A Journey to the End of the Millenium by A.B. Yehoshua

Author:A.B. Yehoshua [Yehoshua, A.B.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780156011167
Barnesnoble:
Published: 2014-09-22T16:50:08+00:00

joined his nephew, who was standing surrounded by throngs of Parisians crowded among the little old wooden houses on a bridge called the New Bridge. Abulafia tugged desperately at his stubborn uncle’s garments to pull him away from the curious crowd , and while the sunlight traced trailing purple marks upon the lovely peaceful river as it circled gently southward , Abulafia led Ben Attar deeper into the island , among the narrow streets packed at this hour with people return ing home, some leading a lamb or a piglet on a cord for their dinner. From the dull look in his nephew’s large dark eyes, Ben Attar knew that some new torment was afflicting him.

Abulafia told him immediately about the rebellion that had broken out in h is home, and how h is wife had sworn in her distress to go far away to her native town on the Rhine, there to convene a new court of justice to compel Abulafia to divorce her. Although the Moroccan merchant appeared surprised at the news, he seemed to find in it a blessing that m ight deepen the partnership that had been so laboriously revived . Perhaps the time had really come, Ben Attar tried to inform his nephew obliquely, with roundabout hints, his arm around the shoulder of his beloved nephew, whose pallor lent an additional beauty to his black locks. Perhaps, the uncle speculated wildly, it was really the hand of the Alm ighty that had urged him to take an old guardship and sail it to this remote little island, which still seemed to him to be rocking in the midst of the river, to rescue a lost lamb. Surely Abulafia could spare the enthusiastic rebel the hardships of a journey to the Janel of Ashkenaz by simply asking Rabbi Elbaz to put into effect the wisdom of the Babylonian sages and impose the divorce that l\ l istress Esther- i'l inna so longecl for. In this way Abulafia would be Free to travel back not only to the Bay of Barcelona but to the golden shores of the rock From which he was hewn. Surely now that he hacl prm·ed to everyone and especially to himselF that the curse of loneliness within him was broken, he would be able to find a wife to his taste in Tangier, ancl even a seconcl wife, if he felt inclined to lm·e her too.

But tulafia , weakened by his fast, merely stumbled ancl fell in the surge of horses ancl pigs ancl hit his heacl on t he cobb les on hearing the Fantastic projects that his uncle Ben Attar was planning for him. Ben Attar did not rea li1.c how much his very being was intcm m-cn \·ith his

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love for his new wife and everything connected with her, including even the cobbles of this narrow Parisian street, which had just made his head spin. It was fortunate that Rabbi Elbaz appeared on the scene, sent with his boy to the ship to get some salt and olive oil.

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