A Pigeon and a Boy (44 page)

“Who needs pigeons in a zoo? There are enough of them on the street, and Dad says they carry diseases.”

Their bodies inclined toward the kitchen. Their necks stretched to bring Liora’s giant refrigerator into view

“What have you got inside that thing to eat?”

“Soon Aunt Liora will be home and we’ll all eat together. In the meantime we’ll look at the albums.”

My finger moved from face to face in old wedding photos. “Who’s this?”

“Dad.”

“No. That’s his father when he was young. They looked a lot alike.”

“Who’s this?” asked
Y-2.

“That’s me.”

“You don’t look like anyone, Uncle Yair.”

“I look like me, when I was a baby”

“Here’s a meat pie,” Yoav said to Yariv, pointing at Yordad’s plate.

I told them that Grandpa Yaacov did not like to stand in the line that formed around the casserole dishes and the platters. “Prepare a plate for me, please, Raya,” he would say

They laughed. “So prepare a plate for us, please, Yairi.”

I was horrified. “Where did you hear that name?”

“That’s how Dad talks to us when we come back from your place. ‘Did you have a good time at Yairi’s? What did Yairi give you to eat?’”

“That’s what he says? Yairi? Really?”

“Yes. But Mom tells him to stop, and that it’s not nice.”

“Look, there’s roast beef And ribs.”

“Then it must be a wedding of the kibbutz uncles.”

I flipped the pages. Yairi. It couldn’t be Yair or Iraleh or my brother or Uncle Yair. Of all the names, Yairi.

And now the boys were scouting about my new house, and the yard, and the view

“Very nice place,” Y-1 said.

“Cool,” concluded Y-2.

“We’ll put in a big grill here, and a wood-fired oven over there,” saidY-1.

“We’ll scarf down pizzas and steak from morning to night.”

“And baked potatoes.”

“If you don’t mind, boys, I am still alive and I have plans to live here another thirty years or so at least.”

“We can wait.”

S
IGAL PHONED
with two matters to discuss: first, Liora’s father wanted us to come to America for a family event. It would be taking place during the High Holidays and the airline tickets should be ordered well in advance. When would it be convenient for me to depart and return?

I: “There’s no need to order tickets for me. I’m not traveling to any United States.”

Sigal: “I’ll pass you through to your wife.”

Piano music in the background. Other offices have electronic music while you wait. Liora has hired Glenn Gould to play Bach for her fans.

Liora: “What’s with you, Yair? What’s your problem this time?”

I: “I have no desire to travel.”

Liora: “It’s not a question of desire, it’s a question of good manners and behavior.”

I: “I don’t like traveling and I’m busy”

Liora to me: “I want a clear answer: are you coming or not?”

I to her: “No.”

Liora hung up. Sigal came back on the line with her second matter for discussion. She apologized for the short notice, but several Dutch bird-watchers who had arrived in Israel had requested that I take them on a three-day tour. Beginning the next day, if possible.

Possible? Of course it was possible. Guiding bird-watchers was more pleasant and paid better than ferrying lecturers and actors about. I
picked them up from a hotel on Nes Ziona Street in Tel Aviv, very near the Romanian restaurant that is the payback spot for bets between Benjamin and me, and that afternoon we reached the guesthouse I had reserved in the Galilee.

The owner, a tall, thin man, seemed bitter and fatigued. Years earlier he had uprooted a grove of lychee trees and built rooms for rent. For a while his business had prospered. Then later—“With all the troubles in this country”—tourists had stopped coming. “For a while,” he told me, “I was forced to rent the rooms out to couples. What can I tell you, it’s simply unpleasant. Couples married to other people would come here, you know what I mean?”

“More or less,” I answered. To myself I said, If ever I come up to the Galilee with Tirzah, I will stay in someone else’s guesthouse.

“Anyway they’ve finally fixed up the pond out at the Hula Valley Nature Reserve and they’ve been spreading corn for the cranes so that they don’t eat the chickpeas planted in the fields. So I’m hoping that more people will come for that reason than others.”

Not only cranes. Pelicans and cormorants spend time here, and all kinds of geese and gulls and ducks and birds of prey all of them arriving at dusk for their nightly rest. The skies become spotted with spread wings and beaks calling and shrieking. The pelicans, with their tight and sturdy bodies, go down to the water assuredly, but a moment before touching down they are stricken with an amusing panic, as though they have discovered a malfunction in the landing gear. Their legs thrash and spray water and their wings—especially those of the younger birds — get tangled up. The cranes, with their long legs and outstretched necks, are not swimmers. They land in the shallowest water, first hovering like dancers hanging from strings and only then handing themselves over to gravity and plunging down into the congestion of their congregating friends, a flock that resembles a hundred of the letter
kaph-sophit
printed in your own handwriting.

My excited Dutch tourists stepped out of Behemoth toting binoculars and cameras. One of them, a tall, gaunt old woman, removed from her bag a drawing pad, watercolors, and brushes and sat down to paint the birds with incredible speed and precision. Her friends peered at her drawings, uttered expressions of amazement, and returned to watching the real birds. Bird-watchers constantly share their discoveries with one another by issuing short directives—name of bird, direction, distance—which change from language to language but always keep
their sense of urgency At once, all heads turn, all binoculars are raised. And there is always someone who has come up with a nice catch in his spotting scope. With a gesture of the benevolent victor he invites his colleagues to view his treasure, and in no time a short line forms, polite and grateful, in front of the lens.

Just like the elderly
Vbgelkundkrs
Yordad had introduced me to, and who had taught me the best bird-watching spots, these Dutch birdwatchers were interested in neither ethology nor ornithology, only identification. Thus, they competed among themselves about who had seen and was familiar with more birds and species. They argued, too: was this a laughing dove or a turtledove, a swamp harrier or a pygmy falcon? More than once their arguments were settled with the help of a spotting scope or a more powerful pair of binoculars, but sometimes the bird under discussion disappeared quickly, or the distinction was particularly difficult to make, as with the common kestrel and the lesser kestrel, especially when the sky was free of clouds. And then the voices rose and the arguments flared.

Very slowly, the sun descended. The mallards lost their sheen, the water silvered, and brown ibises turned black in it. The darkness erased the gray hues in the cranes’ wings and, later, the white of the pelicans’. In the end there remained only the last glow from the water and shadows upon it. Then even those were gathered up, and I gathered my own small flock and we returned to our lodgings.

After supper the bird-watchers stayed at the table, comparing their plunder and continuing their arguments. They even tried to get me to join in, wanted me to determine which old vulture—pun intended— was which, and quickly my ignorance was revealed, for which I was even scolded. “It is unfathomable that the guide does not know such elementary things, like the fact that the wings of the steppe eagle are longer than those of the greater spotted eagle.” But with me, the more things relate to these small matters — the length of wings, the color of walls, knobs for doors and cupboards — the more likely I am to lose interest in advance. The larger perceptions are enough for me: the height of flight, the arc of the heavens, the beeline, the full press of bodies, the air that fills space and home.

I
ROSE BEFORE DAWN,
turned on the samovar set up for us in the evening at the entrance, and awakened my tourists. They wished to see the fowl that had landed in the evening as they took off in the morning. While waiting for them to emerge from their rooms, I filled a large thermos with coffee, removed from the kitchen refrigerator the packages of sandwiches the guesthouse owner had prepared for us and, while it was still dark, we set out for the Hula reserve.

A strong easterly wind was blowing in our direction, raising clouds of dust, bending treetops, and even shimmying Behemoth’s heavy nose. At the entrance to the reserve I told them the story of the reclamation of the Hula Lake and its consequences. That is what I always do, and they cluck their tongues, reciting the local words and even jotting some of them down as a reminder. In another week they will be sitting in their local cafés using these exotic words I have taught them—
agur, sharkia, hula, saknai
—with their friends as if they had received them with their mothers’ milk, and they will sip beer and pass around their photographs.

The wind and dust caused us to seek refuge in the “Aquarium,” a building that is all windows and intended to be an observation point. The door was locked, but the industrious guide—that’s me, Mother, your firstborn son—circled the building and found an unlocked window I slid the glass sideways and invited my charges to enter.

From here on, things happened as if by themselves, like the previous night’s events being screened in reverse: the rise of the wake-up cries, the fading of darkness into gray the clearing of the water so that shadows of the birds are visible on the surface, the further rise of the sun, the beginning of movement. There is no leader or ruler or organizer here, and each bird takes flight when she is ready, and on her own accord and pace. The pelicans heavily the cranes at first as if dancing in the air, the geese and ducks racing across the water, necks outstretched and clapping their wings. All are trying, failing, hovering, landing, waiting for the sun to grow stronger and heat the air and their muscles.

Slowly, the skies once again grew spotted, filling with movement, wingspans, flapping, noises, and suddenly the mobile phone in my pocket rang, and in spite of the looks of reproach I got from the birdwatchers, I hastened to answer it because on the display screen appeared the name
YORDAD.

Y
ORDAD DOES NOT PHONE
often. And certainly not at such an hour. In general,
yekkes
do not wish to be a burden, to make requests from others. And anyway, whenever Yordad needs something he turns to Meshulam Fried. But ever since that conversation and his terrible question—“Is Mother at your place?”—seeing his name on the display screen causes me to worry

“I am truly sorry for disturbing you, Yairi,” he said, his voice perturbed and tired. “I thought long and hard about whether to phone you. You simply must come over here at once.”

I excused myself from the bird-watchers and stepped outside.

“I’m up north with a group of tourists. What happened?”

“Someone has been trying to break into my apartment.”

“Call the police. Right away!”

“Not now—it’s already light outside. It happens at night, every night. Someone presses down on the handle of the door, trying to open it. I haven’t been able to fall asleep these past few nights.”

“Is the door locked?”

“Of course.”

“You’re just hearing things,” I said, trying to calm him down. “Buildings always make noises. Especially apartment buildings, where there are other residents. And late at night, when everything’s quiet, it’s enough that some guy on the third floor is flushing his toilet to make you feel certain that someone is trying to break in.”

“Excuse me, Yairi, but I am still capable of differentiating between someone trying to break into my home and someone flushing his toilet on the third floor. And in case you’re hinting in that direction, I don’t have hallucinations, either!”

Slam. Lately he has developed the obnoxious habit that American businessmen have of ending telephone conversations without saying good-bye. I ignored this and phoned him back. I said, “We were cut off,” pretending that “the connection is poor from up here.” I tried the humorous approach: “Maybe it’s Meshulam, checking to see whether Professor Mendelsohn has locked his door before going to bed?”

Yordad’s voice sounded pleased to hear from me, as if he had not been angry with me a minute earlier. “I’ve already asked Meshulam, Yairi. That’s the first thing I did.”

And what did he say?”

“He said he would send someone from the firm that provides security to his offices to stand guard outside.”

“Agood idea.”

“A
bad idea. This is not the prime minister’s residence. You yourself said it: this is an apartment building. I don’t need some thug with a pistol in the stairwell.”

“Have you spoken to Benjamin about this as well?”

The birds were lifting off I was encircled by the flapping of wings; the wind roared around me. Still, Yordad’s sigh was clearly audible. “There is no point in speaking to Benjamin. He’s busy”

“So that’s the reason you come to me? Because I’m less busy? I work sometimes too, if by chance you forgot that. At this very moment I’m with a group of tourists. Bird-watchers from Holland. I got up this morning at a quarter to four to show them the migrating birds in the Hula Valley, so I’m a little far away”

“I’m sorry to have bothered you, Yairi. I turned to you because you are my elder son.”

That afternoon I drove south with my bird-watchers to our next stop: the Jordan Valley I made sure that everyone was set up with a room and a meal and I traveled to Jerusalem via the Jordan Rift. At ten-thirty I parked Behemoth on Halutz Street in Beit Hakerem. I removed from the car the handle of the hoe I keep there all the time and the folding chair that has been in the car since the aborted trip with Yordad, and I walked up to Bialik Street through the darkened memorial garden. What would someone who caught sight of me think, a man in his prime carrying a club in one hand and a collapsible chair in the other? Where could he be going? What are his intentions? In fact, there would be no need to make too much effort to guess. This man is the little boy who came down to this garden years ago with his mother. Now he is walking through it on his way to protect the father who raised him as though he were really and truly his own son.