him courage when at last he walked out into the square and boarded a bus
for Jerusalem.
He found a seat at the rear, and beside a window. The bus pulled away
and ground slowly up the hill towards the city.
He became aware that he was being watched, and he lifted his head to
find that a woman with two young children had taken the seat in front of
him. She was a poorly dressed, harassed-looking woman, prematurely aged
and she held the grubby young infant on her lap and fed it from the
plastic bottle. However, the second child was an angelic little girl of
four or five years. She had huge dark eyes and a head of thick curls.
She stood on the seat facing backwards, with one thumb thrust deeply
into her mouth. She was watching David steadily over the back of the
seat, studying his face with that total absorption and candour of the
child. David felt a sudden warmth of emotion for the child, a longing
for the comfort of human contact, of which he had been deprived all
these months.
He leaned forward in his seat, trying to smile, reaching out a gentle
hand to touch the child's arm.
She removed her thumb from her-, mouth and shrank away from him, turning
to her mother and clinging to her arm, hiding her face in the woman's
blouse.
At the next stop David stepped down from the bus and left the road to
climb the stony hillside.
The day was warm and drowsy, with the bee murmur and the smell of the
blossoms from the peach orchards.
He climbed the terraces and rested at the crest, for he found he was
breathless and shaky. Months in hospital had left him unaccustomed to
walking far, but it was not that alone. The episode with the child had
distressed him terribly.
He looked longingly towards the sky. it was clear and brilliant blue,
with high silver cloud in the north. He wished he could ascend beyond
those clouds. He knew he would find peace up there.
A taxi dropped him off at the top of Malik Street. The front door was
unlocked, swinging open before he could fit his key in the lock.
Puzzled and alqrrned he stepped into the living-room.
It was as he had left it so many months before, but somebody had cleaned
and swept, and there were fresh flowers in a vase upon the olive-wood
table, a huge bouquet of gaily coloured dahlias, yellow and scarlet.
David smelled food, hot and spicy and tantalizing after the bland
hospital fare.
Hello, he called. Who is there? Welcome home! there was a familiar
bellow from behind the closed bathroom door. I didn't expect you so
soon, and you've caught me with my skirts up and pants down. There was
a scuffling sound and then the toilet flushed thunderously and the door
was flung open. Ella Kadesh appeared majestically through it. She wore
one of her huge kaftans, it was a blaze of primary colours.
Her hat was apple-green in colour, the brim pinned up at the side like
an Australian bush hat by an enormous jade brooch and a bunch of ostrich
feathers.
