IF YOU’D LIKE TO CHANGE into fresh clothes, I’ll wait for you in the lobby,” said Molkho, translating each word into sign language. Still aghast at having her porter for a bedmate, the little Russian sat slumped on the messy bed with her plump legs spread outward and stared at him in a trance. “We’ll have a bite to eat,” said Molkho, “and then I’ll show you around and perhaps even take you to the wall. Just dress warmly, because the autumn nights here are freezing, though that’s something I needn’t tell a Russian.”
He put on his coat, reached for the key, and then left it for her in the door, hoping she didn’t blame him for their predicament, which could have befallen any two travelers. Having seen their guests off to the opera, the friendly Germans were dining in their kitchen, and Molkho put on his bifocals for a better view of them. Time passed. Had the little Russian gotten her signals crossed again? At last, the elevator opened and out she stepped in an old gray raincoat with a funny, matching beret. She had begun to understand him so much better without improving her Hebrew one bit that he was beginning to wonder if language was humanly necessary.
THE SAME DRIZZLE that had greeted them at the railroad station was still falling in the reddish haze of the streetlamps. They crossed some boards laid over the trench (the dirt from which, Molkho noticed, pleased to see that the city was built on its own ruins, was full of smashed brick, rotted sacking, rusty iron, and bits of broken glass) and walked to the restaurant. It was practically empty, its low prices unchanged, as were its greasy menus. While waiting for the two beers he ordered, he thought of breaking the ice with a joke about Russian politics making strange bedfellows but was discouraged by her timid look.
After supper he took her to window-shop in the little streets of the quarter, but she seemed so exhausted that he decided she had best go to bed. It was ten o’clock when they returned to the hotel. “If you’re tired, go to sleep,” he said, letting her into the room and going downstairs to telephone his mother-in-law from the lobby, where he asked the student to place a collect call to Israel. The old lady, however, was not in. Smiling at the thought of an eighty-three-year-old woman being out on the town at such an hour, he sat down to wait and try again. The lobby was pleasantly quiet: the Indians were still at the opera, the student was engrossed in his books, and one of his sisters was setting the breakfast tables in the dining room. I just pray we get through the night, Molkho thought, leafing through some German magazines. Not that there’s any reason not to. Whatever happens, if it happens at all, is up to her. He sat there for almost an hour, missing his wife, who would have liked such a civilized place, until the Indians began drifting in, contentedly chock-full of music. What opera had they seen? he wondered, watching them collect their keys and go upstairs. He rose and asked the sleepy student to place another call, but again there was no answer. Now he was beginning to worry. Why, he thought, casting a glance at the swords in their cabinets which seemed smaller than he had remembered them, they’re nothing but overgrown daggers! If I had come here with Ya’ara, everything might have been different. The student spread a mattress for himself in a corner and began to turn out the lights.
It was midnight when Molkho took the trusty elevator up to the second floor and opened the door of the room, relieved to find it dark and pungent with innocent sleep. Breathing softly and moving like a cat, he slipped off his shoes and took out his pajamas while casting a wary look at the woman in bed. Had she kept to her side of it or would she have to be rolled back? Though it was hard to tell in the dark, he saw no signs of trespassing. Just then however, scotching his optimism, her young body tossed restlessly. Hurrying to the bathroom, he shut the door and switched on the light. The little room had been the scene of intense activity and was so full of steam that he had to wipe the mirror to see himself. The laundry from the sink had been draped over the radiator with a frank lack of inhibition, and he fingered a pair of panties to see if they would be dry by the morning. Indeed, they would be. He was already undressed when he recalled that he hadn’t taken his daily shower. Afraid to wake his sleeping companion, he considered skipping it; but loyalty to his dead wife prevailed and he turned on the water, hoping the sound would blend with her dreams. As he was about to put on his pajamas he noticed they were missing several buttons. My God, he thought bitterly, I should never have agreed to van roomps! But it was too late for needle and thread, and so he switched off the bathroom light and groped his way toward the bed, sensing the little Russian’s eyes opening in the darkness. Though his side of the sheet was warm about the ankles, a sure sign that her feet had crossed the border, she had left him plenty of room. Turning his back to her, he curled up in a fetal ball. The night will pass quickly after all, he told himself, relaxing in the restful silence. It’s a good thing the hotel is full of Indians and not Italians or Greeks. Just then, however, he noticed her breathing, a faint suck of air like a whistle, almost a light snore. Though it was not at all loud or rasping, he felt stunned. I’ve been sleeping alone for too long, he thought, but I’ll get used to it right away.
BUT HE DID NOT. He remained wide awake, listening to her breathe. For a while he tried guessing where his mother-in-law might have gone. Then he thought of a newspaper article he once had read about how sleeping with a partner decreased one’s chances of heart disease. Indeed, for years he and his wife had slept closely entwined, and her heart had held out to the end. Only during her illness did his embrace become painful, while later, when she was moved to her hospital bed, they no longer slept on one level. Now he had risen again in the world, and were he not such a worrier, it would be natural to cuddle up to the pale form by his side, whose warmth might help him fall asleep. If he managed to return her to Russia, she would no doubt remember him fondly. Yet suppose he didn’t? A night like this could be misinterpreted; in fact, there was something quite animal about sleeping in one bed without a common language. Why didn’t she know Hebrew, grieved Molkho, rubbing his bare feet together, or at least a little English? Though the room was hot, the soles of his feet couldn’t seem to get warm.
Where was his mother-in-law? Was she, too, a secret vanisher? He thought of the summer day seven years ago when she disappeared outside the operating room, where they were waiting for the result of the first biopsy. Just then, much sooner than expected, the green-smocked surgeon appeared to report that it was positive and that the breast would have to be removed. He retired to a little office while Molkho, thunderstruck, ran off to tell his wife’s mother. But she was nowhere to be seen, and so he ran back to the office, where the surgeon was nursing a cup of coffee while studying some X rays spread out on a newspaper. Was he waiting for Molkho’s consent or just resting before the operation? Molkho never found out, though knocking lightly on the open door, he began to plead with the man. “If there isn’t any choice. I have complete faith in you. She’s in your hands. The main thing is to get it all out.” The surgeon listened quizzically, finished his coffee, and strode wordlessly back to the operating room, leaving Molkho standing by a wall as white as his wife’s breast, thinking of all the times he had kissed it and of how he would have liked to say good-bye, after which he went despairingly off to look once more for his mother-in-law, the only person who could comfort him, searching everywhere until he found her on a bench in another ward, chatting with a sick friend. Her smile disappeared as soon as she saw him, but at a loss for words, feeling angry at her for the first time in his life, the only way he could think of breaking the news was to slash the air with his hand.