S. Agnon - Two Tales - Betrothed & Edo and Enam

We sat together over tea, talking about the countries they were going to visit. A good many lands are no longer accessible, for since the war the world has closed in on us and the countries that admit tourists are fewer in number. Even places which have not barred their doors do not exactly welcome visitors. Still, if a traveler goes about things sensibly, he can find ways of enjoying his trip.

All the time we talked, their anxiety never left them. I began trying to guess at the causes, but could not find any real grounds. These people, I thought to myself, are my friends; indeed I am almost one of the family. After the riots of 1929, when the Arabs had destroyed my home and I had no roof over my head, the Greifenbachs put me up. Again, in the bad times when people who had gone into town could not get back to their homes on account of the curfews suddenly imposed by the British, I had spent several nights at their house. Seeing them so worried, I felt I should ask the reason, but I found some difficulty in framing the question tactfully. I could see Mrs. Greifenbach staring straight ahead of her into the depths of the room. She was like someone looking at a beloved object in order to fix its image so firmly in mind that he will be sure of recognizing it again. Still staring at the room, she remarked, as if to herself, “It’s hard to leave and hard to come back. I only pray that when we get home the doors won’t be locked against us and we won’t have to go to court with squatters.”

Greifenbach made Gerda’s words more explicit. “These are fine times,” he said, “when we can’t even be sure of a roof over our heads. You open the newspaper, only to read about people breaking into other people’s homes. You go to the shops and hear of this person or that whose house has been broken into. A man’s afraid to go out for a short stroll for fear his house will be grabbed while he is away. And we’ve all the more reason to be anxious, because our house is so far from any others and a long way out of town. It’s true that one room is rented to a Dr. Ginat, but that doesn’t help us in the least; most of the time he’s away from home, and when we go on our travels the house will be left with no one to guard it.”

My heart beat fast as I heard this; not because of the Greifenbachs, but because they had spoken of Ginat as a real person. Since the time when the name of Ginat became world-famous, I had not come across anyone who could say he actually knew him. Nor had I heard any mention of him, except in connection with his books. And now here he was, staying in this very house where I came and went freely.

Even with his first published article, “Ninety-nine Words of the Edo Language,” Ginat had drawn the attention of most of the philologists; when he followed this up with his Grammar of Edo , no philologist could afford to ignore him. But what made him truly famous was his discovery of the Enamite Hymns. To discover ninety-nine words of a language whose very name was hitherto unknown is no small achievement, and a greater one still is the compilation of a grammar of this forgotten tongue. But the Enamite Hymns were more: they were not only a new-found link in a chain that bound the beginnings of recorded history to the ages before, but in themselves splendid and incisive poetry. Not for nothing, then, did the greatest scholars come to grips with them, and those who at first had doubted that they were authentic Enamite texts began to compose commentaries on them. One thing, however, surprised me. All these scholars affirmed that the gods of Enam and their priests were male; how was it that they did not catch in the hymns the cadence of a woman’s song? On the other hand, I could be mistaken; for I am not, of course, a professional scholar, only a common reader who happens to enjoy anything beautiful that comes his way.

Mrs. Greifenbach could tell that I was excited, but could not tell why. She poured me another cup of tea and repeated what she had been saying before. I held my teacup while my heart pounded; at the same time, I could hear a kind of echo from my very depths. This did not surprise me; ever since the day I had first read the Enamite Hymns that echo had resounded. It was the reverberation of a primeval song passed on from the first hour of history through endless generations.

I held down the turmoil within me and asked, “Is he here?” Even as I said this, I was amazed at my own question. Never had I been inside a house where Ginat had been seen.

“Oh, no,” answered Mrs. Greifenbach. “He’s not in.” Well, I thought, that’s clear now. But since they’ve told me that he has rented a room, they must surely have seen him; and if they’ve seen him, they may very well have talked to him; and if they’ve talked to him, perhaps they can tell me something about him. With a great man who shuns publicity and lets nothing be known about himself, even the least bit of information is an unexpected find.

I turned to the Greifenbachs. “May I ask what you know about Ginat?”

“What we know?” answered Greifenbach. “Very little, so little it amounts to less than nothing.”

“How did he turn up at your house?”

“That’s easily answered,” said Greifenbach. “He just rented a room and came to live in it.”

“But how did he get here?” I insisted.

“Well, if you want to know the whole story, I can tell you, though there’s really nothing to tell.”

“Nevertheless, please tell me,” I said.

“One afternoon in summer,” he went on, “we were out on the veranda having tea, when a man with a walking stick and a knapsack came up and asked if we would rent him a room. We aren’t in the habit of renting rooms. Besides, this man didn’t so take my fancy that I felt like changing my ways in order to have him as a roomer. On the other hand, I was thinking, We do have a room that has been empty all these years. We’ve no use for it, and there’s a separate entrance, a shower, and so on. Perhaps it would be worthwhile to rent the room, if not for the money’s sake, at least to do a good turn to someone who wants to live in this modest neighborhood and is plainly a lover of peace and quiet. This fellow went on to say, ‘I promise I won’t give you much trouble. I travel about a great deal and only come to Jerusalem for a rest between one journey and the next. I shall not bring in any visitors, either.’ I took another look at him and could see that it would be a good thing to rent him the room; not for the reasons he gave, but because by now I rather liked him. In fact, I was surprised at myself for not realizing at once what sort of man he was. I looked across at Gerda and could see that she agreed. So I said to him, ‘Very well, the room is yours, on condition that you expect nothing from us; no service or anything at all, except a bed, a table, a chair, and a lamp; and the rent will be such-and-such.’ He took out his money and paid down a year’s rent, and he has kept to his side of the bargain ever since, making no demands on us. That’s all I can tell you, besides what I’ve seen about him in the literary supplements to the newspapers, which I’m sure you have also read. I dare say you have read his Hymns, too. So have I, a bit here and a bit there, but I still don’t see why they are so important. I’m not in the habit of expressing my views about matters on which I’m no expert, but I think I can say this: in every generation, some discovery is made that’s regarded as the greatest thing that ever was. Eventually it’s forgotten, for meanwhile some new discovery comes to light. No doubt that goes, too, for the discoveries of Dr. Ginat.”

I let these remarks pass and returned to the main question, concerning Dr. Ginat himself. “My guess is that Gerda could tell me more,” I said.

Mrs. Greifenbach looked at me, surprised that I should credit her with knowledge she didn’t possess. She hesitated for a moment, reflected for still another, then said, “I really don’t know any more than what Gerhard has told you. There’s a separate entrance to the room, we don’t have to keep it tidy, and our hard working cleaning woman Grazia, as you know, isn’t keen on extra work. Since we gave Ginat the key to his room, I’ve not been in it, nor have I seen him; after staying here one night, he went off and didn’t come back for months.”