Each morning, confused and tearful, he came to tell me he had changed his mind. Surprised by such inner turmoil in a crude fattener of calves like Dani, I dug Tonya up and moved her back and forth five times despite the stench and the stings of angry bees. Even Uri, who normally could not have passed up a quip about this underground shuttle, remarked that Tonya deserved the utmost consideration ‘for her devoted finger-sucking among the bees, rain or shine for so many years’.
Fortunately, Busquilla lost his temper in the end and said to Dani, ‘That’s enough! It’s time to put an end to this farce. Who do you think you’re dealing with here, a dead cat? Where’s your respect for your parents?’
To me he said, ‘What does he think he’s doing? It’s almost Yom Kippur!’
He invited Uri and me to spend the day with his family in the nearby town where he lived.
‘You can come with us to the Moroccan synagogue,’ he said. ‘It wouldn’t hurt you to see that there are real Jews in this country.’
‘Let’s do it,’ said Uri. ‘It might be fun.’
‘You go,’ I said to him. ‘That stuff isn’t for me. When did we ever make a thing about Yom Kippur?’
‘I’m not going without you,’ said Uri.
We stayed at home. That afternoon we were visited by Weissberg’s little twins. Like two black-capped nightingales, they stood bashfully but proudly in the doorway of the cabin. ‘You’re invited to the meal before the fast,’ they said, flying off with matched movements as if each were the other’s shadow.
‘I think we should take them up on it,’ said Uri. ‘Weissberg must have forgiven us.’
‘Not me,’ I said. ‘That’s not my cup of tea. And I don’t like having supper at 4 p.m.’
‘I’m going.’
‘You can do what you want.’
At four o’clock, with the Day of Atonement soon to begin, I took off my shirt, stood in the middle of the yard, and split a few logs as loudly as I could. I stuffed the pieces into the wood-burning stove that stood against the cabin, making sure the iron door clanked, and took a steaming hot shower on Grandfather’s little milking stool while Uri sat in his parents’ house feasting his stomach on the cantor’s food and his eyes on his beautiful daughter.
I scrubbed myself till I was red, hidden in steam as I listened to the deep purr of the chimney on the other side of the wall. I knew that the Weissbergs could hear the stove too and were doing their best to ignore the religious outrage.
Towards evening, when the cantor and his family went off to synagogue, Uri returned to the cabin.
‘Aren’t you going to pray?’ I asked as caustically as I could.
‘Not tonight. But I will go tomorrow,’ he answered solemnly.
Although the second and third generation of villagers kept away from the synagogue, which was empty and abandoned most of the year, the old folk, after lapsing from the fiery free thought of their youth into subsequent indifference, had begun to take a renewed interest in religion. Some became greater heretics than ever, while others, falling prey to fears and penitence, took to praying regularly every Sabbath with great devoutness and even with tears. Eliezer Liberson referred to them as ‘our bugbear comrades’, a term whose exact significance escaped me, though its tone and intention were perfectly clear.
‘What’s she like?’ I asked.
‘Who?’
‘The young cantoress.’
Uri laughed. ‘She sat there like a heifer with its head in its feedbox. She just stared at her plate and didn’t say a word. All I saw of her was a bit of forehead, a couple of fingers, and six yards of blue fabric.’
‘She’s beautiful,’ I said.
‘Since when do you notice women?’ asked Uri. ‘Has something happened? Do you want to tell me about it?’
I kept silent.
‘I’m not really into all that any more, but there’s still a thing or two I remember,’ he said.
I woke him up in the middle of the night, and we went to the cemetery. In spite of myself I dug Tonya up one more time and moved her back to Margulis, although I left her headstone by the grave of Rilov’s boots.
‘Something tells me you’re going out of your mind,’ said Uri, who was sitting on Shlomo Levin’s grave.
‘A scarecrow like you would look better with a beard and sidelocks,’ I said to him.
‘You’re beginning to annoy me,’ said Uri. ‘You’re jealous, that’s all. If you’d like to start up with her, go on. You can ask Pinness for a few good icebreakers from the Bible, go to the synagogue, and make eyes at her. I’ll even teach you a few tricks myself.’