Amos Oz - Where the Jackals Howl

Perhaps Itcheh remembered the pale student whom they had met on the way up from the plain and his Yiddish entreaties. Perhaps he remembered other places and other times. He was intoning a melancholy song to himself:

“Our Father, our King, have mercy and hear us,

For we can do no-o-thing.

Show us ki-indness and grace,

And sa-ave u-us…”

“Amen,” whispered Nahum Hirsch fervently. And his eyes filled with tears.

Near the Shaar-Hagay junction, where the Jerusalem road touches enemy territory in the Latrun salient, the travelers were struck by a blast of cold air: the air of Jerusalem, chilling and full of the fragrance of pine. The engine began to groan, coughed hoarsely a few times, spluttered, and fell silent, silent as the lifeless things of which the night is full.

7

ITCHEH ROSE from his seat, heavy and weary, and opened the hood. Nahum took out the pocket light that was to have been used for the emergency operation and trained it on the interior of the engine. He watched Itcheh grappling with the sparkplugs, blindly pulling and pushing, angrily thumping the metal panels with his fist, tightening a screw with strong fingernails, tugging at wires mercilessly, perhaps aimlessly. This only added to the insolence of the engine. Suddenly, without warning, the other headlight gave out, and the machine went dead. Itcheh snatched the torch from Nahum and hurled it with a wild gesture into the rocks at the side of the road.

“Screw everything,” he said.

Nahum nodded his head as if to say: Yes, of course, absolutely. But now total darkness had descended on them, and Itcheh could not have seen this movement. Nahum used up match after flickering match. With the last match they both lit cigarettes from the pack that Itcheh had taken from the student on the way.

First Itcheh cursed the engine, then Nahum, Bruria, women in general, heaven and earth. Most of the curses were Russian and ruthless, some were Arabic. Itcheh cursed the Arabs, too, long and hard, Finally he cursed himself. Then he fell silent. His voice was hoarse from all the shouting he had done before the raid, during the battle, and after the return to camp. Now all he could manage was a pathetic, desperate croak. He settled himself on the hood of the dead jeep like a hairy mountain. And he lay there without sound or movement.

Then, when the eyes of both men had begun to adjust a little to the clinging darkness, Itcheh picked out a dark, brooding mass across the border near Latrun: the dim, straggling profile of the Trappist monastery, beyond the ceasefire line, on enemy soil.

“That’s a building,” Itcheh croaked faintly.

“It’s a monastery,” explained Nahum brightly. A burning desire to teach suddenly filled his heart. He was wide awake, far from all weariness, feverish. “It’s the Trappist monastery. The monks have taken a vow to be silent forever. Till the day they die.”

“Why is that?” asked Itcheh in a whisper.

“Because words are the root of sin. Without words there are no lies. It’s simple, isn’t it. They live there cheek by jowl and never exchange a word among themselves. Imagine what a divine silence that must be. Whoever wishes to join must take a vow. It’s like an army. You swear an oath of silence.”

“I can’t understand it,” croaked Itcheh.

“Of course you can’t understand. All you can do is destroy a village without knowing anything about its people or its history, without wanting to know. Just like that. Like a mad bull. Of course you don’t understand. What do you understand? Fucking and killing, that’s what you understand. And soccer. And shares in the bus cooperative. You’re a wild animal, not a human being. A wild, stupid animal. They’re deceiving you all the time. Rosenthal fucks Bruria, so do the officers, the MPs, even someone like me. Do you think she’s in Rosenthal’s jeep on the way to Jerusalem? Is that what you think? Because you’re a wild animal, not a human being, that’s why you think they’re all exactly like you. They aren’t all like you. They don’t all trample and kill everything that moves. The opposite. They’re all laughing at you. Rosenthal is fucking Bruria for you, and he’s fucking you, too. I fucked her, and now I’ve fucked you, too. Why did you run like a madman, tell me? Why did you grab a jeep and a submachine gun and me, and start running like a bull on the rampage? I’ll tell you why. Because you’re not a human being, that’s why. Because you’re a stupid wild animal. That’s why.”

Itcheh said with what was left of his voice, “Tell me more about the monastery.”

Nahum Hirsch, the thin and bespectacled medical orderly, lifted his knee and rested the sole of his boot on the wheel of the jeep. He smoked and felt power throbbing in his veins like wine.

“‘The dust of dead words has clung to you. Purify your soul with silence.’ Rabindranath Tagore wrote that, the Indian poet and philosopher. Now, of course, I shall have to start at the beginning and explain to you what a poet is and what a philosopher is and what an Indian is. But who’s got the time and patience to make a human being out of you? It’s a waste of words. Anyway, it won’t help you. Very well, then. Latrun takes its name from a fortress that stood here in the Middle Ages. The Crusaders built a fortress here to control the most convenient route from the Coastal Plain to Jerusalem — the Bet Horon road, that is. Latrun is a corruption of the name of that fortress: Le Touron des Chevaliers — The Tower of the Knights. Touron means tower. Like tour. La Tour Eiffel. There’s a tower in chess, too. We call it tora. Are you asleep yet? Is that too much for one lesson? No? There are some scholars who claim another source, an even older one, for the name Latrun: Castellum Boni Latronis, meaning the castle of the good thief who was crucified with Jesus of Nazareth. Have you ever heard of the Crucifixion, of Jesus, the good thief? Have you ever read a book in your life? Answer me. What’s the matter with you? Don’t you feel well? Answer me!”

Itcheh said nothing.

The lights of faraway settlements twinkled in the darkness. The enemy outposts in Latrun, where news of the destruction of Dar an-Nashef must have arrived by now, pointed spasmodic searchlight beams at the thick woods that grew on the slopes of the Judean hills. A single shot, derisory almost, rolled between the hills and set up a long echo.

“Hey, isn’t it a bit dangerous to stay here like this all night?” asked Nahum, suddenly afraid.

Itcheh said nothing.

“Tell me, isn’t this too dangerous? Should we start walking? Maybe there’s a settlement or a kibbutz somewhere around here.”

Itcheh turned his bearded face for a moment, glanced at Nahum Hirsch, and looked away. He did not speak. Nahum urinated behind the jeep. Suddenly he was scared, afraid of being separated from Itcheh in the dark. He said in a clear voice, grinding his teeth, “What a lump of shit I am! What a miserable bastard!”

Itcheh said nothing.

Then came the first signs of the approaching day, softening the dark masses and sharpening the edges. There was a glimmer of light in the east, like a halo, like a dream of grace. If there are such things as mercy or grace, thought Nahum, that is their color. Bruria will go to the shower to wash away the sweat and the tears, and then she’ll sleep. They will bury Yonich — or, as they like to say — they’ll lay him to rest. If only there were a little rest for someone like me. If only there were rest for Itcheh; he’s tired to death now. After all, everybody needs rest. If only a little. I can’t take any more of this. I need silence.

Suddenly the voices of the jackals rose in triumph on every side. From enemy territory the voices came, piercing the steep wadis and spreading over the plains of the beleaguered land. The enemy searchlights moved back and forth haphazardly, sullenly. Now the light swept down the road and passed the dead jeep and the two lost soldiers, now it stopped and retraced its steps to search among the thorns and bushes. A little night predator was caught in the shaft of light. He froze, stunned, his hide bristling. His mangy fur quivered with mortal terror. A moment later he darted off and fled into the depths of the darkness.