Belbo went out. SignoraGrazia wasn't in her office, but on her desk he saw that the redlight of Garamond's personal line was on: Garamond was callingsomeone. Belbo couldn't resist (I believe it was the first time inhis life he committed such an indelicacy); he picked up thereceiver and listened in on the conversation. Garamond was saying:"Don't worry. I think I've convinced him. He'll come to Paris...Only my duty. We belong to the same spiritual knighthood, afterall."
So Garamond, too, waspart of the secret. What secret? The one that only he, Belbo, couldreveal. The one that did not exist.
It was evening by then.He went to Pilade's, exchanged a few words with someone or other,drank too much. The next morning, he sought out the only friend hehad left, Diotallevi. He went to ask the help of a dyingman.
Their last conversationhe reported feverishly on Abulafia. It's a summary. I was unable totell how much was Diotallevi's and how much was Belbo's, because inboth cases it was the murmuring of one who speaks the truth becausehe knows the time has passed for playing with illusion.
110
And so it happened thatRabbi Ismahel ben Elisha and his disciples, who were studying thebook Yesirah and mistook he movements and walked backward, sankinto the earth, to its navel, tnanks to the strength ofletters.
-Pseudo Saadya,Commentary on the Sefer Yesirah
He had never seen hisfriend so white. Diotall vi had hardly any hair now on his head oreyebrows or lashes. He looked like a billiard ball.
"Forgive me," Belbosaid. "Can we discuss my situation?"
"Go ahead. I don't havea situation. Only needs."
"I heard they have a newtherapy. These things devour twenty-year-olds, but at fifty it'sslower; there's time to find a cure."
"Speak for yourself. I'mnot fifty yet. My body is still young. I have the privilege ofdying more quickly. Bv it's hard for me to talk. Tell me what youhave to say, so I can rest."
Obedient, respectful,Belbo told him the whole story.
Then Diotallevi,breathing like the Thing in the science-fiction movie, talked. Hehad, also, the transparency of the Thing, that absence of boundarybetween exterior and interior, between skin and flesh, between thelight fuzz on his belly, discernible in the gap of his pajamas, andthe mucilaginous tangie of viscera that only X rays or a disease inan advanced state can make visible.
"Jacopo, I'm stuck herein a bed. I can't decide whether what you're telling me ishappening only inside your head, or whether it's happening outside.But it doesn't matter. Whether you've gone crazy or the world hasmakes no difference. In either case, someone has mixed and shuffledthe words o. the Book more than was right."
"What do youmean?"
"We've sinned againstthe Word, against that which created and sustains the world. Nowyou are punishe.. for it, as I am punished for it. There's nodifference between you and me."
A nurse came in and putwater on his table. She told Belbo not to tire him, but Diotalleviwaved her away: "Leave us alone. I have to tell him. The Truth. Doyou know L Truth?"
"Who, me? What aquestion, sir..."
"Then go. I have to tellmy friend something important. Now listen, Jacopo. Just as man'sbody has limbs and joints and organs, so does the Torah. And as theTorah, so a man's body. You follow me?"
"Yes."
"Rabbi Meir, when he waslearning from Rabbi Akiba, mixed vitriol in the ink, and the mastersaid nothing. But when Rabbi Meir asked Rabbi Ismahel if he wasdoing the right thing, the rabbi said to him: Son, be cautious inyour work, because it is divine work, and if you omit one letter orwrite one letter too many, you destroy the whole world....We triedto rewrite the Torah, but we paid no heed to whether there were toomany letters or too few...."
"We werejoking...."
"You don't joke with theTorah."
"We were joking withhistory, with other people's writings..."
"Is there a writing thatfounds the world and is not the Book? Give me a little water. No,not the glass; wet that cloth... Thanks. Now listen. Rearrangingthe letters of the Book means rearranging the world. There's nogetting away from it. Any book, even a speller. People like yourDr. Wagner, don't they say that a man who plays with words andmakes anagrams and violates the language has ugliness in his souland hates his father?"
"But those arepsychoanalysts. They say that to make money. They aren't yourrabbis."
"They're all rabbis.They're all saying the same thing. Do you think the rabbis, whenthey spoke of the Torah, were talking about a scroll? They weretalking about us, about remaking our body through language. Now,listen. To manipulate the letters of the Book takes great piety,and we didn't have it. But every book is interwoven with the nameof God. And we anagram-matized all the books of history, and we didit without praying. Listen to me, damn it. He who concerns himselfwith the Torah keeps the world in motion, and he keeps in motionhis own body as he reads, studies, rewrites, because there's nopart of the body that doesn't have an equivalent in the world. Wetthe cloth for me... Thanks. If you alter the Book, you alter theworld; if you alter the world, you alter the body. This is what wedidn't understand.
"The Torah allows a wordto come out of its coffer; the word appears for a moment, thenhides immediately. It is revealed only for a moment
