Julius Read online

  ‘I know how to make profit in the market,’ boasted Julius.

  ‘That is very clever of you, my child. But to make a soul fit for the Temple - can you do that?’

  ‘Julius hopes to be a Rabbin,’ said Père eagerly. ‘He knows his Hebrew and I have explained to him many things. It is my dearest wish that he should become a Rabbin.’

  ‘Do you want to be a Rabbin?’ asked the old man.

  ‘Yes,’ said Julius; ‘it would be beautiful.’

  But growing to be a man and having his full strength and using that strength, travelling away from Alger and seeing all the countries in the world, all the cities, all the seas, and new things and new people, and other men and other women, and living and loving, and being more powerful than those other men - and getting further than them and further than anyone, not a Rabbin in a Temple, but he himself - he - Julius Lévy - was not that beautiful too?

  He felt the need of escape, he knew not where, to get free from the quiet dead atmosphere of the Rabbin’s house and to lose himself amongst streets and people. It was as though Père’s room smelt already of decay, of tepid warmth and closeness, of the stale breath of a sick person. It was as though Père did not belong to the world any more.

  ‘I don’t care,’ said Julius to himself. ‘I don’t care. I’m going to forget all this. I’m not going to think about Père any more.’ He ran through the streets, defiant in his misery, putting away from him the dark blazing eyes in the white face. He came to the market place. He always found his way here, as though the sense of the market was born in him, deep and inherent, something that would cling to him for ever. There was more variety here than in Neuilly, more colour and life and movement, the cries and smells of a strange race. The Arab smell, amber and dust and leather, the rubbing together of warm dark skins; great scarlet fruits, over-soft, over-ripe, a purple flower with its petals crushed by a naked foot, a fellow pushing his way through the crowd, carrying carpets, a little old man kneeling on the ground arranging a row of brass pots and jugs, a veiled woman fingering bright silks spread out on an open stall, and amongst the legs of everyone a crippled beggar wormed his way, crawling like a dog with his hands in shoes, his face the thin pointed face of an idiot under his scarlet fez. The stir of the market excited Julius, he felt restless and impatient, he could not bear to listen to the merchants bargaining with one another and he not able to bargain himself. He belonged to the life of the market, he could not keep away. He remembered the first day he had sold at Neuilly, picking up faded flowers from beneath a stall, and he knew he must do it again, that nothing and nobody would prevent him.

  He pushed his way in amongst the stalls, he grubbed in the litter and found fruits that had fallen, crushed blossoms, odds and ends of market produce that had slipped from the stalls unperceived. He clasped them next his blouse and went with them to the lower end of the market where the street sloped downhill, where the houses touched, where the narrow passages and steps intermingled with one another like a spider’s web. A poor quarter, a quarter of beggars. He knelt on the dusty street, spreading out his handkerchief and he lay his gathered pickings on the top.Then he put his hands to his mouth and called: ‘Who would fill his belly and save his purse? Come and buy fresh fruit at the lowest price.’

  An old woman heard his cry; she bent down to him and fumbled amongst his goods; a man passing turned on his heel and waited, then bought a bunch of flowers scarcely faded, another woman pressed against the first woman’s shoulder.

  ‘Save your purse - save your purse,’ shouted Julius, and he held up two oranges, round and smooth, hiding the black mark where they had fallen with his thumb. ‘Would you pay double the price up the market?’

  Julius smiled; his sharp eyes darted amongst the faces of the crowd choosing his victim.

  ‘A sweet cake for you, little girl? Look at this - how rich, how plentiful. What about the sou your mother gave you to spend? Thank you, thank you.’

  A blind man approached, tapping on the ground with his stick. Julius thrust a bunch of dusty flowers under his nose. ‘Only a sou for these fresh buds - smell them, my friend, smell them. They came this morning from a garden in Mustapha.’ He jingled his money in his pockets, he wiped the sweat from his forehead. By selling off the dead flowers to the blind man he had cleared his stock. He rose hastily and disappeared in the crowd before the market people should find him and beat him. He laughed, his hands clutching the coins in his pocket.

  ‘I shall never be a Rabbin, it’s no use. I was not meant to sing in the Temple. This is my thing, selling to make profit. Something for nothing, something for nothing.’

  He kicked a stone before him as he walked, whistling a tune, smiling to himself. He had forgotten Père on his bed, the stale atmosphere of the sick-room, the grave bearded face of Moïse Metzger the Rabbin.

  Julius made his way down to the port. He spent his day watching the loading of ships and listening to the cries of sailors, he rubbed shoulders with little half-caste boys and sewer rats, he had food and drink at one of the cafés on the quay.

  He breathed it in, the clatter, the noise, the movement, the heat and the sweat of humanity, the scorching, dusty, amber, Alger smell.

  The sun was setting when he returned to the house of Moïse Metzger, and the sky was flaming gold. A muezzin wailed from the mosque, a little dark figure crying with his hands to his mouth.

  At the corner of the street an Arab crouched with his face in the dust. Soon it would be dark, the night coming swiftly with no twilight like a black cloak over the white city, and there would rise a murmur from the closed houses, queer, mysterious, and the throbbing of music.

  Julius knocked on the door of the Rabbin’s house. Old Amédée the servant let him inside. He laid his finger on his lips.

  ‘All day Monsieur le Rabbin has waited for you,’ he whispered. ‘No one could say where you had gone. Your father is dying.’

  Julius stared at him without speaking. Then he ran upstairs to Père’s room, he stood with his ear against the door. He could hear the low droning murmur of Hebrew prayer, moaning and monotonous. It was the Rabbin praying. Julius turned the handle of the door and crept into the room.

  The Rabbin was kneeling by the bed, his head bowed in his hands. Père lay still with his eyes turned towards the open window. The setting sun had dipped below the roof of the last house, and the sky was still lit with a dusky shadow of gold. Julius knelt beside the bed and watched the eyes of Père. They were like two glazing onyx stones in a dead mask. He did not seem to be listening to the prayers of Moïse Metzger. He was wondering how long it would be before he should die. He did not turn his eyes away from the flaming sky.

  The muezzin from the mosque had ceased his wail to the setting sun; outside the street was hushed.

  The Rabbin continued his low monotonous prayer. Suddenly Père made a little movement with his hands, he was fumbling with something on the counterpane. It was his flute. He lifted it to his lips, never taking his eyes away from the sky, and he began to play. It rose in the air, soft and mysterious, the whisper of a cry that would lose itself in the air, the call of someone who would leave his bed and escape. Higher and higher it rose, trembling, exquisite, the fluttering song of a bird borne on the wind, like an arrow sped through the sky to the sinking sun, a last question, a last appeal, the messenger who whispered at the gates of the secret city.

  And as Julius knelt and watched Père go from him, little by little, on the breath of his song, it was as though part of Julius himself was taken also, the child who listened in the Temple, the child who leant against his father’s knee, the child who lay crushed, flesh to flesh, in the jolting truck from Paris, the child who whimpered and loved and stretched out his hands.

  Père smiled, and his last note was like a note of defiance flung into the air, bearing him away to nothing and to no one, and as he went he took with him something that would never come again, the lost boy, the frightened happy child - he took something of Julius himself -
something that was tremulous, and pitiful, and young.

  Part Two

  Youth (1875-1890)

  The hot sun shone through the drawn curtains, it forced an entrance through all the glass window panes and the curtain-stuff into the little book-room, dark and silent, and the sun cast golden patterns on the carpet and caught the leather bindings of the books in a sudden circle of light. There was no sound except for the steady scratching of a pen, irritating and harsh, and ever and again the little dry cough of Moïse Metzger as he paused to dip his pen in the ink, and to balance his spectacles more firmly on his nose.

  Julius glanced up from his book and watched him, the pursed lips above the long beard now streaked with grey, the lines that ran from his nose to his mouth, the high, placid forehead that never wrinkled in anger, the round shoulders bent over the manuscript he was writing, heedless of the hot sun that would make its way in, caring nothing for the close fusty atmosphere of the room.

  Julius loosened his collar and ran his hands through his hair. He sighed heavily and moved in his chair to attract the Rabbin’s attention, but either Moïse Metzger did not choose to hear him or he was deaf, for the old man continued his writing and gave no sign to prove that he had heard. Julius fluttered the leaves of his book, the Hebrew writing stared up at him as though they were no longer words of beauty but so much nonsense calculated to rouse fury in the heart of a boy, and slowly and stealthily Julius drew a thin paper book from beneath the cover of his Hebrew History, a book shabby from constant use, the pages crinkled and dirty, the lettering, Principles of Mathematics, almost obliterated by the tell-tale marks of sweetmeats and chocolates. He opened the book at random and began to jot down calculations with the stub of a pencil. ‘Marcel Hibert owes five francs and fifty centimes, borrowed by him the first of June. Interest at the rate of ten per cent a week, fifty-five centimes; three weeks brings it to one franc sixty, making in all to-day, the twenty-first of June, seven francs ten centimes that he owes. Pierre Falco borrowed two francs a fortnight ago, he can only pay three per cent, his father is poor and keeps him short, that makes eleven sous interest, or two francs sixty - total of both borrowings nine francs seventy centimes. If I do not press Pierre for one more week his interest will bring sum up to ten francs ... With ten francs much can be done; I can bargain with Ahèmed for those two carpets when he is tipsy, and get them at a low price, say fifteen francs for the two, and then sell them up at Mustapha as genuine for thirty francs each - sixty minus fifteen, forty-five francs. Forty-five francs profit and almost something for nothing ...’

  Julius mopped his forehead with his handkerchief, and fanned himself with his book. He looked at the chink in the curtains that betrayed the sun, and he could picture the glare upon the white houses and the cobbled twisting streets, the hard glaze of the blue sky, and the intolerable burning heat that he loved.

  Finally the old man closed the book and laid aside his spectacles. ‘That will do for to-day,’ he said. ‘We must not tax the brain beyond its strength. Go and rest yourself.’

  Julius went from the room, laughing under his breath. At fifteen he was tall and slim, with Paul Lévy’s face, Paul Lévy’s narrow hips, and his long beautiful hands, but his shoulders and chest were broad like Jean Blançard’s had been, and he carried his head high, aggressive and confident, as his grandfather had done.

  He stood for a moment sniffing the hot air, the amber and the dust, the sweat of a sleeping Arab lying against the wall taking his siesta, the whiff of steam on linen that blew down the street from the window of Nanette the blanchisseuse, and these things seemed good to him, part of the life he was leading, and he fumbled in his pocket for a cigarette, glancing behind him at the house to see if the Rabbin was watching. He inhaled deeply, satisfied with the smoke and the intake of breath, and in his pockets he found a petal of bougainvillea flower and a eucalyptus leaf pressed together that he had picked up in Mustapha some days ago, now faded and crushed but the scent still strong as ever. He bit the flower so that he should taste it as well as smell it, and he strolled along the streets, his hands in his pockets, his cigarette hanging from his lips, whistling a song. He went to the street corner where he knew he would find the other fellows. There they were, Marcel Hibert, Pierre Falco, Toto the freckled madcap son of a coiffeur, Boru the half-caste. Julius at fifteen was the leader, younger than any of them. ‘I couldn’t get away before,’ he said. ‘Come on, there’s no time to lose.’

  It was a long climb from the town of Alger to the hills, where the road to Constantine stretched over the unbroken country. A hot walk too, in the full glare of the sun.

  It was two hours or more before they had left the last village clinging to the fringe of Alger and were standing by a belt of trees that screened them from the road.

  ‘Phew! what a trudge!’ grumbled Pierre. ‘I thought we should never get here. Let’s hope we shall have some success.’

  ‘It’ll be a lark even if we get nothing at all,’ grinned Toto, and he winked at Boru and snapped his fingers.

  ‘Have we ever failed yet?’ said Julius; ‘would I have brought you here if I hadn’t been confident?’

  ‘Come on, what’s the plan of attack?’ said Marcel. He was the eldest, sometimes he resented this leadership by the youngest boy.

  ‘You owe me money, my friend,’ said Julius; ‘have you made any reckoning?’

  Marcel reddened and shuffled his feet. ‘You might give me till to-morrow,’ he muttered. ‘We shall see what happens to-day.’

  ‘The three weeks at ten per cent interest are up,’ said Julius; ‘after to-day my interest is fifteen per cent.’

  ‘Oh! very well, you shall have it now. I cannot afford more interest.’

  The coins changed hands.

  ‘Meanwhile, I’ve decided our plan,’ said Julius. ‘The merchant will soon appear along the road. There’s a stretch of three kilometres or more he has to cover before he reaches the shade of these trees. He’ll be tired from the sun. He will want to rest his feet. You must hide here and I’ll begin conversation with him. When I give the signal you will burst from the trees and run to the mules. Boru is used to managing animals; he will take charge of two. The rest of us will take one apiece. Then ride like the devil, shouting at the top of your voices. This will scare the mules, and they’ll bolt. Hold on tight and don’t let yourselves be thrown.’

  ‘Supposing the merchant tries to follow us?’

  ‘He’ll not follow us, I shall see to that,’ said Julius. The boys glanced at each other, half excited, half scared.

  ‘What will you do?’ asked Toto.

  Julius patted his pocket. ‘The same as David did to Goliath,’ he said.

  They blinked stupidly, they did not understand. Julius laughed and turned on his heel. ‘I am a Jew, I know everything,’ he said. Then he walked away from the belt of trees to a high position where he could watch the long winding road and the dust from a merchant travelling with his mules.

  Julius crouched in a ditch by the side of the road, his chin resting in his hands, and an hour had passed before he finally saw the little cavalcade approaching in the distance. The five mules were harnessed one behind the other, a gap of four feet or more between them, and the Arab merchant himself brought up the rear on the sixth mule, lopping backwards and forwards in the high saddle, his head bowed over his breast in weariness.

  Julius rose from his hiding-place in the ditch and walked slowly along the road to meet him.When he came within hailing distance he lifted his hand. ‘Good day to you,’ he shouted. ‘May Allah protect you and your sons and your grandsons. Can you give me a cigarette?’ The merchant gazed down at him with sullen eyes. ‘I’ve travelled ever since noon, I’m weary and pressed for time. Let me get on with my business.’ He cracked his long whip, he called out to his mules. Julius backed aside from their hoofs, he fumbled in his pocket. ‘You are the seventh merchant to pass this way,’ he said; ‘they were all driving mules. You will find the market glutted when you reach Alg
er.’ The Arab turned in his saddle, exposing his full face in astonishment. ‘Impossible ...’ he began, but he did not finish his sentence, for the boy had taken careful aim and the stone spun from the catapult and struck him between the eyes. The Arab fell into the road with a groan, kicked a moment and lay still. Julius darted to his side and fumbling with his belt he took the heavy purse from the stunned merchant and tucked it hastily down his own shirt; then glancing around him he propped the man into a humped sitting position at the side of the road and stuck a cigarette between his lips. From a distance he might have been taken for someone resting, overcome by fatigue.

  Only then did Julius give his signal, and the boys ran out from behind their clump of trees, each one seizing the bridle of a mule and cutting the rope that bound them together. They flung themselves on to the backs of the frightened animals, shouting at the pitch of their lungs, and the mules kicked and plunged in terror, shaking their heads and bolting in a cloud of dust down the long white road.

  Julius bent over the Arab. Still he had not moved, but sat hunched and motionless, a deep cleft between his eyes where the stone had struck him. Julius climbed into the saddle of the sixth mule, and clinging to the high supports he dug his heels into the creature’s sides, shouting, and pressing with his knees.

  The mule bolted after the others, and Julius was flung up and down in the saddle, his nose bumping the arched neck of the mule, his hair falling over his face - shaking with mingled laughter and pain, the dust blowing up into his eyes and the sweat becoming part of it, grimy and caked. The scared animals would not stop now, they galloped as though possessed by the devil, and it seemed to Julius there was no breath left in his body, so shaken he was and exhausted, the heat rising in him like a clammy, suffocating blanket, yet he could not stop laughing as he reeled in the saddle, hysterical at the sight of the other boys each as helpless as himself on the backs of the strong mules, and in spite of his bruised flesh and his agony of fatigue there was something exhilarating and grand in this mad screaming gallop in the dust under the burning sun, something splendid in the way his blood pounded and his heart throbbed, in the fierce motion itself, in the smell of sweat and dust, in the tearing clatter of hoofs upon the hard road.