Read Online Girl Unwrapped by Gabriella Goliger - Free Book Online
Authors: Gabriella Goliger
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the paper and the dull ticking of the old, brown clock.
Still in her pyjamas, Toni watches their curved backs. She creeps forward and peeks at the paper. There is a picture of a balding man in a dark suit, with thick, dark-rimmed glasses like her father’s, standing with his head turned sideways and slightly raised as if someone is talking to him and he’s listening very carefully to each word. Behind him, a man with a peaked cap like a policeman’s sits on a chair looking bored. Above the photo, the headline reads: “Court’s Authority Challenged as Eichmann Trial Begins.” A smaller headline states: “Nation Aware Israeli State Also on Trial.”
“They should hang him from the nearest lamppost,” Lisa growls with animal fury. “They should hang him upside down and use his head for a football.”
“Hush. That would be wrong,” Julius says. He rakes his fingers across the furrows in his brow. “Eichmann must have a fair trial. Due process. The Israelis have to prove we are a civilized people. There’s enough controversy already about the abduction. The government says it wasn’t the Mossad that did it. Volunteers, they say. But everyone knows.”
“Right they were to hunt him down. He’d still be dancing in Argentina if they hadn’t.”
“The defence says the judges are biased and the court has no authority and Israel has no jurisdiction. Listen to this: ‘Since Israel did not exist at the time of the alleged offences, it has no jurisdiction to hear the case.’ They will have to make an iron-tight case, otherwise he’ll become a martyr.”
“That monster, a martyr? What are you saying, you of all people? Mutti, Mutti , listen to this madman, he defends Satan.”
“Hush, hush, don’t excite yourself. I’m just saying how the world might see it.”
“Who cares what the farshtunkene world thinks?”
“We can never ignore what the farshtunkene world thinks.”
He speaks quietly. He touches her arm, then takes her hand, balled into a fist at her side, and encloses it within his long fingers. He does all this without removing his eyes from the paper.
“Who’s Eichmann?” Toni asks.
Her father’s head shoots up. He whisks the newspaper off the table and refolds it into a small package. “Go, go, go. Get dressed. You’ll be late for school.”
When Toni returns, her mother has dismantled the burners on the stove and scrubs the tarnished rims with Dutch cleanser, as she always does when particularly upset. Her father eats scrambled eggs and toast, chewing with his usual care, but his eyes are unfocussed, and a bit of egg is caught in the bristles of his goatee. Lisa brings more toast to the table. She too seems lost in brooding silence. Neither of them takes notice of the rogue bit of egg in his beard.
There are no more fights. There are murmurs and long silences behind the wall that separates Toni’s bedroom from that of her parents. One Saturday morning, Toni finds her mother in her flannelette housecoat humming happily as she tends to her plants.
“Grow. I command you to grow. It is spring, and you must grow,” she warbles to the African violets lined up along the windowsill. Her flushed face appears softer and more rested than it has for a long time. More astonishing for Toni is to see her father emerge from the master bedroom still in his rumpled pyjamas. Usually he’s up and dressed before anyone else. The open V-neck shows the crinkled black hairs on the white skin of his chest. He seems a bit sheepish to have slept so long, but also, like her mother, unaccountably cheerful. When he’s been to the bathroom and put on his Saturday clothes—pressed pants, white shirt, grey wool cardigan—and is seated at the dinette, Lisa plants a kiss on his bald head. She brings the newspaper, but instead of handing it to him, as usual, she spreads it out in front of herself, open to the classifieds. Her finger runs down the columns of ads.
“‘Three-bedroom upper, bath, kitchen, sun
Still in her pyjamas, Toni watches their curved backs. She creeps forward and peeks at the paper. There is a picture of a balding man in a dark suit, with thick, dark-rimmed glasses like her father’s, standing with his head turned sideways and slightly raised as if someone is talking to him and he’s listening very carefully to each word. Behind him, a man with a peaked cap like a policeman’s sits on a chair looking bored. Above the photo, the headline reads: “Court’s Authority Challenged as Eichmann Trial Begins.” A smaller headline states: “Nation Aware Israeli State Also on Trial.”
“They should hang him from the nearest lamppost,” Lisa growls with animal fury. “They should hang him upside down and use his head for a football.”
“Hush. That would be wrong,” Julius says. He rakes his fingers across the furrows in his brow. “Eichmann must have a fair trial. Due process. The Israelis have to prove we are a civilized people. There’s enough controversy already about the abduction. The government says it wasn’t the Mossad that did it. Volunteers, they say. But everyone knows.”
“Right they were to hunt him down. He’d still be dancing in Argentina if they hadn’t.”
“The defence says the judges are biased and the court has no authority and Israel has no jurisdiction. Listen to this: ‘Since Israel did not exist at the time of the alleged offences, it has no jurisdiction to hear the case.’ They will have to make an iron-tight case, otherwise he’ll become a martyr.”
“That monster, a martyr? What are you saying, you of all people? Mutti, Mutti , listen to this madman, he defends Satan.”
“Hush, hush, don’t excite yourself. I’m just saying how the world might see it.”
“Who cares what the farshtunkene world thinks?”
“We can never ignore what the farshtunkene world thinks.”
He speaks quietly. He touches her arm, then takes her hand, balled into a fist at her side, and encloses it within his long fingers. He does all this without removing his eyes from the paper.
“Who’s Eichmann?” Toni asks.
Her father’s head shoots up. He whisks the newspaper off the table and refolds it into a small package. “Go, go, go. Get dressed. You’ll be late for school.”
When Toni returns, her mother has dismantled the burners on the stove and scrubs the tarnished rims with Dutch cleanser, as she always does when particularly upset. Her father eats scrambled eggs and toast, chewing with his usual care, but his eyes are unfocussed, and a bit of egg is caught in the bristles of his goatee. Lisa brings more toast to the table. She too seems lost in brooding silence. Neither of them takes notice of the rogue bit of egg in his beard.
There are no more fights. There are murmurs and long silences behind the wall that separates Toni’s bedroom from that of her parents. One Saturday morning, Toni finds her mother in her flannelette housecoat humming happily as she tends to her plants.
“Grow. I command you to grow. It is spring, and you must grow,” she warbles to the African violets lined up along the windowsill. Her flushed face appears softer and more rested than it has for a long time. More astonishing for Toni is to see her father emerge from the master bedroom still in his rumpled pyjamas. Usually he’s up and dressed before anyone else. The open V-neck shows the crinkled black hairs on the white skin of his chest. He seems a bit sheepish to have slept so long, but also, like her mother, unaccountably cheerful. When he’s been to the bathroom and put on his Saturday clothes—pressed pants, white shirt, grey wool cardigan—and is seated at the dinette, Lisa plants a kiss on his bald head. She brings the newspaper, but instead of handing it to him, as usual, she spreads it out in front of herself, open to the classifieds. Her finger runs down the columns of ads.
“‘Three-bedroom upper, bath, kitchen, sun
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