Suddenly, Love

34

ERNST HAS WRITTEN ALL NIGHT. WHEN IRENA ARRIVES IN the morning, she finds him sitting at his desk. His face is open, and his forehead glows. For a moment she wants to say, You mustn’t work all night. Working without a break will weaken you. But seeing his enthusiasm, she keeps her mouth shut.

Irena is frightened by Ernst’s enthusiasm. And, indeed, after days of increased effort come days of depression and darkness. Sometimes she thinks it’s her fault: she doesn’t have welcoming words. What comes out of her mouth barely forms a coherent sentence, and sometimes it’s only broken syllables.

Irena rushes to serve Ernst breakfast. He doesn’t ask how she is or what happened to her on her way there. He mutters a few words, eats hurriedly, and goes back to his desk. When Ernst is immersed in his writing, it seems to Irena that he is swimming in deep water. She can tell this by the way his head tilts, as though he were plunging and rising. When he’s done, he wraps his arms around himself.

About an hour after breakfast Ernst surprises Irena and reads aloud to her from what he had written:

Early in the morning Grandfather would open the eastern window, wrap himself in his tallis, and speak directly to God. I would lie in bed and see God approach the window. Grandfather’s face was hirsute, and his eyes were scarcely visible under thick eyebrows. He would pray in a whisper, but sometimes he would shout, too. While he prayed, Grandmother would stop her housework and sit at the table with her eyes shut. The mighty Lord was a constant guest in their house. After praying, Grandfather would slowly remove his tefillin. All that time Grandmother would sit attentively, and not until he closed the window would she rise to her feet.

After prayers, they would sit together at the table and eat breakfast. Grandmother would have baked a loaf of peasant bread and prepared dairy dishes, vegetables, and fried eggs. Grandfather would break off a piece of the bread and whisper the blessing. They used to eat from the same plate, without speaking. Sometimes Grandmother would ask Grandfather something, and he would reply briefly. Silence hovered over their meal. When he was finished eating, Grandfather would lower his head and recite the Grace After Meals.

One morning I lay on the broad wooden bed and saw the sun flood the kitchen and the dining alcove. I feared the arrival of angels, because the night before Grandfather had told me about the angels who came to visit Abraham.

I spent all my summer vacations with my grandparents. They were short vacations, but each hour was full and each had its own light. In the Carpathians, there is more shade than light, but during the summer, daylight extends until deep into the evening.

Grandmother would be busy cooking prune jam. Two copper pots were placed on an iron stand, and a wood fire licked them until they turned dark gray. Grandfather would sit and smoke a pipe as the sun set. He looked like a giant to me. If he rose to his feet, he would shake the tall trees that surrounded the house.

During one vacation, when I was nine, Grandfather died. When he was late for lunch, Grandmother went out to the field and found him lying on the ground. I saw her fall to her knees, slap his face, and cry out, “Mordechai, Mordechai!” I was standing at a distance and didn’t dare approach. When her efforts failed, she rose to her feet and asked one of the peasants to call the neighbors.

Within a short time people began to arrive, coming from every direction. They were Jews like Grandfather: tall and sturdy, with the fragrance of the earth and sap coming from their clothing. They surrounded the dead man, and some of them fell to their knees. The people of the Carpathians don’t die in their beds but in the field, in the vegetable patches, among rows of trees in the orchard, or sometimes next to a tree they were about to chop down. Both Grandfather’s father and his grandfather departed from the world in the field.

Everyone in the room was mourning, but there was no panic. The men did what they had to do, moving quietly and deliberately. Haste is not proper when performing a commandment. They drew water from the well and washed Grandfather according to the Jewish custom. Grandmother sat at the door of the house, withdrawn and not uttering a word. God gave and God took away. One doesn’t reproach the Creator of the world. Unfortunately the sons and daughters would not be able to escort their father to the World of Truth. They lived in distant cities, and one had sailed to America. There is nothing to fear: Grandfather is going to a place far from here, but he would not rest in heaven. The merit of his good deeds would assist his descendants whenever they were in distress.

The sun, whose light had filled the morning sky, suddenly departed, and low, dark clouds descended in its place. That was when I noticed Grandfather’s large hands, which delicately held his prayer book as though it was a fragile treasure. His height and strength only accentuated his gentle ways with people, but when he chopped wood in the yard, his power was thunderous.

By now people had come from all over and surrounded the house. Only the elderly heads of households were permitted to enter. The rest stood outside, close together. Some Ruthenian peasants gathered near the fence. For years they had worked on Grandfather’s small farm. They knew that Reb Mordechai was a God-fearing Jew who observed all the commandments and did not mind other people’s business. Only acts of violence would upset him. When he saw a Ruthenian peasant threaten his neighbor or his wife with an ax, he would intervene. “God dwells within us, and we mustn’t act with brute force,” he would say softly, and, amazingly, the peasant would put down his murderous tool.

The small tombstones in the cemetery were carved from basalt. The tall trees shed thick shadows on them and on the grass that grew around them. Suddenly the clouds parted, and a bright summer light scattered the shadows. The pallbearers stopped and lay the coffin on the earth.

One of the old men stood next to the coffin and, with his eyes closed, spoke to the dead man. “Here is a faithful servant of God,” he said, “who worked the soil all his life and took care to give tithes for the needy. God in heaven will receive Reb Mordechai with a glowing countenance. Just as he was connected to the earth, so, too, he was connected to heaven, making sure to pray to God three times a day. Reb Mordechai, remember your wife, Raisl, and your children, and help them from above.” As the old man finished speaking, his voice broke.

In a few minutes the grave was dug. Grandfather was laid in his grave, and the friable soil covered the coffin. For a long while those in attendance stood silently in the sunlight, next to the small headstones. Then I saw the Attending Angels. Their faces were like those of children, and they raised Grandfather from the mound and bore him to heaven. No one else noticed this miracle, which took place before my eyes. Everyone else stood silent and in pain, but no one saw what I did.

Irena is stunned by the final sentences, and tears well up in her eyes. The person who read these words wasn’t the Ernst she knew so well but an Ernst who was connected with other realms. The words had a clear sound. They were cut to fit his breathing.

The reading tired Ernst. Irena makes him a glass of lemon tea. This time he doesn’t ask, What do you think? He just sits at his desk without uttering a word. Irena serves him some apple cake and withdraws into the kitchen.