Friendly Fire

by A. B. Yehoshua

  The image of the bed and window at the foreign clinic stays with Daniela, and sorrow wells up within her like a hot potion, and pity too, for the bald man, her seventy-year-old brother-in-law, a constant in her life since childhood, whose long springing strides do lend him a faint resemblance to a peeled monkey.

  At the station the train is waiting, already packed with passengers. Whole families, bunched like grapes in every window, peer out at them, and at first she fears they will not find seats. But the head of the local UNESCO delegation, who takes this train regularly, has arranged a compartment for them. At the doorway of their car they pay the porters, not merely for their labor but also for the tools of their trade, since the three big baskets are coming aboard too. And because the visit to the clinic took the time they might have spent lunching at a comfortable restaurant, Sijjin Kuang has bought food for the road. To Daniela's disappointment, the diverse bounty she produces does not include any dessert. Meanwhile, the guest has spotted a peddler bearing a well-stocked snack emporium on a tricycle and asks her brother-in-law, a little sheepishly, if she has time to add a few sweets to the meal. To her surprise he approves her going alone to the moveable kiosk, not even warning her to hurry, as if unconcerned by the possibility that she might miss the train and be left behind.

  Still, he watches her every move from the train window: a middle-aged woman who despite her years has a nice figure and good legs, like her sister, although the candy she consumes freely has thickened her a bit. There she stands, eagerly picking out one treat and then another, like the young girl in her school uniform with her book bag on her back who would dawdle on the way home at the kiosk near their apartment block.

  And indeed, as she returns all excited to the compartment and sets before her companions bags of chocolates and toffees imported from the Asian continent beyond this shared ocean, her brother-in-law reminds her of the kiosk of her youth, where she would take sweets without paying.

  "Don't exaggerate, it was all written down."

  "In an open account, which your mother would pay off on the first of every month."

  "Something like that..."

  "I don't get it, was there a system like that for other children in your class?"

  "I don't think so."

  "That's what always amazed me, that your father and mother, who were modest and almost ascetic, agreed to give a girl an open account. In your home, after all, there were almost no sweets."

  "Which is why they didn't care that I hung around the kiosk."

  "They weren't afraid of spoiling you?"

  She smiles.

  "You've known me more than forty years. Do I seem spoiled to you? Money was never important to me. When I earned money from babysitting or as a camp counselor, I would give it all to my mother and didn't care about it. No, Yirmi, my mother and father didn't lose anything from my open account at the kiosk; they only gained smiles and a good mood."

  "And your suitors?" he teases her. "They also benefited from that open account?"

  "Who do you mean?"

  "The boys who would walk you home after school."

  "They weren't looking for candy."

  "Of that I am sure." Yirmi chuckles, as if the visit to the clinic has lightened his mood. While the train toots and flexes for the journey with a little lurch forward and then back, he derives enjoyment from his sister-in-law's youth, taking the opportunity to ask why, with so many suitors, it was Amotz she had picked.

  "Why not?"

  "Because you had boyfriends who were more successful. At least that was what Shuli used to say."

  "Successful?" Her eyes flash, as the train sets off with a screech. "Successful in what way?"

  Yirmiyahu, suddenly anxious, shrugs and doesn't answer.

  15.

  SINCE THESE ARE raw recruits—lust ten days earlier they were civilians—they are not aware that one may violate a military order out of misunderstanding, but not out of compassion, and so they open the gate for the bereaved father bringing warm clothes to his remaining son. But as for the location of the reservists' command, they do not know it.

  No problem, he will find it himself. All he asks now of the guards, who have displayed such genuine humanity, is that they keep an eye on his car. Then he sets out briskly through the wintry dusk on the paths of the big military base. Above him the wind rustles softly in the eucalyptus trees, which grew to great heights after the fetid swamps were drained back in the early Zionist era. He asks no one the way, but finds it for himself among sheds and tents, walking quietly past the evening formation of a platoon of recruits in full gear, who listen to a lecture on morality from their arrogant sergeant. Ya'ari wanders, possibly in circles, mud accumulating on his shoes as in the blackening sky two or three wayward stars appear. Just as the fast-falling darkness might have begun to undermine his confidence, he notices two civilian cars and a dusty army Land Rover parked by a shed thumping with dance music.

  In the belief that the darkness will conceal his face, he creeps up to the building and peeks into window after window, verifying by the equipment and uniforms and beds that reservists are quartered here. One room is only a darkened office, but the next one is lighted, with two unmade army cots, and there on a blanket spread out on the floor beside a small heater sits Moran dressed in a civilian shirt, playing backgammon with a diminutive major sporting a mane of wild red hair. Ya'ari is in no hurry, he stands close to the pane and continues to watch his son. Suddenly Moran looks up, but he does not seem surprised to see his father's face in the window and doesn't get up or stop the game. With a friendly wave he invites his father inside, and says to his companion, don't say I didn't warn you that my father would try to rescue me from here. And the short red-haired officer looks at Ya'ari affectionately and says, welcome, Abba of Moran, just give us another minute to finish the game, so I can chalk up another victory.

  "By all means, beat him as much as you want; he deserves it," Ya'ari replies facetiously. "Just so you know, I did not come here as a father, but as an employer."

  Moran smiles and groans, "Sure, an employer," and vigorously throws the dice.

  Within a minute or two the game is over, and the two slowly stand up and stretch. Now Moran hugs his father warmly and without embarrassment presents his cheek for a kiss, as the major introduces himself to the visitor with a cordial handshake: Hezi, maybe you remember me, I was with Moran in officers' training school.

  "And you're also locked up here? I see that the two of you are having a good time in confinement."

  "No, Abba, Hezi is not a prisoner, he's on the side of the jailers. Hezi is the adjutant of the battalion. He had nobody to play backgammon with, so he decided to attach me to himself for ten days."

  Ya'ari is amused.

  "So you're the adjutant? You should know that I kept warning your friend here to request a release from duty in the proper formal manner and not to count on people just forgetting about him."

  "And he was right not to," says the adjutant. "He knew very well that he wouldn't get any release from me."

  "Even if he's in the midst of an important project for the Ministry of Defense?"

  "I have soldiers whose wives are eight and nine months pregnant, I have soldiers with a father or mother in the hospital, I have soldiers for whom every day of reserve duty hurts their business; why should I care about the Ministry of Defense? From his standpoint Moran was right to decide to just ignore us and hope that we'd forget about him."

  "But..."

  "But unfortunately it's not so easy to forget someone like Moran, so I sent a military policeman to go get him, and believe me, Abba of Moran, it was purely out of mercy that we didn't send him to jail and instead kept him here attached to the adjutancy—also so I would have someone to play backgammon with, although he is a mediocre player without much luck."

  Moran laughs. "Don't believe him; he's just ragging on me."

  "But..."

  "But what?"

  "But..." Ya'ari says, hesitating, "w
hy didn't you send him to serve with the rest of them?"

  "There they don't really need him. We assigned another officer to his platoon. And I have an iron law: an extra soldier is a vulnerable soldier. Overall, too many reservists showed up this time—there are many unemployed workers in Israel."

  "So why not let him off?"

  "Why let him off? He damaged the solidarity and thumbed his nose at the camaraderie, so he'll sit here confined to base till the end of his reserve duty and take stock of himself, and in the meantime improve his backgammon."

  Moran laughs, and it seems he also enjoys his friend's rebuke. But his father studies the officer to determine if he's being serious.

  "How did you get to be a major and Moran stayed only a lieutenant?"

  "Because I don't have a rich father like Moran, so I stayed on a few more years as a career officer to save money for my studies."

  "And what did you study?"

  "In the end, I didn't study."

  "So how do you make a living?"

  "This and that."

  "In any case I think I remember your face from somewhere."

  "Maybe you saw his mug on television," Moran says.

  "On television?"

  "Because just as you see him here, adjutant of reservists, distinguished major, bursting with patriotic values, on television he's on a satirical show rattling off bad jokes, and lucky for him there's a laugh track so he won't fall flat."

  The officer-comedian punches Moran in the ribs with an affectionate fist.

  "So what do you say, Hezi,"—Ya'ari turns to the adjutant, man to man—"I came to bring the detainee warm clothes, but better still why don't I free you of him? So he can do something useful for the world instead of wasting away here."

  But the officer-comedian puts on a grave face and answers firmly: It is all right to give the clothes to Moran, but it is not all right to give Moran to his father. He is sentenced till the end of his unit's reserve duty, and will be released when the others are. And as for usefulness to the world, his cell phone has been confiscated, but he is allowed one call a day to his wife, and if she's not home or her cell is turned off, that's not the army's problem. And anyway, how did you get permission to enter the camp?

  "I told the recruits at the gate that I am a bereaved uncle."

  "Bereaved uncle?" the adjutant says, marveling. "What on earth is a bereaved uncle?"

  Moran, surprised by his father's words, reminds his friend about his cousin who was killed seven years before.

  "By friendly fire," Ya'ari quietly adds.

  16.

  THE TRAIN ACCELERATES, the cars emit a metallic rumble, and the three straw baskets, left in the corridor, embark on little independent journeys and need to be reined in. Sijjin Kuang rises from her seat, pulls them into the compartment, ties them together, and shoves them against the door, blocking the entry of any curious passengers strolling through the train. Then she takes a newspaper from one of the bags of food she bought at the station, gets down on her knees, and spreads the paper on the floor. Then she lays out the feast: brown eggs, smoked sardines, fried calamari, a wedge of hard white cheese veined with red, a few greenish bananas, moist dates, and a hairy coconut. With her long delicate fingers she takes a large smoked sardine and begins to gnaw at its flattened head.

  Daniela watches with admiration as the tall and graceful Sudanese flexibly folds her legs to allow room for others on the floor of the compartment, and after hesitating a moment she gathers up the hem of her skirt and also assumes a kneeling position. Avoiding the smoked fish and seafood, she cuts herself a slice of the cheese with the blade of a penknife that Sijjin Kuang opens and offers her. Yirmiyahu, without leaving his seat, fashions himself a cone out of newspaper and fills it with sardines and squid, and tears off a generous piece of pita bread. They lunch together in silence, as at a mourners' meal, but with a warm sense of conviviality in this compartment set apart by its wall of big baskets, which glow golden in the afternoon light.

  Sijjin Kuang does not eat sweets and is content to offset her salty, spicy lunch with some coconut. Yirmiyahu happily tops off his meal with the Indian toffee procured by his sister-in-law, then tilts his head back next to the window and closes his eyes. Daniela finds that the candies she bought are too sweet and have an unfamiliar aftertaste, and makes do instead with a few dates. Since long silences are generally difficult for her, she tries to draw out Sijjin Kuang on the subject of rituals of fire and winds and trees and animals, and from the pagan's short answers gathers that among idolaters as well as monotheists, materiality carries less weight than metaphors and symbols. Indeed the Sudanese woman thought that when Yirmiyahu threw the candles in the fire, he was performing a religious rite.

  There's no telling whether he is asleep or listening to their conversation with his eyes closed. Daniela helps the nurse gather up the food-stained newspapers, and when Sijjin Kuang slips out of the compartment, stepping over the baskets, to dispose of the bags of trash, Daniela resumes her seat by the window, opposite her brother-in-law. Yirmiyahu opens his eyes and smiles. Well, this is surely not how you imagined the visit, being hurried from place to place. But it's not so bad—in the remaining days you'll have a chance to rest.

  "It's absolutely fine, this traveling. Resting I can do at home."

  He nods.

  "All in all, it's good that Amotz didn't come with you. He always wants to accomplish something clear and practical, and a trip like today's, back and forth just to see a window and a bed, would have driven him crazy."

  His mildly critical tone makes her uneasy. The train suddenly speeds up and blows its whistle repeatedly. Yirmiyahu sticks his head out the window to see what the noise is about. They are riding through a sea of short yellow grass. Had her sister really told him about more successful suitors in her youth, or was that his own idea? When she was in high school, Yirmi and Shuli were already married and living in Jerusalem, only on Saturdays would they visit Tel Aviv. And who talked then about "more successful" anyway? Certainly not her parents. They never characterized her friends that way, but would only express an opinion about who seemed nice, and who less so. From the first, they found Amotz likeable and, most important, trustworthy.

  Suddenly she has the desire to confront her brother-in-law and defend her husband. "It's strange," she turns to him with a serious look when the train's whistle blasts die down. "Strange that you mention boyfriends from more than forty years ago, as if you had actually known them."

  "That's true, I didn't know a single one of them, but sometimes, years later, Shuli would recognize someone's name in the newspaper, someone who went far."

  "Far where?"

  "Do I know?" he says, uncomfortably. "For example, that guy who ended up becoming the attorney general."

  "Why do you think I should have married the attorney general? I was never involved in any crime."

  He laughs. "How about medical problems?"

  "What's the connection?"

  "I'm thinking about that chubby professor we ran into at a concert in Jerusalem a few years back, the famous heart surgeon, who was so excited to see you ... no regrets?"

  "About what?"

  "Don't get upset, I'm just making conversation. That you didn't pick him over Amotz?"

  "He was a rather limited and boring man. Anyway, you're funny—what do you know about him?"

  He places his hand on her shoulder. "Little Sister, don't mind my jabbering away here, at the end of the world, the end of life, about suitors you had forty years ago. I'm just curious. I would also ask Shuli sometimes, what is it about your sister that attracts the boys? I mean, you were never especially beautiful."

  "Certainly not. There were always prettier girls around."

  "But the men were drawn to you anyway, like bears to honey. Especially the intellectuals."

  "You're exaggerating..."

  "And in the end, out of all of them, you picked a technician..."

  "He's not just a technician."


  "And you picked him out so early, you were maybe twenty."

  "What's this about?" she says indignantly. "What do you have against Amotz?"

  "Who said I had anything against him? Why are you putting words in my mouth? When all those many years we've been not just brothers-in-law but also friends."

  "So why does he suddenly make you uncomfortable?"

  "Who said uncomfortable? What's the matter? Why can't we just chat about your youth? It's so rare that we're alone together, without Shuli or Amotz. So tell me why you picked him over everyone else?"

  "He lived in our neighborhood but didn't go to our school. In his second to last year, he switched to a vocational high school."

  "Why?"

  "Because his father wanted to prepare him better for the technical side of his business. But afterward, you know, he became a certified engineer."

  "Of course. I never doubted his abilities. Only..."

  "Only what?"

  From behind the straw baskets guarding the compartment appears the beautifully sculpted ebony figure of Sijjin Kuang. She enters and remains standing in the middle of the floor, gazing out the window. All at once she turns with a big smile to Daniela, gesturing with her long arm for the white woman to look outside. From within the railway car shouts of joy can be heard, and the train seems to be slowing down.

  Not far from the track, in the branches of a lone baobab tree in the open plain, perch lions and cubs, blinking peaceably at the passengers in the train.

  But Daniela, unwilling to be distracted, is trying not to lose the thread of conversation.

  "Why was Amotz in my eyes the best of all? Because from the start I not only felt but knew that this was the man who would be able to protect me from unnecessary suffering. He wasn't a doctor or a lawyer, and not an especially talented engineer either, and maybe he can be a little oppressive and tedious at times, but he is a person who has love and loyalty stamped in his soul, which is why he won't let despair near me."

  "Despair?" Yirmiyahu says, recoiling. "What are you talking about?"