A Simple Story by S.Y. Agnon

Author:S.Y. Agnon
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, azw3
Publisher: The Toby Press
Published: 2014-03-23T00:00:00+00:00

Mina was far from blind. Though she had never been in love, she knew what love was not. Once, when the two of them were waiting for Sophia to arrive, she said to Hirshl, “I know what’s on your mind. You’re thinking about Sophia.”

“What makes you think I’m thinking about Sophia?” asked Hirshl.

“I just know you are. You wish she were here already.”

“Why should I wish she were here?”

“So as not to have to be alone with me. I bore you.”

“Do you think I’m bored?” asked Hirshl.

“What do you take me for? You wish I were dead.”

“Why should I wish you were dead?”

“You just do.”

“Nobody just wishes his wife were dead.”

“Nobody who loves her,” said Mina.

“And somebody who doesn’t love her does?”

“That’s just what I was waiting to hear from you, dear.”

“What were you waiting to hear?” asked Hirshl.

“That you don’t love me.”

“I don’t?”

“Didn’t you just say that if you loved your wife you wouldn’t wish she were dead?”

“Supposing I did,” said Hirshl. “Does that mean I don’t love you?”

“If you loved me you wouldn’t have said it.”

“What would I have said?”

“If you loved me,” said Mina, “you wouldn’t even have thought it. Or would you say I’m wrong and that you do care for me a tiny bit after all? You’re a smart boy, Heinrich: you know I’m no worse than other women and that you won’t find another wife like me even if I do die. Do you hear me, darling? But I have no intention of dying, not even for your sake, because your next wife won’t make you any happier. Do you think Sophia’s better than I am? Well, she’s not. Oh, she seems likable enough, but if you knew her as I do you’d realize that’s just on the surface. She learned to get on people’s good side helping her father sell lottery tickets, which is lower than I’d ever stoop, because I come from an honest family that’s earned its keep by hard work, not by flattery. Why, when I think of how my father started out as a milkman with a route, I feel proud of him! And my own children won’t go looking for an easy living either but will support themselves like he’s done without bowing and scraping. Oh, how miserable I am! Come here, Heinrich, give me a kiss. No, not on the forehead, darling, I’m not a dowager queen. On the mouth. Or was that the last kiss you had left? Looking at you, a person might think every kiss cost a fortune.”

Like any well-bred Szybuszian, Hirshl was proud of his family. It may not have been descended from the celebrated Yeshaya HaLevi Horowitz, but it was highly thought of nonetheless, and though until now he had refrained from boasting of it, Mina’s reference to her father made him do so. It was doubtful, however, whether he made much of an impression on her, perhaps because he soon got onto the subject of his mother’s brother, whom his surprised

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