Where the Bird Sings Best (4 page)

—
Abraham Groismann

Alejandro and the Rabbi were moved. They could not imagine how my grandmother clung to the leather coffer.

“Let’s just leave things as they are, Teresa. We’ll use only a few coins to rebuild the house and put the rest back into the hive. Let’s live off the honey, the miracle of these bees, organized and peaceful as perhaps human beings will one day be if they learn to work together.”

“Enough!” interrupted Teresa. “I am not a professional victim. If we stay here, they’re going to slit our throats, with Adonai’s good wishes. The Union of Russian People is accusing Jews of stealing blood from Christian children, and
The Protocols of the Elders of Zion
is being published in every city. The whole country is sharpening sacrificial knives. And what is it you’re defending? A black suit? A fur cap? A beard and sidelocks? A rest on the Sabbath? A few festivals based on fairy tales? A few prayers in a dead language? A severed foreskin? Is that what it means to be a Jew? Bah! We’re just as disgusting as everyone else! So, why not blend in? We’ll move to the United States. There, all citizens live in palaces and have their teeth plated gold. Nobody pays attention to your name, and no one asks you where you’re from. Their only interest is how much you have. And we have a fortune. We will be welcomed. We can apply for permits to leave today. Let’s cut our roots!”

That afternoon, they brought the tub with the two enraptured corpses down to the Dnieper and slipped it into the water. Like a small white ship, it was carried by the current toward the reddish sun. The bees, in a compact black cloud, went along with it.

Alejandro, Teresa, and the four children abandoned the empty hives and left Odessa with the clothes they were wearing—and the jewel casket my grandmother hung between her breasts. Then they rented a hotel room in Elisavetgrad. Thanks to Alejandro’s Polish name and the magic of a few gold coins, they had no trouble acquiring an exit visa.

“I grant the present certificate to the subject Alejandro Jaimovich Jodorowsky, thirty-six years of age, native of the district of Zlatopol, Administrative Department of Kiev. This certificate confirms that there exists no impediment with regard to the Municipality of Zlatopol to the aforementioned Alejandro emigrating along with his wife, Teresa Jodorowsky, maiden name Groismann, thirty years of age, and their children Benjamín and Jaime, born on July 25, 1901, and Lola and Fanny, born on July 4, 1902. In accordance with the protocols of the municipality, it has been determined that the aforementioned Alejandro Jodorowsky and his family have committed no crimes, criminal or civil. I, Vladimir Grigorievich Shevchenko, notary, in my offices located on Upenchaya Street, number 27, in Elisavetgrad, delivered the original and the copy of the aforementioned document to the Jodorowsky family, who reside in the vicinity of the third commissariat of Elisavetgrad. On this day, the 14th of March, 1909.”

What immense joy! With that scrap of paper they could get to the other side of the world! A series of stamps, seals, signatures, and sonorous words that conferred freedom: Code, Document, Certificate, Subject, Power, Family, Crimes, Commissariat, Administration! “This Vladimir is a ridiculous madman,” Teresa observed after an attack of happiness, and she led the family into a large store to dress her entire family in the style of the goyim.

They bought third-class tickets and, after filling a couple of baskets with food, they boarded a train that would leave them in Paris. There they would obtain visas for the United States and take a ship leaving Marseille. On the ship, they would learn English and forget Yiddish and Russian forever.

They ate cream herring, blinis, pickles, and apple pie. Only when their stomachs were full did they raise their eyes to observe the other passengers, the goyim. What they could plainly see, and the fact upset them, was that the car was filled with miserable-looking Jews. Pretending that the emigrants didn’t exist, Teresa belched, sighed with satisfaction, and hugged the precious coffer even more tightly against her chest. She first made sure the children were asleep, and then, to attract her husband’s attention, she pinched his leg.

“It’s going to be a long night, Alejandro. Now that we’re well on the way, I’ll have time to tell you what your children have been up to these past five years.”

It took my grandfather an hour before he could concentrate his wife’s stories. Seeing so many Jews piled up on the narrow benches, carrying packages wrapped in faded shreds of cloth, dignified in their misery, some with bandaged heads, others with their arms in slings or with black eyes or broken noses, doubtlessly fleeing some pogrom—it all filled him with an overwhelming sadness. Oh dear! Those maternal women with huge, wrinkled hands, licking the wounds of their children with dog-like love! Oh dear! Those underfed and beaten men with their eyes burning with religious zeal! Oh dear, those children dressed in black, immobile and wise, wrapped up in their Bibles, which they already knew by heart! All of them like a tribe of the just, suffering because of the crime of loving God above all things! The Rabbi lamented not having a real body so he could give the fugitives warmth with his embraces, so he could kiss the wounds on their feet. He flew from one place to another, emitting heartbreaking moans at the sight of his compatriots’ plight.

Alejandro, repeatedly pinched by Teresa, was absorbed little by little by her tale. The personalities of Benjamín and Jaime were exactly opposite. Each felt a strange need to differentiate himself from the other. Jaime (the one who would become my father at twenty-eight) was interested in manual labor, in violent games, in killing sparrows, cats, and ants. He became an expert in stamp collecting and in smashing the faces of the neighborhood brats. Benjamín observed the life of the bees, collected fairy tales, and made great efforts to learn how to read them as soon as possible. He liked to water flowers, always slept with a candle burning beside him, and did not play with boys; the slightest contact with harsh cloth wounded the fine skin on his hands.

The same thing happened with the twin girls. Lola was taciturn, to such a degree that it seemed she knew just two words: “yes” and “no.” She ate little, liked to bathe every day, even in cold water, and painted beautiful landscapes on the honey labels. She hated to help her mother in the kitchen, but she adored setting the table, lighting the candles, and embroidering tiny birds on napkins. Fanny was violent, funny, and voracious. She happily twisted the necks of chickens and peeled potatoes with astounding speed. Her pudgy fingers worked the darning needle with disgust. But doing carpentry work, digging, clearing the chimney, and, in summer, robbing fruit from the neighbors’ trees—all that, she adored.

The boys got along badly with each other, as did the twin girls. They formed two mixed couples: Benjamín, the delicate boy, was fond of the company of the mischievous Fanny. She quickly took control of the duo and protected her brother in street fights. She knew how to punch and kick better than the scamps wearing trousers. When he was with Lola, the vigorous Jaime would change. The nervousness that caused him to move around ceaselessly—little leaps, wiggles, roughhousing—would disappear, and he would stand there observing his younger sister in a state of astonishment. Contact with that feminine refinement revealed in him unsuspected desires, subtle feelings, delicate tendencies that anguished him. He would finally bellow to break the charm and run for the street, where he would give a bloody lip to the first boy he met.

Teresa, half asleep, half awake, went on talking as the train sliced through the rough wind—snorting like a dying bull, emptying itself of steam clouds—and stopped for eternities in dark stations. More emigrants got on. Fat policemen passed through checking passports and cutting open packages, treating the Jews with a mocking disdain. If they found even the slightest error in the papers, they would order entire families off with rifle butts and kicks. Other groups would quickly fill the empty spots.

All around the Jodorowskys, who passed as goyim under the Administrative Code thanks to the Certified Document, formed a perimeter of respectability. The fugitives, fearful of abuse, did not dare look at them. The soldiers, seeing that magic document, clicked their heels noisily, saluted energetically, and grimaced sympathetically, apologizing for the abject neighbors such honorable passengers were obliged to put up with. Throughout the third-class cars echoed dialects from all parts of Europe: the Yiddish of Lithuania, Poland, the Ukraine, Crimea, Bulgaria, Austria, and Hungary. Poor people with no homeland, fleeing to who knew where.

Teresa made a point not to acknowledge any of this. Speaking Russian slowly and carefully so she wouldn’t reveal her Jewish accent, she made her words into a shield that separated her family from a reality that had become, for her, an old nightmare.

Tugging on Alejandro’s left earlobe, she whispered:

“If you want to survive, you’ll have to change. Forget the others and watch out for us. They are to blame for whatever happens to them because they’re going around disguised as the righteous, believing in superstitions. God gives them bad luck. Death feeds on good fools. Follow the example of the goyim: everyone works for himself, and the one with the wettest mouth swallows the most beans. Stop daydreaming and listen to the story of how Benjamín lost all his hair.

“One spring morning, a circus wagon painted like a carriage from the funeral parlor pulled by two skeletal horses decorated with black plumes passed along our street, heading for the town square. A man wearing a skeleton costume held the reins. Next to him sat a female dwarf dressed as the Angel of the Last Judgment, playing a sad melody on an old trumpet. Attracted by their sinister looks, we ran to see the performance.

“Those trapeze artists really knew how to seduce the audience. A show that was merely jolly could never compete with Nature, which was emerging exuberantly from its winter lethargy. Between the invasion of multicolored butterflies and the blossoming of lascivious flowers, the abject levity of a few acrobats couldn’t have interested anyone. But decked out this way, gloomy and toothless, miserable remains of the glacial cold, they gave us the chance to feel healthy, well fed, and safe.

“The starving clown fighting with a rag-doll dog over a piece of kielbasa made us shriek with laughter, as did the rubber man disguised as a worm, who was making all sorts of contortions inside a coffin and threatening us in a ferocious voice that one day he’d eat us. The female dwarf unrolled a carpet in the center of the square and put a basket down on it. A thin black man, probably the one we’d seen dressed as a skeleton, decked out in a turban, a robe, puffy trousers, and slippers whose toes curled upward, all in a golden-red color, kneeled before the basket and began to play a flute that was long and had a ball at one end.

“We’d never seen human skin like that, as black and shiny as the boots the Cossacks wore. Nor had we ever heard a sound like that. It seemed like the hooting of an owl combined with the wail of a woman giving birth, plus the screech of a metal door. He spoke an incomprehensible tongue, which the dwarf lady said was Sanskrit, the magic language of Hindustan. For the first time in Russia, the illustrious public would witness the taming of a cobra, queen of venomous beasts. To encourage the Hindu prince, she asked that we generously fill her trumpet with coins.

“As we dug into our pockets and shed, with difficulty, a bit of money, the melody resounded continuously, without silences, drawing us closer to the land of dreams. When the collecting was over, the dwarf lady, causing her paper wings to chatter, opened the basket. Out came a huge serpent hissing like an angry cat. It flared its hood and struck at the black man, who expertly dodged it and intensified the undulating rhythm of the flute. The snake, like us, fell under his spell and just stood there, stiff, erect in a terrified beatitude.

“I have no idea what happened to Jaime. I still don’t understand. We were all frozen with terror, hypnotized by the Hindu and his serpent. We practically didn’t even dare to breathe. Then Jaime stepped forward into the empty circle, and with a big grin he stretched his hand out toward the cobra and began to pet its head.

“The lady dwarf tensed up, and signaled to us not to move. The animal, hearing the slightest whisper, could reassert its aggressive nature. The flautist, terror on his dark face, went on playing the same phrase again and again. Jaime kissed the serpent’s snout. Then he picked it up and, staring at it with tenderness in his eyes, delicately danced, while hugging the snake to his bosom. Since the serpent was much longer than he was, its tail dragged along the tiles of the kiosk’s floor, making a metallic sound. What it sounded like to me was the chattering of Death’s silver teeth.

“Jaime stopped opposite Benjamín and with cruel innocence offered him the snake. Benjamín was covered in sweat from head to toe, but since his brother had brought it so close that he’d actually put the serpent’s snout next to his mouth, he held back his tears and his nausea and took hold of the cold animal. ‘Dance! Dance!’ cried Jaime. Benjamín, awkward, his legs stiff, his mouth wide open, his breath short, tried a few steps. The lady dwarf made more and more signals to us not to move. Our desperate silence spread to the entire neighborhood—you couldn’t hear a cart, the birds stopped singing, the wind left the leaves still. The whine of the flute filled everything. Benjamín made slow circles, staggering like a fatally wounded bear, with the deep gaze of the cobra fixed in his eyes. A yellow liquid ran down his legs and a coffee-colored stain marked the seat of his short pants.

“Jaime pinched his nose shut and burst into laughter. The snake went mad. It began to smack its snout against Benjamín’s forehead. Transfixed by terror, he didn’t let go. Luckily, as we found out later, the cobra had no venom and no teeth. But the blows it gave as it tried to bite were as hard as a hammer. With his face lowered to avoid the pounding, Benjamín took the punishment on his skull.