S. Agnon - A Book that Was Lost

“Well,” I asked him, “what will you do?” “What we ought to do we certainly shall not do,” he replied with a smile. “But I only hope the future is no worse than the past, for nothing is so bad that there’s nothing worse. Master Gedaliah Klein, may he rest in peace, was a great man and meant to help the builders of the neighborhood. He came forward when they were in difficulties and found them money at a low rate of eight per cent when people pay nine or ten and up to twelve. But anyone who gets into debt has to leave his house in the end.”

“And is there no hope for your neighborhood?” I asked. “There is one hope,” he replied. “And what is it?” I asked. “When the Messiah comes,” he said, “and the wolf dwells with the lamb, we shall no longer be afraid of our bad neighbors, and the goats will do no more harm either.” “And until the Messiah comes?” I said. He smiled and replied, “The Old Man of Shpoli used to say, ‘Master of the universe, I can assure Thee that the world will go on degenerating in this way until the coming of the Redeemer.’ True, there was once a chance to put things right. You see the two rows of houses, on the road to our neighborhood, that separate us from the town and the next neighborhood? All these houses, as you see them, are new, recently built. But before they were built, that was virgin soil, and we could get from one neighborhood to the other in a short time. The owners of the land offered to sell it to us, and we agreed. So we went to our wealthy neighbors and said to them, ‘This land is up for sale; buy it, and both of us will no longer be surrounded by the Arabs, who terrorize us so long as we are few. And we will pay our share for the bus and the watchmen and all the other public facilities that every Jewish community must have to survive.’ But our neighbors sent us away empty-handed. After all, they had moved away from the town and its paupers, and then paupers come along and propose to get closer. We started going around from one institution to another, but they put us off, some for budgetary reasons and some for economic. ‘It isn’t enough that you haven’t succeeded,’ they said, ‘but you want to drag other people into this mess.’ So we were in despair. Meanwhile, along came Syrians from Syria, bought the land, and built themselves large houses. So we are still living in fear and trembling, and we can’t keep up any public facility, not even a grocery. Our dignified neighbor has also suffered for its pride, for the Arabs have surrounded it, and it is far from any Jewish settlement, and the bus hardly comes for lack of passengers, for anyone who has no house of his own moves to town, and new houses are not being built there, for no one builds his home in a neighborhood whose people are leaving. And even those who own their own houses would be glad to leave, and this garden city, builded in beauty, is gradually being abandoned.”

As we were talking, a bus came from town and the whole neighborhood went out to meet it. Women and children got off, carrying torn and tattered baskets, with a little cabbage, a little beet, a little turnip, a little garlic and onion in them, and a loaf or two on top — all those things a poor man covets. They set down the baskets and sacks, got into the bus again, and threw out bundles of rusty spikes and old iron hoops they had bought in town to reinforce their tottering houses; some brought out crates and some cradles.

The neighborhood began to hum and bustle. Even those who had been hidden in their houses came out and asked what news there was in town and when they would say the afternoon prayer. Little by little, the rest of the people returned from town with their sons, the young ones from the heder and the older ones from the yeshivah . And from end to end of the neighborhood, people came running to the synagogue.

In the meantime, Arabs came by, on their way back from their work in town to the neighborhood villages. They were followed by shepherds with their flocks, who stirred up clouds of dust. The people of the neighborhood pushed their way through the sheep, groaning and panting.

It was time for me to return to town, so I got into the bus. An hour passed but it did not move. I asked the driver when he would start. “What’s wrong with staying here?” said the driver. I said to him, “If you are not going, tell me and I will go on foot.” “Do you think I’m a prophet, that I should know if I’m going?” he said. “If you’re not afraid of tiring out your legs, get up and walk. If I find passengers and start off, I’ll pick you up on the way and take you in; if I don’t, I’ll stay the night here. Nice neighborhood, isn’t it? Refreshing air! Pity you can’t live on air.”

I got off the bus and set out on foot. Fine, big houses accompanied me most of the way. When were they built? We did not read about them in the papers; we were not invited to the dedications, but there they are, sound and solid. Every house is surrounded by a garden, with an iron fence around it, so that no goat can get in. The Lord buildeth Jerusalem, sometimes by means of Jews and sometimes by means of gentiles.

7

Once I was going to and fro, as usual, in the streets of Jerusalem, when I saw large posters announcing a memorial meeting that night on the thirtieth day after the passing of Mr. Gedaliah Klein. Ah, thirty days had passed since the day I wrote the letter of condolence.

I took out my watch to see if the time had not yet come for the commemoration, and I saw that the time had not yet come. To pass the time I went from wall to wall and from poster to poster. I doubt if there was a man in Jerusalem that day who was so well versed as I in the names and titles of the eulogists.

I began to be afraid I might have made a mistake in the order of the days, and the day of the commemoration had passed. I went into a bookshop to buy a calendar tablet.

The shopkeeper said, mockingly, “We are just going to print a calendar for next year and you are looking for yesteryear.”

“I am content with the old tablets,” I said.

To pass the time I bought a newspaper. Since I had the paper, I read all the articles that were printed on the thirtieth day of Mr. Gedaliah Klein’s passing. In the past, all the deeds of men were included in a single verse, such as “And Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for God took him,” but now that knowledge has expanded and the deeds of men have multiplied, we cannot complete all their praises in one sentence.

It is almost eight o’clock. The shopkeepers are locking up their shops, with double locks, for fear of the thieves who have multiplied in Jerusalem. Buses race by, and so do passersby. As they run, they bump into peddlers and broom-sellers, beggars and flute-players, reformers, crazy men and crazy women, distributors of leaflets and advertisers of merchandise, a dog who has lost his master and a mistress who has lost her dog.

As you escape from these, the shoeshine boys take hold of your feet. While they are sharing out your feet, paperboys offer you their newspapers. As you stand and read, agitators come up and fill your hands with pamphlets. If you get rid of them, women come along and pin all kinds of tags on you. You stop to pay, but your pocket is empty, for in the meantime pickpockets have extracted your purse. As you stand in despair, wanting to go home, along comes a procession of boys. While you wait for them to pass, a bus goes by and runs over an ass. You run to lift it; along come the police and strike you with their batons for obstructing the populace and holding up the traffic. When you run away and find a place to hide, you come across a girl who has been attacked by zealots. While they are punishing her because they saw her going with the English, a young man throws vitriol in another girl’s face and blinds her. The gramophone shrieks, “How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob,” while the radio sings back, “Happy are ye, O Israel.” Meanwhile, the whole street lights up, revealing the picture of a naked woman, and a loudspeaker proclaims to the heavens, “Come and see the enchantress!”