It was not yet eight in the morning, and already the sidewalk in front of the Faddouls’ establishment was crowded with customers. The pleasant weather had turned humid. The men at the coffeehouse tables mopped their brows with their handkerchiefs, and unstuck their shirt collars from their necks.
Mahmoud Saleh mixed eggs and sugar and milk in his churn, then added ice and salt. He affixed the lid and turned the crank until it felt right. Already an impatient line of school-bound children stood before him, trading taunts and pulling pigtails. Saleh scooped ice cream into tin dishes, kept his eyes on the churn until a whisper of skirts caught his ear.
“Good morning, Mahmoud,” Maryam said.
He grunted his hello.
“It’s going to be hot today,” she said. “And it might rain. Come inside if you need anything.”
Her words were familiar; what was new and surprising was her tone. She sounded exhausted, even defeated. He made no comment, only scooped more ice cream, trading it for coins warmed by small fingers.
More footsteps: another child joined the line. And now the giggling and teasing turned to silence. A girl whispered to her neighbor; someone else whispered back. Saleh heard the word mother and the word dead. The one who’d caused the silence came to the front of the line, and Saleh saw a boy’s short pants and pale knees. Saleh gave him his ice cream, received the barest whisper of a thank you in return.
Maryam said, “One moment, Matthew.” And then in a lower voice: “Are you certain you want to go to school? I could come with you and speak to your teacher . . .” A quiet answer, and then Maryam’s sigh. “Well then, don’t stay out too long afterward. Supper will be at five. We’ll talk more then.” A movement—perhaps a tentative attempt at a hug?—but the boy was already gone, soft footsteps lost in the noise of the street.
Curious despite himself, Saleh went on with his labors. There were only a few more stragglers; those who’d played truant would approach him when Maryam had gone. The line dwindled, ended—but Maryam was still at his side. Likely this meant that she wanted to talk.
At length she said, “That boy worries me so.”
As he’d thought. “Who is he?”
“Matthew Mounsef. Nadia Mounsef’s son. She died, last night. Sayeed and I are caring for him until we can contact his mother’s family.”
He nodded. Were she anyone else, the idea of a Maronite woman taking in an Eastern Orthodox child would have made for scandal, even outrage. But not Maryam. One day, he would work out how she managed it.
“He was asleep when Nadia died. I had to be the one to tell him.” A pause, and then, hesitant: “Do you think he hates me now?”
Saleh thought back to the mothers he’d seen die, and the children who’d blamed him for not saving them. “No,” Saleh said. “Not you.”
“I’m no replacement for Nadia, I know. I thought he should stay home from school, but there’s only so much I can presume. And I have little experience at caring for children.” This last, with a self-conscious offhandedness. After a minute Maryam said, “Have I ever told about how I nearly died, when I was a baby?”
Saleh shook his head.
“I caught a terrible fever, and the doctor told my mother I had little chance. He told her to take me to the Shrine of Saint George, in Jounieh.”
Saleh frowned at the thought of a doctor offering this advice. “I know,” Maryam said, “but she was desperate. Do you know this shrine?” He shook his head. “It’s a pool, in a cave above Jounieh Bay. Where Saint George washed his spear, after slaying the dragon. She took me to the cave, and she lit a candle and dipped me in the water. It was spring then, and the water was freezing cold. The moment I touched the water, I started to howl. And she cried, because it was the first real noise I’d made in days. She knew then that I’d be all right. She told me this story over and over—that Saint George had answered her prayers, and saved my life.”
Saleh could think of any number of explanations for the miraculous recovery. The doctor had made a poor diagnosis; or else the cold water had broken the fever. But he said nothing.
“Childless women go to the shrine too,” Maryam said. “Sometimes I think . . . But I don’t want to ask for his help twice. I feel it would be greedy of me.”
“No it wouldn’t,” Saleh said.
“No? Why not?”
“It’s his duty. A good healer can’t pick and choose. If he can help, then he must.”
A pause. “I hadn’t thought of it like that,” she said, musing. “A good healer. How I wish Nadia’s doctor had been a healer. She might have stood a chance.”
“What did she die of?”
“I can’t remember the name. It was long, and in Latin. But she had pains that came and went, and fevers, and a rash on her face. Dr. Joubran saw it, and he knew right away.”
“Lupus erythmatosus.”
He hadn’t meant to say it. The words had appeared in his mind, and then their echo was hanging in the thick morning air. He’d give all the coins in his pocket, and the churn as well, to take them back again.
He could feel her looking at him, considering him anew. “Yes,” she said slowly. “That was it.”
He tried to ignore the feeling of her scrutiny. “The boy,” he said, staving off the questions. “No father?”
“Not to speak of. He disappeared, peddling out west.”
“His mother’s family will take him in?”
“I imagine so. They haven’t seen him since he was a baby. It seems cruel to make him leave the only home he’s known. But how can he stay here, with no family?” The sigh again. “Maybe he’ll do well in a village, a quieter place than this. At least he’ll be away from the tinsmith’s shop.”
“The tinsmith’s shop?”
“Oh, I don’t mean Boutros! He’s a wonderful man, I only wish he would come out of there and talk to people. No, it’s his partner. The Bedouin.” He felt her sudden tension. “Mahmoud, may I tell you something? I’ve never liked that man. Never. I feel like he’s fooling us all somehow, laughing when our backs are turned. And I could not for the life of me tell you why.” Her voice had a hardness he’d never heard before. “But Matthew adores him, he’d spend all day in that shop if Boutros let him.”
“Don’t.”
“I’m sorry?”
“Don’t let the boy spend time in the shop. With the Bedouin.”
“Why not?” She was closer now, leaning toward him; he turned his head away, looking at the gray pavement, the dim shadow of his cart. “Mahmoud, do you know something about him? Is he dangerous?”
“I don’t know anything.” He picked up the cart’s handle. “But I don’t like him either. Good day, Maryam.”
“Good day,” she said faintly. And he trudged away, up the street, the ice cream in the churn long since melted.
Anna Blumberg stood on a baking-hot roof at the corner of Hester and Chrystie, and peered from behind a chimney at the building across the street. She’d chosen the corner carefully: it was well traveled and convenient, and she could see the stoop clearly. But now, drenched in sweat and wreathed in fumes of tar paper, she was beginning to regret her decision. She blotted her face with her sleeve and willed herself not to gag. If all went as planned—if he actually came with the money—then the misery would be worth it.
But what if he didn’t? What would she do then?
She swallowed against bile and panic, and felt the baby shift below her ribs. Wasn’t it past noon already? Her pocket watch was long since pawned, but she’d checked the clock at the pharmacist’s—
There. A tall man, walking confidently against the crowd. Even at this distance, she knew him instantly. She watched, heart pounding in her throat, as he reached the bottom of the stoop. He looked around, scanning the traffic and the pushcarts, the men chatting on the sidewalk. She resisted the urge to duck behind the chimney. Even if he thought to look up, the sun would be in his eyes, making her near impossible to see. But then, hadn’t she seen him do the impossible already?
From a pocket he took an envelope, thumbed through whatever was inside. She leaned forward, straining to see; but he turned and strolled up the stoop, past the boys that loitered on its bottom steps. At the top he slid the envelope beneath the flowerpot, so graceful and quick that even someone standing next to him might not have noticed. Without another glance he returned to the sidewalk and disappeared around the corner.
Was that it? Could it possibly be that easy?
She hurried down to the sidewalk, then checked up and down the street. Had he doubled back to catch her? No, he was too tall, too noticeable, she would’ve spotted him instantly. Trying to walk calmly, she crossed the street and climbed the steps, ignoring the boys who sniggered at her swollen middle. She crouched next to the flowerpot—not nearly so quick as he, not in her condition—and retrieved the envelope with shaking hands. Inside was a stack of five-dollar bills. She counted: twenty of them. It was all there.
Her own building lay farther down the street, and she cried a bit as she walked there, from exhaustion and relief. For weeks now she’d slept on a dirty pallet in a tiny, windowless room with five other women, three Jewish and two Italian. The pallet was so thin and lumpy that she could barely sleep, and the others all hated her because she got up so often to use the water closet. For this luxury she paid the landlady fifteen cents a day. When she woke that morning, she’d had two dollars to her name.
But for now, at least, her newfound luck was holding: none of her roommates were at home. She could take her time and decide where best to hide the money. And after that, she would go to the fancy cafeteria down the street, and treat herself to a plateful of chicken and a baked potato. She lit the candle they kept in a teacup next to the door and began to search for a likely hiding spot: a gap in a floorboard, or a loose bit of plaster.
“I wouldn’t,” said a voice behind her. “Too easy to discover. Better keep it with you, since you’ve worked so hard to earn it.”
He was standing in the doorway, filling it. In two steps he was inside. He closed the door, slid the bolt home.
Terrified, she scrambled back and struck the wall with her shoulder. The candle fell from its cup and rolled, still lit, across the floor. He bent with that same grace and picked it up, regarding her in its light.
“Sit down, Anna,” he said.
She slid down the wall and sat, her arms shielding her stomach. “Please don’t hurt me,” she whispered.
He gave her a scornful look but said nothing, only glanced about the dark and tiny space. For a moment he seemed uncomfortable, even haunted. “I have no wish to stay here any longer than necessary,” he said. “So, let us talk.”
He sat down and placed the candle upright between them. Even cross-legged on the floor, he towered over her like a magistrate. She began to cry. “Stop it,” he said flatly. “If you have the nerve to blackmail and threaten me, then you can face me without whimpering.”
With an effort she calmed herself and wiped her face. She was still clutching the envelope. If she apologized and gave it back, he might forgive her, and go.
Her fingers tightened, rebelling. The money was her future. He’d have to take it from her.
But he seemed uninterested in force, at least for the moment. He said, “How did you find me?”
“Your shop,” she said in a thin voice. “I went to Little Syria and walked until I saw your name on the sign. Then I watched until you left, to make sure it was you.”
“And you told no one else? You have no accomplices?”
She gave a quavering laugh. “Who would believe me?”
He seemed to accept this, but went on. “Have you blackmailed Chava as well? You might recall she’s the one who injured your lover. I merely saved his life.”
“I remember everything,” she said, ire growing despite her terror. “Although you might recall that I was being beaten half to death at the time.”
“Then answer my question.”
She hesitated—and her unguarded face answered for her. “I see,” he said. “You’re afraid of her. More than of me, it seems.”
She swallowed against a dry throat. “What is she?”
“That’s her secret. Not mine.”
A faint laugh. “And what are you?”
“What I am is not your business. You need only know that, like her, I’m dangerous when angered.”
“Is that so?” She sat up straighter. “Well, so am I. I meant what I said. I will tell the police, if I have to.”
“A strange threat, when the money is there in your hand. Or do you mean to repeat your blackmail, when this first payment is spent? Will you rob me little by little, relying on my discretion and goodwill? Because both have reached their limit.”
“I’m not a thief,” she shot back. “I don’t mean to do anything like this ever again. I only need something to live on until the baby is born and I can find work.”
“And what will you do with the baby? Keep it here?” He glanced around with distaste.
She shrugged. “Give it away, I suppose. There’s plenty of women who want one. Some’ll even pay.” She affected a carelessness she didn’t feel in the least.
“And your lover? He knows of this plan?”
“Don’t call him that,” she snapped. “He isn’t anything to me, or to the baby. Why should I care what he thinks? He told me to get rid of it, that night. Called me a scheming whore and said I couldn’t prove it was his. It would be over between us even if Chava hadn’t—” Her throat tightened. “But that doesn’t make it right, what she did. I heard he can’t even walk now. The doctors say he’ll be in pain for the rest of his life.”
She saw him wince. “Does Chava know this?”
“How should I know? I haven’t even set foot in the bakery since then. I only heard about her marriage from the papers.”
At that, the Jinni went absolutely still. “What marriage?”
“You didn’t know?” She stifled a smile, sensing the upper hand at last. “She married again, very soon after that night. To a man named Michael Levy.” The naked shock on his face emboldened her, made her rash. “He’s a social worker, so of course he’s poor as dirt. But she married him anyway, so there must be something between them, don’t you think?”
“Be quiet,” he whispered.
“And you two seemed so friendly, dancing together—”
“Be quiet!”
He was staring fixedly at the wall. He wore a look she remembered from her father, whenever he heard bad news: as though he was trying to undo the truth by sheer willpower. In that, then, he was no more than just a man. For a moment, she nearly pitied him.
“The money in your hand,” he said, his voice strained. “Consider it a loan. It will be repaid, someday soon. And if any more threats are made against myself—or Chava, or anyone else—they will be answered. My patience with you has reached its end.”
With that, he reached out and put a finger to the candle’s burning wick. The flame erupted, turning to a white-hot jet of fire. She cried out and turned away, covering her eyes. Almost immediately the candle dimmed to its usual glow; and by the time she could see again, he had disappeared.
Around the corner from the Sheltering House lay a nondescript basement tavern called the Spotted Dog. A popular haunt for dockworkers and day laborers, it was nevertheless a quiet place at midafternoon, while the day shift waited for the whistle and the night shift slept off the morning’s excesses. Only two souls were in evidence: the barkeep, who was using the lull to sweep up the old sawdust and spread a new layer; and Michael Levy, who sat at a small table hidden in the shadows.
Michael hadn’t gone out drinking in the afternoon since his school years. Back then, his cohorts’ ideas had never seemed so right-minded, so noble, as when shared over a glass of schnapps. Now, though, he was merely drinking to get drunk. Before him were his uncle’s notes, a not-too-clean tumbler, and a bottle of something that called itself whiskey. It had a slippery taste, like rotting apples. The bottle was now a third gone.
He downed another swallow, no longer wincing at the taste. He’d come here to decide what to do with the papers. Written and dated in his uncle’s hand, they were a liability and an embarrassment. They said things that could not possibly be true. And yet Michael was beginning to believe them.
He’d told the Sheltering House staff that he felt ill, that he was going home for the day. They’d made sympathetic noises, assuring him that they could manage without him until morning. Joseph Schall in particular had insisted he only return when he felt better. A decent fellow, Joseph. He remembered his wife’s probing questions and winced. She’d made it seem as though she suspected him of something; but what if it was the other way around? Had he noticed something strange about her?
Good God, he would go mad if he continued like this.
He sat up straighter, ignoring the swimming sensations in his brain. Perhaps it would be best to treat the whole thing like a mental exercise. He would assume, purely for the moment, that his uncle had not been in the throes of senility, that the papers weren’t merely the fantastic ramblings of a superstitious mind. His own wife was a clay golem with the strength of a dozen men. She knew all his fears and desires. The dead husband—the man she never spoke of—was in fact her master, the man for whom she’d been built.
Suppose all this were true: what, then, would he do about it? Divorce her? Alert the local rabbinate? Go on as though nothing had changed?
He flipped back through his uncle’s notes, searching for the line that had had seized him like a fist:
Will she ever be capable of real love, of happiness? Beginning to hope so, against my own better judgment.
Was that not the crux of the matter? Could he stay married to any woman—flesh or clay—who wasn’t able to love him back?
He took another swig and thought of their first meetings, all those shy smiles and companionable silences. He’d loved her for those silences, as much as for what she said. Before her, he’d met women who thought the way to an intellectual’s heart was through an overflow of conversation. But not his wife. He recalled the silent trip to his uncle’s graveside. She’d said just enough—she’d seemed to understand him, just enough—that he’d hung on every syllable, treated her words like rare jewels. The fact that she was saying exactly what he wanted to hear had only made her remarks seem all the more precious. And when she’d refrained from speaking, he’d taken her silences and filled them with an alluring profundity.
A dull headache was gathering at the front of his skull. He felt the urge to laugh, stifled it with another swig of the liquor. Really, did it matter whether she was woman or golem? Either way, the plain truth remained: he had no idea who his wife really was.
The Jinni stood on the roof of his building, rolling and smoking cigarette after cigarette. The walk back from his meeting with Anna had not even begun to calm him down. He recalled the night he’d stared out Arbeely’s window, impatient to begin his exploration of the city. He should have stayed hidden in the shop, blissfully ignorant. He should have stayed in the flask.
She’d married. Well, what of it? Already she’d removed herself from his life. It changed nothing. So why did it still seem to matter?
For weeks now he’d tried to relegate her to some remote corner of his mind, only to have her reemerge when least wanted. Perhaps he was going about it the wrong way; he’d never tried to forget anyone before. But then, he’d never needed to. Relationships between jinn were altogether different. A tryst could be calm or volatile, could last a day or an hour or years on end—and often overlapped with one another in a way that the residents of Little Syria would find completely amoral—but always they were impermanent. Whether begun out of lust, whim, or boredom, each pairing eventually ran its course, and over the years they all had softened equally in his recollection. Why was it not the same with her, when they’d spent so little time together? A few conversations and arguments, nothing more than that—she’d never even been his lover! And yet the memories refused to lie still, to grow weathered and distant, the way he desperately wanted them to.
Married. To Michael Levy. She hadn’t even liked the man.
He rolled another cigarette, touched the end, inhaled. The iron cuff peeked out from beneath his shirtsleeve, winking at him in the dull afternoon light. He considered it a moment; then carefully, from beneath it, he drew out the square of paper he’d taken from her locket. He opened one fold, so that only a single crease hid the writing from him. The paper was thick and heavy, but still he could see the shadows of the letters on the other side. He could open it and read it. He could drop it into the gutter. He could burn it in his fingers, and scatter the ashes to the wind.
A small hand pulled at his shirt.
He jumped, startled. It was Matthew, manifested from thin air. How did the boy do it? Quickly the Jinni folded the paper again and slipped it back under the cuff.
“I suppose Arbeely sent you,” he muttered. He was having a hard time looking at the boy. The morning’s events had pushed the previous night from his mind, but now it all came rushing back—the tiny parlor room, Matthew’s mother on the couch struggling for breath—and with it an obscure, uncomfortable shame.
The boy shook his head vehemently, then pulled on the Jinni’s shirt again. Puzzled, the Jinni leaned down, heard the small, urgent whisper:
“Bring her back!”
Astonished, the Jinni stared at him. Bring her back? The woman was dead!
“Who told you I could do this?” he said. But the boy spoke no more, only let his expression of stubborn hope say it all for him.
Slowly the realization dawned on the Jinni. This why Matthew had stayed by his side for these months? Not friendship, or admiration, or a desire to learn? The boy had run to him, instead of Maryam, or Dr. Joubran—someone, anyone else, who could’ve truly helped—and all because he’d thought the Jinni could heal his dying mother, as easily as patching a hole in a teapot!
The day’s angers and disappointments roiled inside him. He crouched down, took the boy by his thin shoulders.
“Let me tell you,” he said, “about the souls that go on after death, or are brought back against their will. And this is the truth, not some story told to children. Have you ever seen a shadow that flies across the ground, like that of a cloud? Except that when you look up in the sky, there are no clouds to speak of?”
Hesitantly Matthew nodded.
“That is a shade,” the Jinni said. “A lost soul. In the desert there are shades of every type of creature. They fly from here to there in perpetual anguish, searching and searching. Can you guess what they are searching for?”
Matthew had gone pale and still. He shook his head.
“They’re searching for their bodies. And when they find them—if they find them, if their bones haven’t long turned to dust—they crouch over them, and weep, and make the most horrible noises. Would you like to know what they do then?”
The boy’s frightened eyes were filling with tears. The Jinni felt the first twinge of remorse, but pressed on. “They find the nearest of their kin, and plead with them, asking to help them find rest. But all their kin can hear is a kind of wailing, like a high wind. And all they feel is the cold chill of death.” The Jinni gripped the boy’s shoulders harder. “Is this what you want, for your own mother? To see her soul go howling down Washington Street, and hear her shrieking like a windstorm? Looking for her bones that lie rotting in the ground? Looking for you?”
The boy gave a hiccupping gasp, tore from him, and ran.
The Jinni watched Matthew disappear across the roof, heard his feet clattering down the fire escape. He turned away from the ledge. The boy would go to someone else now: Maryam or Arbeely, or the priest, or one of the sewing women. They would comfort him, dry his tears. And the next time he was in need, he would go to them, and not to him.
Alone, he smoked down the last of his cigarette, letting it crumble to ash between his lips.
Inside the tinsmith’s shop, the mood was grim. Maryam had stopped by briefly while the Jinni was away, to give Arbeely the sad news of Nadia’s death—a death that apparently the Jinni had witnessed.
“He was here earlier,” Arbeely said, confused. “He said nothing of this.”
“Boutros, I have no business telling you who to associate with . . . but isn’t there something strange about him?”
More than you could say, Arbeely thought. “I know he can be difficult—and he’s been in a terrible mood, lately—”
“No, it’s not that.” She hesitated, as if weighing words. “At Nadia’s—it was as though he’d never seen someone ill before. He had no idea what to do. He was holding her, and he looked up at me, and for a moment—Boutros, he didn’t even seem human.” Her eyes turned pleading. “Does that sound awful? Am I making any sense?”
“I think I know what you mean,” he said.
Then Maryam had left, and the Jinni had returned from whatever errand he’d run—but still he’d said nothing about Nadia. Watching him now from across the cramped shop, Arbeely wondered what had happened to their feelings of friendship. Perhaps it was simply too unnatural an arrangement to succeed. Wasn’t that the moral of the stories he’d been told by his mother, his aunts? That the jinn and their kind were meant to be left alone, far removed from flesh and blood? He’d been blinded by the Jinni’s mask of humanity, and had neglected to remind himself that beneath it lay a different creature altogether.
Without warning, the door burst open. It was Maryam again, but she was utterly changed. After a lifetime of empathy and understanding for every soul that had crossed her path, the woman finally looked angry enough to kill.
“You!” She pointed at the Jinni. “Explain yourself!”
The Jinni had risen from his bench; his look of surprise was now replaced by a cold and wary stare. “And what must I explain?”
“Why Matthew Mounsef is now hiding in my storeroom, sobbing and shaking, frightened half to death!”
Arbeely’s heart squeezed at the image. He thought he saw the Jinni cringe as well; but then the Jinni said, “Why should I be the cause? Didn’t the boy’s mother just die? I believe you were there when it happened.”
Maryam inhaled sharply, as though slapped. “I don’t know who you are,” she said, her voice like splintered ice. “You’re not who you say you are, that’s certain. You’ve taken in Boutros, because he’s too trusting for his own good, and you’ve taken in this entire street. But you haven’t fooled Mahmoud Saleh, and you haven’t fooled me. You are dangerous. You have no place here. I knew all this and said nothing, but I won’t stay silent any longer. Any man who would tell a seven-year-old boy that his dead mother’s soul will come looking for her body, and chase him up and down the street—anyone who would do something so cruel deserves neither compassion nor understanding.”
“Oh my God,” Arbeely said. “Is that true? Did you really say that to Matthew?”
The Jinni threw him a glance of wounded exasperation, and Arbeely thought he would explain himself. But then he turned back to Maryam and said, “Yes, that is what happened. I did it for my own reasons. Why should I care whether you comprehend them—especially when, as you say, you’ve disliked me from the start? I never asked for your compassion or understanding, not that you were ever inclined to give them. Neither you, nor Mahmoud Saleh, nor you for that matter,” he said, looking at Arbeely, “may dictate my actions. My life is my own, and I’ll do what I wish.”
A held breath of silence. Like two titanic forces of nature, Maryam and the Jinni stared each other down.
“Enough,” Arbeely said. “We’re through here. Take what’s yours and leave.”
At first the Jinni seemed not to understand. Then he frowned. “I beg your pardon.”
“You heard me. Get out. I dissolve our partnership. You’ll do what you wish, but not here. Not anymore.”
A hesitation, perplexed. “But—the order for Sam Hosseini isn’t finished yet.”
“I’ll explain to Sam,” Arbeely said. “Consider yourself absolved of all responsibility. For you, that shouldn’t be difficult.”
The Jinni looked from Arbeely’s angry glare to the righteous triumph in Maryam’s eyes. “You’re right,” he said. “I’m done here.” He put away his tools, then carefully rolled the unfinished necklaces in flannel and placed them atop the worktable. And then, without so much as a backward glance, he was out the door and gone.
Chava,
A number of unavoidable difficulties have arisen at work, and I’m afraid I have to stay for the night. Don’t worry about supper, I’ll eat at the House. Will see you tomorrow.
Your husband,
Michael
She gave the errand boy a penny and closed the door, then read the note again. Michael had told her once that he’d always fought against staying overnight at the House, afraid that it would become expected of him. She wondered what could have happened, to make him break his rule.
She had only just set the table; now she cleared away the dishes and cups, the bread and schmaltz, the frying pan that sat in anticipation of the liver he’d promised. She paused, her hand on the icebox door. He would expect her to have eaten, of course. Would he notice that there was still as much food as before?
A frustrated anger rose in her—would she always be trying to anticipate his responses? She slammed the icebox shut, harder than she’d meant. If he asked, she would tell him she hadn’t been hungry.
She retreated to the parlor, took up her sewing. At least, for one night, she would not have to try to ignore his fears and desires, or lie awake remembering to breathe. She felt her body relaxing at the thought; in the next moment she was seized with guilt. Her husband was working through the night, and all she could think of was her own comfort. Perhaps she should take him supper after all, to show that she was thinking of him.
She put down her needle and thread, then frowned in rebellion and picked them up again. She would stay home. For just one night, she would return to her old life: sewing alone, with a window between herself and the world.
The Jinni was in his room, trying to decide what to take with him.
He was leaving Little Syria. There was nothing left for him there—and what, really, had there ever been? An occupation for his daylight hours, a place to shelter from rain and snow. No more than that. Still, it surprised him, surveying the tiny room, how little he’d accumulated. A few shirts and trousers, two pairs of shoes, a coat. The awful woolen hat that the Golem had insisted on. The cushions on the floor, bought cheaply and with little enthusiasm. A few hand tools that he’d liberated from the shop, intending to bring them back at some point. The jar that held all his money. The necklaces he’d bought from Conroy. The umbrella with the silver handle. And, in a cupboard, his figurines.
He took them out and lined them up on the writing desk. There were birds and mice, tiny insects built from tinplate, a rearing silver cobra with a diamond-patterned hood. The ibis, stubbornly unfinished, its bill still not quite the right shape.
He pocketed the money and the necklaces, and then, after a moment’s hesitation, the figurines. Immediately he took the figurines out again, and placed them back on the desk. Let the next tenants make of them what they would. What did he need, besides a roof over his head when it rained? Nothing. Nothing at all.
On the street again, he felt energetic, untethered—as though he were back in the desert, free to go wherever he wished. Why had he partnered with Arbeely in the first place? The old rationales seemed flimsy, cowardly even, compared to this freedom. Where would he go? He glanced up: the sky was turning cloudy. Perhaps he would need somewhere to stay for the night. The Bowery? He hadn’t been there in weeks, save to buy necklaces from Conroy.
He passed Matthew’s building, and paused. Perhaps, before he left, he would see his ceiling, one last time.
The lobby was dark and cool, the gas jets not yet lit for the evening. Overhead the tinplate desert shone in early twilight. On the wall nearby, someone had hung a framed copy of the newspaper article about the ceiling. One hopes, the article declared, that the ceiling is only the first of many new civic improvements by this distinguished Syrian talent.
The inverted peaks cast their shadows on the valley floor. His palace, as always, was missing; and he found himself unable to tear his eyes from the spot where it should have been.
All at once his hectic energy drained away. He’d never be completely free of Little Syria, not as long as the ceiling stood. He could rip it down, he supposed, or melt it to a puddle; but the very thought made him cringe. All right, then—they could keep the ceiling. Arbeely would see it, and perhaps remember what the Jinni had done for him and his livelihood. And Matthew—he would see it too.
He returned to the street. Overhead, the clouds were thickening. No more sightseeing; it was time to leave.
On the edge of the neighborhood he passed Saleh, trudging back home with his empty churn. The old man stopped when he saw him, nearly backed himself against the wall.
“Saleh,” the Jinni said. “What did you tell Maryam Faddoul?”
There was fear in the old man’s eyes, but he said, “Nothing she didn’t know already.”
The Jinni snorted. Then he dug in his pocket and came up with the key to his room. He tossed it to Saleh, who caught it, surprised. “A farewell present,” the Jinni said, and told him the address. “It’s paid through the end of the month. I’ll be in the Bowery,” he added as he walked away, “if anyone should find that they need me.”
In his darkened dormitory, Yehudah Schaalman readied himself for another night of hunting. He dressed quietly, padded down the creaking staircase, and crept out the front door.
He’d thought to go north again, back to the park where the dowsing spell had last led him. It seemed less than promising, but what else could he do? He had so little to go on, with these trails appearing and fading at random, like the marks of a restless spirit . . .
The realization exploded through him, and he nearly stopped in his tracks. His quarry, the thing he was looking for: it was a person. The Bowery rooftops, the parks—someone was wandering the city, and Schaalman was following him like a bloodhound. It explained why the trails left off the way they did: having reached his destination, the wanderer would then retrace his steps to his home. Which meant that all Schaalman had to do was find a path and follow it back to its source, and there his quarry would be waiting.
He had no sooner reached this conclusion when, as if by reward, a path appeared beneath his feet. He halted, amazed. He was at the corner of Hester and Chrystie, still in the Jewish neighborhood. He’d walked these streets dozens of times—yet now the street corner glowed in his mind, every concrete inch a fascination. His wandering quarry had passed this way so recently it might have been that very day.
He could have danced in the street, but he forced himself to remain calm. He turned in a slow circle. There: the building on the southwest corner, that was the one he wanted. The front stoop was lit with interest—and so, strangely, was the ill-tended flowerpot next to the door. But there the trail ended. The door itself was merely ordinary. So: his quarry had climbed these steps, perhaps for a conversation, or to see if someone was at home, and then set off again. But where?
He wandered down the stoop again, letting his feet direct him. Halfway up the block was another building, shabbier than the first—and at this one, the trail did not stop at the door. Cautiously he entered the lobby, his shoes slipping on filthy tile. The trail drew him up a dark and treacherous staircase that led to a cabbage-smelling hallway, and at last to a particular door. He pressed his ear to the wood, but heard no voices, only what might have been breathing.
As he stood debating whether to knock, someone emerged from the water closet in the stairwell. He retreated down the hallway and watched as a pregnant woman in a white nightgown navigated sleepily toward the very door that had grabbed his interest. The aura that surrounded her was so strong it drew his gaze like a compass-hand. “Excuse me,” he said.
He’d spoken quietly, but she jumped nonetheless. “Good God,” she panted, one hand to her swollen belly.
“I wonder if you can help me, I’m looking for a friend.” He paused to think, plucked a name from the dark. “Chava Levy?”
The woman seemed to shrink from the name. “I haven’t seen her in months,” she said, fear and suspicion weighing her voice. “Why are you looking here?”
“I was told she might have come this way. By a mutual friend.”
“Ahmad? Did he send you?”
He took the lead she’d offered. “Yes, Ahmad sent me.”
She scowled. “You might have said so. Tell him he won’t get his money any more quickly by hounding me. And you, old man, you ought to be ashamed of yourself! Frightening a pregnant woman in the dark!”
Her harangue was growing louder. Soon someone would hear, and investigate. The time for subtlety was over. He gripped her wrist, as he had with each of the rabbis. For a moment she tried to pull away; then she went still.
He asked, Who is Ahmad?
And before she could open her mouth to reply, a vision shot through his mind: a searing light, an immense singular flame, burning with the strength of an inferno.
He dropped her wrist and stumbled back, trying to rub the light from his eyes. When he could see again, she was watching him with wary suspicion, oblivious to what had happened. “Are you all right?” she asked.
He pushed past her to the staircase, and fled in the darkness.
On the street again, he paused, breathing deeply in the damp air. What was that, in her mind? A flame that burned like the fires of Gehenna, a flame that was somehow alive—but she had called it Ahmad, talked about it as though it were a man! How did this make sense? Was there another force at work here, something beyond his own considerable understanding?
Ahmad. He wasn’t even sure what sort of name it was.
At the Spotted Dog, the nighttime crowd was turning raucous and unruly. Already three patrons had been tossed out for fighting. But Michael, at his table in the corner, was roundly ignored. He wondered what he looked like to the regulars, the muscled factory workers and dockmen. A cowardly, henpecked bureaucrat, afraid to face the long walk home? Not far from the truth, he supposed.
He sifted through his uncle’s notes again, his eyes skittering over the formulae and diagrams. He had sent the message to his wife at seven-thirty; it was now passing eleven o’clock. He’d dispensed with the tumbler and was now drinking the dubious whiskey directly from the bottle. Reason still insisted that the notes were full of delusions, the products of old age and superstition—but the battlements of his reason were crumbling.
He took one last pull from the bottle, then picked up the papers, stumbled out to the alley, and vomited. It made him feel no better. He wove through the alley and back to the Sheltering House. All was dark and quiet; he’d missed lights-out. In his office, he opened an overflowing desk drawer and stuffed his uncle’s notes inside. To Bind a Golem to a New Master, screamed the one on top. He grimaced and slammed the drawer shut.
The room was spinning. He had nowhere else to go, no destinations in his life besides the Sheltering House and his now dubious home. And what about friends? He’d neglected them all, drifted away in a fog of work and exhaustion. There was no one left on whom he could impose, for conversation or a couch to sleep on. He needed someone willing to listen without judging, who could observe with a clear and sympathetic eye.
Joseph. He could talk to Joseph, couldn’t he? The man was as close to a friend as he had these days. Even through the alcohol, Michael knew that to wake an employee for a heartfelt outpouring in the middle of the night was beyond the bounds of acceptable behavior. Still, he forged up the stairs to Joseph’s dormitory.
Joseph’s cot was empty.
He stood in the restless dark, feeling obscurely betrayed. What business could Joseph have elsewhere at this hour? He sat down on the cot. Perhaps Joseph had gone for a walk to escape the dormitory heat. Nevertheless, a prickle of suspicion gathered like an itch. He thought of his wife asking after Joseph, and the measly bits of information he’d been able to tell her. Why had she been so interested in him?
He had never before invaded the privacy of any of his guests. There were men all around him who might wake and watch. But now, with one eye on the hallway door, he rummaged beneath Joseph’s cot. His hand encountered the handle of an old-fashioned carpetbag. He drew it from beneath the bed, wincing as it scraped the floor. It smelled old and musty, as though it had been stored beneath innumerable cots for generations. The latch creaked open at his touch. Inside were a few articles of clothing, neatly folded, and an old prayer book. That was all. No photos of relatives, no mementos or trinkets of home. Was this all Joseph owned in the world? Even for the Sheltering House, this was a meager collection. Michael might have felt a surge of pity, except that Joseph’s strange absence made the lack of belongings seem sinister—as though the man didn’t truly exist.
He knew he should put the carpetbag back and leave, but the liquor and his mood made him feel disinclined to move. He took the prayer book from the bag and began to leaf through it, as though it might tell him what to do. The moonlight caught its edge; and the ordinary prayer book transformed, became ragged and burnt. What he’d thought were prayers were now formulae, spells, incantations.
He turned the pages with growing disbelief. He had come to Joseph for reassurance, and found this instead? His uncle, his wife, and now this: it was as though they were conspiring against him, making him doubt everything he knew to be true.
On one page, smeared with what looked like dried mud, he read, in a slapdash handwriting he recognized as Joseph’s:
Rotfeld’s desires in a wife: Obedience. Curiosity. Intelligence. Virtuous and modest behavior.
Obedience innate. Intelligence the most difficult. Curiosity the most dangerous—but that is Rotfeld’s problem, not mine.
And then, farther on:
She is complete. A fine creation. Rotfeld sails tomorrow for New York.
She will make him an admirable wife, if she doesn’t destroy him first.