“After David has shot the Jew.”
She is silent.
She looks at them, one after another. She pauses, they say nothing. She cries out:
“I want to understand.”
“Do it,” says the Jew. “Understand.”
She sits there, facing him, completely still.
That violent blue stare.
“The merchant’s police have abandoned the Jew to Gringo so he can kill him,” she says, her voice faltering.
“Probably,” says Abahn.
“They are agreed on this. Gringo said to them, ‘Don’t get involved in this, the thing I ask of you.’ ‘Understood,’ said the merchants. And there you go, Gringo and his Jew to kill.”
“Yes.”
The Jew smiles. She does not see. She speaks quickly, “And there is Gringo with his Jew in his grip. And there are the police of merchants just waiting for Gringo to have killed his Jew.”
“No,” says the Jew.
“And there are the tradesmen’s police who are waiting to be able to say: ‘Here is Gringo, the one who killed the Jew.’”
“Yes,” says the Jew. “Like that.”
“And then Gringo who will be able to say: No, the one who killed the Jew is the one named David, a mason from Staadt. You’re mistaken, you’ve been fooled, it wasn’t me, it was David, a mason from Staadt.”
“Like that,” says Abahn.
“An unlucky Gringo?”
“No.”
“An acquaintance of the Jews?”
“Yes.”
Silence.
She walks away. Toward the window. Then a moan of anger, of sadness. She looks through the window at the night, lingering. Then roughly she turns toward the Jews.
“And if it isn’t David?”
They do not answer.
“Who would it be?”
Her question asked, she doesn’t wait for the answer. She answers herself, staring at them:
“It would be nobody, maybe?”
She turns toward him, the Jew, she sits there, before him, in front of him. There’s a moment of clarity—the setting sun pierces the place and illuminates it with yellow light.
“Who are you to create such fear?”
The sun sets.
“Who knows?” says Abahn. “Suddenly out of the blue, one Jew too many?”
“Killed?”
“Yes.”
“The one who upset the merchants?”
“No, because the merchants agreed.”
“Who?”
“The one who agitated the other Jews,” says Abahn.
She wants no more to account for death.
“We speak without understanding,” she says. “It’s so difficult to understand.”
“Yes,” says the Jew.
Abahn walks over to stand next to her. She notices him suddenly.
“Why did you come?”
“I saw someone crying.”
“A Jew.”
“Yes. I know them.”
“Racists are executed here.”
The blue eyes darken.
“I’m a racist,” says Abahn.
They do not take their eyes from one another.
“You’re Abahn the Jew, Abahn the dog?”
“Yes, that’s me as well. Didn’t you recognize me?”
“Yes.” She looks from one to the other. “You’re the one who will not be killed.”
“Perhaps.”
“The one who speaks?”
“I speak for the Jew.”
“The one who sees? The one who will speak?”
“Yes.”
“To whom?”
“To those who see and understand.”
Sabana turns toward David, his eyes closed. She gestures. “And to him as well? The deaf and dumb? And to apes?”
“Them too, yes,” says the Jew.
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