“Look, I’m just saying that it’s not for me,” said Yonatan. “What good does it do to get angry? I’m not made for that kind of work, and that’s it. Besides, I’m having second thoughts about my future altogether. And here you are, arguing about young Labor Party politicians while we’re both getting soaked. See, it’s raining again.”

Which wasn’t what Yolek heard him say. Or perhaps he heard correctly and preferred to back off. At any rate, he replied: “Right then. Sleep on it and give me a yes or no. No point standing here arguing all night with the rain pouring down on our heads. And speaking of heads, you ought to get a haircut.”

One Saturday, when Yonatan’s younger brother Amos was home on a short leave from the army, Yonatan snapped at him:

“Why talk so much about next year? You have no way of knowing where you’ll be a year from now. And neither do I.”

To his wife Rimona he said: “Do you think I need a haircut?”

Rimona took a long look at him. With a diffident, delayed-action smile as though she had been asked a delicate or even dangerous question, she replied: “You look nice with long hair, but if it bothers you, that’s different.”

“Nonsense,” said Yonatan.

It saddened him to have to part with the smells, sounds, and colors he had known since childhood. He loved the fragrance of evening as it slowly descended in the last days of summer over the newly mowed lawn—across which, by the oleander bushes, three mutts would be fighting furiously for the remains of a torn shoe. Some old pioneer in a peaked worker’s cap would be standing on the path, reading a newspaper, his lips moving as if in prayer. An elderly woman carrying a blue bucket with vegetables, eggs, and a fresh loaf of bread would pass the old man by without so much as a nod because of some ancient feud. “Yonatan,” she would say softly, “look at the daisies at the edge of the lawn. They’re so white and clean, just like the snow that fell every winter back in Lupatyn.” And the sound of a recorder from the children’s house would mingle with the cries of birds, while in the distance to the west, beyond the citrus trees, beyond the setting sun, the engine of a passing freight train would bleat twice.