"This time you have not changed the subject to Svidrigailov," you observed ruthlessly.
Again we went for a walk together, this time beyond the perimeter, toward the buildings of the small farming settlement of Motza. My loneliness, and perhaps my extreme caution in the choice of my words, aroused your sympathy. You liked me, and you said so in a matter-of-fact tone of voice. Afternoon light on the hills. The gentle cypresses. A blaze of geraniums among the houses of the settlement, red-tiled roofs, a poinciana flaming red like a greeting from Tel Aviv. A light, dry breeze. Our conversation now is impersonal, Viennese as it were, a sort of exchange of views on the question of sexual pleasures and their relation to the emotions. You are remarkably free in the way you speak about anatomical and physiological details. You find my hesitancy appealing perhaps, but definitely surprising nonetheless: After all, Emanuel, we are both doctors, we are both perfectly familiar with these mechanisms, so why are you so embarrassed, secretly praying for me finally to change the subject?
I apologize; my embarrassment springs from the fact that in Hebrew the intimate particulars of the anatomy — very well, the sexual organs — have newly invented names, which seem rather sterile and lifeless, and that is why, paradoxically, I find it hard to utter them. You describe this explanation as "pilpulistic." You do not believe me. When all is said and done, what is to prevent my switching to German, or making use of the Latin terms? No, you do not believe me. Unhesitatingly you identify psychological inhibitions. Latent puritanism.
"Mina," I protest, "forgive me, please, but I'm not one of your patients yet."
"No. But we are making each other's acquaintance. We are taking a walk together. Why don't you ask me questions about myself?"
"I haven't got any questions. Only one, perhaps: you have been humiliated by someone, a man, perhaps a cruel man, a long time ago perhaps, viciously humiliated."
"Is that a question?"
"I was… voicing an impression."
Suddenly, forcefully, you take my head between your hands.
"Bend down."
I obey. Your lips. And a small discovery: tiny holes in the lobes of your ears. Is it possible that you once wore earrings? I do not ask.
Then you remark that I seem to you like a watch that has lost its glass. So vulnerable. So helpless. And so touching.
You touch my hair. I touch your shoulder. We walk on in silence. Darkness is falling. Overhead a bird of prey in the last rays of twilight. A vulture? A falcon? I do not know. And there is a hint of danger: outside the grounds of the sanatorium, Arab shepherds roam. Not far away is a notorious brigand village called Koloniyeh. We must be getting back. All around us the sadness of darkening rocks. Night is falling on an arid boulder-land. Far on the northern horizon, in the direction of Shu'afat and Beit Ikhsa, a star shell splits the sky, fades, shatters to shivers of light, and dies in the darkness.
After supper, a vulgar entertainer from the Broom Theater appeared in the dining room. He told jokes and made fun, in a heavy Russian accent, of the hypocrisy of the British government and the savagery of the Arab gangs. Finally, he even made faces at the audience. The Trade Union bigwig flushed, rose from his seat, and condemned such frivolity as being out of place in such critical times. The entertainer retired to a corner of the room and sat down, abashed, on the verge of tears. The audience was totally silent. When the speaker used the word "self-restraint," you suddenly burst into loud, resounding laughter, youthful laughter, which instantly provoked a reaction of astonished rage all around. At once people were laughing with you, or perhaps at you. We left the dining room. Darkness in the corridors and on the stairs. Almost immediately we were in each other's arms. Whispering, this time in German. You liked me, you said, you had a small volume of Rilke in your room, you said, and after all we were both adults and free agents.
In your room, almost without an exchange of words, rules were established at once. Orphan and dominating aunt. I must play the part of an ignorant, awkward, shy, but obedient pupil. But grateful. And very diligent. Yours to command in a whisper, and mine to obey in silence. You had all the details drawn up ready in your mind, as if you were carrying out an exotic program taken from an erotic handbook: Here. Now here. Slowly. Harder. More. Wait. Wait. Now. That's right.
Dear Mina, we both intended that night to be the first and the last. Adults, you said, free agents, you said, but, after all, who is an adult or a free agent, both of us were captured by a force that carried us away like twigs in a river. Perhaps because I was subjugated. Perhaps you had decided from the outset to subjugate me that night, and so I found myself a slave. But you, too, became a slaveowner, Mina, through my very subjugation. And again the following afternoon. And the next night. And again. And after the holidays you began sending postcards to me in Jerusalem with curt commands: Come to Haifa the day after tomorrow. Expect me on Saturday night. Come to Kate Graubert's pension in Talpiyot. I'll come to you for the festival. Tell Fritz that his fast is almost over. Hug Gips and Gutzi for me.
Until you finally taught me to call you Jasmine, to unleash the panting satyr, to conjure up a Baghdad harem in low-ceilinged boardinghouses. To torment and be tormented. To scream aloud. Again and again to grovel at your feet when it was all over, while you lit a cigarette, shook out the match, and studied our love-making in precise terms, like a general returning to a battlefield to analyze the fighting and learn lessons for the future.
No, Mina, there is no bitterness, no regret. On the contrary. Unbearable longing. Longing for your rare words of praise. And longing for your rebukes. For your mockery, too. And for your fingers. My own Jasmine, I am a sick man now, I don't have much time left. One might say I fell into your clutches. Or one might say I loved you out of humiliation.
New paragraph.
Let me return to my record of the place and the time. As I have already said, here I am, on the lookout.
Jerusalem, evening, summer's ending, signs of autumn, a man of thirty-nine, already retired for reasons of serious ill health, sitting on his balcony writing to a girl friend, or a former girl friend. He is telling her what he can see, and also what he is thinking. What the purpose is, what can be called the "subject," I have already said I do not know.
The daylight has been fading for an hour and a quarter now, and it is still not quite dark. I am at rest. On the face of it, this is a peaceful hour. Every Saturday evening there is a miracle of sound in Jerusalem: even the noises of the children playing, the cars, and the dogs, and in the distance a woman singing on the radio — ail these sounds are assimilated into the silence. Even the shouting down the road. Even a stray burst of machine-gun fire from the direction of Sanhedriya. The silence cloaks it all. In other words, on Saturday evening total silence reigns in Jerusalem.
Now the church and convent bells have started to ring out from nearby and far away, and they, too, are inside the silence. Tomorrow is Sunday. The color of the sky is dark-gray with a segment of orange between the clouds. They are fast-moving autumn clouds. And there is a flock of birds flying past. Larks, perhaps. Various people pass below my balcony in Malachi Street. A woman from next door with a basket. A student with an armload of books. And now a boy and a girl walking past rapidly, separated from each other by a good yard or so, not exchanging a word, yet there is no doubt that they are together and that their hearts are at rest.
Opposite, on the corner of Zechariah Street, an old Arab woman is sitting on the sidewalk. A peasant woman. Cross-legged and almost motionless. In front of her there is a large brass tray full of figs for sale. At the edge of the tray, a little pile of coins, no doubt milliemes and half-piasters, her day's takings. She comes here all the way from Sheikh Badr, or perhaps even from Lifta or Malha. How calm she is, and what a long journey she still has to make this evening. Meanwhile she is waiting. Chewing something. Mint leaves? I do not know. Soon she will get up, I almost said arise, balance the tray on her head, and pick her way in the dark among the thistles and boulders. Like a fine network of nerves, the footpaths stretch across the fields, joining the suburbs to the villages all around Jerusalem. A slow, sturdy old woman, at peace with her body and the desolate mountains; my heart yearns for that peace. As she goes on her way, the yellow lights of the street lamps will come on all over the neighborhood. Then the ringing of the bells will cease, and only the sadness of the evening will remain. Iron shutters will be closed. All the doors will be locked. Jerusalem will be in darkness, and I shall be alone in its midst. Suppose I have an attack in the night. Will the child really watch out for the slanting crack of light at my bathroom window, will he really slip out and come to me, be at my command?