The Liberated Bride

by A. B. Yehoshua

  “The court agreed without knowing where it’s going?”

  “That was the condition. But there’s no need to worry. We’ll be told the exact location as soon as we get to Vienna. And the Israeli embassy will know where we are.”

  “But suppose I were to abscond like that?”

  “I’d be annoyed,” Hagit admitted with an unflappable smile. “But that’s only because you could always take me with you. I can’t take you. But why should you care? Won’t it be nice to be rid of me for a while?”

  “Not like this.”

  “Then like what?”

  “I’d need a more thorough break from you.”

  Taken aback, she laughed and went to kiss him.

  “Don’t imagine it’s going to be all fun and games. This is a working trip.”

  Yet she did not seem put out by the prospect of it. Her mood was one of excitement. Besides the adventure itself, there was the prospect of new evidence deciding a case that had dragged on inconclusively for months. And surrounded by male colleagues, she would surely be getting at least as much attention as could be provided by a single husband.

  Rivlin felt an anxious sadness, coupled with an unfamiliar aggressiveness. Their impending separation, though short, was a rare event, and his wife’s forensic talents, marshaled to convince him that it was a blessing in disguise that might revive his powers of concentration, did not reassure him. He grumbled not only about the fancy restaurants and good meals she would enjoy without him and the new places he would not get to see with her, but about the chronic disorder she always left behind. This was why he insisted, on the eve of her departure, on her keeping an old promise, made earlier in the year and repeated before her sister’s visit, to go through the clothing in her closet and throw out what wasn’t needed. It was time they gave their stuffy life an airing.

  3.

  EVEN THOUGH HAGIT was leaving the next day and hadn’t yet decided what to pack, so that she swore she would do “anything” for her husband if only he put off closet-cleaning until her return, he was determined to have his way. And so at 10 P.M., two chairs were set up in their bedroom, one for the clothes whose fate had been sealed and one for those granted a temporary reprieve. Hagit hated parting with her old things, which were an inseparable part of the self she felt comfortable with. Not surprisingly, the Rivlins were at loggerheads at once.

  “First of all, what about this?” He grabbed a faded gray coat by its fur collar as though it were a beggar caught panhandling in the closet. “The last time I wanted to throw this out you promised to wear it, but I’m still waiting for that to happen. All it did was spend two more years growing moldy in the closet and infecting everything else.”

  “You can’t blame me if we haven’t had any real winters.”

  “You wouldn’t have worn it if we had. A heavy coat with a fur collar is an absurdity in this country.”

  “But I love it.”

  “Strictly platonically. The time has come to part.”

  “We’ll regret it the first cold winter that we have.”

  “Bye-bye, sweetheart,” Rivlin said, depositing the folded coat on the first chair. “And now, before we do anything else, the moment has come, ten years after her death, to pay our last respects to your mother’s woolen skirt.”

  “Don’t you dare touch it!”

  “But why not? You’ve never worn it, and you never will. Give it to some new immigrant from Russia.”

  “Don’t Russia me. It stays right here.”

  “Why?”

  “I’ve already told you. It has sentimental value.”

  “I’ll be damned if I understand what sentiments an old black skirt of your mother’s can arouse.”

  “You would understand better if you had ever felt any sentiments for your own mother.”

  “I certainly never felt any for her old skirts. How long does this skirt have to hang over us like a black fate?”

  “What’s fateful about it? It’s a memento.”

  “It doesn’t look like we’re going to get far tonight.”

  “I told you we wouldn’t. I’m tired. Why do we have to do this now? I have to be up at three in the morning. I promise to go through everything when I get back.”

  “I’ve heard such promises before. You’ll come back exhausted, and that will be the end of it. Here, let’s give it one more try. Fifteen more minutes. I deserve a less cluttered house. Look at this embroidered blue blouse. It’s lovely, but it’s reached the end of the road. It’s much too tight on you.”

  “Do you remember when we bought it?”

  “In Zurich.”

  “No. In Geneva. In a little store near the lake. It cost a fortune, and you were against spending the money.”

  “I wasn’t. I just had my doubts.”

  “That was so long ago. And look how alive this purple embroidery still is! Do you have any idea how often I’ve worn this? How much use I’ve got out of it?”

  “Of course I do. It’s one of your uniforms.”

  “Then let’s spare it. For a blouse like this, I’m ready to lose weight.”

  “Hagit, you know you’ll never lose weight. Bye-bye, blouse. It’s been good to know you. Now lie down and let yourself be folded like a good girl.”

  “I can’t stand giving it away.”

  “And now, Hagiti, look this brown suit in the eye and admit that it’s been five years since you last touched it.”

  “No, it hasn’t. I wore it to the party you were given by the oriental Society.”

  “So you did. But my partying days are over.”

  “It’s not my fault if it’s out of fashion.”

  “That’s what you said the day you bought it.”

  “It could come back in.”

  “Not a chance.”

  “You’re a hard man. What’s it to you if I own another suit?”

  “I told you. It clutters up your closet and hides the clothes that are wearable.”

  “Then let’s put it in your closet.”

  “Are you out of your mind? Come on, bite the bullet! This suit will make a perfect gift to some poor, penniless woman who can’t afford to be in fashion. And she can also have these old velvet pants of yours. . . .”

  “Never!”

  “But there’s a hole in them.”

  “I can wear them around the house.”

  “With a hole? I don’t deserve the honor.”

  4.

  YET THOUGH YOU knew you would have trouble sleeping the night before she left, you never thought such desolate sorrow would chip away at you, slowly and dully, minute by minute. Already at ten-thirty, feeling the impending signs, you hurriedly put on your pajamas, threw another pillow on the bed, turned off the lights, and lowered the blinds to shut out the moon, as if in it lay the threat to your sleep. And even then, still not reassured, you preemptively swallowed a blue sleeping pill to stun the day’s anxieties and the morrow’s premonitions. Not that you were reckless. Afraid of sleeping through the alarm, you divided the pill in two, taking half for yourself and giving the other half to the guileless traveler, a stranger to worry and insomnia. Excited by her adventure and protesting the loss of the newspaper that you snatched from her hands while switching off the reading light, she kissed you gently and curled herself, to the serenade of her musical snores, into her usual, peaceful ball of sleep.

  How could you have been so slow then to recognize the poison dripping into you as you tossed for a whole hour in bed, dozing fitfully, rumpling sheets and kicking off blankets, until you went to lie down on the convertible couch in your study, the royal bed from which you vainly tried to shake the leftovers of your fragile sister-in-law’s sleep, until at midnight, with a desperate hope, you swallowed another sleeping pill, this time a whole one ingested with a glass of brandy that, though it hit you like an uppercut, merely poured more fuel on the stubborn flame inside you?

  Can it be that your beloved’s folded clothes, now lying resigned to their fate in a higher pile t
han you had counted on, reminded you of happier times? Because Hagit, after fighting tooth and nail for each item, suddenly reversed course and joined your clearance campaign with such ardor that you had to stop her in a panic, uncertain whether this was a shrewd ploy to make you back down or a genuine decision to prune her wardrobe, which would inevitably be followed by a demand for its massive renewal.

  And so, fatigued and confused by new and old desires, you return after midnight to reconsider the old dresses, skirts, and blouses. By the glow of the reddish night-light between the two floors of the duplex, you run your hand over worn velvet, finger beloved embroidery, caress light wool, and sniff at a never-worn pair of red high-heeled shoes that you called “whorish” because you thought their provocative nature would bring a blush to the cheeks of defendants and plaintiffs alike. Their straps shamelessly seductive, they have fled from drawer to drawer, closet to closet, and apartment to apartment before being apprehended at last and added to the pile of castaways waiting to be sent to some charity.

  You know what is the one thing capable of chaining to your bed the recalcitrant sleep now wandering about the apartment. But you know, too, that your mate of many years will never allow you to mix love with slumber, lest she lose control over an act that is in her opinion more spiritual than physical. And so, reduced to raising the blinds again in the hope that the rebuffed moonlight may dispel the darkness of the room, you whimper (though not to tomorrow’s traveler, whose sleep is precious, but to the sky, the stars, the sleeping ghost across the street, the blue pill that has been swallowed by your anxiety rather than vice versa):

  “I haven’t slept a wink. Not for one minute.”

  And you lapse into silence, not knowing whether your voice has made a dent in the woman beside you. After a while comes her faint but clear answer. It is on automatic pilot, that unconscious critique born of pure judgment that enables her, in all times and places, no matter how deep the night or her sleep, to utter words of reassurance or reproach that not only are unremembered by her in the morning, but amuse her greatly when she is told of them.

  “Never mind, my love. There’s nothing sacred about sleep.”

  “Look who’s talking.”

  “Ben-Gurion slept four hours a night and was the best prime minister the country ever had.”

  “Give me four hours and I’ll be a happy man.”

  “You can sleep all you want when I’m gone.”

  “How? When? What are you talking about? The housekeeper is coming tomorrow. How can I sleep with her around? And that goddamn Samaher is sending me her cousin with her material. What made me get involved with her? God Almighty, how did I let it happen?”

  “Never mind. You’ll sleep afterward.”

  “I’m a wreck.”

  “What’s the matter with you tonight? Don’t tell me you envy me too.”

  “Of course not. There’s nothing enviable about you. It’s just the injustice of it. You can abscond all the way to Europe, while I can’t even do it for a few hours to Jerusalem without feeling guilty.”

  “When did you abscond to Jerusalem?”

  “I didn’t.”

  “Then what do you feel guilty about?”

  “You. Wherever I go makes you jealous and angry.”

  “Because I don’t like being without you. Tomorrow will be hard for me too. But what was I supposed to do? You mustn’t mind my going. I had no choice. Believe me, I’m not looking forward to it.”

  Astonished, you stare at this woman making perfect sense in her sleep, from the depths of which she talks like an obedient fetus.

  “All right, all right. It doesn’t matter. Go on sleeping. You only have an hour and a half left.”

  “Would you like me to put you to sleep too?”

  But already her breathing grows regular, and she sinks back under, beneath the straight blanket, upon the crisp sheet, her fist against her mouth like the last trace of an old habit of thumb-sucking. You snuggle up to her from behind, one hand on her stomach, trying but failing to access her warmth, to cling to her, fetus-to-fetus, your breath in one rhythm with hers, sucking in the generous bounty of her calm, untroubled sleep—only to give up and, with a sudden movement, despairing and reconciled at once, free her of the burden of you. Oddly, your mood improves at once. Slipping out of bed, you put on your bifocals, shut the bedroom door behind you, turn the light on in the kitchen, put up some water up to boil, and go to switch on your computer, across whose screen float the words “Be of Good Cheer.”

  5.

  ONLY WITH THE first glimmerings of dawn was Rivlin permitted to shut the suitcase and stand it by the front door. Hagit, wearing makeup and her regulation black suit that no number of clearance campaigns would eliminate, joined him for coffee. Beaming and expectant, she agreed to help finish an old piece of cake left over from her sister’s visit. The two of them sat looking at each other with a deep and weary affection, surprised to discover that their rare, if brief, separation was really about to take place.

  “What would you like the housekeeper to cook for you today?”

  “Nothing. The fridge is full of leftovers.”

  “Will you come downstairs with me?”

  “Of course.”

  “It’s not necessary. The suitcase isn’t heavy.”

  “What’s necessary is to get a coherent explanation from you of how we’re going to be in touch and how I’ll know when you’ll be back. This whole trip is a little too mysterious for me.”

  “Mysterious? It’s only for three or four days. And I won’t be alone.”

  “But who will be responsible for all of you?”

  “Why does anyone have to be responsible? The embassy in Vienna will know where to contact us. Just don’t expect a phone call today. Maybe tomorrow. Are you going to change that shirt?”

  “What’s wrong with it?”

  “It’s creased. You can’t come down with me in that. And please shave, too.”

  “I never shave this early.”

  “Shave anyway. You can’t expect everyone to be familiar with your habits.”

  He shaved, put on a fresh shirt, and took down her suitcase while she lingered to check her makeup, in an assertion of her feminine prerogative to be late. A sleek Corrections Authority van was waiting in the narrow street. The driver, dressed in a prison warder’s uniform, had switched on the revolving blue police light to proclaim the importance accorded by the state to its judicial institutions. The district court secretary, a tall, lanky man, greeted Rivlin and moved quickly to take the suitcase. Recognizing the Orientalist at once, Hagit’s two colleagues on the bench shook his hand. Soon she appeared, her eyes aglow with adventure, wearing an old cardigan salvaged at the last moment from the pile of cast-off clothes. Two young men, the prosecutor and the defense counsel, scrambled from the van to salute her and make the professor’s acquaintance.

  His wife was now surrounded by a full-court press of five attentive men. Overhead, a first cloud was turning pink in the dawn light above the Carmel. Drunk from his sleepless, lovelorn night, Rivlin took his wife in his arms and kissed her before everyone. Then, suddenly relaxed and smiling, he turned to the travelers and declared, as if it were he who was dispatching them:

  “It’s time you ended this damn trial.”

  A head movement of the judge’s told him he had gone too far. Trying to make up for it, he said gallantly:

  “And try to enjoy yourselves if you can. . . .”

  Only upon returning to the apartment, where he noticed that Hagit had taken the unusual step of washing the breakfast dishes, did he realize how guilty she had felt, not for leaving him, but for the moment of parting. At once he picked up the phone and dialed Ofer, the night guard sitting behind a heavy green security door in Paris. Although the switchboard of the Jewish Agency was shut down after work to prevent the off-hours from being whiled away on the phone, Ofer had an emergency line that could be used in a pinch. If he ever fell asleep while on duty, Rivlin told himself, it wa
s better for him to be awakened by his father than by his boss.

  He began the call by relating Hagit’s dawn departure, the feverish preparations for which had turned him into a night watchman like his son, although one who watched only himself. With a touch of irony he described the Corrections Authority van, into which an entire courtroom had fitted. Next he asked Ofer about the weather in Europe, his latest exam, and the date of the next one—and since the emergency line could not be used for long, he inquired casually before hanging up whether a reply had arrived from Jerusalem to his son’s condolence letter.

  The voice at the other end was startled. “How did you know I sent Galya a letter?”

  “I suppose you told me.”

  “I couldn’t have, Abba. I never said a word to you.”

  “Well, then I suppose I assumed that’s what you would do,” Rivlin said, trying to keep his presence of mind. “Don’t forget that she was once your wife.”

  There was a heavy silence behind the green door, on the other side of which an early-morning Parisian breeze was perhaps already blowing. Then came the unexpected query:

  “Have you told Ima?”

  “Told her what?”

  “What you’ve been hiding from her. That you told me about Hendel even though she asked you not to. . . .”

  “Not yet.”

  “But why not, Abba?” Ofer’s laugh was cynically provocative. “It’s not like you to act behind her back. In the end you’ll have to pay for that.”

  “Don’t worry about what I’ll have to pay for. And don’t romanticize your parents. We’re good friends, not Siamese twins. Your mother is a judge. It’s her job to put a line through the past by passing sentence. I’m a historian. For me the past is a gold mine of surprises and possibilities.”

  “A gold mine?” Rivlin heard a note of scorn. “A dunghill is more like it.”

  “Dunghills have their surprises too.” He spoke softly, the telephone pressed to his ear like a rifle tracking a bird. “So? Did you get an answer from Galya?”