Amos Oz - Where the Jackals Howl

Nahum said good-bye, but he did not go. Instead he sank down, exhausted, on the camp bed at Bruria’s feet. He began weeping softly. She placed a comforting hand on his shoulder. The room was filled with a pale, sickly light from the unshaded yellow bulb. A sheaf of blank forms lay on the top of a steel filing cabinet in the corner of the room. Here and there pieces of women’s clothing were scattered; perhaps underwear, too; Nahum did not dare to look, just buried his head in Bruria’s lap and rubbed his burning cheek. She stroked his hair, staring into space and saying over and over again, “That’s enough, enough, enough.”

The first sounds came unexpectedly, as if prematurely. Bruria had anticipated a thundering salvo, but the battle opened with tentative, stammering shots, cautious and very soft.

“The orchestra is tuning up. Soon it will start,” said Nahum.

“Relax,” said Bruria, “relax, little baby. You may put your head in my lap as long as you’re quiet and don’t talk and don’t cry any more. You baby. You don’t understand anything, anything at all. And what you say is all nonsense. They won’t bring Itcheh back to this camp at all. They’ll take him straight to the hospital, you won’t have a chance. The best surgeons are standing by at the hospital tonight. No sucking blood out of lungs through a rubber tube. They have an operating room, proper instruments, and they will save Itcheh a thousand times quicker and better than you could. You’re just a little boy. You don’t stand a chance. Stop making me laugh. Just your head, I said, keep still, you’re tickling me. Relax. Like that. Good boy. Quiet. Hush. And don’t touch me. Let me see your hand. You little fledgling. Maybe Itcheh will take you along on a mission some time, and you can save each other to your hearts’ content, because I’ve had enough now, I’ve had enough of all of you and I don’t care what happens, I just want the time to pass. Put your glasses on the table. Yes. Now I can touch you. Relax. I’ll sing you a lullaby. I can persuade Itcheh to take you on the next mission. He’ll even make a combat orderly out of you. When Itcheh recovers from the wound in his throat I’ll tell him that you were a good boy and you didn’t want him to die and you even wanted to save his life. I shall tell him that you didn’t say anything and you just lay quietly. Yes. Like this.”

The big damp stains on the ceiling were like shadowy monsters. At intervals a little mouse scuttled across the room, hid between the cracks in the tiles, and then appeared again from an unexpected corner. Bruria took off her sandal and threw it at the mouse; she missed. At that moment the ominous distant sounds were renewed. Long bursts of machine-gun fire split the silence. A mortar broke into a thick, angry cough. Sounds like thunder rolled in the darkness outside.

Nahum said: “I can breathe into his lungs quickly and violently, blow him up, burst him. I can pull out the rubber tube and he’ll turn blue again and suffocate. But I won’t do either of those things. I’ll save him if you’ll just stop insulting me. And don’t sing me to sleep, I mustn’t sleep now, I must be ready at any moment to run to the clinic and carry out the operation and save him for you. And don’t push me; I’m stronger than you. It will be a gift, and I’ve earned my reward by saving his life and bringing him back to you alive.”

Now the long-range artillery was heard. The enemy batteries on the mountain slopes started shelling the settlements close to the border and lighting up the sky with tracer shells. The demolition squads obliterated Dar an-Nashef house by house, while the spearhead units were still burning out obstinate pockets of resistance. The thunder of the guns tore apart Nahum’s pleading. “You’ll be the death of me,” said Bruria. She groaned and gave in. The young man streamed with sweat and his eyes rolled up. She stretched out her hands to her sides as if awaiting crucifixion and said, “At least get it over with quickly.” As it turned out, these words were not necessary.

The frantic sound of automatic fire was scattered in all directions. Dim, faraway salvos echoed in the background. A violent explosion drowned the bursts of machine-gun fire. Gradually the sounds of the battle settled into some secret rhythm; wave upon wave of humble, diffident queries, and thick, hoarse crashes in reply. The strident wail of strings swallowed by the dizzy boom of percussion. At last this rhythm was broken, too. A glittering cataract of blazing sound rose up and roared to the dark horizons. Then the final spasmodic bursts, until they, too, died away. Silence came and pieced together the fragments with gentle, merciful patience. The orderly left the room without another word and hurried to the clinic to prepare the operating instruments that were kept in a sterile pack for use in emergency. The stillness of the night descended on the plain. Soon the crickets and the jackal packs returned to their evil ways.

5

OUR COMMANDER said: “That was sharp and to the point. Just like in the training manuals. No problems. No obstacles. Neat as a Bach fugue. Run along now, girls, and open up a bottle of arak for the maestro.”

Parched, dirty, and overflowing with husky elation, Itcheh began shooting off joyful bursts of gunfire into the sky.

“Got it!” he roared. “Got mutton, potatoes, arak, everything we need, and no more Dar-bloody-Nashef! There’s not a cat left there! No cat, not even a dog! Not one son-of-a-bitch is left! Where’s that whore Bruria, where is she! And all the p-r-r-retty girls, where are they!”

He suddenly stopped roaring when the orderlies dragged the corpse of Yonich off the tailboard of the truck and carried it to the lighted clinic. The body was wrapped in a dirty blanket, but Nahum turned it up for a moment and saw that the eyes were wide open in hurt surprise as if they had made a fool of him again. Even his strange smile seemed to have softened. The smiling half of his face had not relaxed, but the other half had conformed to it. Nahum turned to Itcheh.

“What have you done to Yonich?”

“Why are you looking at me, why me?” cried Itcheh self-righteously. “His name was written on the first bullet. He was killed before things even got started. A volley missed me by a couple of yards, and he was standing in the way.” As he spoke, Itcheh began stripping off his belt and weapons and equipment, pulled off his crumpled shirt, and asked quietly, “Where is she, where is she hiding?”

“How should I know?”said Nahum.

“Then go and find her for me and bring her here. You’ve got five minutes,” commanded Itcheh hoarsely and wearily. “And before you do that, get me a drink of water.”

Nahum obeyed.

He poured a cup of water, handed it to Itcheh, waited till it was empty, refilled it, waited again, then rinsed the cup in the sink and ran off to look for Bruria.

Almost without hesitation he went to the place where the shadows were darkest, behind the storehouses on the hillside. There he saw Bruria, leaning against the wall. The buttons of her blouse were open, one breast protruded from her brassiere, and Rosenthal, the operations officer, was holding the nipple between two fingers and whispering playfully. But she was not laughing or moving. She stood there as if asleep on her feet or as if all was lost and there was no purpose left. This sight filled Nahum with a silent, heartrending anguish. He did not know why; he knew only that it was all a mistake, all of it, from beginning to end. He turned and went back to Itcheh.

“She isn’t here at all,” he lied. “She’s gone away. The two of them were seen going off in a jeep before you got back. She isn’t here.”

“OK,” said Itcheh very slowly. “I see. He’s taken her with him to Jerusalem. She could at least have waited to see if I’d been killed or not.”