She had even lowered the bowl with the dumpling dough to her lap.
But she was on the alert; because of the always-stinking man she could not relax the tension in her body.
Occasionally, the noblemen would throw a bone or piece of meat to the dogs, who grew excited by the smell of food, but they forgot about the rabbi. The prince, who sat close to the rabbi but facing away from him so he could warm his aching back at the fireplace, turned to him only once.
If you ever blabber about my question to you, Jew, I’ll have your tongue cut out, and then I’ll have your head chopped off.
But nobody ever uttered, or ever would utter, the certain question or request that the rabbi might reveal to someone. No allusions to it have been found either in Rabbi Ephraim’s notes taken in Bonn, which, of course, is more than understandable.
However, they could not deceive the rabbi.
Because of the prince’s words, the drinks, the music, the dogs’ barking, and mainly because of the postprandial gratification coursing through their entire beings, the good mood kept rising among the noble lords.
The rabbi neither asked for nor received more than some fresh water.
He was still hoping somehow to get through this ill-omened visit.
Until the count of Cleve stood up and spoke for a long time directly into the prince’s ear. He spoke for about a quarter of an hour as if, in the midst of great giggles and guffaws, he were dripping poison in the royal ear. And Jan Willem, who was nicknamed the Wealthy because of his immense treasures, at first laughed at the deluge of words with which the whispering large-nosed count of Cleve inundated him; not until the count had stopped and, smirking under his large nose, contentedly strolled back to his seat did he summon the rabbi before him.
In the silence that fell in the great hall, the lashes of the flooding river could be heard.
Now, however, to everybody’s great surprise the prince addressed the rabbi by his name, as if the Jew too had a regular name like everybody else. He no longer needed his advice, the prince told the rabbi, and he could keep all his advice to himself, because he, the prince, had taken care of everything, he and the other lords had set the world aright. But just then Margit made a move on her stool and let out a painful moan.
I already put your mushroom soup on the stove.
Let your mushrooms be. Who’s interested in your mushroom soup now.
How could I let it be. The good mushroom juice will boil away, and I still have to thicken it with flour, and I haven’t chopped the parsley either, the woman whimpered, yet she seemed to be nailed to the stool.
Unless, with some luck, the fire’s gone out, oh, maybe I didn’t put in enough twigs.
We’re still very far from the end of the story, listen, Gottlieb said, and he looked up for a moment to ascertain whether he could continue.
Margit was of course paying very close attention not to the story but to him.
Here comes the terrible turning point, Margit, because the ruling prince says to the rabbi that along with his entire family, the rabbi should move to the court. The prince would be glad to have him as his permanent counselor, and he wouldn’t even have to give too much advice. What a great honor that would be, you see, and the only condition of receiving this position was, Gottlieb read on in his book, happy to see that with the bowl in her lap and her lips parted the woman was affected by the story and was leaning forward, that the rabbi abandon the faith of his ancestors.
Well, Margit, you can just imagine, that he should dress in civilian clothes, take off his hat to all the saints, and live his life with that name always on his lips and in his heart, the name of that big Niemand the goyim call their redeemer.
When he reached this point, Gottlieb laughed aloud with pleasure at how infinitely ignorant and stupid the goyim were.
Although Margit did not laugh along with him, the man’s joy did cause her some pleasure.
In his haste, Rabbi Ammon replied by asking for three days to think it over, and begged respectfully that he be allowed to spend the three days in his home.
Go, Jew, the ruling prince answered graciously and waved his hand as if, with this gesture, he had already forgotten what the count of Cleve had whispered to him. But he did not forget it, not by a long shot; when a week had passed, then another, and then a third, and the rabbi had still not returned, he sent after him.
The mean, the vile, the godless man, how mean can such a godless man be, Margit said, this time referring to the prince.
Don’t get excited, Margit, wait until the end. Gottlieb looked up again from his book.
In that year, the floods lasted a long time and it took the prince’s messenger a good week to reach the count of Cleve’s city, Gottlieb continued softly. But when the messenger finally got there, the rabbi and his family were not to be found, and nobody could tell him where they might be. In great secrecy, the rabbi and his family had moved to the town of Pfeilen.
Where in the world did they move to, asked Margit, irritated, and in her fear regarding the possible outcome of the story she pressed the bowl to herself even harder.
To Pfeilen, Gottlieb repeated the town’s name.
And where in the world is that. I’ve never heard of a town by that name.
After all these years, what difference does it make to you, Gottlieb replied, and he slowly closed his book.
It’s much more important that the Jews there dressed him in beggar’s clothes and he lived like that to the end of his life, enjoying the greatest respect of his people.
Margit laughed a light laugh of relief, and Gottlieb laughed along with her. Which was such an exceptional event in their lives that they kept laughing together for quite a while, guffawing with the pleasure generated by their own laughter. That on the same night the count’s soldiers burned down the synagogue of Cleve, along with the houses of the ghetto, Gottlieb chose not to tell Margit. And that they put to the sword every Jew they could find.
The Last Judgment
Interrupting the usual early morning music, the loudspeaker called him to the south gate.
Kramer to the south gate.
And it cannot be claimed that he did not know what that meant. The people they called to the south gate they put away for good.
The Niers flowed there, nice and slow.
By nature, he was the kind of man who rarely thought there was any problem he could not solve or avoid. He was breathing more heavily, or rather he had the feeling that with his body grown heavy he should be out in the fresh air. This time there was no way out. He could not avoid it. For days, he had counted on the water’s slow current to sweep him away. They could hear shots from the direction of the river; it was surprising they wasted bullets on people. And there was one fleeting moment when he still hoped. The person he loved more than his life, more than his long-forgotten wife, more than all his incidental lovers — and he did remember them all simultaneously during this long moment, all of them — the person he loved even more than his children was standing only two steps away from him at the deep-brown, empty table of the Blockälteste, in the harsh light. A pale, fragile, but strong and nimble young man whose ambition and energy had given him a stooped back and who could get away with nearly everything and could afford not to be completely bald like the others. His shapely skull was covered with maddeningly rich hair, curly, golden, and ruddy.
He was ordered to special details at least once a week. To sort clothing in the laundry building, which did not necessarily mean anything but sorting and loading clothes, though sometimes it could mean something else too. The camp had eyes for things like that, since close connections acquired a commercial value of their own. Eisele, an always well-dressed and very cruel man, the commandant’s deputy for supplies, personally managed the work in the laundry. At such hours, it was still dark outside. If the loudspeaker ceased, they could hear the intense bombardment. The potbelly stove was glowing red. Every breath of night dripped or cascaded down the small square windowpanes. He was chatting with someone, with Bulla, obviously doing business with him, explaining something very convincingly, his snow-white hands flashing in the lamplight.