With the exception of my family, he was probably the only other Jew who had ever set foot in B. But unlike us he let you see it from the very start. We were not conspicuous Jews. We wore our Judaism as people do almost everywhere in the world: under the shirt, not hidden, but tucked away. “Jews of discretion,” to use my mother’s words. To see someone proclaim his Judaism on his neck as Oliver did when he grabbed one of our bikes and headed into town with his shirt wide open shocked us as much as it taught us we could do the same and get away with it. I tried imitating him a few times. But I was too self-conscious, like someone trying to feel natural while walking about naked in a locker room only to end up aroused by his own nakedness. In town, I tried flaunting my Judaism with the silent bluster that comes less from arrogance than from repressed shame. Not him. It’s not that he never thought about being Jewish or about the life of Jews in a Catholic country. Sometimes we spoke about just this topic during those long afternoons when both of us would put aside work and enjoy chatting while the entire household and guests had all drifted into every available bedroom to rest for a few hours. He had lived long enough in small towns in New England to know what it felt like to be the odd Jew out. But Judaism never troubled him the way it troubled me, nor was it the subject of an abiding, metaphysical discomfort with himself and the world. It did not even harbor the mystical, unspoken promise of redemptive brotherhood. And perhaps this was why he wasn’t ill at ease with being Jewish and didn’t constantly have to pick at it, the way children pick at scabs they wish would go away. He was okay with being Jewish. He was okay with himself, the way he was okay with his body, with his looks, with his antic backhand, with his choice of books, music, films, friends. He was okay with losing his prized Mont Blanc pen. “I can buy another one just like it.” He was okay with criticism too. He showed my father a few pages he was proud of having written. My father told him his insights into Heraclitus were brilliant but needed firming up, that he needed to accept the paradoxical nature of the philosopher’s thinking, not simply explain it away. He was okay with firming things up, he was okay with paradox. Back to the drawing board—he was okay with the drawing board as well. He invited my young aunt for a tête-à-tête midnight gita—spin—in our motorboat. She declined. That was okay. He tried again a few days later, was turned down again, and again made light of it. She too was okay with it, and, had she spent another week with us, would probably have been okay with going out to sea for a midnight gita that could easily have lasted till sunrise.
 
除了我的家人之外，涉足 B 城的犹太人或许只有他一个了。但他与我们不同，他从一开始就亮给人看。我的家人从不高调彰显犹太人身份，而是像其他分散世界各地的犹太人一样，放在衬衫里，不加隐藏却保持低调——借用我母亲的话来说，我们是“谨慎的犹太人”。看见奥利弗敞着衬衫领口宣告项链所代表的犹太信仰，直接骑上家里的脚踏车进城，令我们震惊，同时也让我们知道我们也可以这样，完全不会遇上什么麻烦。我几次试着学他那样出门，可是我太放不开，像个想要大大方方光着身子在更衣室走动的人，到头来却被自己的裸体勾起了性欲。更多是出于压抑的羞耻感而非自大的心态，我试着在城里以一种静默的虚张声势来昭示我的犹太信仰；而他则不然，尽管他并非从未考虑过在这个天主教国度里身为犹太人意味着什么，或犹太人的生活是怎样的。偶尔在漫长的午后，趁着一家老小和客人全都懒洋洋地晃进空余卧房里小憩个把钟头的时候，我俩会抛开工作，愉快地聊天，而我们讨论的正是这个话题。他曾在美国新英格兰的几个小镇住过相当长一段时间，很清楚犹太人只身在异乡的局外人感受，但犹太信仰带给我的困扰从未发生在他身上，也从来不是他自处或面对世界时，那个会引发永恒不变的、深奥难解的苦恼不安的主题。犹太信仰甚至并不包含那种玄秘的、未以言明的关于相互救赎的兄弟关系的美好预言。或许正是出于这个理由，犹太人身份对他丝毫不是困扰，他也不需要时不时就此烦恼一下，不像小孩子经常去抠伤疤，盼望着疤痕早些消失。身为犹太人对他而言不是问题。他很能接受自己，就像他接受自己的身体，接受自己的相貌，接受自己古怪的反手拍动作，接受自己选择读的书、听的音乐、看的电影和交的朋友。他弄丢了获奖得来的万宝龙钢笔也不介意。“我可以自己买支一模一样的。”他也不介意批评。他拿了几页引以为傲的文章给我父亲看。父亲告诉他，他对赫拉克利特的见解很精彩，但论点还需加强，他必须接受哲学家思想中的悖论本质，而不是一味找理由开脱。于是他接受立论必须加强的意见，也接受悖论，重起炉灶——他不介意从头开始修改文章。他邀请我的小阿姨半夜单独（开我们的汽艇）去 gita，也就是兜风。小阿姨拒绝了。没关系。几天后他又试一次，再度遭拒，同样不以为意。小阿姨也无所谓，若是再多住一周，她或许就会答应半夜出海去兜风，甚至玩到天亮。
 

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