"Your problem, pal."
And with his face to the night, in a low, decisive voice, he answered:
"Correct. It is my problem. And I am going to solve it."
And he smiled again. But this time it was not his habitual, sad smile of self-deprecation, but the astonished curled lip of a man who for a long time has been seeking a complex answer to a complex question and suddenly discovers a simple one.
He turned and went inside. At once he saw Yael, who was deep in conversation with Uri on the sofa, their knees touching. Fima had the impression that laughter had frozen on their lips as he entered. But he felt no envy. On the contrary, a secret joy welled up inside him at the thought that he had slept with every woman in this room, Shula, Nina, and Yael. And yesterday with Annette Tadmor. And tomorrow was another day.
At that moment he caught sight of Dimi kneeling on the carpet in a corner, a quaint, philosophical child, slowly revolving with his finger Baruch's huge terrestrial globe, which was illuminated from within. The electric light painted the oceans blue and the land masses gold. The child seemed absorbed, detached, concentrating entirely on what he was doing. And Fima remarked to himself, like a man making a mental note of the whereabouts of a suitcase or an electric switch, that he loved this child more than he had ever loved any living soul. Including women. Including the boy's mother. Including his own mother.
Yael got up and approached him, uncertain whether to shake his hand or just rest a hand on his sleeve. Fima did not wait for her to make up her mind, but hugged her hard and pressed her head to his shoulder, as though it were she, not he, who needed and deserved consolation. As though he were making her a present of his new orphanhood. Yael mumbled into his chest something that Fima did not catch and did not even want to hear, because he was enjoying the discovery that Yael, like Prime Minister Ben Gurion, was shorter than he by almost a head. Even though he was not a tall man.
Then Yael broke away from his clasp and hurried, or escaped, to the kitchen, to help Shula and Teddy, who were making open sandwiches for everybody. It occurred to Fima to ask Uri or Tsvi to call the two gynecologists on his behalf, and also Tamar, and why not Annette Tadmor too? He had a sudden urge to gather together all the people who had some bearing on his new life. As though something inside him was planning, without his knowledge, a ceremony. To preach to them. To tell them something new. To announce that henceforth… But perhaps he was confusing mourning with a farewell party. Farewell to what? What sort of sermon could he preach? What news did a man like him have to give? Be holy and pure, all of you, in préparation for the Third State?
He changed his mind, and abandoned the idea of a gathering.
He suddenly chose not to sit in the place vacated by Yael next to Uri on the sofa, but in his father's armchair. He stretched his legs comfortably on the upholstered footstool. He relished the soft seat that took his body as though it had been made to measure for him. Without thinking, he banged twice on the floor with the silver-headed cane. But when they all stopped talking and looked at him attentively, ready to do his bidding, to offer him affection and condolence, Fima smiled benignly and exclaimed:
"Why this silence? Carry on."
Tsvi, Nina, and Uri tried to draw him into a conversation to distract him, a light exchange about subjects dear to his heart, the situation in the Territories, the way it was presented on Italian television, which Uri had been watching in Rome, the significance of the American overtures. Fima refused to be drawn. He contented himself with keeping the absent-minded smile on his face. For a moment he thought of Baruch lying in a refrigerated compartment in the basement of Hadassah Hospital, in a sort of honeycomb of freezer drawers, populated, in part or in whole, by the fresh Jerusalem dead. He tried to feel in his own bones the frost, the darkness of the drawer, the dark northern ocean bed below the whaling station. But he could find no pain in his heart. Or fear. No. His heart was light, and he almost began to see the humor in the metallic mortuary honeycomb with its drawers of corpses. He recalled his father's anecdote about the argument between the Israeli and the American railway boss, and the story of the famous rabbi and the highwayman who exchanged their cloaks. He knew he would have to say something. But he had no idea what he could tell his friends. However, his ignorance was growing thinner and thinner. Like a veil that only half hides the face. He got up and went to the bathroom and rediscovered that here at his father's the toilet was flushed by a tap that could be turned on or off at will, with no race, no defeat, no constant humiliation. So that was one less thing to worry about.
Returning, he joined Dimi on the carpet, got down on his knees, and asked:
"Do you know the legend of Atlantis?"
Dimi said:
"Sure I do. There was a program about it once on educational TV. It's not exactly a legend."
"What is it then? Fact?"
"Of course not."
"So, if it's not a legend and it's not fact?"
"It's a myth. A myth is not the same thing as a legend. It's more like a nucleus."
"Where was this Atlantis, roughly?"
Dimi turned the illuminated globe a little and gently placed a pale hand on the ocean that glowed from the depths in the radiance of the electric light between Africa and South America, and the boy's fingers were also illuminated with a ghostly glow.
"Roughly here. But it makes no difference. It's more in the mind."
"Tell me something, Dimi. Do you think there's anything after we die?"
"Why not?"
"Do you believe Granpa can hear us right now?"
"There isn't that much to hear."
"But can he?"
"Why not?"
"And can we hear him?"
"In our minds, yes."
"Are you sad?"
"Yes. Both of us. But it's not good-bye. You can go on loving."
"So — we shouldn't be afraid of dying?"
"No, that isn't possible."
"Tell me something, Dimi. Have you had any supper tonight?"
"I'm not hungry."
"Then give me your hand."
"What for?"
"Nothing. Just to feel."
"Feel what?"
"Nothing special."
"Stop it, Fima. Go back to your friends."
At this point their conversation was interrupted, because Dr. Wahrhaftig burst into the room, red-faced, panting, and ranting, as if he had come to put a stop to some scandal rather than offer his condolences. Fima was unable to conceal his smile when he noticed for the first time a resemblance between Wahrhaftig and the Ben Gurion who bellowed at his father in Rashbam Street forty years before. Tamar Greenwich arrived with the doctor, nervous, rather weepy, full of good intentions. Fima turned toward them, patiently accepted the handshake and the hug, but did not catch what they were saying to him. For some reason his lips muttered vacantly:
"Never mind. No harm done. These things happen."
Apparently they too failed to catch what was said. They were quickly given a glass of tea.
At half past eight, seated again in his father's armchair, with his legs comfortably crossed, Fima pushed away the yogurt and the roll with pickled herring that Teddy had placed in front of him. He removed the arm that Uri put around his shoulder. And he declined Shula's offer of a blanket for his lap. He suddenly handed back to Nina the brown envelope he had removed from her attaché case earlier and told her to start reading the will aloud.
"Now?"
"Now."
"Even though usually…"
"Even though usually."
"But Fima…"
"Now, please."
After a hesitation and an exchange of rapid glances with Tsvi and Yael and Uri, Nina decided to comply. She drew two closely typed sheets of paper from the envelope. In the silence that had fallen she started to read, at first with some embarrassment and then in her professional voice, which was calm and detached.