Suddenly, Love

46

“IRENA!” ERNST CALLS OUT.

“How can I help you?”

“Nothing special. I want to read you a chapter.”

“I’m glad.”

Irena has noticed that Ernst’s preparations before writing involve a hunching over of his body, to focus his attention. When his attention is well directed, Ernst sees things that he saw in his childhood but also things that he never actually saw with his own eyes, like his great-grandparents. The family had lived in the Carpathians for generations. All the paths around the house, all the fields and orchards, were part of their sanctuary, which consisted of their huts, their storehouses, and the barns that surrounded it all. The woods were also part of the sanctuary, as well as the large black rocks that jutted out of the earth. There were also high, soaring mountains in the Carpathians; if you raised your head to look at them, you would get dizzy.

A neighbor, a frequent visitor, enters the yard, and his appearance is different than it usually is.

“What’s the matter?” Grandfather approaches him.

“The Jews crucified Jesus, and the crucifixion pains me. It’s been paining me for years,” the peasant says, nearly in tears.

“You also believe that the Jews crucified Jesus?” Grandfather asks quietly.

“Everybody says so.”

“And so I say to you that they didn’t crucify him. It’s a lie that people are spreading. Not everything that people say is the truth. You’re a smart man, and you know that not everything people say is true.”

“The priest says so, too.”

“Sometimes even a priest can be mistaken. A priest is a man, not God. You’ve known me ever since you came into the world and opened your eyes. Did you ever see me raise a hand against anyone? Did you ever see my wife, Raisl, shout or curse?”

“No,” the peasant says in embarrassment.

“So why do you say, ‘Everybody says so’? ‘Everybody says so’ isn’t proof.”

Grandfather’s restraint makes an impression on the peasant. He keeps on mumbling, but his mumbling no longer has any force. Grandfather’s words apparently influence him. Grandfather approaches him and says, “You’ve forgotten that we used to work in the fields together. How many years have passed since then? How old were you?”

“Young.” The peasant rouses himself from his distress.

“We hoed the cornfield together.”

“Right. So why did the Jews crucify Jesus?” The peasant goes back to his original question, as if he’d forgotten what Grandfather told him.

“We already talked this over back then, don’t you remember?”

“I don’t remember.”

“I’ll remind you. We all have one God. You go to church, and we go to the synagogue, but we pray to the same God. One God created us all and gave us the Ten Commandments.”

“True,” says the peasant.

Grandfather walks over to the window, and as a sign of reconciliation he takes the bottle of slivovitz from the cupboard and pours two drinks. Both men call out “L’chayim,” and down their drinks. As is the custom here, Grandfather pours each of them another drink. He takes the peasant by the arm and tells him that this year the wheat harvest wasn’t as it had been in prior years, apparently because there was too much rain. Sometimes an excess of blessings can become a curse. The peasant agrees with Grandfather. His fields haven’t done well, either.

The peasant’s house is nearby, and Grandfather escorts him home. Before opening his gate, the peasant tells Grandfather that his daughter has left home and has gone astray and that he plans to kill her at the first opportunity.

“Don’t kill her. She’ll repent,” Grandfather speaks in a soft voice.

“I don’t believe it.”

“You’ll see. Sometimes a person loses his mind, and you have to forgive him. Someone who confesses and leaves his evil ways will be forgiven. That’s what the Bible teaches us.”

The peasant loses himself in thought for a moment and then says, “Who knows?” And he goes inside his house.

After the High Holidays, the mountains are filled with a different silence. Grandfather rises early, prays, and goes out to the fields. Grandmother stays at home and prepares the house for the rainy season. God’s presence is diminished, perhaps because of the low clouds that are always visible in the windows. It’s hard to visualize God in the image of darkness or of melancholy. Grandfather doesn’t come home at noon, and Grandmother brings his meals to him in the orchards in three clay pots.

When Grandfather returns in the evening, there is no joy in his eyes. He opens the shutter and prays fervently, but the prayer doesn’t draw him out of his gloom.

Grandmother serves him a drink and immediately brings another. Two glasses of vodka do their work: Grandfather’s forehead becomes flushed, and a fixed smile appears on his face, as though he was smiling at himself. Grandmother doesn’t ask him how he feels or what he wants to eat. She just serves red borscht in a wooden bowl, a saucer of sour cream, and a pot of potatoes in their peels.