David Grossman - To the End of the Land

“So let’s say the women will give birth in secret, in all kinds of hiding places, right? Out in nature, or in garbage dumps, parking lots, and they’ll just run away from the newborns? Yes, that’s it … Parents simply cannot tolerate the sorrow.

“This whole part is still a little weak.

“I can’t imagine what it’s like, parents. Parents and children, I can’t figure out families.

“That’s the awful thing, that people will have time to understand the exact meaning of everything that’s about to happen to them.

“On the other hand, and the other, and the other”—he was awake again now, alive—“it’s a kind of condition where you can suddenly fulfill all your dreams, all your fantasies. There’s no shame, you see? And maybe there’s no guilt , either.” He gave a quiet but triumphant laugh, as though finally acknowledging some profound, private shame to himself.

Ilan leaned his head on his arm, pressed the headphone to his ear, and wrote quickly, every word.

“Why not? Why not?” Avram whispered, as though arguing with himself. “Did I get carried away? And what would Ilan say? That I’m full of hot air again?

“It’s a good thing I have enough balloons for all his pins.” He laughed.

Ilan laughed too, then grimaced.

“No one will feel guilty about what they are. And there will be a time, not for long, a month is enough, or a week, when every single person will be able to completely fulfill what they were meant to be — everything their bodies and souls have offered them, not what other people have dumped on them. God damn this all!” he roared. “I wish I could sit down and write it all now. Such light, such massive light, God.”

He sighed, after a brief pause. “And every sight, every landscape or face, or just a man sitting in his room in the evening, or a woman alone in a café. Or two people walking through a field, talking, or a boy blowing bubble gum. There will be such splendor in the smallest thing, Ora’leh, and you’ll always see it, promise me that.

“Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,” Avram whispered, “I will fear no evil, for my story is with me.

“And I have to decide if they’ll even use money—

“Well, we can leave that for later—

“There is no later, you idiot.

“Hello, Israel, homeland? Do you even exist anymore?”

The transmission was getting weaker. Perhaps the battery was dying. Ilan’s foot tapped incessantly.

“I wish they’d come already,” Avram moaned. “I wish they’d shout out their Itbach al Yahud and burn it all.”

He breathed heavily. Ilan could no longer tell when Avram comprehended his situation and when he was disoriented.

Avram was sobbing uncontrollably now. “Everything’s going to die. All the thoughts and the ideas I won’t be able to write now, and my eyes will be burned, and my toes also.

“Ilan, you asshole,” he whispered through his sobs, “this idea is yours now. If I don’t come back, or if I come back in a decorative urn, do whatever you want with it. Make a movie out of it. I know your mind.”

Some disturbances came over the radio, as though someone were rocking heavy objects in the background, behind Avram.

“But listen, it has to start like this, this is my one condition: A street, daytime, people walking quietly. Silence. No noise at all, not yelling, not whispering. No soundtrack. Among the walking people, a few stand on crates here and there. And then the camera narrows in on a young woman standing, let’s say, on a laundry tub. That’s what she brought with her from home. A red laundry tub. She stands there hugging herself. She has a sad smile, she smiles into herself—”

Ilan clutched the headphones. He thought he could hear human sounds in the background.

“And she doesn’t even look at the people standing around her. She just talks to herself. And she’ll be beautiful, Ilan, I’m warning you, eh? With a pure forehead and perfect eyebrows, the way I like, and a big, sexy mouth, don’t forget. Anyway, you know who she should look like. Maybe you can use her?”

There was no doubt now: the Egyptians were inside the stronghold. The transmitter’s microphone had picked them up, but Avram still hadn’t noticed.

Avram laughed. “She can’t act to save her life, but she’ll just need to be herself, and she knows how to do that better than either one of us, right? And you’ll shoot her face, we don’t need anything more, you know? Just her face, and that happy, naïve smile—”

The sounds grew louder. Ilan stood up. His left foot was stomping madly, and his hands crushed the headphones against his temples.

“Wait a minute,” Avram murmured, confused, “I think there’s someone—

“Don’t shoot!” he shouted in English. Then he tried Arabic: “Ana bila silakh! I’m unarmed!”

Ilan’s ears filled at once with shouts in throaty Arabic. An Egyptian soldier, who sounded no less startled than Avram, was screaming. Avram pleaded for his life. One shot was fired. It may have hit Avram. He screamed. His voice was no longer human. Another soldier arrived and called out to his friends that there was a Jewish soldier there. The frequency bubbled with a medley of shouts and commotions and blows. Ilan rocked back and forth and murmured, “Avram, Avram.” People walking by looked away. Then came a very close burst of fire, one dry sequence, and then silence. The sound of a body being dragged, and again curses in Arabic, and loud laughter, and one more single shot. Then Avram’s transmitter went silent.

The commander gathered all the soldiers again in the war-room bunker. He said it didn’t look like anyone was coming to rescue them, and they had to try to get out on their own. He asked for their opinions. There was a quiet, friendly conversation. People talked about the duty to save lives. Others feared that in the army, and in the country, they would be seen as cowards or traitors. Someone mentioned Masada and Yodfat. Ilan sat among them. He had no body, he had no spirit. The commander summed up and said he was planning to notify Arik Sharon immediately that they would leave that night. “What if Arik says no?” someone asked. “Then they’ll slap us with a five-year prison term,” one guy said, “but we’ll be alive.”

The landline wasn’t working, and the officer used the two-way radio and asked to speak with “the boss.” He said the situation was hopeless and he’d decided to leave. There was a short silence, and then Arik said, “Excellent, you leave and we’ll try to hook up with you on the way.” The soldiers listened as Arik said, “Do whatever you can.” He stopped, and you could hear the cogwheels running in his mind. Finally he sighed and said, “Okay, then, um, goodbye, I wish you well …”

The religious soldiers recited the evening prayers before leaving, and a few other soldiers joined them. Then everyone prepared for departure. They filled their canteens and made sure they didn’t rattle. They emptied their pockets of change and keys. Everyone had a weapon. Ilan got a bazooka in addition to his Uzi. “An anti-tank pipe,” they explained. He didn’t know how to operate it. He didn’t say a word.

At two a.m. they set off. In the light of the full moon the stronghold looked like a ruin. It was hard to believe that this lopsided enclosure had protected them all those days. Ilan avoided looking left, toward Avram’s stronghold.

They walked in two rows, at some distance from one another. At the head of Ilan’s row was the commander, and at the head of the other one was his deputy. Next to the commander walked a soldier who was born in Alexandria. If they ran into Egyptian forces, he was supposed to shout that they were Egyptian commandos on their way to nail the Yahud . The soldier recited his lines to himself as they walked, trying to embody the Egyptian commando spirit. Ilan was somewhere in the middle of the row with his head bowed. They tripped on the sand frequently and fell in silence, quietly cursing.