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never been able to understand that. On the other hand, all those years everyone had known that Benny Meyuhas was in love with Tirzah, that because of her he had never married. But in comparison with Rubin, Benny was, well…he looked like he could be Tirzah’s father, with his small, pinched face; really, you couldn’t compare the two men at all, even though they were the same age. He, Zadik, had had a lot of time to think it over—after all, he had not slept all night, and there were all those questions the police officer, Eli Bachar, had asked him. He had supposedly come to question him about what had happened, to discuss the accident and shoddy work procedures, but after he had spoken with someone over the phone—Zadik did not hear the conversation, he merely saw Eli Bachar move aside and lower his voice to a whisper—after that, Bachar was asking for a list of the engineers, contractors, technicians, and God knows who else to determine whether this was a case of criminal negligence; that was what he had called it. At first it had seemed as if the whole affair would end with a coroner’s examination, and then all of a sudden the guy was asking questions about Tirzah and her personal life, as if there was some connection. How ironic that in this case, Tirzah had been the most negligent party. Zadik should have explained to Police Inspector Eli Bachar how she had always insisted—this time more than ever—whenever it was one of her husband’s films and the scenery was particularly expensive, that the scenery should stay where it was, and how in this case she hadn’t even agreed to store the scenery in the carpentry workshop until the shooting was wrapped up. Ultimately, even though he was not directly responsible, even Benny Meyuhas could be charged with negligence, as well as Hagar, his assistant and the film’s producer. That police inspector had asked to summon them too, even after Zadik repeated himself several times about Tirzah’s work procedures and how she herself had instructed the carpentry shop workers where to place the scenery, including the marble pillar. Marble! He goes nuts every time he thinks about that marble pillar. What do these people think, that he has piles of money to dish out? All those claims from Benny Meyuhas that an actor performs differently if he’s leaning on a marble column and not a piece of plywood—what bullshit! If it weren’t for those crazy ideas of his, no pillar would have crushed Tirzah’s skull in. He himself was telling them all the time that this insane wastefulness was the mother of all sins. And if he’s already thinking about money, where the hell is Matty Cohen, the guy who had promised to shut down that production? In another forty-five minutes a meeting of department heads was scheduled to take place in his office, and Matty Cohen was expected to attend. But nobody had seen him since yesterday. That stupid production had to be shut down, it had already cost them more than two million—the whole budget for drama—but now they would say it wasn’t the appropriate time, that it wasn’t fitting to stop Benny Meyuhas just when he’d lost his life partner. Zadik himself couldn’t care less whether Tirzah was his legally wedded wife, he was open-minded in these matters, didn’t have any prejudices, and anyway, Benny Meyuhas presented her as his wife, so to him, she was his wife. If only someone could explain to him how those two, Rubin and Benny Meyuhas, had remained friends.
    With women it could never happen, Zadik had told Hefetz that morning before the news meeting when they were discussing the police investigation. Women would hate each other for the rest of their lives. Forever. Only with men could a friendship like that endure. “But even me, as a man, I’m not sure I could handle it,” he had admitted to Hefetz. “I don’t know how I’d manage to remain