A. Yehoshua: Friendly Fire: A Duet

And so, at dawn, he keeps his word. Focused and alert, he stands silently facing the four elevators — each of which is currently stopping at a different floor of the tower — bringing his seasoned intuition to bear on the violent wailing of the winds. Finally he calls for one. The closest descends and opens its doors. He sends it one flight up, then presses the button again to see if a more distant cab responds or if the first one returns after concluding its upward mission. Yes, the control panel is properly programmed: the faraway elevators stay put and the nearest one comes back. There is no superfluous movement between floors; energy is being properly conserved.

Now he enters the car and with the master key detaches it from the group system and bends it to his will. This way he can navigate its movements from floor to floor and try to identify the point where the wind flows in. He crouches against the rear wall mirror, leaning on his own reflection, and as the elevator slowly climbs he listens to the howling outside the steel cage. Here the roaring he heard underground is muted, a growl of stifled fury that at certain floors shifts into mournful sobbing. Without question, within this shaft that was meant to be completely sealed off from the outside world swirl uninvited spirits. But are they also breaking into the cars? Have his elevators let him down? For Ya'ari, over the objections of the engineers at his firm who preferred Finnish or Chinese elevators — which might actually have proven, bottom line, to be cheaper — had for once insisted on using an Israeli model.

Before he orders the technicians to shut down the elevators and examine the shaft, there is still time to summon to the tower not only the acoustic expert with her sensitive ear, but also a fresh and creative intelligence. Ya'ari is thinking of his son, who joined the business three years ago and has demonstrated an ingenuity appreciated by his father and coworkers alike.

He rides to the top floor, and before he emerges from the elevator, he cancels his control and returns it to the main system. Here, on the thirtieth floor, all is silent. It would seem from the plastic wrapping on the door that a buyer for the deluxe penthouse has yet to be found. He enters the machine room opposite; to his surprise he hears neither growl nor whistle, only the precise, pleasant whoosh of the European cables, which now begin to stir as the earliest-rising tenants leave the building. He edges between the huge motors and walks out onto the tiny iron balcony, which the building's architect opposed but Ya'ari insisted upon, so that maintenance technicians could flee into the fresh air in the event of fire.

Slovenly, dark clouds enfold Tel Aviv. The Pinsker Tower has sprung up in the midst of a quiet, low-rise urban environment and thus commands a wide view and can even conduct a respectable dialogue with the downtown skyscrapers that sparkle in the grayish southeast.

The yellow brushstrokes now visible on the horizon are no trick of the light, and the passenger plane silently gaining altitude is also very real. No, thinks Ya'ari, checking his watch, it's not her plane yet. Even barring a delay, she won't take off for another ten minutes, and there's no point waiting for her in the freezing cold, since there is no way of knowing which plane is hers.

But his love for his wife rivets him to the little balcony. Her journey has begun and can't be stopped, but he can watch over her from afar. In principle he could have gone with her, but it wasn't his workload alone that made him stay behind. Knowing her so well, he understood that his presence would prevent her from fulfilling her desire to focus on the loss of her sister and to resurrect, with the help of the bereaved husband, the sweet sorrow of childhood memories in which he, Ya'ari, had played no part. He knew that even if he were to sit quietly with his wife and brother-in-law and not take part in the conversation, she would feel that he was insufficiently interested in the morsels of distant memory, of her sister or even of herself, that she hoped to coax from a man who had known her as a child, back when he was a young soldier soon to be discharged who came to the house as her sister's first and final suitor.

He leans with his full weight upon the iron railing. As a veteran elevator expert, he is unaffected by dizzying heights, but he does wonder what has become of the winds that ought to be stroking his face.

AS SHE DEPARTS the duty-free shop, she is surprised to hear her name called on the public-address system and is struck anew by the recognition that on this trip there's no one at her side to keep track of time. All she'd wanted to do was buy some lipstick that her housekeeper had asked for, and when she couldn't find it at the cosmetics counter she had turned to leave, but then one of the older saleswomen, sensing the disappointment of a nice lady her own age, had talked her into buying another brand in a similar shade and of equal quality.

Indeed, she is aware that since her sister died she has been increasingly drawn to older women, as if she might find in them the image of her loved one. And these women, for their part, respond to her attentiveness and slightly abashed, inviting sympathy — which is why she gets stuck in endless conversations with teachers at her school and with women met by chance, in cafés, the doctor's waiting room, the beauty parlor, and, of course, shops — such as this friendly saleslady who began to talk about her own life, managing at the same time to cajole her patient listener to add to her purchase (at a significant discount) a fancy face cream guaranteed to rejuvenate her dry skin.

And the passage of time must be apparent in her face if the young steward bounding toward her identifies her as the tardy passenger and nabs her without asking her name, tears the stub from her boarding pass, and insists on escorting her to the plane, as if it were in her power to escape the sealed sleeve. It's okay, he says, his arm around this woman who could be his mother, the main thing is you're on board, and he hands her over, as if she were a confused child, to the stewardess, who takes her carry-on bag, stuffs it into an overhead bin, and shows her to her seat. "I was sure you weren't going to make it," confides the young man who hesitantly rises from her window seat under the stern eye of the stewardess.

She blushes, but won't give up her window. Even though she usually naps on planes or is immersed in a book and rarely looks out at earth or sky, being by a window is important to her, and even more so this time, with no husband beside her. As the doors are locked, and the engines rumble, and the flight becomes an irreversible reality, a wrinkle of worry furrows her tranquil brow. Is this trip necessary? Will it be helpful? Will Yirmi, her brother-in-law, help her revive the pain that has dulled over the past year? She doesn't lack consolation. Her friends and loved ones still remember to say something nice now and then about her sister, and her husband and family try to lift her spirits. But it's not consolation she wants. On the contrary, she is looking for precise words, forgotten facts — or maybe new ones — that will inflame her pain and grief over her big sister, whose death has claimed a portion of her own youth. Yes, she has a clear desire to breathe life into her loss and crack open the crust of forgetfulness that has begun to envelop her. She longs to spend a few days in the company of a man she has known since childhood, whose love for and devotion to her sister, she is certain, were no less strong than her own.

At the request of the concerned-looking stewardess, she fastens her seat belt, takes the newspaper that is offered her, and adds a request. If possible, at the end of the flight, could the stewardess save her some of the Hebrew newspapers and magazines that have been left on board? For out there deep in the Syrian-African Rift is an Israeli who would surely love to have them.