Suddenly, Love

21

THE WINTER DEEPENS. IRENA BOUGHT AN ELECTRIC heater for Ernst’s study, for the times when the central heating is turned off. Ernst’s financial situation is apparently satisfactory. Every few months he gives Irena a raise, and on holidays he buys her a silk scarf or some jewelry. For Hanukkah he bought her a pendant and earrings.

“Why do you spend so much money?” she complains.

“You deserve it,” Ernst answers briefly.

Irena keeps the gifts in a drawer, and on special occasions she wears them. She is secretly very proud of these ornaments, and at night, when she can’t sleep, she takes them out of the drawer, places them on the table, and stares at them.

Ernst has returned to his nightly work. How strange, I live in Jerusalem and I write in German. Sometimes he is puzzled by this. Years ago a coarse-minded editor had written to him, “Why don’t you write in Hebrew?” Ernst, who was then forty-five and in the midst of a desperate struggle with his writing, replied with a long and detailed letter in which he explained his ambivalent attitude toward the German language and the way it scratched at him every day. “But nevertheless,” he added, “it’s my mother tongue, the language in which I spoke to my parents, and I read my first books in that language. It’s the only language in which I have the power to write.”

Ernst secretly envies all those whom fate had endowed with the ancient Jewish language. He feels that the primal Jewish essence is rooted in it. For him, as it was for the poet Else Lasker-Schüler, Hebrew is a promised land he will never reach. Still, Ernst does not let a day pass without reading a chapter from the Bible or from one of his books on Hasidism. There are days when he wanders about drunk from the heady scent those books give off. And sometimes after reading from the Bible, he sits and weeps like a child.

One evening, before Irena left for the day, Ernst turned to her and said, “I want to say something to you.”

“What?” she asked nervously.

“Don’t be alarmed. I want to make you my heir.”

Irena was startled. “Me?” she exclaimed.

“You’re the closest person to me.”

“I don’t understand. Why think about death?” She was mixing the two matters up.

“There’s no reason to think about death. But I … well, you know.”

“You’ll live for many years.”

“That’s true, but still.”

“I can’t.” She made the gesture of an obstinate child.

“We’ll talk about it later. There’s nothing to be afraid of. It’s simpler than you imagine.”

Irena hid her face in her hands, and Ernst retreated.

Irena was restless that night. Scraps of thoughts and images wandered through her head. The short conversations she would have with Ernst at the door always frightened her, and now it was as if the fear had come out of the darkness and shown her what reality was. If God had given her more words, she would have stood fast and said to Ernst, Don’t charge me with tasks that are beyond my strength. This work isn’t hard for me, but don’t unsettle my thoughts.

All night long Irena composed in her head sentences that she would say to Ernst in the morning. In the end she decided to say, I’m an uneducated woman. I can’t even write Hebrew without mistakes. I’m prepared to do physical work, but don’t give me tasks that I don’t have the power to do. I barely finished tenth grade.

But when she returned the next day and found Ernst wearing his gray suit, sitting in the armchair and reading a book, all the fears that had oppressed her during the night dispersed. Ernst ate breakfast and went out to the café. She was relieved. It appeared as though what had happened the day before at the door was just a passing nightmare, and now reality had returned to erase it.

For a long while Irena sat at the table and imagined Ernst’s struggles at night. His life and his writing had recently become one single thing. Some days the words respond to him, and other days he is helpless. When she sees him fail, she wants to cry out, Death is an illusion. It’s deceit. Don’t be afraid. We’ll always be together. There are days when something of her mother, perhaps something of her grandparents as well, overwhelms her. Then other words rise to her lips, and she feels strong.

After returning from the café, Ernst stood taller. The sights he took in on the way excited him. If he hears an unusual word or a proverb, he’s as pleased as if he had found a jewel.

“I prepared a light meal today,” Irena announced.

“I like light meals,” Ernst said. “All the meals you make are light and tasty.”

“Today there are squash dumplings.”

“As the Bible says, ‘A righteous man knows the soul of his animal.’ ”