’t accept the fact that I’m no longer under her thumb. Talk about principles in that logical way you’re so good at… unsentimentally, as though it were a lecture to your students. I’m counting on you…. Isn’t there going to be a rest stop?”
“No.”
“Once they used to stop at some diner on this trip.”
“There’s no point in it anymore. The whole ride barely takes two hours now.”
“You look so pale.”
“I’m just tired.”
“Then why don’t you try to sleep? You can rest your head here, I’ll squeeze over.”
“No, I can’t sleep on buses.”
“That’s because you’re afraid of losing control.”
“Where did you get that idea from? You’ve suddenly become this big psychologist”
“I’m afraid to fall asleep when I travel too. But never mind. I’ve been meaning to ask you: do you have enough money?”
“For what?”
“In general. I’ve noticed that you worry about money a lot. If you’re hard-pressed, let me know. I’ll scrape up something over there and send it.”
“Hard-pressed? Whatever made you think…?”
“All right, all right, don’t be upset. I really enjoyed my stay with you. I’m sorry it had to be so short…. What are you working on these days, tell me. I apologize for not responding when you sent me your doctorate. I was actually very proud of it. After all, that’s something I dreamed of myself and never managed to achieve…”
“I didn’t expect you to read it. I just wanted you to have a copy. I knew it wouldn’t interest you.”
“No, I should have responded. I should have made the effort to understand at least part of it. Not that I didn’t thumb through it I even read that poem of Pushkin’s that you quote… it’s a good one… but my mind was somewhere else.”
(It always is. That’s why he’s never gotten anywhere.)
“Never mind.”
“But I do mind. When I get back I’ll read it and write you what I think.”
“Don’t bother. Really, father. It will bore you.”
“I’ll do it for my own sake. What are you working on now, those Russian terrorists?”
“No. That was just today’s lesson.”
“What then?”
“It wouldn’t mean anything to you.”
“Try me anyway.”
“On the question of historical necessity. On the possibility of shortcutting historical processes. Something having to do with the nineteenth century. A kind of a model.”
“But that’s very interesting. Why wouldn’t it mean anything to me?”
“Because it involves a controversy about theories that you know nothing about.”
“You and your controversies. You waste too much energy arguing with everyone.”
“I had a good teacher to learn from.”
“Maybe I once did let myself be goaded against my better nature… but it happens less often now. I’m more on my guard. Connie… well, never mind. Shortcutting history? Can it be done?”
“It can.”
“For example?”
“Not now, father. Not on this bus.”
“Right you are. But this, Asa, you must send me to read. Do you promise?”
“All right.”
“After all, how can I allow myself not to know what you’re doing, even if I am so far away? I’m sure to understand parts of it…”
“Parts of it, certainly.”
“I myself, you’ll be surprised to hear, am in a very productive period. I’m constantly doing new things. I have my little linguistic projects… it’s very peaceful there… and in the winter you can’t go out anyhow. And recently — I’ll let you in on a secret — I’ve been writing this… these memoirs… maybe one day they’ll turn into a…”
“Novel? I always thought you’d write one someday.”
“Why shouldn’t I try? There’s no need to be so scornful.” “Who’s being scornful?”
“You are. You keep parading this intellectual scorn for me.”
“I was never intellectually scornful of you.”
“But I keep feeling it. Well, it doesn’t matter. You’re like a small boy, angry because I’ve left you…”
“Since when? You’re totally mistaken.”
“But I’ll return. You may not believe me, but I’ll return to live here someday.”
“I never said you wouldn’t.”
“I keep feeling that you’re judging me.”
“I’m not.”
“For all it mattered to you, I could have stayed locked up with her in that house until I died. Just as long as I didn’t bother you.”
“Did I ever tell you to stay there?”
“If I had stayed, could I ever have hoped for such a relationship with a woman… for such an intellectual renaissance? Tell me… when I see your angry looks… why, you would gladly have seen me taken away and locked up there with her!..What’s this, already the new road to Haifa?”
“It’s the old road. The inland route.”
“But it’s so wide. It looks new too.”
“They’ve widened it.”
“How soft and lovely everything seems… these orange groves on either side… it’s a beautiful country, we should be kinder to it… But where was I? Enough, let’s change the subject…”
(Now! I can feel it coming over me. Right smack in his puss.)
“Did you tell Dina that mother tried attacking you?”
“Murdering me, not just attacking. You know perfectly well… please…”
“You know that’s not so.”
“What are you talking about? How can you keep insisting?…Tsvi saw me lying there in my own blood…”
“All right, forget it. Don’t let’s start with that again. So she wanted to murder you. Why did you tell her yesterday…?”
“I just mentioned it in passing. What was wrong with that? So she’d understand why I didn’t come to your wedding. I owed her that much of an explanation.”
“Did you also owe it to her to open your shirt and show her your scar?”
“I don’t remember showing her… did you say that I opened my shirt? How can that be… is that really what she told you? Perhaps I just outlined it with my hand. She really said that? But you know what she’s like. Terribly childish, she lives in fantasies… or call it the literary imagination… and even if I did show her, so what? I suppose she thought it was a big joke.”
“No.”
“Then what did I do wrong? For better or worse she’s one of us now. Let her know. It’s not something that can be kept hidden. Why must you keep feeling ashamed?”
“I’m not ashamed. I just want you to know that if I feel scorn, it’s for that. It’s not intellectual. I never looked down on you intellectually. On the contrary, I learned a great deal from you. You were a teacher too, and I’ve followed in your footsteps, although in a somewhat different field. But this sentimentality of yours… this uncontrollable need to talk… without the slightest sense of discrimination…”