“Did you damage the jeep?” Esther asked. When he didn’t answer, she walked around the jeep, inspecting it carefully. “Everything looks fine,” she said.
“I was driving too fast when I suddenly saw this child,” Israel said. “I braked hard and hit my head against the— the—” He fell silent.
“Against what?” Esther asked. She took her husband’s lighter and flicked it on Israel’s face. He lifted his hand against the light. “What did you hit it against?”
“I hit it, Esther, that’s all,” he said softly. “Take that goddamn light away. My head hurts.”
Little Dov took the lighter from her hand.
“I’m thirsty,” Israel said.
“Buy yourself something to drink,” Little Dov said. “There’s a stand by the hotel where they sell cold beer.”
“I haven’t got any money,” Israel said.
“You spent the whole day driving that woman around,” Esther said. “Didn’t she pay you?”
Israel didn’t reply. They watched the red end of the cigarette glow over his bruised and tired face.
“Has Dov gone to sleep?” he asked after a pause.
“No,” Esther said. “He’s been looking for you in every bar in town and he’s really upset. He didn’t even eat his supper. Has that woman paid you?”
“Of course she has,” Israel said. “Women always pay what they owe.”
“You said you didn’t have any money.”
“I don’t have any change,” he said. “You misunderstood me. I haven’t learned Hebrew all that well yet, and I don’t know if I ever will. I wasn’t born here like you two. I can’t fight or sing. So I have to settle for what they pay me.” He removed Esther’s hand gently from the steering wheel. “I have to go now. I guess Dov won’t go to sleep until I return. He got used to my company during the year we’ve been together. Though I myself don’t know why he likes me.”
He started the jeep and made a U-turn on the wet sand; as he drove slowly past them, they once again saw his battered face.
“Did we offend him, Esther?” Little Dov asked.
“Don’t you have other worries?”
“I don’t like to hurt people’s feelings, that’s all,” he said. “Didn’t he seem offended to you?”
“No,” she said.
“Good.”
“It’s not like you think. I don’t believe it would be possible to offend him even if we wanted to.”
“There’s no reason to despise him.”
“There’s also no reason to like him,” she said. “Better don’t talk to me about him. He’s your brother’s friend. You heard what he said. Dov can’t fall asleep unless he’s there.”
“Dov was a broken man after his wife left him. I was afraid he would do something to himself. I’m glad Israel was with him. Let’s go, Esther.”
“Where do you want to go?” she asked. “If you want to go swimming, we can swim right here.”
“And if I don’t want to go swimming?”
“Then throw them out of the house,” she said. “So that we can sleep in our bed. I’m embarrassed doing it here, Dov. What if somebody sees us?”
“He’ll go on his way. A man can make love to his wife anywhere he likes.”
Esther sat down on the sand, bringing her long legs up and resting her chin on her knees.
“You don’t like Dov, do you?” her husband asked.
“No,” she said. “Neither him nor his friend. I don’t know why they came here, and I don’t believe they’ll ever go away.”
“Dov is my brother. I can’t kick him out into the street.”
“No,” she said. “You can’t do that. So maybe we should order a bed big enough for four people and sleep in it together. Or maybe big enough for five, so that when that woman comes over to see Dov, she’ll fit in comfortably, too.”
“What woman, Esther?”
“Just a woman,” she said. “What’s so strange in that? If your brother is anything like you, there’s gonna be plenty of women coming to the house.”
“You mean the one who’s rented the jeep?”
“I know nothing about the jeep,” she said. “I don’t believe the jeep is what she’s after. Who’d need a jeep to see a town of five thousand, which you can cover on foot in twenty minutes?”
“You shouldn’t say such things, Esther,” Little Dov said. “You don’t know her.”
“There’s nothing strange in it,” she said again. “Your brother is a very handsome man.”
“I wouldn’t know, Esther. I’m not a woman. I don’t know what’s so handsome about him.”
“But I’m a woman. And so is she. I bet she could explain to you what’s so handsome about Dov, even though he told her she looked like a whore. But that won’t stop her, she’ll come anyway. She’ll come to him to tell him he was wrong. Dov knows how to win a woman. You have to insult her and then buy yourself a pack of cigarettes and a newspaper, lie down in bed, and wait. She’ll come of her own free will to convince him he was wrong. Or right. But by then the distinction won’t matter much.”
Little Dov sat in silence, leaning against her knees, drawing something in the sand with a stick.
“How do you know such things, Esther?” he finally asked.
“Nobody ever told me,” she said. “I just know. I feel it.”
“I don’t want you to feel such things, Esther.”
“But I do,” she said. “I can’t help it. You wouldn’t want me to lie, would you?”
“Try thinking of something else,” he said. “And now take off your dress. You know how to make me happy.”
“Why should I make you happy here?” she asked. “I have my own home and my own bed.” When he didn’t answer, she went on, “Oh, I forgot your brother is staying there now. But why should I do it here?”
“Because I want you to,” Little Dov said. “And that should be reason enough. As long as we’re together, anyway.” He pushed her down on the sand and was about to pull off her dress when she jumped up and ran into the darkness, out of his reach. She burst out laughing, looking at him, and he knew he couldn’t stand up because he’d look ridiculous if he did. So he stayed on his knees, his face contorted with anger, and started ripping to shreds the shirt he had been carrying.
“Too bad you’re ruining that shirt,” she said. “Your brother might need it. He might need it when he takes that woman to our bed.”
“Esther,” he said softly, “something’s changed. I can feel something has changed and there’s nothing I can do about it. Maybe I’m too stupid, or maybe I can’t see something that’s obvious to everyone else. But I don’t want anything between us to change. Come here. I prefer to kill you with my own hands than to let you talk and act this way and to feel the way I’m feeling now. Yes, it’ll be better if I kill you. Come here. I’ll know what to do with myself afterwards.” He paused and then said again, “Something’s changed. Something’s changed.”
Suddenly he grabbed a stone from the sand and lurched after her, but she retreated quickly into the darkness; for a moment he could hear the patter of her slim bare feet on the wet, warm sand. He trudged home, all the way feeling her smell, like a dog, and following it in the dark.
ISRAEL PARKED THE JEEP WITH ITS PASSENGER SIDE wheels on the sidewalk, turned its lights off, and walked into the house. It was dark inside. Passing Dov’s father’s room, he stopped. He stood for a moment fingering the bones of his face and listening to the old man’s deep, even breathing. Then he went into the room where he and Dov slept and saw the red glow of a cigarette end in the dark.
“You’re still awake, Dov?” he asked.
“How can I sleep? I walked around the whole town asking people if they had seen you or the goddamn jeep.”
“And what did they tell you?”
“That they hadn’t. Maybe because they didn’t know who I was looking for. Turn on the light, Israel.”