The stateless one left his hotel at five. In front of the doors to the building he stopped for a moment and looked first up at the sky and then at his watch. “The marquise went out at precisely five o’clock,” he noted to himself.
The blow came so fast, so unexpectedly, that our apatride couldn’t have felt anything save the penetrating pain on the crown of his head; and all at once daybreak lit up all around him, as if a thunderclap had struck in the vicinity; lightning flashed in his mind, illuminating with its fearsome and powerful tongue of fire his whole life, and immediately thereafter darkness must have descended. His limbs separated from his body, as if an invisible force had ripped them from his torso. (We can, by means of analogy, have a presentiment of this horrific sensation of a higher power pulling the limbs from our body: once upon a time you were rocking on a chair and the chair suddenly flipped over, and you found yourself lying with the crown of your head on the concrete floor while for a moment your hands and your feet seemed to be separated from your body, ripped out of their joints, and you lay for several seconds without moving on the ground, incapable of screaming because robbed of your voice.) This rapid flash of light, like the flame of a torch before a hard gust of wind extinguishes it once and for all, this illumination prior to complete obscurity — this is as far as we are capable of following the experiences of the man without a country. Further than this (as Mme Yourcenar would say), we cannot go. No such experience has ever been vouchsafed us. And we will never be able to experience such things.
You, dear sirs, would like for me to show you the house in which I was born? But my mother gave birth in the hospital at Fiume, and that building has been destroyed. And you won’t manage to put up a memorial plaque on my house, because it has probably been torn down, too. Alternately, you’d have to hang three or four plaques with my name on them: in various cities and various countries, but in this I could not be of assistance to you either, because I don’t know in which house I grew up; I no longer recall where I lived during my childhood; I barely even know anymore what language I spoke. What I do remember are images: swaying palms and oleander somewhere by the sea, the Danube flowing along, dark green, next to pastureland, and a counting rhyme: eeny, meeny, miny, moe.
JURIJ GOLEC
I had just returned to Paris after the Easter holidays. I live in the 10th arrondissement and I do not suffer from homesickness. On sunny days, I am woken up by the birds, like in Voždovac. Through the open door on my balcony I hear the Serbs shouting and cursing at each other; in the early light of dawn, as they are letting their engines warm up, accordion notes come tumbling out of their tape players. For a moment I don’t remember where I am.
I pulled the mail out of the box and started listening to my messages: Anne-Marie is letting me know that a new review of my book is out. (Just for the record: I had already read it.) Then some music, and giggling; I don’t recognize any of the voices. B.P. from London informs me that he has no intention of conversing with phantoms, and I should throw this machine out with the trash. Then, giggling and music again. A certain Patricia Hamburger (“Yes, like the meat”) reminds me, if I understand her correctly, that I flirted with her after a visit to an exhibition in some gallery, and that I kissed her hand. (It’s possible.) After that, there were two or three hang-ups. And B.P. once more: if he gets this machine one more time. Then, probably grasping the fact that time is running out: “I have something important to tell you. As for this accursed little machine, throw it in the garbage. I want to speak with you, and it’s quite a serious matter. But, damn it all, I cannot talk to a machine! I’d like to know what moron convinced you to buy this marvel. And why? It’s not like you’re some traveling salesman! I mean, really, what kind of all-important business dealings do you have? And those women of yours can just be patient for a bit. Incidentally, it would be better for you to write instead of. Did you really. ” Yes, I know, that’s all fine and good, but the thirty seconds are up and I still have no idea what important matter he wanted to share with me. Luba Jurgenson conveys her apology: the last sentence of her article was cut, and so the text sounds incomplete. And then a frail voice: “This is Jurrri Golec. My wife has died. Burial Thursday at four p.m. The Montparnasse cemetery.” After that: Mme Ursula Randelis. O.V. from Piran. Kristos Arvanitidis, my friend from Thessaloniki. A certain Nadja Moust from Belgium; she would like to take a course in Serbo-Croatian; what are the requirements for registering. B.P. again, this time in medias res: “I just want to say that we’ve known each other for more than thirty years and we have still never had a serious talk. Farewell.” After which the line went dead.
At least ten days had passed since Jurij Golec had left that message, so I immediately sent him a telegram of sympathy. Then I tried repeatedly, and at different times of the day, to reach him by telephone, but no one answered. I assumed he had left town. Later I found out from Ursula Randelis, a friend of his of many years, that he had moved into Noémie’s apartment. (They had separated over twenty years ago; she lived by the Jardin du Luxembourg and he in the 14th arrondissement.) I called there a number of times, till at last I heard his faltering voice: “You’ve reached 325-26-80. Jurrri Golec and Mrs. Golec, also known as Noémie Dastrrre. Please leave your number.”
One morning he rang me up: “Jurrri Golec here.”
“Poor Noémie. Did you get my telegram?”
“Yes, thank you.”
“I thought maybe you’d left town,” I said. “It happened so suddenly.”
“Never mind. I’m calling on an important matter.”
“All right. Go on.”
“You are a sensitive man, David. You’ll understand.” (Pause)
“I’m listening.”
“You aren’t like the French.” (Suddenly he switched to Russian.) “Ty poet. That’s not flattery. After all, I said as much in the foreword to your book. You’re the only one who can help me. Money isn’t an issue anymore. It doesn’t matter what it costs. Noémie had plenty of money. I don’t know if you’re aware of that. She was working in ethnographic films and made a pretty penny. And then there were her African sculptures. Are you listening to me?”
“Of course I’m listening to you.”
“She’d cut me out of the inheritance completely, but then right at the end she changed her will. In the hospital. She was of the opinion that I had atoned for all my sins in relation to her. She left the largest portion to a foundation in Israel that will bear her name.”
“What kind of foundation?”
“For the study of the folklore of East European Jewry. Which is apparently in the process of dying out. But what she left to me is quite sufficient.”
“So travel somewhere.”
“I have to remain here. All the formalities pertaining to the inheritance, the official inventory. ”
“At least move out of that apartment. It’s not good for you.”
“You have to help me.”
I thought maybe he wanted to borrow money until the issue of the will was settled. Or maybe that he wanted me to help him move. He had a huge library with books in every imaginable language.