A. Yehoshua - The Liberated Bride

“Would you believe that I was asked to fill in for you tonight?”

Tedeschi was alarmed. “To talk about what?”

“About anything. I refused. You know me. I don’t open my mouth without documentation.”

“And quite rightly.” Tedeschi regarded his old student fondly. “Never let these giddy conference organizers talk you into anything. So what if they have a hole in their program? It’s not the end of the world. They can add another course to their dinner. But where are your glasses? Don’t tell me you’re wearing contacts.”

“That will be the day!”

“And who is the young lady you’ve brought with you? Do I know her?”

“You should.” Rivlin introduced Mrs. Suissa, who had been standing quietly by.

The old scholar jumped to his bare feet and embraced the young widow warmly, his white chest showing through the hospital smock. “So it’s you!” he said delightedly. “Just yesterday I read another article of your husband’s. For the first time I fully appreciated the depths he was exploring. I stand behind every word my wife has said about him. His loss was not just yours, but Orientalism’s. Wait and see. The Arabs will yet mourn for him, too.”

19.

THE YOUNG WOMAN perked up. She looked radiantly at Rivlin, as though asking him whether she should add the Jerusalem polymath’s wing to his own.

Just then the white curtain on the window was moved cautiously aside. It was swarthy-headed Ephraim Akri, peering in to ascertain whether he had found the right patient. “What an idiot I am!” Rivlin apologized. “I talked you into coming to Jerusalem and forgot to tell you that Carlo has canceled his appearance in favor of a one-night stand in the emergency room.”

“I haven’t canceled a thing,” the old scholar protested, thrilled to have yet another Orientalist come from afar to pay his respects. “Don’t be nasty, Yochanan. You have no right to judge me until you know what it’s like to be throttled to death at night by your own breathing.”

“Enough of that! Leave the man alone.” The rebuke was Hannah Tedeschi’s. She had just arrived, waving the results of her husband’s tests and his release form.

Although many years had passed since Ephraim Akri’s days as a teaching assistant in Jerusalem, he remained nervous and obsequious in the presence of his old teacher — who, for his part, had nothing but admiration for the religious department head’s elegantly polished Arabic. Now, sure that the keys to his promotion lay more in Jerusalem than in Haifa, Akri asked to see the test results. Using the doctor’s royal “we,” he pronounced with relief:

“Thank God! We’re on the borderline of danger, but not over it.”

An ironic smile crossed the round, childlike face of the released patient as he rose to dress. When he spoke to Akri, who was now searching for his old teacher’s pants and shoes, it was tenderly. “It would be a pity, Ephraim, seeing you’ve come all the way from Haifa, if you missed the lecture tomorrow. Even if you don’t agree with my conclusions, you’ll enjoy hearing how I reach them. And don’t worry about a place to sleep, because we’ll put you next to Rivlin. You can hold a midnight departmental meeting.”

Rivlin took Hannah aside.

“That’s fine with me. By all means take Akri home with you. He’ll drive you in his car. I’m going into town to do some walking and thinking. You needn’t worry about me. If I’m not back by ten, lock the door and go to sleep. I’ll either have thrown in the towel and gone back to my courthouse in Haifa or found somewhere else to sleep in Jerusalem. If I stay and Carlo doesn’t do an encore in the emergency room tomorrow, I’ll be at the lecture, listening to every word.”

And before she could argue or protest, he took his stiff old classmate, the translatoress of the Age of Ignorance, in his arms, gave her a hug and a kiss on each cheek, and bade her a conspiratorial adieu.

He made his way quickly past nurses and medical instruments, certain he could tell the healthy from the sick and locate the exit even without his bifocals. In his haste, he failed to notice the young widow, loath to be abandoned by her protector, running after him.

“Let me drive you,” she implored.

“I’ll take the bus. Your children are waiting for you.” It came out sounding like a reprimand. “Just tell me what bus to take.”

“Screw the goddamn bus!” she swore. “Who needs it?”

He felt her anger melting his resistance. “But I’m going to the other end of town,” he said.

“Fine. I’ll drive you.”

Strapped into his seatbelt beside her, he let her talk while they crossed the city from north to south. Anxious to leave her before reaching the hotel, he pointed to the corner of a small street halfway up the rise to Talpiyot and said, “This is where I get off. Thanks a million.”

Yet she wouldn’t part with him. “Why on the corner? Tell me the house number. I’ll bring you to the door.”

“It’s a short street,” he demurred. “The number doesn’t matter. I’m going to the old Agnon house. They’ve made it into a museum.”

“A museum?” She grabbed at the opportunity. “Why don’t I have a look at it?”

Without waiting for an answer, she turned into the street, parked by the gray old building with its small, barred windows, and got out to investigate. The museum, it appeared, was closed for the day. “Where to now?” she asked, as if she had become, like Rashid, his personal chauffeur. He gave her a hard look.

“Nowhere. I have a meeting right here. Now go home and stop worrying about me.”

Overcoming her curiosity to know whom he was meeting in such an unlikely place, she nevertheless insisted on a peek at the Nobel Prize winner’s backyard. The gate was open. Quickly she disappeared down a narrow path that led past garbage cans and tanks of cooking gas to a hedge of dusty bushes. A restless woman, Rivlin thought. How had her husband ever managed to concentrate? After a few minutes passed and she did not return, he went worriedly to look for her.

The small yard was empty. A large, rough concrete wall, covered with water pipes, blocked one end of it. Apart from a few patches of old, melancholy grass, the ground was paved with plain, cracked floor tiles. Suissa’s widow was seated on a low fence, smoking a cigarette that wreathed her in sad blue smoke. He gave her a friendly nod but kept his distance. Without his glasses, she looked none too distinct. He inquired if she knew who Agnon was.

“Of course. Who doesn’t?”

Cautiously he asked, “Have you ever read anything of his?”

She exhaled a large, perfect smoke ring that floated slowly in his direction. Yes. She had read something or other. Everyone had to in school.

“What story?” he persisted, as though quizzing a student. “What was it called?”

“You’re asking me to remember now?” she replied, bemused. Since her husband’s death, she had forgotten more important things than Agnon’s stories. Her husband had liked Agnon. He had read him a lot. He had once even told her he saw a connection between some of his stories and Arab folklore.

“Agnon and the Arabs?” Rivlin chuckled, struck by the dead scholar’s boldness. “But how can that be?”

She was sure her husband had talked about it. Agnon and the Arabs. The Arabs were always on his mind.

A mixed-up woman, too, Rivlin thought, still careful not to come too close to her. Her husband must also have been a little around the bend. But now, as if his homeless status were written all over him, she turned the tables and questioned him. Suppose the person he was supposed to meet didn’t show up? Where would he go? Where would he eat and sleep? Dr. Hannah Tedeschi had enough on her hands without him.