The World as I Found It

by Bruce Duffy

  It looks as if you lost part of your Bible.

  Not lost, said Max with a snort. I pulled it out. The Old Testament it was. Five years behind I see this is all lies made by the desert Jew. To show God with such filth, yes, and so cruel? To make of God such a murderer? I say this is evil. Men make murder, not God. God does not trick or lie — he does not tell Abraham to kill his son, then break his word. What God would tell Ezekiel to bake his bread over human filth and the filth of beasts? In these books are two Gods, the Jew God and the Christian. Both cannot be.

  Wittgenstein sighed with irritation at what was clearly an old argument, saying, Oh, drop it, Max. You’re talking nonsense. Who are you to decide what God would do or be, or which God is the true one? The story of Ezekiel is disgusting, but it speaks of an experience we cannot comprehend. God is different things to different men.

  Sure, Ludwig! said Max, reddening. And what do you say now? You say we cannot know. But truly now, you say I am wrong. How is this? Sure, you are just like me, Ludwig — as bad in your thinking. So take your old murderer Jew God — your bloody Yahweh. God save us from this Yahweh. Thank you, I will eat my bread with bee’s honey, not this fool’s honey. Not even a dog would eat what Ezekiel did.

  John the Baptist was fond of locusts, mused Moore, attempting to inject a note of pleasantry.

  Max only shrugged at this. Insects are not unclean. Several times, in hunger, I have eaten such. Worms also. Good for birds, good for Max.

  The effect of this pronouncement hung on for a while, but then it faded as Max began talking about his travels. This was a different Max, a sunnier Max, a man with a free wind about him. To hear Max talk, it seemed the world was unbounded and undivided, without mountains or oceans or borders but only the grace to be. In the face of eternity, time was as water to him, with one place quite as good as another. Max was amused by Dorothy’s questions about chronology, the pointless accounting of where, when, why and how. That one place was the effect of the last, or that life should devolve from successive occurrences or reasons — this to Max was as foreign as concepts of privacy or property. Stories, faces, kindnesses Max remembered, and he gave of himself freely: anyone who needed his help would have it, and for nothing. Of a place there persisted for Max only the snap of a good apple, impressions of certain curious plants and animals, or memories of the local provender ripening by the roadside. Max’s sense of direction was extraordinary. Forgetting roads, mostly oblivious to the sights, he knew with the unerring compass of a migrating bird the declination of the sun and the local constellations visible at that latitude, in the advancing season. He had been many places. He had been to Greece, to the ruins, which for him were holy, even if pagans had built them. He had gone to the holyland, too, and to Palestine. As an ordinary seaman, firing boilers and chipping rust, he had shipped to America, Argentina, Chile. He was fairly good at picking up languages and dialects. For a while in Chile he had even lived among Indians.

  Dorothy said, I gather you went to Palestine before you tore out your Old Testament?

  Um, before, yes. Gretl, Ludwig’s sister, said I should go there, to see. All right. I go. There I work. On their farms — die Kibbutzim. These are different people, different Jews. On a different standard they live. Not money but the land. This much I can respect. To build again a … a Charakter. For a peoples this is much work.

  Now Moore’s ears were up. Character? he asked.

  Max nodded. Sure, Moore. A people’s Charakter. To rise — to make of themselves a different life. To grow to men. This is Charakter, nicht wahr?

  This was queer. With his hands folded on his stomach, his eyes half closed and his mouth half open, Moore was now considering what Max had said. For the longest time, Moore sat there, breathing in starts, formulating his reply. Wittgenstein, meanwhile, was growing increasingly uncomfortable with the turn the discussion had taken. Finally, Moore said:

  I’m sorry, Max, but I’m afraid I do not understand where character enters into this. It seems to me that the Jewish peoples and Zionists have gone to Palestine not to rebuild their characters but to rebuild, or rediscover, a life. Or to escape the old life. But not, I would say, for want of character.

  As Moore was saying this, Max popped open the gas mask container. In plunged the fist. Out came a handful of grain, which he dribbled into his open mouth. Moore could see the muscles working in Max’s temple and bulging lower jaw. Then Max’s eyes slowly floated up, and he said:

  In America, they have the Negro peoples. As slaves they come there — a steel — a stolen peoples. Still today, I think, they are the slaves, still stolen. In America, very bad do I see this fear in their faces. On the street, the Negro will not look at you. In New York I am told by a sailor that they want to go back to Africa, these Negroes. This wonders me. The little Jew, he wants to be the big Zion Jew. The Negro to be again African. Many peoples want their Zion land. Africa I think is their Negro Zion — in Africa I think will be better for them. In New York, I am thinking these things to me, ja. So one day I think to ask these Negroes if they will go back to Africa, to their hot Negro Zion. But, Moore … they will-not-talk-to-me! It is this fear in them. Like that — Max struck his hands together — they run away.

  Moore was walleyed. Staring at Max in incomprehension, Wittgenstein half groaned, You never told me this. I know I never heard this.

  Max was still chewing, unconcerned. Ummm, sure, this happened. Oh, but one Negro — this man, he will talk to me. He knows this Zion, sure. Oh, he is a fast-talking, black-black, this man. I can hardly understand his Negro talking. He says they are buying a big ship, an ark. He wants to taken me to his church. All right. Good. I go there with him. Here are black Negro men, Negro ladies wearing the white dress, to the floor. Terrible, terrible it was! Such shouting! On the floor they are falling. Max flopped his arms spastically. Like this, elektrifizieren, they are doing, huh? Never do I hear such noise, such singing! I hope to God never again will I hear such singing. You know me, Ludwig. Not much I fear, but from there I run. Max grinned. I know it when the devil touches me!

  Wittgenstein and the Moores sat there at a loss, not knowing what to say. Max, meanwhile, went on chewing, his little eyes now trained out the window, fastened on something else. Max’s stories frequently had this effect.

  Succession Song

  Toward noon, they entered Liverpool Street Station, where they caught a taxi through the city to make their connection at Waterloo Station. They were hungry by then, so after settling their seats and luggage, they all had lunch in the dining car. They were already outside London by the time they had finished. The train was rapidly picking up speed, the cars coursing and swaying as Moore followed Dorothy through the narrow aisles back to their seats. It was treacherous, crossing between the jamming, shuddering cars. Dorothy half closed her eyes, the gritty wind pummeling her ears as she clasped Moore by the arm and stepped across the caged couplings. If only he were more nimble! Frightened he would loose his footing and be sucked under the wheels, she shouted, Quickly, Bill, quickly! All right! he shouted back. Just go on yourself! looking as if he would sneeze, with his tie flapping up into his red face.

  By the time they reached their seats, they were passing London’s outlying suburbs. The little streets were giving way to increasingly green stretches where the sun became more steady and the westward distances more blue. The car was warm, and as Dorothy pasted down the wing of Moore’s collar, she saw a fine sweat on his brow. I’m quite all right, he huffed, repairing his silvery white hair with one careful finger. Now, really, he repeated under his breath. Just leave me. Very well, she replied. But she eyed him a moment longer, not altogether sure.

  As this was going on, Wittgenstein had noticed a rust-colored bird sitting on a stone wall. What was that? he remarked. Must be some kind of thrush — it’s too large for a wren.

  I’m sure we can find it, volunteered Dorothy, pulling her field guide from the wicker creel in which she carried her birding things. Flipping the pages a
nd biting her lip. One eye on the book and one on Moore, who by then had ebbed into a pall of aloof and weary abstraction.

  It was then that Max snatched her binoculars from the creel and trained them on the far hills. Grinning foolishly, he said, I will show you birds tomorrow, Dorthe! I will show you the things. Tomorrow we will go together out.

  At this, Wittgenstein snapped, Don’t invite yourself, Max! Mrs. Moore might want to be by herself.

  Max looked at him with hurt surprise. It seemed not to have occurred to him that Dorothy might not want him along.

  Dorothy could see his feelings were hurt and she spoke up. Oh, no, we might go tomorrow. In the afternoon, perhaps.

  But then she was stuck. The idea of going birding with Max was somehow incomprehensible, but she couldn’t very well withdraw her offer. In her nervousness, she began telling a silly little story about an old man she had known, a Mr. Collie, who kept finches. Yet no sooner had Dorothy begun the story than she realized it would bother Moore. Stuck again. She had no choice but to finish it: the story was dangling from her lips like a long string of spaghetti.

  Of course, male birds are the ones that generally do the singing, she said, resuming her story. Well, Mr. Collie had one particular pair of which the male was an exceptional triller. Oh, a regular little Cock Robin he was. All day long he would be preening and singing. The female was just a drab little thing, and quiet. Hardly made a peep. She just kept to herself on her perch, fluffing and nipping at herself. Anyhow, Mr. Collie awoke early one morning and heard the male singing away. He didn’t know what was the matter. It was still pitch black outside, and of course the cage was hooded for the night. Caged birds almost never start singing that early.

  Well, he lay there for the longest time, hoping the little bird would quiet down, but he just kept trilling away. So finally Mr. Collie crept downstairs to see what was the matter. And when he found what it was, he couldn’t believe it. The male was lying at the bottom of the cage, stone dead. He’d died during the night, you see. It was that little female who was doing all the singing. And not just singing, mind you, but singing his song — exactly. Mr. Collie said it was as if she had spent her life as the male’s understudy, listening so she could take up after him. Isn’t that the most peculiar story? Oh, it sent a shiver down me when I heard it, I don’t know why.

  But looking at Moore then, Dorothy knew why, just as he did. It was the unspoken part of the story — the loss part lingering in the background, hooked like an old coat behind a darkened door.

  No wonder Dorothy Moore shrank at this story of succession. At times, she felt like the female canary herself, the way she had to take up for Moore, paying the bills and maintaining the house with the help of their two boys. But of course there was more to it than that. Increasingly, they felt the nineteen-year difference in their ages. At thirty-nine, Dorothy was a handsome woman, plump and abundantly healthy — if a tad dowdy — in her plain flowered frock, rolled-over ankle socks and scuffed oxfords. Moore could hardly keep up with her. He found her energy and enthusiasm astounding. Dorothy was always ready to hike for miles, or get on her bicycle, or do rubbings or dig for fossils. He, on the other hand, was slowly retiring from life’s more strenuous activities, having reached the age at which he craved inward peace and privacy. Most telling of all, he was at the age when men acquire a fondness for stale puns and seemingly pointless jokes — jokes that, to Moore’s delight, made Dorothy and the boys wince and hold their noses. The jokes were silly, but the reason he told them was not. Moore loved this tomfoolery; it was his deepest intimacy. Well, he’d say to the boys after telling some stinker, I guess your father’s just an old fool. But the old fool was not getting simple. He was just testing the waters, seeing how it felt to think of oneself as old. At fifty-eight, Moore was finding it all easier to imagine. With his white hair and his face now pale and wrinkled around the eyes, Moore had quite lost his boyish looks. He was also thinner, having lost his epic gut to seltzer water, digestive pills and late moderation prompted by proddings from Dorothy and his doctor about his high blood pressure.

  No, Moore did not expect to last, but then men seldom do. Oh, no, he fully expected to go first — not soon, necessarily, but first. This was sporting of him. Why, it seemed somehow chivalrous, spreading one’s life like a cloak before the woman that she might pass over it unscathed. After all, there was only so much mutual time and air between a man and woman; this life is not free for the breathing. In a sense, dying seemed to Moore a selfless act, as if by dying he would bequeath that much more life to Dorothy. And yet in another sense Moore felt cowardly and guilty, realizing that he vastly preferred the idea of going first to hanging on like old Collie, wifewrecked, with only shrill birds for company.

  They had been traveling for a while when Max got up to stretch his legs. Wittgenstein took the opportunity to speak to Dorothy:

  Please do not feel you must go with Max tomorrow. I’ll talk to him. He may even forget it. Max’s eyes are always bigger than his stomach.

  Oh, I quite understand, she said, passing it off. He is a bubbling pot. But it is charming in him.

  That’s true, said Wittgenstein, nodding. He seemed grateful that she had noticed Max’s good points. He is charming — I forget that. And absolutely generous and pure. Wittgenstein thought about this for a moment, then added, And please do not misunderstand me. I am not suggesting you should not go with him tomorrow. In fact, I am sure you would find it tremendously rewarding. Max has a most amazing eye. I don’t know how he manages to find or see the things he does.

  Wittgenstein appeared slightly agitated. He kept starting and stopping, as if all his thoughts of Max were afterthoughts. Closing his eyes, he resumed:

  If only he weren’t so stubborn. He has no sense. He doesn’t even have fear — not even fear to preserve himself. My sister Gretl is a cultured woman. To see her, you cannot imagine her tolerating for one second a man like him. Yet she is very fond of him — like a headstrong son. Of course, they quarrel. He thoroughly exasperates her at times. Oh, he’ll work. He’ll work his heart out for anyone — for nothing — for a bowl of soup. But will Max take a job? Absolutely not. It’s quite out of the question. The mere idea of taking money — and I mean honestly earned money — morally offends him. Name one account in the Bible of Christ’s taking money, he’ll say.

  Wittgenstein dismissed this with a wave of his hand, then continued, We thought last year he was going into the monastery, but no. When he travels, he gets into trouble; when he stays put, he gets into trouble. My sister thought it would be good for him to see me. It was she who bought him his ticket.

  Oh, really? said Dorothy, a come-on so he would tell them more about his friend.

  But Wittgenstein abruptly changed the subject when he saw Max ambling back down the aisle, hauling himself along the seat tops like a gymnast.

  And not long after that, Wittgenstein himself got up, leaving the Moores alone with Max. Clearly, Max suspected that Wittgenstein had been talking about him, because he smiled and said with a glance at Wittgenstein’s departing back:

  Ludwig thinks I talk crazy. I know this is true sometimes. Just now I think: Max, you are a Zionist looking for your Zion. This is how it is for me, you see. Always am I changing. And I am a bad man. Now you smile, Dorthe, but is true, is the true! I am a looking man. Ludwig also. Ludwig is worse in his looking. His sister sends me here, you see. Because she thinks he works too hard.

  Oh, said Dorothy. So she sent you here?

  Max nodded. Sure, to see after him. This is a good woman, this Gretl. She gets me out of the jail when I fight these two men. Max made a guttural noise in his throat. Communists. I don’t hurt them so bad. In Vienna, you know, everybody knows Ludwig’s sister, Frau Stonborough. Oh, people, they are surprised that I will know this great lady. Well? She sends me to Palestine, to see this place. She thinks this will do me good to be with Jews, to see myself these peoples. All right. I look. For me this is good, I think. If too long we stay, a
s I think, we become a church. No, I will not be a church. I hate all these lying churches.

  They crossed the wealds, rolling, softly wooded land capped with high lopsided hills whose broad backs broke off into flaky scarps of seamed chalk — the same chalk that whitened the notched roads the hills enclosed and the squiggly stone walls that ran in every direction. Wittgenstein and his companions dully watched it pass, the roads enclosed by hills, the trees hemmed by clouds, the land receding to sea, and all this dissolving into the private, mutual life that intimacy enfolded. Slowly, a certain awkwardness set in. They found themselves running out of words. Perhaps the barrier was the Moores: the barrier of marriage, a private language enclosed as if within parentheses from public view. Or perhaps it was more the two foreigners enclosed by English, a tongue that made Max, transmogrified, sound foreign even to Wittgenstein, as if he were hearing a translation of a translation.

  It was something of a relief, then, when around two-thirty the train pulled into Petersfield, where they were to meet Russell. For Moore, who had arranged the trip, it was also a minor embarrassment because they were over an hour early. Earlier, while squinting through his bifocals at the timetable, Moore had apparently strayed into the wrong column.

  It was just as well, really. Wittgenstein wanted a word with Max, and Dorothy wanted a few minutes with Moore — time to collect themselves and compare notes. Moore and Dorothy were quite agreeable when Wittgenstein asked if he and Max might take a short walk. It was too pleasant a day to sit inside the station. The platform was almost empty, so the Moores said they would wait there, with the luggage.

  And so Moore and Dorothy found themselves sitting silently together in the summer air. The sun warmed the pavement, and the billowy clouds carried the sense of the sea, though it was ten miles distant. Moore patted his pockets, reassuring himself of their return tickets. Dorothy refolded the tops of her white ankle socks. Finally, she asked: