Cafe Nevo (37 page)

“Think about it,” said Sternholz, laying a finger against his nose.

“I suppose it means that though the State of Israel has been established, Zion has not yet been redeemed.”

“So, you are not entirely a fool.” Understanding this, correctly, as high praise, David felt absurdly pleased. Sternholz lowered his voice, in the manner of one adult speaking to another in the presence of children. “In a sense, you see, Israel
is
Nevo: it is a vantage point onto the unattainable.”

The waiter winked and lumbered painfully to his feet. Bemused and somewhat short of breath, David leaned back in his chair. It crossed his mind that he must be suffering jet lag, for it was highly unlikely that this old waiter could have afflicted him with such disorientation. The old man had a shtick, that's all, a routine for the tourists.

But as Sternholz walked away, supremely indifferent to the cries for service that rose from all quarters, his apron swaying like a greatcoat, David saw clearly the great dignity of the man, which enveloped him like a blue flame. Unbidden, there came to him an image of Sternholz as a general, striding through a fieldful of wounded.

 

Arik and Sarita had ordered espressos, but a beaming Sternholz had served champagne, or the closest Nevo ran to it, and then tiptoed off.

“Sarita,” said Arik, “come to the kibbutz with me.”

“What?”

“I have to go up tomorrow. I'm meeting Brenner again next week, and I've got to see my father first.”

“But what's that got to do with me?”

“I want to be with you.” He took her hand and looked intently at her.

She felt the champagne rise to her head. “I couldn't,” she said hastily. “I'd feel like such an outsider.”

“Please come. My mother's asked to meet you, and she can't get out.”

“Asked to meet me? Why should she? She doesn't even know me.”

“Somehow,” Arik said airily, “she's got it into her bead that you and I are going to marry.”

“What nonsense!” Sarita exclaimed sharply.

“So go already,” said Sternholz, sidling up. “A boy wants you to meet his mother, you don't say no. Besides, Rina could use the
nachas.
So be a good girl. Go.”

As the old man bustled away, Arik turned to Sarita and saw acceptance trembling on her lips. Suddenly he spied Coby strutting purposefully toward him. He waved him off, but the boy, ignoring Sarita, dropped into a chair at their table.

“Hey, man, where the fuck you been? I've been looking all over for you.”

“Watch your language, punk.”

Coby goggled, then turned to Sarita with a ready leer. She smiled at him. “Sorry, lady,” he said surprisingly, with a little bob of his head. Then, to Arik: “Did you know they reopened the center?''

“Yeah, I know.”

“Yeah, so when are you coming back to work? They've got some geek in there now, man.”

“I'm not, Coby. But I'll try to get you someone decent.”

Coby's face shut down. “Yeah, right. Golden boy's got better things to do with his time than waste it on a pack of street rats.”

“Hey, man, I thought we were past that.”

“Right. So. When are you splitting?”

“What?”

“Jumping ship, asshole. Going abroad, okay?”

At first Arik wondered where he'd come up with such a stupid idea. Then he remembered. Sarita's unguarded face betrayed a disappointment tragically shot with resignation, a look that cut him to the heart. “I'm not going anywhere,” he told her fiercely. “It was a long time ago, and a bad idea to begin with.”

 

Vered and Jemima came strolling up Dizengoff with Daniel in tow. When she spotted Caspi, Vered stopped. Jemima put a hand on her sleeve and whispered urgently. Vered listened, then shook her head.

“Stay with Grandma,” she told Daniel, and placed his hand in her mother's. She entered the café.

“Oy Gottenyu
,” sighed Sternholz to Muny. “Trouble.”

“That's Vered Caspi,” Ilana said excitedly to David. “The friend I told you about. I want you to meet her. Vered!”

Vered waved but continued on toward Caspi. He looked up with a startled face, and his arm dropped off the shoulder of the girl beside him.

Caspi's eyes were bloodshot, his hair and beard unkempt. He looked with trepidation at his wife.

“This is an unexpected pleasure,” he said. “Ladies and gentlemen, meet my wife.”

Vered glanced disdainfully at the circle of new friends, most of whom would not have had a word from Caspi a few weeks ago, and whose current acceptance proved the proposition that beggars can't be choosers.

“I'd like to speak with you privately,” she said.

They moved to a table deep in the bowels of Nevo. Like an ant scenting a picnic, Muny sidled up; but Caspi tossed some stale coffee at him and the little man scurried away.

“I thought it only fair to tell you,” Vered said. “We're leaving today.”

“Yeah, yeah,” said Caspi.

“I didn't want you to come back unexpectedly to an empty house.”

“Darlin', we've been through this. You know I won't stand for it.”

“There's food in the fridge,” she said; “eat it or throw it out, don't let it rot. I'm leaving you the car. There are some unpaid bills on the kitchen pegboard. I've taken half the money from our accounts.”

“Forget it, baby. I won't have it. I lost one family; that's enough for a lifetime. I'd sooner—”

“Caspi,” she said, “I'm pregnant.”

His mouth fell open; he stared stupidly and began to breathe stertorously. Then two things happened simultaneously. Daniel recognized his father and, slipping his hand from Jemima's, ran dodging through the café toward him. And a long white Peugeot with rental plates and tinted glass pulled up in front of Nevo.

Caspi opened his arms. “Daniko! Come to Daddy!”

“Daniel, no! Go back to Grandma,” called Vered.

“I knew it, I knew it,” muttered Sternholz. He began hobbling purposefully toward the Caspis.

The passenger door of the Peugeot opened, and a man stepped out. His face was wrapped in a keffiyeh. The man pulled back his arm and hurtled something. A silvery bird soared leisurely over the heads of Nevo's inhabitants.

Arik leaped onto Sarita, wrestled her to the pavement, and lay on top of her.

The chess players scattered like sparrows.

Ilana screamed, her hands flying down to her belly. She dove under the table. One arm snaked up, grabbed David's, and pulled him down.

Muny ran toward the Peugeot, brandishing a beer bottle. The car sped down Dizengoff.

Caspi jumped up when he saw the silver bird flying toward him. He grabbed Vered's arm with one hand, Daniel's with the other, and with all his strength he hurled them aside. They crashed into the wall and fell heavily to the floor. Vered wrapped her body around Daniel's.

Sternholz froze.

The silver bird landed at Caspi's feet, sputtering and hissing. He picked it up, screaming, “Clear the back!” Caspi pivoted toward the open back door of Nevo, ten feet behind him. The way was clear. He swung his arm back to throw. The grenade exploded.

 

The poet Rachel wrote that at the hour of his death each man stands upon Nevo. Emmanuel Yehoshua Sternholz thinks of this as he climbs the mountain. Though he never entered Moab in his life, he recognizes the rich shades of amber, gold, and sienna in the blue-veined rock. The air is as clear as crystals. It is not yet dawn, and dark at the foot of the mountain; but as he ascends, light gathers around him. The climb, though steep, is effortless. Sternholz cannot put a foot wrong; he clambers like an ibex, limbs bathed in agility.

As he rises, the air thickens, growing viscous and golden. On the higher reaches of Nevo it is almost liquid, but Sternholz breathes the strange element with ease. The lightness of his body delights him; he lifts up his apron and does a little jig upon the mountainside.

He is alone on the mountain but others have gone before: here and there along the wayside he sees discarded shoes, sloughed outer clothing, a worn teddy bear. The path snakes upward. He cannot see what lies ahead but pushes forward with all the yearning of his heart. Out of the perfect silence comes a child's laugh. He knows that laugh, though half a century has passed since he heard it last. Sternholz hurries forward, upward.

The light is intense, but rather than blinding, it clarifies. Sternholz has never seen so immediately; it is as if a filter has been lifted from the world. He rounds a bend and comes in view of the summit. Two figures stand on the mountain-top; they face him; they are waiting for him. A woman and a small boy. Sternholz starts to run.

Another bend, and they are lost to sight; another; and they reappear, closer, more luminous. The woman sees him. She waves and lifts the child for him to see. The boy laughs and raises his arms aloft.

Sternholz is on the last leg of the climb. He can almost touch them now. Greta is smiling with all her heart. Jacob reaches toward him.

He cannot move.

He presses forward against an invisible barrier. He stretches out an arm and encounters an impassable nothing.

He begins to slip backward.

“Greta,” he cries. “Jacob! God, no” he sobs. Though he struggles fiercely, the downward tug is irresistible.

Greta's face is suffused with sorrow now. She touches her heart. Her lips form a single word: “Soon.” She throws a kiss. Jacob is still, clinging to his mother.

Sternholz is swept backward into a vortex. As he descends, his limbs grow heavy and his breath rattles inside his chest. Darkness and pain overtake him. The sweet liquid air of Mount Nevo is gone, and in its place comes something rank.

“He's back,” says a voice.

A bristly mouth fastens itself to his, and a blast of fetid air fills his mouth. Sternholz gags and turns his head aside. He opens his eyes. Muny's mottled face is inches away.

“Oh, God “ cries Muny, “I thought we lost you.”

Sternholz closes his eyes. A tear trickles down his cheek.

 

 

 

Chapter Twenty-Four

 

Dying changes a lot in a man's life. Sternholz resurrected was a different man from what he had been, though the differences were subtle and not easily seen. Strangely enough, although he'd enjoyed his short death and resisted his revival, he was in no hurry to return to that state. It seemed to him that he had lived all his life in fear and a kind of retroactive foreboding and that now (miraculously, considering whose rancid breath had saved him) he had been afforded a chance to live out its final stage in a state of joyous anticipation and secret serenity.

When he was dead, nothing mattered, but after his revival Sternholz was troubled by his lack of forethought. If Café Nevo died with him, what would become of his poor old derelict chess players? He could not bear the thought of them cast out into the cold, cruel worlds of Café Rowal and the Sabra, where they would be bilked for every lousy cup of coffee and plagued for tips by insolent young waiters.

He was not foolish enough to believe that Nevo could endure forever, for in the Promised Land the only constants are change and disappointment. Nor did he consider Nevo a suitable candidate for permanence, even if such an unnatural state were presumed to exist. Nevo was by nature a way station, never a destination; but it was his duty to make Nevo as permanent a way station as could be contrived.

And so to that end Sternholz, while still in the hospital, drew up his last will and testament. The stewardship of Café Nevo he assigned to Muny, who, though manifestly undeserving, was the only person he knew foolish enough to take it on. Since (he wrote) Muny would pilfer anyway, he was not to be paid a salary, but allowed to keep what he took, which would not exceed his needs; the rest would be paid into a fund for the preservation of Nevo, not as a landmark but as a living café. Mr. Jacobovitz was given tenure for life and a pension if and when he should retire, and Sternholz bequeathed the rest of his estate, including his apartment, to Sarita Blume, because she had no parents to take care of her, and he no child to care for.

When the document was ready, Sternholz signed it, put it aside, and forgot about it. He had other matters to attend to. Through Muny he directed the repair of the café, which, though damaged by the blast, was yet structurally sound. The café remained open during the work, most of which was carried out by Nevo customers. Sternholz criticized his doctors and lectured them on proper medical procedures; he interviewed the police, under the pretext of being interviewed by them, and evinced an odd satisfaction in their failure to arrest a culprit; and he received visitors, resuming his interrupted direction of their lives.