Free Suddenly in the Depths of the Forest by Amos Oz Page A

tried to make up for it by being nice to them, by offering them luscious fruit to eat, the likes of which they had never tasted before. Then they went out to the garden again to be with the animals, birds, insects, and reptiles. The light faded slowly, but darkness held back. The evening itself came and went, drifting slowly from one flower bed to the other along the garden paths, a hesitant kind of evening that didn't want to be and didn't want to cease.
    It was neither day nor night.
    And Matti thought, I don't remember but I haven't completely forgotten that I was here once at a time that was a little like this, a time that wasn't day and wasn't night, not light but not not-light, and in fact, there was no time, but the opposite of time, and all around me was tenderness and caring. A dream? In an illness? When I was little? In the delirium of a high fever? When I was still nursing? Or even earlier, before I was born?
    Nehi, when he was still the child called Na'aman,
always took pity on animals and made sure to feed them, even the flies and the ants and the fish in the river, when he was only four or five years old.
    And in the village, they made fun of you for that too, Maya said.
    She didn't say the words as a question, but as something she knew.
    And Matti said, They still haven't forgotten that, but they don't remember it either. Maybe there should be another word, a special word that includes both remembering and forgetting: sometimes, out of the blue, a mother or father in the village imitates animal or bird sounds for their child. But a minute later, they regret it and correct themselves and explain that animals are merely a fairy tale. Then they sigh because our teacher, Emanuella, confuses us so much with all those crazy animal stories out of her poor head.
    When Matti said there should be a word that would mean both remembering and forgetting, Maya thought about her mother, Lilia, who scatters bread crumbs at the end of the day for birds that aren't there and tosses slices of bread into the river for fish that vanished a long time ago. And how the day was approaching its end. And how right now, her mother was standing alone on the riverbank. And soon they'll start to be very worried about us. Or maybe there, down below, many days and nights, sunrises and sunsets, have passed, and everyone has already given up on us, and it's only here that time has stopped? And the river itself, Maya thought, that river never rests, day in and day out it churns, twisting among the yards in the village, racing stubbornly onward to the valley, rushing bubbling down the slope, white foam on its banks, as if running away from us, downward to some peaceful valley, and stops in our village for a moment only to curse it.
    Maya said, We'll have to go back soon. They'll be worried about us there. They'll think something terrible has happened.
    Matti said, Just a little while longer. Till the end of his story.
    And the man suggested, We'll ask the darkness to hold off a while longer. We agreed with the evening a long time ago that it would approach slowly.

27
    Maya said, But you did a terrible thing to us by taking all the animals away. And you took animals that no one was ever cruel to. You even took animals that were loved, that were happy to be part of the family, like Almon's dog, for instance, and Emanuella's cat and her three kittens. In my opinion, kidnapping the animals was even crueler than the ridicule you suffered. And you, when you decided to take revenge, did you stop for even a minute to ask who you were really taking revenge on? The ones who made fun of you? The ones who abused their animals? Or were you taking revenge on Almon and Solina and my mother and Emanuella, who you still say you loved?
    Na'aman raised his shoulders and seemed to be trying to bury his neck and head between them. As if he had suddenly become ugly right in front of their eyes. And his hands began to dart about, searching for something, as if begging