Yolek stood listening, but all he could hear from the distant buildings was a raucous whoop of children, spiteful and cruel like the sound of a lynch mob, but without the cries of a victim. Hedges trembled in the cold wind. Hibiscuses shed drops of water hidden in their leaves from the last rain.

Soon the moon would rise, distorting the rectangular roofs, creating soft, free-flowing forms, silvering the laundry on the lines that had been strung across the streets. It was then that the middle-aged survivors who lived in those streets would put on their hats and coats and wrap scarves around their throats to go out for a stroll, stepping along like cosmonauts on a planet of undependable gravity, as dreamy as sleepwalkers. Should they pass a new office building, they would see it collapse. Should a car drive by, they would hear bombs. If music poured forth from a radio, the blood would curdle in their veins. If they looked at a tree, it would burst into flames.

Tel Aviv on a winter evening between wars. A forced gaiety stretching as far as the farthest suburbs. In it a hard-working carpenter, from Cracow, Munya Liberson by name, stayed up late in his fluorescent-lit shop. His glasses perched precariously on the tip of his nose. Now and then he murmured to himself as he carefully made a measurement or inspected a joint. The flowering of so many pretty Jewish girls outside his window seemed to him a cause for grave concern. And the clamor made by the city each night to drown out the outer silence. What would it all come to? Why so many new hotels going up along the shoreline? Why this bulwark between the city and the sea?

Lest worst should come to worst. Behind this western wall, the city cowered, cringing with fear of the open spaces that lay beyond. Even as a man turns his back to a strong wind, rounds his shoulders, tucks his head hard between them, and awaits a coming blow.

6

And then the winter rains stopped. Overnight the fog was driven eastward, and a blue Saturday broke with the dawn. With the first fingers of light, even before the sun had risen over the ruins of Sheikh Dahr, bird survivors began to discuss their luck with great excitement. As soon as the sun came up, they broke into demented screams.

The sabbath light was warm and crystalline. Every puddle, every window pane, every strip of metal glinted and dazzled. The air buzzed and flowed like honey. Figs, mulberries, pomegranates, almonds, and arbors of grapes stood bared in their ultimate leaflessness, huge droves of birds flocking to them all. All morning long a clear wind blew from the sea, wafting its salty smells.