Yesterday it rained and gusted today the sun’s beating down how can you expect stability in a country with such weather? The can keep streaming down the hill no one stops to let you in you might think from the rush that people actually work around here they just want to punch in quick so they can go moonlight somewhere eke. Honk you stinking Subaru screech till your brakes burn it’s my road too I pay enough taxes for it.
To think that once I went to this school too I’d kill myself if I had to go back how scared I was of those shitassed teachers but he looks like he actually enjoys it the jaunty way he bounces out of the car. Where are those traffic monitors they promised? Don’t tell me young kids have started striking too. I’ll just wait to watch him cross the street. I don’t like to think of his walking home by himself with all these crazy cars zooming around. Honk honk your head off you fucking Volvo you just wait till my son crosses the street you bitch if you’re itching to kill some child this morning go find another one than mine.
That’s it. I can’t see him anymore among the children. When they’re babies you don’t feel a thing for them but the older they get the wilder you become about them. That’s all life is in the end just a few people no matter how grand no matter how complicated no matter how wretched so spare them a smile if you can.
“Morning.”
My secretary is huddled by the electric heater small dark and bitter if she goes on like this only the heater will want to marry her.
“Are you cold, Levana? And here I was thinking I’d actually seen a little bit of sunlight outside—or was I mistaken?”
She glances up at me darkly with that look that’s already driven more than one client away.
“For the forty thousand pounds that I pay you per month plus all the fringe benefits don’t I at least deserve one smile in the morning? Or do I have to pay extra for that?”
By the time she gets it and gives me a twisted smile I feel sorry for having made fun of her. And it’s only on her good days that she gets one out of every ten jokes that I tell her. When I opened a private practice two years ago after getting fed up with financing a new Cadillac for Mr. Advocate Gordon each year I was advised by those in the know to take an old maid with two years of high school it will cost you less they said and you can be sure she’ll sit faithfully in the office and not run to the doctor every day with a sick baby what they forgot to mention was that you can also be sure of perpetual gloom stuck to a chair a foot away from you and of a big hike in the electric bill.
“Was there any mail?”
“No.”
That aggrieved tone of voice. They can’t forgive us for having rescued them from the caves of the Atlas Mountains and introduced them to civilization.
“Did anyone call from the district court to let us know if they’ve set a date for our murder trial?”
“No.”
“Did Mr. Goren call to tell us when he sent that check of his that he never sent?”
“No.”
“Did anyone call this morning, was anyone in the office?”
“No.”
I pay her forty thousand pounds a month to hear her say no all day long. Two hundred pounds for each no.
“All right, then. Call Goren right away and tell him that I still haven’t gotten his check and that if he doesn’t get it to me this morning I’m not going to the rabbinical court tomorrow and he can stay married a few years more ”
A fancy divorce settlement that I finished two months ago. In the end it upsets people to realize that they’ve gone to a lawyer when they could have gotten the same deal on their own if only they’d kept their cool. Maybe they could have but it takes a certain amount of intelligence to know when you’ve run into a blank wall most people prefer to bang their heads against it and then hire a lawyer to explain to them that it can’t be moved. Why is she looking at me like that in a minute she’ll be asking me what Goren’s number is.
“I don’t know Mr. Goren’s telephone number.”
“And why indeed should you? I’ve only given it to you thirty times. It’s a pity you can’t move away from that heater, because if you could you might free your legs enough to get to the telephone book. When is your birthday?”
“Why?”
“I want to know. Is it a secret? Do I have to find it out from the police?”
“June tenth.”
“Then maybe you could move it up a bit so that I can buy you the present I’ve been meaning to—an electric blanket to wrap yourself in so as not to be addicted to that heater...”
Those dark Moroccan eyes regard me does she get it or am I jerking off another joke in vain she’s already cried more than once over my jokes in a second she’ll cry again I’ll have to add the cost of all that Kleenex to the electric bill.
“I was only kidding. Don’t take me so seriously. I see you’re feeling low this morning. Did something happen at home?”
“No.”
Her father must have beat her. Those primitives run amuck before each Jewish holiday or maybe one of them’s in jail I already once had to bail out a brother of hers after he socked somebody in the market that’s how I made the acquaintance of a family of greengrocers for my fee they sent me a check drawn on eggplant we ate them for a whole month now when I see one I cross to the other side of the street. It was clever of them to plant a daughter in a lawyer’s office though if you intend to run regularly afoul of the law you need dependable legal coverage.
She gets up and goes to the stack of telephone books she turns their pages as though they were the Talmud. Let’s see how long it takes her.
“I won’t be in the office this morning. I told you yesterday that I’d be out today, didn’t I?”
“Yes.”
Yes? Did she really say yes? All is not lost there’s still hope.
“Did you finish typing that agreement that I gave you the day before yesterday?”
“Yes. It’s on your desk.”
Yes again. If she keeps it up she’ll find a husband after all the agreement is in fact on my desk I can’t deny she makes clean copies she works slowly but surely.
“Did you guess who the parties in it are?”
“No.”
“That’s just as well.”
She looks at me with huge surprised eyes like a witness japped by the prosecution she won’t have any peace of mind until she japs me back.
“If you’d look for Goren in the Haifa phone book instead of in the Tel Aviv one you might find him there before noon.”
She’s so alarmed she drops the phone book but I look at my feet to avoid embarrassing her the phone book’s not made out of glass after all the phone company’s taken her into account.
I quickly read the divorce agreement I drew up. A good one a really good one. In a few years I can publish a treatise on divorce and get a university chair. Everybody’s uncle writes a book in this country and everybody’s cousin praises it in the newspapers so why not let the world see for itself the grade-A work that I do. I just hope the old lady signs today with no problems. When I was alone with him in the living room last night I said be a sport don’t quibble over each cent don’t forget you live in dollars now the Messiah himself when he comes couldn’t up the value of the Israeli pound against them do you know how many men over sixty would love to get a divorce like this and trade in the old jalopy? He sat shocked in the shadow of the unlit lamp looking at me angrily a savage glitter in his glasses he jumped up shaking flushed with rage I was sure he was going to hit me. Maybe it’s true that I come on as a bastard I’ve got a big mouth my poor dead father used to say there’s no clutch between your brain and your tongue though it was he who taught me that style it’s just that he had to aim most of his jokes at himself since who’d have laughed at them if he hadn’t? How he used to lose his temper with me yet secretly pleased with me too two hours before he died with twenty tubes stuck up him I still got a laugh out of him but he had a sense of humor how many people like that do you find nowadays? I have to be more
careful. Once I made a gag in court I waited for the merry tinkle of laughter it was so quiet you could hear a pin drop one of the judges was so stunned he nearly fell off the dais. I thought I’d be debarred for it in the end I got off with a reprimand. What can you do? That’s the world we live in. The trouble is that sometimes I regret having said things myself it’s not that I really think of her like that I’ve learned to respect and even to like her although those first years she wasn’t totally human I mean the way it’s defined in the encyclopedias.
But what could I tell him that I’m sorry then he’d think I’d really meant it so I just waited for him to insult me back because at least if I hurt people’s feelings I’m willing to have mine hurt too let him say what he wants that I’m fat that I’m clumsy that I’m a very mediocre lawyer I’ll even write his lines for him something really mean he’ll see I’m the first to applaud him but he didn’t say a thing he just spun around dumbstruck in the room how I hate all these people with thin skins.
“Maybe you’d like a glass of some good, special cognac?”
But he refused with an angry wave of his hand as though chasing away a fly and left the room. Let him suit himself. Afterwards when I undressed in the bedroom Ya’el kept asking me what did you say to him. What did you say? Did you say something to him? I only said he should be a little more generous. That’s all? Yes that’s all. For sensitive souls like him that’s apparently too much come to sleep do you know how many nights it’s been since you’ve fulfilled your connubial duty I could get a rabbinical permit for adultery but she just looked at me mournfully and walked out in the middle of the sentence. The family’s falling apart. The last bastion.
Should I go or wait for the mail?
Levana comes to tell me that Goren insists that he sent me the check four days ago. The thought that a check for a hundred thousand in my name is making the rounds of this town in the hands of those morons in the post office is enough to give me the willies. I asked him the day before yesterday didn’t you at least send it registered. It turned out it hadn’t even occurred to him. When he married his wife ten years ago it didn’t occur to him that he might want to dump her one day either. Should I go or wait for the mail?
It’s so quiet. What’s going on here? No one needs me today? No one killed anyone last night? No one stole no one burgled no one cheated no one put his hand in the till? No one wants to sell an apartment or to rent anything? Anyone reading the newspapers might think that half of Israel does nothing but earn a living for us let him come and see the quiet in the lawyers’ offices there are too many of us wolves all waiting for the same prey. Well if nobody needs me I’ll go visit my murderer and from there to the loony bin. A charming itinerary isn’t it?
“All right, Levana, I’m on my way. If the check comes, deposit it right away in the bank before it can bounce. And when you’ve warmed up, take a wet rag and clean off our sign below. All that soot on it doesn’t make us look good. The whole world thinks that all lawyers are shysters; we’ll never convince it otherwise, but at least it needn’t think that we’re dirty ones.”
Suddenly the phone rings I can tell from the sound that it’s someone in the family still I let Levana answer if she doesn’t keep busy she’ll degenerate completely it’s part of what I’m paying her for I’ve had to teach myself not to grab at the phone people think more of you if they have to ask a secretary for you.
It’s Tsvi from Tel Aviv. All in a tizzy. A few minutes ago he spoke with Ya’el and heard that I was going there alone and he thinks (why shouldn’t he have thoughts too?) that it’s out of the question someone from the family must come with me if not Ya’el then himself he’ll come right away he’ll cancel everything (what could he possibly have to cancel?) and join me because we have to break it gently it’s not just a formality there’s the doctor to talk to as well she may get emotional when she hears that he’s in Israel it will be very painful for her...
I let him talk the call from Tel Aviv is on him so what’s the rush. He can talk all he wants. I’m listening. It’s his right. In the family they say that he’s the problematic middle child that he’s very close to his mother not that I’ve ever seen proof of it it’s all purely theoretical long-distance sympathy. Since she was put away five years ago he and his brother have kept the fifth commandment strictly by phone. If Moses had thought of such a possibility he could have gotten by with nine. I the stranger who thank God doesn’t have a drop of her blood in my body have visited her more often than her two sons put together and now they want to mess things up for me.
“Do you hear me, Kedmi? Wait there and I’ll come with you.”
“Don’t bother. Either I go see her by myself or else you can count me out. You can find yourselves another lawyer, it will cost you fifty thousand smackers plus tax just for the right to talk to him. You have no idea how lucky you are that I’m both in the business and a member of this family. If I didn’t exist you’d have to invent me. You’re wrong if you think that I’m nothing but a big oaf with a loose tongue. You have no monopoly on either pain or gentleness.” I glance at my secretary sitting silently with her head down playing with her pencil lapping up every goddamn word. “I have an old mother too and I know what it’s like. I’ll know how to handle her. I’ve already talked to her several times, I’ve done the groundwork and prepared her. She’s a lot stronger and saner than you think. We have a good, unsentimental, working relationship, even the dog’s taken a liking to me lately.... Where are you talking from, home? Then there’s time to explain to you exactly what my plan is....”
In the end he manages to hang up on me. It’s almost ten o’clock am I going or not. Maybe the check will still come I’ll feel better if I deposit it myself. I dial Ya’el.
“Yes, Tsvi called me.... No, he’s not coming with me.... Yes, I’m being stubborn. If someone has to be stubborn, it damn well better be me. Is your father still sleeping?...He had to come all the way to Israel to learn the fine art of slumber.... What did I say to him? I already told you, I didn’t say a thing. Tell me what he said that I said, go on, I want to hear.... If you don’t know stop hassling me, I’m hassled enough as it is.... Because I’ll go see her by myself. I’ll get her to sign, you’ll see it will all work out.... All right....All right....All right....All right.... I’ll only say what’s absolutely necessary. Ten percent of my average output.”
I know she’s smiling now into the phone that wise tender smile that I married her for not like Levana’s who isn’t missing a word her curly African head down grinning to herself for sheer joy. Hats off to her I never would have thought that she knew what average output meant. I can see that if I want to keep up her morale I have to crack some joke at my own expense every hour on the hour.
“Just a minute, Ya’el.’’ I cover the receiver with my hand. “If you don’t mind, Levana, as long as I’m still in the office ... that wet rag we talked about ... the sign down below...”
She rises grudgingly she takes a rag and goes out while I get back to Ya’el I say a few sweet words and remind her to reserve a place for her father on the limousine to Jerusalem tomorrow.
I’d really better go or should I wait some more but what for. It doesn’t look like there’ll be any mail today. I sit down and open a locked drawer I take out the murder file and leaf through it. By now I know every detail by heart but still it obsesses me. This is my chance this is my hope this is my ticket to get ahead. The rest is garbage. Three months ago when Steiner died his office divvied up his cases. I got a young murderer a television repairman it looks like he really did it though he insists that he didn’t since then he’s all I think about. I’ve slept with him dreamed of him spent dozens of hours with him. His family has no money but they’ve called in a rich uncle from Belgium to help and help is what he’ll need. He made sure to leave his fingerprints all over the apartment everywhere except on the television that he never got around to fixing. But did he murder the old man or did he just find the corpse there I’m going nuts trying
to figure it out I’ll drive the judges nuts too. I phone the prison and ask them to get him ready for me I’ll stop off on my way to have a chat with him.
So now I really have to move. Only where’s Levana? I step into the dark corridor into its underworld mold. A few unsavory characters are sitting on the bench by the door to Mizrachi’s office for the past year the media have been arguing whether there’s organized crime in this country if they could see who’s being licensed to practice law these days they would realize that the organization is the government.
So where has she gone to? I should never have sent her out. All I want now is to move to get going to do something. I return to the office glance at the telephone gather up my papers wipe a little dust with my finger from the volumes of the proceedings of the supreme court smear it on an old map of Israel on the wall rummage through Levana’s pocketbook hanging from her chair photographs of movie stars clipped from the newspapers crumpled tissues a vial of cheap perfume what a wasteland in keeping with the grayness of this office with its high mildewed British ceiling that smells of failure once I said to Ya’el give me some bright new idea here some fresh direction of paint but I dropped it when I saw what it would cost. I call my mother to let off some steam.
“It’s you at last. I thought you’d forgotten me.” (Since Ya’el’s father arrived she hasn’t had a moment of peace.) “What’s happening.” (It’s not a question, it’s a statement of fact.) “I called yesterday afternoon, did they tell you? What kind of business is that, leaving Gaddi alone with the baby, he’s only six.” (Seven.) “He sounded so sad.” (He always does to her.) “And the old man was sleeping.” (That’s what she calls him, even though he’s a year younger than she is.) “What’s the matter with him? Is he sick or is there something up his sleeve? He didn’t even bring Gaddi a present. What sort of egotism is that? Did he bring anything for you?”
A Late Divorce Page 5