They laughed.
Wailing, Selim urinated in his pants.
Samira took the shaken child in her arms. “Despicable men,” she spat on the ground, though she wanted to spit on them, “Shame on you, to frighten a small child.”
Thank Allah Suha was not in sight. But when Samira entered Musa’s house, carrying Selim, she found her unconscious on the floor.
“Eumi, Eumi,” Selim cried.
Samira threw cold water on Suha’s face and was able to arouse her. Later, Suha shivered even under the warm shawls Samira enveloped her in. After both Suha and Selim were settled comfortably, Samira discovered looked down to see that she still held the second letter.
Fatima opened the door, her finger on her lips commanding silence. The fear of the Iraqi soldiers made her house as quiet as a tomb. In her bedroom Fatima eagerly opened Musa’s letter. Her face went pale as she read it: she handed it to Samira without a word. Samira started to read it aloud, slowly deciphering his dense writing,
Jerusalem, December 1947
Salaam Aleikum, Dear Eumi, My Honored Mother,
Cousin Abdullah has shared with me his thoughts and worries about our immediate future. I am grateful to him for the concern he’s always shown our family.
I haven’t yet spoken with Mahmood. If it will come to pass that we leave Palestine, even for the shortest time, I think that neither you nor I would want to do it without Na’ima and her family.
Unfortunately, the visit with Na’ima filled my heart with sadness. If I leave and take the children with me, she cried, Mahmood will find us and kill me.
I know how fanatic Mahmood is, cousin Abdullah knows it too, yet I want to convince Mahmood that Abdullah’s plan is wise. Leaving Na’ima’s house, I couldn’t stop thinking that not all marriages are made in heaven like mine.”
Samira stopped reading and looked at Fatima. Seeing no reaction, she continued.
Yesterday, I went with cousin Abdullah to Ein-Karem, the beautiful village in the valley west of Jerusalem. One of the bank’s clients defaulted on his payments and his house was slated for foreclosure.
“I want to sell it,” the man said, “but in these unstable times who would buy it?”
I suddenly thought that with some restoration the house could be a nice, cool summer place for us. We’d all be happy to stay away from Jaffa’s merciless summer sun. I gave the man a deposit. He kissed my hand in gratitude.
“Can you believe this?” Fatima screamed. Samira was startled; it had been a long time since she had seen her mistress so angry.
Though it is winter, and the rains never seem to stop, I don’t think it will take long for the house to be fixed up. Meanwhile I will work in Abdullah’s bank while I keep an eye on the builder.
Dear Eumi, I think that we should all wait in Ein Karem to see how events develop further. There is no need to rush.
Your faithful son, Musa
Samira looked at Fatima. “What are you going to do?” she asked cautiously. “Are you going to answer him?”
Fatima burst into rage, “What’s going on with him? Is he irresponsible? Why does he want to stall our departure? Does he realize the danger we are in? Did I raise my son to be a coward? I am going to order him to come home immediately. There is no time to waste. He doesn’t know the danger his son, and all of us are in since the arrival of our guests.”
She sat at her desk and started writing, while Samira, with fear in her heart, made her way back to Musa’s house and the other letter. She was wondering what he wrote to his wife and whether Suha would tell her.
Though nestled under a mountain of blankets, Shifra felt frozen. Since the terrible afternoon when the Iraqi soldiers played cat and mouse with her child, laughing as they tossed him up in the air, she could not stop shaking. A feeling of dread had taken root in her heart. Musa was away when his son needed him most!
Now what she had from him was a letter! Not a piece of paper… Musa, you should be home to protect your family. Her trembling hands found it difficult to tear open the envelope.
To my sweet wife, Suha, My Dove, Salaam Aleikum!
It’s hard for me to be away from you and from our son, for whom I constantly pray to Allah to grant a long life. Yet I have to ask you for more patience, because I am delaying my return. For a good reason! I’ll tell you about it when I get home. I’m sure you’ll be pleased!
Take care, my love, and don’t spoil Selim too much,
Musa
While still puzzled by Musa’s letter, Shifra heard Samira’ steps approach her door. The older woman coughed. Has she caught cold? Shifra wouldn’t be surprised. The ceilings in the Arab houses are so high that it makes it impossible to heat the rooms properly. Maybe she coughed to let me know she was back. Shifra wanted to know what Musa had written to his mother, but she felt tired. She closed her eyes. She heard Samira gently open her door; stand for a minute, then retreat.
Shifra knew Samira was worried about her, particularly about her loss of appetite. The more Samira pushed, the less she ate. After seeing the two Iraqi soldiers holding Selim at the tip of their bayonets, Shifra could not stop throwing up.
A worried Samira said, “You have to see Uhm Zaide,” her face wrinkled with concern.
“I was so afraid Selim would fall and die,” Shifra said, her eyes filling with tears,
“Ssh, it’s over. Nobody will touch a hair on Selim’s head. Not as long as I live,” Samira said.
Yet almost every day, Samira insisted Shifra should call on Uhm Zaide.
“If not Uhm Zaide,” Samira said, disappointed, “maybe we should go to the English nuns. They might know of a cure,” though Shifra could guess from her tone that Samira had doubts. As sick as she felt, Shifra wouldn’t see Uhm Zaide nor would she consult the English nuns.
She dreamed of resting in her mother’s arms, while her mother sang a forlorn Jewish song. In her dream, following her mother’s song, she heard the siren of an ambulance. Where did she hear that lately? Feverishly awake now, Shifra searched her memory. Yes, it was on Yehuda Halevi, the street where the violin teacher lived. People said that a hospital was close by. Was that an omen?
For a few nights the dream returned, first her mother’s song, then the siren’s howl. What was the dream telling her? It surely had a meaning: go back, go back where?
Otto’s image floated before her eyes. Yes, her dream had a meaning. She has to go back! To see Otto, to confide in him and ask for his advise; Otto, in whose eyes she saw the love and care for her son, was the only person whose sincerity she did not doubt.
But could she leave home without arousing Samira’s suspicions? She is so worried about me; especially after I refused to see Uhm Zaide, or go to the English convent.
“I need a doctor, a woman doctor,” I’ll say to her, “and soon.” I know that Samira suspects that I am pregnant. “I am out of the pills she had prescribed for me and my headaches kill me.” What should I do if Samira opposes this or if she wants to go with me? I’ll be adamant, “Musa trusts me, and so should you. You don’t want me to complain to Musa about your attitude, when he returns home.”
With or without Samira acquiescence, she would go the coming friday afternoon, when Otto surely would be home. Shifra remembered that when he lived in Jaffa, he used to teach home on friday afternoons.
4 5
Otto felt relaxed sitting in the familiar ambiance of the Grubers’ home, with its needlepoint curtains, and Charlotte’s family portraits on the wall, her mustached grandfather, looking like Emperor Franz Joseph, holding the chain of his onion-sized vest watch, standing proudly behind the chair, where his petite wife was seated holding three children on her lap. Lotte never missed a chance to point out that she was the youngest of them.
During that night of terror when Otto had dragged an unconscious Gretchen out of their house, photos weren’t on his mind. His thoughts were focused only on the need to escape from Germany. It pained him to watch the display of Charlotte’s family pictures
when he had not been able to save one image of his daughter Ruthie.
After a tiring day of rehearsals with the Palestine Philharmonic Orchestra, Otto was grateful for the cup of steaming coffee and the apple strudel Charlotte placed in front of him. Yasha Horenstein, whom Otto knew from Berlin, was a very demanding conductor, and though the members of the Orchestra were anxious about an imminent war, Yasha wasn’t going to lower his standards.
“In times of turmoil, making good music is our way to encourage the young fighters, and to let them know, that on the home front, everything is all right.”
Though the conversation in the Gruber home was always about politics, to which he had little to contribute, Otto felt good to be included, that feeling of gemutlichkeit, the comfort and intimacy of being among friends. The thought that from the beginning they should have lived in Tel-Aviv, rather than Jaffa, nagged Otto again. But what was done couldn’t be undone. Otto was grateful to Charlotte Gruber and to Mazal for the time they spent with his Gretchen. It was clear to him that she liked being with both of them, as different as they were from one another. She conversed in German with Charlotte, but both women were serious about teaching her Hebrew.
Sie leben in diesem Land, müssen Sie sprechen ihre Sprach, when you live in this country, you must speak its language, Otto heard Charlotte say time and again when Gretchen complained that it was too hard, or she was too old to learn Hebrew.
“Nonsense,” answered Charlotte, who wouldn’t take no for an answer.
Mazal, twenty years younger, brushed Gretchen’s now mostly gray hair as she whispered in her ear, “You are beautiful.”
“Only conversation, b’ivrit kala, in easy Hebrew, commanded Charlotte, and Gretchen, like the good student she once was, tried hard. Otto noticed that her nightmares had become less frequent.
Sigmund Hochmeister, the bass player, with the perennial cigar in his mouth, played with the radio knobs. “Nine o’clock, time to hear the broadcast from Kol Zion Halochemet.”
“You are obsessed with Etzel. Begin should listen to Ben-Gurion. This should be a time of restraint, not of war. At least until May, when the British Mandate ends,” said Hugo Gruber.
“You want us to sit with our arms crossed, when every day we lose people? We are no cowards, nicht so, Otto?” asked Sigmund, Sigi to his friends.
Bruno Herbst was quicker. “The Haganah, as Ben-Gurion has determined, is not going to initiate fights. It will only retaliate and punish a violent attack.”
“It is that simple? Have the snipers on top of the minarets of Jaffa’s Manshya’s Mosque, or the terrorist bands hidden in the hills along the highway to Jerusalem been silenced? How many victims have already fallen prey to them?”
A moment later they heard the sound of bullets from the areas of Shchunat Hatikva and Kerem Hateimanim, the two oldest Tel-Aviv communities and the closest to Jaffa.
Sigi got up and paced the room. “You see that they are not afraid of the Brit’s curfew. Why should we be?”
“We have to stay calm and not give way to hysteria. Haganah is strong and well-organized. All you think about is revenge. In the long run this is not what we want,” Hugo Gruber said in a quiet voice.
“We are as concerned as you are,” Charlotte Gruber, who was knitting a sweater, joined the conversation. “Only the other day, the kibbutz of one of our boys, Ef’ Al near Tel-Aviv, was under attack. Thank God, the attackers were repelled.”
“Good evening, you are listening to the news from Kol Zion Halochemet.”
The stern voice of the broadcaster brought silence to the room. “Again, Arab attacks and violence occurred simultaneously, at Kfar Uria, near Ramla and other settlements in the North as well as at the edge of towns. Lehi, in retaliation, has attacked and wiped out the Arab villages of Yazur and Tira.”
“It’s really a war,” whispered Otto, bewildered.
“Sheket, silence,” demanded Sigi, who bent his cupped ear toward the radio.
“Syrian Bedouins attacked Kfar Szold,” continued the announcer, “but were quickly defeated and pushed back across the frontier.”
“Bravo,” Mazal clapped her hands. Unobserved, she had entered the room. Otto stood up, his eyes worried, but Mazal gestured for him to sit down.
“We have noticed that most of the wealthy Arabs are leaving. They are going to Damascus, Amman or Ramalla,” the broadcaster continued. “They think they are taking a holiday, and will be back soon. The Mufti Al-Husseini is upset, because not only women, children and old people are leaving, but also young men who should serve in the towns’ militias and the Arab Liberation Army.”
Sigi turned off the radio. Nobody talked, but each one could guess the others’ thoughts. Arabs could leave to get protection from the neighboring Arab countries, but where could Jews go? They had no other place. Their brethren, even if they wanted to help, lived in faraway countries.
“For better or for worse, we are going to stay and fight until the last one,” said Charlotte, speaking for everyone in the room. “Our son, Uri, is training orthodox Jews, who volunteered for the Haganah. Isn’t this extraordinary? Can you imagine, a Jew with the Torah in one hand and a rifle in the other?”
Everybody smiled. They knew that she wanted to raise their spirits. Otto kept his eyes shut. He thought of the little boy, Selim, who showed such a rare gift for music. Where were they, the child and his mother? Had they left already? He felt sorry for the boy. Would he receive the musical training he deserved? He remembered that Charlotte and Mazal had told him that the mother came looking for him and Gretchen. Should he try to find her, the girl with the bluest eyes, Ruthie’s eyes?
“I am sorry,” Otto said, blushing, when he saw five pairs of eyes riveted on him, “I dozed. I am getting old.”
“You were dreaming,” said Mazal. “You had such a serene smile. What did you dream of?”
Otto was amazed by Mazal’s boldness, but he knew that she had the gentlest of souls and she cared so much about Gretchen.
“I was thinking of the little Arab boy, such musical promise, the one I told you about. Where would he be? Has he any chance to develop his talent, a refugee in an Arab country?” Otto answered.
He saw Mazal’s eyes open wider, as if his words took on a special meaning for her. “We have to find her and tell her the truth,” Mazal said. “No Jew can feel safe in an Arab country. My mother thought that Morocco was heaven, until Arab hooligans burned her store. Poor girl, she doesn’t know what awaits her and maybe her son as well.”
For a long time before falling asleep, Otto thought of Shifra and Selim. How could he find out what happened to them? Maybe Nabiha, his former housekeeper in Jaffa, would know. But where could he find Nabiha?
It had been by chance that Otto hired her. He was shopping in Jaffa’s souk when he noticed a strong woman crouched on the floor, cleaning the entrails of a freshly butchered chicken. Though he hated the stink, Otto admired her efficiency. Through sign language and a volunteer interpreter, he made her understand what he wanted. She wiped her hands, ready to follow him. Every day for four years, she took care of Gretchen and their needs, but he never knew where she lived.
Otto fell into a deep sleep, dreaming that he had offered his life in exchange for his daughter’s, his obsessive dream.
Mazal also had difficulty falling asleep. She kept thinking of the young girl who had enough courage to approach them, before Mazal let her slip away. She was sure the girl didn’t come just to pay a courtesy call. Maybe she needed help. She turned over in bed. It was hot and Bruno’s snoring annoyed her.
Mazal arose and went onto the balcony. The February night was bleak and cold and made her shiver. She thought of a plan. She knew it could be risky even in peaceful times, now it would be plainly dangerous. If she told Bruno, he’d say, “You want to abduct somebody? At ishtagat-are you crazy?”
Back in bed, Mazal threw her arm around Bruno’s large back. His body warmed hers. Before falling asleep her last thought was, “Why would I want to
play with fire? Is my desire to protect a Jewish girl strong enough to take such a risk?”
Shifra awoke with a start. What was that noise? It was still dark outside. Careful not to wake up Selim curled next to her, she rose and peered through the window. The neighbors across the street were busy loading their household wares into a donkey drawn cart, already filled with mattresses and pillows. A weeping child carried a load of pots and pans taller than himself. When one of the pots fell, the father, his arms filled with chairs, screamed, “Not again, Ali, you good-for-nothing, you break one more thing, and I’ll break your back.”
Shifra sighed. What she saw had become a familiar sight. People were leaving Jaffa. Where were they going? A few days ago Samira told her about the two Lebanese ladies who came to visit Fatima.
”You must remember them,” Samira said, “The owners of the French Perfume Shop. Cool, beautiful and elegant as ever. Fatima was so happy to see them. It had been a long time since she had visitors. She called me to help her serve the guests, but they said, no need, they had stopped for only a minute, to say goodbye to Fatima. They were leaving, returning to Lebanon.”
Shifra did not need to ask the reason. The answer was everywhere. Menace floated in the air, the clouds of war becoming denser every day.
“Fatima cried,” continued Samira. “She had ordered Musa to come home, but he answered that there was still time, not yet reason to hurry. Now is the orange picking season. He had consulted with other orange-grove owners who said they would leave after the oranges were boxed and shipped to their regular customers.”
Shifra waited to hear more. Samira had yielded to her pressure and told her already that Musa had written to his mother about the house he bought in the village of Ein Karem.
“Another reason for Fatima to be upset with her son,” Samira had said. “Who needs to buy a new house, when we don’t know what tomorrow will bring?”
Shifra knew that Samira repeated word for word what Fatima said. She was seized by tremors. So that was the surprise Musa had for her! To live close to Jerusalem!
Jaffa Beach: Historical Fiction Page 27