Davita's Harp (12 page)

“I’ll take you in swimming tomorrow, if you want.”

“My father is leaving tomorrow.”

“I’ll take you in after he goes.”

“I won’t feel like it.” He turned abruptly and started up the beach. Still walking, he pivoted and called out to me, “You shouldn’t build your castle on Shabbos. It’s wrong. You keep the Messiah from coming.”

I watched him cross the dunes and go into his house. He seemed to leave behind him a heavy wake of sadness.

My father and Jakob Daw returned from the city and came down to the beach. It was late afternoon and still hot, the sun high and pale orange in a milk-white sky. My father, wearing his
bathing trunks, called out, “Hello, my love!” and went into the water with my mother. Jakob Daw, dressed in baggy pants and a shirt, watched as I shaped some final towers on my castle.

“It is beautiful,” he said. “I have never before seen such a sand castle.”

“Uncle Jakob?”

“Yes?”

“Will there be a war in Spain?”

“There already is a war in Spain.”

“Are you going back to Europe?”

“Yes.”

“When?”

“Very soon.”

“But there’s a war in Europe.” “Europe is my home, Ilana Davita.”

“Uncle Jakob, were you religious when you grew up in Europe?”

He did not answer. The sun shone full upon his face, giving his pale skin a yellowish translucent look. He seemed ghostlike, insubstantial.

“Uncle Jakob?”

“I was once very religious,” he said. “Was my mother?”

He looked off toward the sea. There were many bathers in the water. I could not see my parents.

“You will have to ask your mother.” He coughed briefly. “Now I think I will take a little walk along the beach. It is a beautiful day.”

“Did you know my mother in Europe?”

“Yes. We were good friends.”

“Was that when she went to school in Vienna?”

He looked surprised. “Yes. We were together in Vienna, in the high school, the gymnasium. Your mother told you about that? It was during the World War.”

“There was another war?”

“Oh, yes. There have been many wars.” “Were you in that war, too?”

“Yes.” He coughed again. “Now I will go for my walk, Ilana, before the sun sets and the air becomes too damp. We will talk more later if you wish.”

He went off across the beach toward the distant jetty, walking stiffly in the pull and yield of the sand, his hands clasped behind his back. I watched him until I could no longer make him out. Low overhead a biplane flew languidly along the shoreline and, off in the distance, freighters sat heavily upon the line of pallid horizon. The surf lapped at my feet, cold and foamy and dense with seaweed. I thought, If the ocean ends in Europe, then I’m now connected to Europe. I stepped back out of the surf and stood looking out across the ocean at the far-off freighters. After a while I felt tired and went back across the beach and the dunes to the cottage.

All through supper they talked about Spain and social fascism and the third period. I sat quietly, listening to the urgency in their voices, and then no longer wanting to hear anything. Standing on the porch, I saw David Dinn and his father and uncle leave their house. I recognized his father as the urbane and courteous gentleman who had visited my parents now and then in our various apartments. David Dinn noticed me and raised a hand in greeting. They went along the driveway and turned into the street.

My mother came into my room that night as I was getting ready for bed.

“You were so quiet during supper, Ilana. We didn’t pay much attention to you. I’m sorry, darling. Were you upset by all our talk about war?”

“Yes.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“Is Uncle Jakob going away soon?” “Yes. On Monday.” “To Europe?”

“Yes.”

“But there’s a war in Europe.”

“He has work to do, Ilana. We each have work to do.”

“Did Uncle Jakob fight in that other war?”

She hesitated. “Yes.”

“Was it a bad war?”

“There are no good wars, Ilana.”

“I mean, was Uncle Jakob hurt in that war?”

“Yes. He was gassed. They poisoned the air. His lungs were badly hurt.”

“Like they did in Ethiopia?”

“Yes.”

“Mama, were you religious in Europe? Uncle Jakob said he was very religious in Europe.”

“Yes,” she said after a moment. “I was religious when I lived in Europe.”

“The religious boy next door said I shouldn’t build my castle on Shabbos. It’s a very special day.”

“I’ll have to ask my cousin to talk to his son. What did you tell him?”

“I said we weren’t religious.”

“That’s right, Ilana,” my mother said. “We’ll build the new world in our own way. The old way is false.” “I like their songs, though, Mama.”

“Yes? That’s nice, darling. Now I want you to go to sleep. It’s late.”

“Their songs are pretty, Mama.”

“There is a lot more to them than their songs, Ilana. The ideas they live by are false.”

I was very tired. The boardwalk and the carousel and the movie and the swimming and the castle. A long day in the sun on the margin of the sea.

“Good night, Mama.”

“Good night, darling.”

I felt her kiss. Cool and dry. She went from my room.

•  •  •

In my sleep I heard a cry and the shuffle of feet and the opening and closing of doors and a man’s voice calling and my mother responding. Through my window I saw lights in the next-door house and my mother hurrying across the dunes with David Dinn’s father and disappearing into the house. I was very sleepy. I heard the roll of the ocean and the whispers of the wind. I slept again. A shout woke me. I heard the voices of Jakob Daw and my father and thought they were on our porch. My head felt weighted; I could not lift it from my pillow. My room seemed to fill with whispers and shadows from the world of Baba Yaga. I was still awake when my mother came back to the cottage. I heard her talking on the porch with my father and Jakob Daw about David Dinn, but I did not understand what she was saying. I fell back asleep. In the morning it all seemed a dream and no one said anything about the strange dark music of that night.

David Dinn came down to the beach that afternoon. He wore a cap and a full-length bathing suit over which was a white cotton garment that was open at the sides. It hung over his shoulders and came down across his chest and back. From each of the four corners of the garment dangled a long woolen fringe. He looked pale and thin. He was carrying a large towel. He walked over to where I was completing my castle and said nervously, “Hello. I can go swimming. Can you go in with me?”

“Sure,” I said, glancing back up across the beach and the dunes. His father was watching us from inside their porch.

David Dinn spread the towel neatly on the sand and put his cap on it. He removed the white garment, folded it with care, and placed it next to the cap. The air was hot and the beach was crowded. I walked into the surf and felt the chill touch of the water on my legs. I turned and saw David Dinn hesitating on the edge of the ocean, staring at the water. I went back and took his
hand. He looked surprised and tried to shake free. I held on and pulled him with me.

“Come on,” I said. “It’s cold at first, but you get used to it. Come on! I’ll show you how to ride the waves.”

He let me lead him into the water. He shivered with the cold and cried out as a wave broke too high against us and nearly knocked him off his feet. His face was white with fear. But I held on to him and soon the sea felt warm and we went deeper into the waves and I showed him how to ride the crests, how to anticipate the swells, how to jump as they billowed, what to do when they crashed and came rushing toward us in a charging cascade of foaming water. We held hands and jumped up and down in the water, riding the waves. Then a wave broke high over our heads and I stood poised, facing the beach, waiting for the wall of water. It struck us solidly and I was caught in its churning thrust and saw David Dinn go under, come up gasping, and go under again. I pushed against the swirl of the water and stood and looked quickly around. There he was, a few feet away, coughing. I ran over to him through knee-high water.

“Are you okay?”

“I swallowed some water.” He coughed again. “I’m fine. We better go out.” “All right.”

On the beach he asked me to hold his cap and cotton garment as he quickly dried himself. His lips were blue and he was shivering. He wrapped the towel around himself and took the cap and garment.

“Thanks,” he said. “That was fun. I liked it.”

He started up the beach toward the dunes. I looked at the house and saw his father still standing on the screened-in porch, watching.

We ate supper on the porch. I sat quietly and listened to my parents and Jakob Daw talk about Hitler and Franco and the rebellion in Spain. They talked about Roosevelt sailing his yacht off Nova Scotia—“That’s not far from Prince Edward Island,” my father
said—and about something that had taken place in a city called Danzig.

A car came up the driveway and stopped. In the adjoining house the side door opened and David Dinn and his aunt and uncle stepped out. My parents and Jakob Daw went on talking. David Dinn’s father was dressed in a dark suit and a dark felt hat. He put down the suitcase he carried and embraced his son. They were locked in that embrace a long time. Then he climbed into the car and it drove off. David Dinn stood awhile with his aunt and uncle, looking at the empty driveway. He turned and saw me watching him. He was crying. He followed his aunt and uncle back into the house.

My father went into Manhattan after supper and my mother and Jakob Daw sat on the porch, talking. I wandered alone on the beach, my bare feet in the cool sliding surf. The ocean rose and fell with fearful and monotonous power. Along the line of the horizon the day had already become night; stars shone, a crescent moon was rising. From the trees beyond the dunes came the call of the bird I was never able to see.
Hoo hoo hoo hoo hoo.
I passed my castle. The tide had filled its moat and now surged against its bastion and outworks. I would repair it in the morning. A chill wind blew in from the sea. I returned to the cottage.

Jakob Daw knocked on the door of my room that night and came in and sat on the edge of my bed. He looked very tired and the tremor was still in his hands.

“I came in to say good-bye to you,” he said quietly. “I am leaving very early in the morning.”

I sat up in my bed. “Are you going back to Europe?”

“Yes.”

I was quiet.

Jakob Daw coughed briefly. “Ilana Davita, it has been a pleasure to meet you and get to know you. I wish you a good life.” “Will you come back to America?”

“I do not know. It would be pleasant. But I have never done the pleasant things. Still, it would be very pleasant to return to
America. This is a great land. But Americans do not know what to do with its greatness. It will all be wasted.” He looked at me. “Do you understand what I am saying? Sometimes I forget that you are only a child.”

I said nothing.

He leaned toward me and gave me a shy, awkward embrace. I felt the fragile gauntness of his body. He got slowly to his feet.

“Good-bye, Ilana Davita. I admire your castle very much. It is a fine and formidable castle. Good-bye.”

He moved into the shadows of the room and was gone.

I lay back in my bed and closed my eyes and listened to the night. I slept and woke and slept again. Sounds woke me, a long whispering, a sigh, the roll of the ocean, the pulsing of night insects. The surf seemed immediately outside my windows, lapping at the dunes and curling toward the cottage. And there were the horses, racing along the beach, beating the sand with their flying hooves. They were so near I thought they would break through the walls of my room. I felt the thunderous beating of my heart and got out of bed and stood at a window. The moon was gone. The sky seemed washed with stars. The beach lay deserted. Distant sounds of a woman crying drifted faintly into my room.

In the morning Jakob Daw was gone. During breakfast my mother told me that my father had come very early with a car and had taken Jakob Daw to the pier in Manhattan where his ship was docked. I wondered why the car had not awakened me. On the kitchen table were the newspapers my father had brought back from Manhattan. I saw the headlines. R
EBELS GAIN IN SOUTH SPAIN; CIVIL WAR RAGES IN CITIES.
My mother looked pale and distraught. Her eyes were red. She stayed inside the cottage most of that day.

I went down to the beach and the castle. The air was warm and bright. David Dinn came over to me and we went into the water together. He rode the waves grim-faced and fearful. I taught him how to breathe out with his face in the water and how to move his arms and legs. He seemed astonished by his sudden ability to
move through water. Later we sat near the castle in our wet bathing suits, and I said, “I’m going to build another castle.”

He stared at me. “You’re going to wreck this one?”

“I want to build a second one.” I paused a moment. “Will you help me?”

He hesitated a moment. “Sure,” he said. “All right.”

We started on the second castle. All that week we worked on it together. Sometimes I found myself looking off at the ocean and thinking of Jakob Daw. I would touch the surf. His ship was on this water and now I’m touching his ship.

On Saturday David Dinn would not work on the castle. I didn’t work on it, either, because I didn’t want to do any of it alone anymore. We were still working on it together and it was almost done when he, too, went away.

There were meetings in the cottage. Many of the people at the meetings were strangers to me. Some spoke to one another in languages I did not understand. Mrs. Greenwood came to one of the meetings and bestowed upon me her small, fixed smile. I asked her about Teresa. “Why, as far as I know she is fine, just fine.” On occasion people traveled in from the city for those meetings. Words flew through the air of the cottage. Revisionism. Trotskyists. Popular Front. Trials. Comrade Stalin. There were loud arguments.

Once a week three or four people came to the cottage and together with my mother they would study a book by Karl Marx. My father was working at his special writing. I played on the beach with boys and girls my age and worked on the castles. Sometimes it rained. I watched the rain from our porch as it fell upon the beach.