See Under by David Grossman (famous ebook reader TXT) 📕

first to interrupt this “impudent prying,” stops himself and, suddenly looking around the room, at Wasserman, at the curtained windows, he rubs his tired, red-rimmed eyes, and says in a dry voice without a trace of aggression: “We couldn’t have children for a long time. We tried for over seven years.” And Wasserman, in a quiet whisper: “Neither could we, Herr Neigel, eight years we … nu, well.” And in the heavy silence that envelops them both like a thick scarf Wasserman grits his teeth to hold back a scream. “Nu,” he reflects sadly later on, with tired, defeated anger not directed at Neigel, “there is nothing more to say.”

“Let us continue, then,” Wasserman sighs, the leader of a weary caravan forced to continue its wanderings. “Maybe Paula could have the baby, after all,” says Neigel with almost childish innocence, and Wasserman, gently: “Paula will die, I am sorry to say. But Fried will believe in his heart of hearts that the baby discovered in the zoo is Paula’s baby.” And Neigel: “I understand I have no choice but to accept this.” “Indeed. I am sorry to say.”

And they return to the story. But now Wasserman tells the story cautiously, walking a thin line. And Neigel too is tense. He no longer offers comments. No longer bullies him. They carry the story between them. Wasserman describes how “Paula’s cheeks bloomed with the fire of destruction, how her strong and pretty teeth began to loosen and decay,” how her skin became dry and cracked, and only her breasts continued to swell and ache, and the ache unraveled the stringy smile on her lips, an apologetic smile to Fried for the trouble she was causing him, but Marcus: “When our Paula leaned over the toilet bowl in the morning to vomit, and you, Dr. Fried, knelt to support her forehead, the two of you saw your faces reflected in the tiny pool below, two messages detained so long, and you knew, Fried.”

And at this point, for no apparent reason, Wasserman slowly closes his notebook with a smile and confesses to Neigel that this evening in Neigel’s company reminds him of other evenings, long ago, during his bachelorhood, before Little Lights went off to the printer and he would go to Zalmanson’s office in fear and trembling to turn in his latest installment, and together they would go over the writing, argue and make peace a hundred times, and toward midnight, when both were exhausted and the room was malodorous with the smoke from Zalmanson’s little cigars, for a few moments, “nu, well, there was a pleasantfeeling in our bones, you understand, Herr Neigel, as we confabulated about this and that … yes, how pleasant it was.” (“At such times, Zalmanson spoke truthfully. I would listen to him in silence, he said the deepest, most beautiful things when he wanted to! Without crooked cleverness or bad-natured jokes. About myself I told him nothing. What was there to tell? That the cat had been whining in the courtyard? That there was a leaky faucet in the house? And here, with this big goy, of all people, nu, well, it appears that even Anshel Wasserman can stitch a tale …”)

“This Zalmanson,” asks Neigel casually, “was he a friend of yours?” And Wasserman looks at him in surprise and answers, “Indeed he was.” His only friend. And when Neigel does not seem to be in too much of a hurry to get back to the story, Wasserman tells him, hesitantly at first, about Zalmanson, ready to retreat at a moment’s notice, but when he sees the expression of amused interest on Neigel’s face, he is filled with courage and speaks. This Zalmanson, he says, was always pretending he had just stepped out of the pages of Dostoevsky or Tolstoy, always dropping hints about the other realms where he lived his real life. A very important man, says Wasserman, raising his hand in a gesture of deprecation and mild annoyance: “A Moishe Gros! Never down here with the likes of us, heaven forbid,” Wasserman continues angrily. “Here in our world, Zalmanson is merely doing his duty, visiting poor relatives, but there, in his invisible realms, that is, he is among the wheels of heaven and the secret spheres! Oy vay! The anguished soul and its travails! That Zalmanson—feh, why I am getting so angry with him now I do not know, Herr Neigel, for I came to like him a little with the years … with his subtle smiles and his vainglory, and such a coxcomb he was, ai!” (Here Wasserman gets carried away and tells an amusing anecdote: When the armband orders were issued in the ghetto, Zalmanson did not go out to buy the band at Shaya Gantz’s with everyone else, but sat down instead with his wife, Zilla, who sewed bands for themselves and their three daughters. “Such fancy armbands, a Polish soldier almost shot them, heaven forbid, on charges of inciting to rebellion.”) “That Zalmanson …” continues Wasserman. “How sick I was of his merciless derision of any poor soul who happened to fit a witticism, nu, the house parties, have I told your honor about the house parties?” “No,” answers Neigel. “Ai, the parties at the Zalmansons’ … all Warsaw was there … and the wine flowed like water, and thepoor guests were forced to listen to Madame Zilla banging on the piano, and her three daughters torturing their flutes and violin … Zalmanson liked to surround himself with people … and a womanizer he was, too, begging your pardon … To tell you the truth, sir, I was not fond of attending these parties, nor was my wife … we felt drab and gray there … shy. We knew no one, and no one knew us. They were people of the world, while we, nu, well, we were field mice, no more. And in the end I refused to go, and my wife went alone, just once, and that was enough.