Dismayed, Yolek bought an evening paper at a newsstand and sat down to read it in a small cafe not far from the station. Headlines announced that a conference of Arab generals meeting in Cairo had arrived at a number of secret decisions. The Prime Minister’s speech was reported in a few brief paragraphs. In an adjoining column was a story about a pitched battle among new immigrants in a suburb near Nes Tsiyyona. Yolek could easily imagine it, this fracas of asthmatic, ulcer-ridden, sclerotic refugees, their feeble blows glancing off their antagonists with mounting hysteria.

Elsewhere, in the town of Bet-Lid, two middle-aged men had had to be tied down to be restrained from attacking each other with an ax and a hoe. The hoe-wielder was a baker from Bulgaria and the ax-swinger a goldsmith from Tunis. A settler in the Lachish region had walked out on his family of two wives and nine children, including two sets of twins, left a note that he was going to look for the ten lost tribes of Israel, and disappeared without a trace. A Persian faith healer from the village of Ge’ulim had been indicted for selling amulets to barren women, making them drink a narcotic potion, and, once they were under its influence, committing unspeakable acts.

Yolek thanked the waitress, paid for his coffee, and left. Tel Aviv was not in his opinion an attractive city, yet there was something intrinsically miraculous about it. Great pains had been taken to make day-old streets look historical. There were even green benches here and there that might remind one of Cracow or Lodz. Since his back was bothering him and party meetings never started on time, Yolek decided to sit for a while. A passerby soon recognized him, perhaps from a rally somewhere, or from an old picture in the newspapers in the days when Yolek had served in the cabinet. He wished him a good morning and even sought to strike up a conversation.

“Well now, Comrade Lifshitz, I suppose you find yourself worrying a lot these days.”

“Worrying about what?” asked Yolek.

“Oh, things in general. The situation, you might say.”

Yolek answered with a question of his own. “And when did we Jews ever have it better?”