About the Night (35 page)

She left her apartment to buy oil and rice. A Carmel Dukas parked opposite her building was still smeared with mud to camouflage its white color. People found it difficult to put aside the effects of the war, as if they were afraid it would run away from them or slip through their fingers; six days was too short a time for such an enormous change, and in order to adjust they needed to preserve everything that reminded them of the war.

Outside the grocery was a heap of color photographs for distribution with the newspapers. These were photos of the war heroes, who, from that evening, would be hanging in shop windows, in classrooms, in falafel stands. They were everywhere: Moshe Dayan and Uzi Narkiss and Yitzhak Rabin and Motta Gur in olive uniforms, marching proudly, victory shining from their faces, their extraordinary charm unassailable.

The grocer said, “Isn’t it beautiful? What commanders we have! Like from the Bible. We’ve regained the Temple Mount. It’s a miracle!”

His wife added, “We paid a heavy price.”

He said, “Yes, but it was worth it.”

Lila felt fuzzy headed. The remnants of a headache threatened to fog her in completely. A heavy price, she thought. Who has the right to determine who should pay it, who should be sacrificed, and who shall rejoice?

The grocer’s wife said, “The son of the baker’s deliveryman was killed in the battle for Ammunition Hill.”

Lila found herself in the milk products aisle but could not manage to extend her hand to take a yogurt.

“Let me help you,” said the grocer’s wife. “Take some sour cream, too. You need to put on some weight; you’ve grown too thin.”

The grocer said, “The war’s the best thing to happen to our people. Everyone’s united, helping each other out. We’re all partners in this big achievement.”

Lila said, “War is never a good thing.”

“In this case,” the grocer made clear, “we had no choice. The Arabs forced our hand.”

As a memento, he offered her one of the photographs that would later be appended to the newspapers. “By this evening,” he assured her, “they’ll all be gone.”

Why would she want one? They were all shrouded in the sweetness of victory, all of them eager to touch the Western Wall and kiss every stone, thirsty to encounter the Old City again, drunk with power and starry-eyed, keen to make use of property returned, rolling names in their mouths that had been forgotten—Notre Dame, Dormition Abbey, Via Dolorosa—and bringing them back to life. They were sated and happy and invigorated and unified, while she stood off to the side.

She did not care who had won and who had been conquered and how the army had broken through to the Temple Mount and which newspaper in London had written that the face of the region had been changed forever. She did not care that all the Arab nations had been vanquished and dispossessed of their armies and lands, or that Israel was now the strongest country in the Middle East. She did not care that the Israel Defense Forces had taken command of the entire West Bank or that Moshe Dayan had said, “We’re waiting for a phone call from the Arabs.” As far as she was concerned the dice could be tossed again, but let her Elias be safe, and closer. She was willing to give up on everything else.

Margo came to visit, breathing heavily and red-faced and beautiful after her climb up the stairs. She requested a cup of coffee and something small to go with it. She was in a talkative mood and crammed Lila full of stories from the hotel: the employees, the guests, the rich Jews from abroad, the pilgrims, the anticipated postwar prosperity, the feeling that something huge was about to happen, and the fear that she might miss out on it. After all, from her perspective, all that was good in the world was divided generously among everyone but her. Lila was exhausted from nights and days of tension and found it difficult to follow Margo’s incessant prattle. Her mind was on that evening nine and half years earlier, when Mano had come to tell her that Margo was in the hospital, in labor, and how disappointed Margo was in her newborn daughter from the very start, nursing her without even looking at her while Lila was mesmerized by the baby’s tiny, pumping cheeks. And when she held Nomi, she thought about herself, at thirty-six, having missed the opportunity. She would never mother such a pure and innocent and helpless newborn that was free of all evil thoughts.

Margo was still chatting about the pride and joy of her life, her work at the hotel, that glittering world that showed off her talents, unlike the depressing, faded world of home. She talked about the guest who brought her Nina Ricci perfume and the one who bought her a collapsible umbrella and the one who sent her After Eight mints every week and another who promised her
paradiso
if she would only travel with him to Rome.

Lila realized that Margo never came to visit without a reason. There was always some hidden agenda that would eventually become clear. Life as a continuum of days and nights, of work and rest, of sunrise and sunset, did not interest Margo; she needed emergencies and dangerously curving roads, and sometimes it seemed they actually found her. She was always in a state of war or in preparation for the next battle. She was shrewd and seasoned, and Lila could read her like an open book. The purpose of this visit would come out before the cookies on the plate disappeared. Lila knew her manipulations, her score settling, her street smarts, her cunning. Mostly, she admired her talent for survival.

“Tomorrow,” Margo said, “I’m calling the guy at the phone company who’s in charge of hooking people up. It’s about time you had a phone.”

Lila shrugged. In any event, there was only one person she cared to hear from. She was like a monk who, day and night, winter and summer, wished only for quiet to hear God’s voice.

“You’re such a
tiyara
today,” Margo was saying. “Spacey as a kite. Did you take a tranquilizer or something?”

Lila, in order to evade her fervent guest, sliced open a melon, cut it into pieces, and served it with two small forks.

Margo said, “You’re only able to think about today. You don’t see tomorrow. If you had a telephone, you could leave that miser at the salon and receive clients at home. You’d make a lot of money, and you wouldn’t have any partners.”

The sound of several explosions shook the apartment, and Margo jumped.

“They’re removing the mines from what used to be no-man’s-land, and sometimes they go off,” Lila said. “A reminder from the Jordanians.”

“How do you know that?” Margo asked, suspicious.

“You know Miriam from the salon? Well, her husband drives a tractor, cleaning up the mines.” Lila prepared a pot of tea with mint leaves.

Margo said, “Did you know that the Arabs don’t have telephones or electricity? We’re going to hook them up to our network now. Oh, would I love to be married to a contractor right now. They’re the ones who are going to make the big money, excavating and paving day and night. Our country’s grown bigger, Lila, just look at a map: we’ve gone from being a scrawny little chick to a stuffed chicken. The Golan Heights, Bethlehem, Ramallah, East Jerusalem, the Sinai . . . it’s a huge territory we’ve conquered, and now it needs to be built up.”

Lila suddenly noticed that Margo was dressed for an evening on the town: navy-blue dress, high heels with a white ribbon, mascara, earrings poking out from under her light-brown hair. She did not look like she’d just come from a day at work, with fading makeup and a pallor taking over her complexion.

Margo took off her shoes and stretched her toes. Lila could see her toenails, done in red, through her sheer stockings. She was petite next to Lila, nearly a head shorter, compact, compressed as a bottle of sparkling wine before opening.

“Oh,” she said, reaching for her handbag, “I almost forgot.” She pulled out a white envelope and waved it in the air. “This was downstairs.”

“Where?” Lila asked, without looking at the envelope.

“In your box,” Margo said. “You must not have seen it because it was so dark. Just as I was walking in, the neighbor was changing the lightbulb.”

“It’s about time,” Lila said.

Only as she reached for it did her eyes take in the handwriting on the envelope.

“It doesn’t have a stamp,” Margo pointed out, like someone who has already examined the evidence from all sides.

Lila’s heart was going wild. Her name was written on the outside of the envelope and nothing else, on either side.

Margo said, “Your brow, you’ve got beads of perspiration.”

Lila felt like she was suffocating and went to stand by the open door to the roof.

“Who’s it from?” Margo asked, sending x-rays of curiosity into the envelope.

“A client of mine,” Lila improvised. “She went to Paris.”

“So why isn’t there a stamp?” Margo asked.

“They send things by diplomatic pouch,” Lila said.

Margo was bursting with curiosity. “Let me open it,” she said.

“You look beautiful, Margo,” Lila said as she put the envelope on a cabinet as if to show how little interest she had in it. “Are you and Menash going out tonight?”

“I wanted to ask a little favor of you,” Margo said, growing serious.

Lila answered with an expression of encouragement.

“If anyone asks, I was here with you this evening,” Margo said.

“And so you are,” said Lila.

“No,” Margo said, impatient, “I’m on my way out. If Menash asks, tell him I was here with you. The whole evening. Only if it comes up when you’re at our house.”

“All right,” Lila said. She felt uncomfortable. This was not the first time Margo had asked her to cover for her. Lila was like a member of their family, and she did not feel right dissembling to Menash, whom she liked. She grew sad thinking about the two of them, how different they were: while Margo was shrewd and decisive and worshipped the gods of mammon, Menash was slow and preferred a life without risks, a man who had no concept of utilitarianism and whose goodhearted nature made up for the fact that he was not as calculating as she.

“You’re not asking me where I’m going,” Margo noted as part of the hidden negotiations she was always in the process of conducting. In exchange for providing an alibi, she assumed that she would have to expose her secret to Lila.

But Lila said nothing.

“It’s better this way,” Margo said. She glanced at her watch, stood up in a very cat-like manner, reapplied her red lipstick, and combed her hair in front of the mirror. “If there’s an invitation to a diplomatic ball in that envelope, take me with you, will you?”

“Of course,” Lila answered.

“He’s Canadian,” Margo revealed, referring to that evening’s secret. “One of the biggest furriers in the business over there. He’s got minks and foxes in his factory, just like in the magazines you have in the salon.”

Lila was about to hug her good-bye, but Margo was already on her way down the stairs toward the man she would enchant that evening.

When she shut the door behind her, Lila felt a huge wave of relief that she was finally alone. The letter was still sitting on the cabinet. A moment later, Margo’s heels could be heard on the stairs again, like a new threat, and Lila opened the door.

“And if he asks how I could have spent so much time at your place, tell him that I fell asleep on the couch. Just in case, I mean. Be prepared, because you’re not too on the ball lately.”

Lila locked the door and listened as Margo’s clicking heels receded. The letter lay there, waiting for its time. Her heart was beating so irregularly that it seemed to be searching for the right rhythm. She looked down at the street from the window. A shiny Lark was standing at the curb, and Margo was just getting inside it. The Lark signaled and pulled away from the curb. Lila’s apartment cleansed itself of what Margo had brought with her: the tempestuousness of a woman who always wishes to be somewhere else.

If only she could leave the letter sealed; an unopened letter brought hope while an opened one could bring terrible grief. Lila’s hands were quick, however, acting on their own, and with a letter opener, they slit the envelope open. There was a single page, just a few lines.

I am writing to you, Lila, because I find no other way.

It has taken me time, and I apologize for that.

On Thursday at 7 p.m. I will be at the InterContinental Hotel.

I will wait until you arrive.

Each time she read it, she found something that gave her strength and something else that weakened her, something that made her happy and something that plunged her to the depths. Something she had waited for eagerly, but now that it had arrived, she felt unprepared, irresponsive, stunned. The first sign of life from him—happy to know he was alive, he existed. But doubts gnawed at the weak spots. She had not been certain she would know how to act, and with the passing of time, she felt even less certain.

His handwriting had changed. It was less artistic, less legible. His style was hidden between the words he chose carefully: soft but determined. He was feeling his way delicately, like a violinist tuning his instrument, and only when the sounds came out correctly to his own ears would he play. But there was something else in the letter as well, a hidden hint that she could not decipher, something that may not have been written but which bothered her nonetheless.