In the kingdom of the Quiet Bay lived Eitan, a quiet and devoted ship's captain, together with his partner Tamara. Tamara was a woman of iron principles and a heart that knew no compromise. She had a rigid inner law: anyone who had ever said a word out of place, forgotten to invite her, looked at her in a way she could not read or hurt her feelings – was sentenced immediately to be an "enemy for life".
The Black Book
In the black book she kept in her head there were no pages of forgiveness: when her close neighbour did not stop to greet her because she was hurrying to tend to a sick child, Tamara declared: "She is struck out. The wretch, I will never set foot on her doorstep again!"
When Eitan's family did not praise the pastry she brought to the festival meal enough, she forbade them to enter their home: "They are wicked, they killed my soul, as far as I am concerned let them all die!" And when Eitan tried to say that everyone is human and sometimes people make mistakes without meaning harm, she screamed: "You are a traitor! Whoever does not hate my enemies – is my greatest enemy of all!"
The Bridge That Went Up in Flames
Every time she cast out another person, Tamara would go out into their yard, take a burning torch, and set fire to another beam of the wide wooden bridge that connected their house to the rest of the village. Beam after beam, rope after rope – Tamara burned the ties with the neighbours, the bridge to the cousins, the path to the brothers, and the trail to the old friends.
With every fire she felt a small victory of "justice": "Now they will see. Now no one will be able to hurt me again." Eitan stood helpless before the flames, begging her to leave an opening, one small path for talking, but Tamara went on setting fire to every connecting thread.
The Great Winter Day
Until the great winter day came. A terrible storm, the like of which had never been seen, fell upon the bay. The waves threatened to drown the house, the winds tore at the roof, and the fire in the stove went out. The cold was bone-freezing, and the house began to give way.
Tamara ran in alarm to the door of the house to call for help, but when she opened the door – her breath caught. Around their home a black, deep chasm had opened. All the bridges, every one – down to the last beam – were burned and charred.
Across the chasm stood the villagers, the neighbours and the family, wrapped in warm coats, holding ropes and blankets. They wanted to reach out a hand, but there was no path by which they could come near.
Tamara shouted into the wind in rage and tears: "Look at them! They stand there and watch me freezing and do nothing! I knew they were all vile and wicked!"
Then Eitan laid his frozen hand on her shoulder and looked at her with pained, clear-eyed sorrow: "Tamara, look down at the ashes. They did not leave you – you burned their way to you. Every time you demanded an impossible perfection, every time you struck a person out over a human mistake, you burned a bridge of kindness. Whoever declares war on the whole world and casts out everyone around them is not building themselves a fortress of protection – they are building themselves a lonely island of frost and death."
The wind went on blowing over the burnt ash, and Tamara stood at the edge of the chasm.
Whoever is not willing to hold any injury and to forgive any mistake sentences himself to drown in the storm – not because of the wickedness of others, but because of the fire he himself refused to put out.