The Fifth Servant (53 page)

           
The mood was black.

           
And I wondered if next time, perhaps I could get an easier job—say, working for Rabbi Gans’s cousin, the one who specializes in making gunpowder.

           
THE K LAUS S HUL WAS PACKED with worshippers, huddled close for warmth, and Rabbi Loew’s face was glowing from the flames of twenty candles as he led the congregation in prayer. But the people hung their heads and mumbled their responses.

           
Then the rabbi’s voice shook the rafters like a trumpeter’s blast: “We must not cower in constant fear,” he said, “nor give in to despair and hopelessness. We must never lose our courage in the face of oppression, for as the Sages say,
as long as a man breathes, he should not lose hope.

           
“It would do us all good to remember how many times the Jews were saved on the third day of a crisis: Joseph freed his brothers from captivity on the third day, Jonah was delivered from the fish’s belly on the third day, and
Moyshe Rabbeynu
received the Torah on the third day at Mount Sinai. The Midrash also comforts us with the promise that
God does not allow His righteous to remain in dire straits for more than three days
.

           
“But if the worst should come to pass, we need not fear dying for the Sanctification of His Name. There is only
one thing
that we need to fear, and that is the deceitful parasites who live among us and who line their purses by collaborating with the authorities at the expense of the rest of the community. Such hypocrites are
worse
than any other kind of sinner.”

           
He stopped. “Why?” he asked.

           
The word echoed around the vaulted chamber.

           
“I’ll tell you. Because the man who commits a sin might actually believe that what he is doing is right, but the hypocrite
knows
that what he is doing is evil, yet he publicly pretends that it is for the good of all.”

           
A few people were sidling conspicuously toward the exit, but Rabbi Loew wasn’t finished with them yet.

           
He lashed out at his detractors, saying, “And by far the lowest form of hypocrite is the
moyser
.” The informer. “Even the great rationalist Rambam—may his light shine on—says in his
Mishneh Torah
that it is permissible to kill a
moyser
, and that it is even permissible to execute this sentence
before
he has informed.”

           
Incredulous murmurs rustled through the rows of benches.

           
But Rabbi Loew didn’t give them a chance to object. “And on this night, one begins the counting of the Omer,” he said, returning to the order of the service.

           
The Omer. Forty-nine days that often coincide with disaster for the Jews. The Crusades and countless other massacres, and all the plagues that have befallen us, always seem to come out of winter hibernation right about now, all rested and ready to inflict maximum damage on the populace. So it’s really a time to hold our breath and count the days, hoping that if we make it all forty-nine days to Shvues we might actually stand a chance of surviving another year.

           
When the service ended, I straightened up the chairs and benches and swept the aisles as quickly as I could, and begged the rabbi to let me go and speak to Freyde and Julie Federn.

           
“That can wait.”

           
“Then at least let me talk to Reb Meisel.”

           
But he said, “Shabbes isn’t over yet, and I expect you to attend the second Seder.”

           
I could see that it was futile to insist.

           
The sky outside was blanketing the cemetery in a magical shade of purple. It was the
time of favors
, a mixture of holy and regular time when it is neither day nor night, when God is at His most merciful, a time that lasts until three stars appear in the sky.

           
So Rabbi Loew and I put aside all other thoughts and recited solemn and mystical prayers as we plodded through the streets to his house, while the twilight came and went in the blink of an eye, without stopping to let us grasp at its magic.

           
HANNEH THE COOK BROUGHT IN a silver tray of yesterday’s
gefilte
fish, which she had garnished with tarragon in the Bohemian style, and set it on the Lord’s table, which is made holy by the family gathering around it.

           
Sixteen people crowded around the table, and there was still an empty seat for our fallen comrade. And Lord knows what deprivations Yankev was suffering at that moment.

           
Poor Anya wasn’t even supposed to be here. But since she was trapped inside the ghetto with us, she had fallen into her regular role as Christian servant girl, watching the Seder with fascination.

           
The rabbi’s granddaughter Eva came around and filled our glasses with wine. We washed our hands, bowed our heads, and said the blessings, then Rabbi Loew broke the matzoh and passed it around the circle.

           
Rabbi Loew also said a special prayer for Emperor Rudolf, whose intervention had secured the release of Freyde and Julie Federn.

           
The two women looked waxen and haggard, but they managed weak smiles when Anya brought them both steaming mugs of tea. They both had sworn that they didn’t tell the Christian authorities anything that could be used against the community. And now they sat at our table wearing borrowed clothes, with their whole bodies shaved like the captive Joseph preparing for an audience with Pharaoh.

           
Rabbi Loew conducted the meal as if it were a continuation of the
minkhe
service and we were his congregation.

           
“The Sages tell us that our fathers were freed from slavery because they kept themselves apart and did not try to adopt Egyptian customs,” he said. “But the danger is even greater these days, when the fashion is to act like the
goyim
.”

           
Rabbi Isaac Ha-Kohen and Avrom Khayim nodded in agreement.

           
Rabbi Loew went on: “Although we are dispersed throughout the world, we must remain a people dwelling alone, and limit our contact with the nations of the world, and not try to imitate their ways, or we will lose our identity as a people.”

           
Anya was leaning against the doorframe with one foot in the kitchen and the other in the dining room, and I could only wonder if the rabbi knew something about his young pupil’s budding relationship with the
Shabbes goye
.

           
Then Rabbi Loew looked around the table and warned us that such dalliances would delay the coming of the Messiah.

           
“But Rabbi, the
Seyfer Hasidim
—” I started over, repeating the title for Anya’s benefit: “The Book of the Pious says that any Jew who marries a non-Jewish woman who is kind-hearted and charitable will find her to be a better wife than a woman who is Jewish by birth but who lacks these virtues.”

           
My eyes met Anya’s.

           
“But you are talking about when a member of a foreign tribe becomes a Jew,” said Rabbi Loew. “That is a completely different matter. See what happens when you don’t take the time to stop and replenish yourself? Your mind is losing its sharpness, Ben-Akiva.”

           
“Have some more
gefilte
fish,” said Perl, serving out another portion, as if more food were the solution to my problem.

           
I obliged the rabbi’s wife and accepted the second helping of fish. But soon it was time to end the Seder.

           
“Next year in Jerusalem,” said Rabbi Loew. “
Borukh atoh Adinoy
, Lord our God, Ruler of the Universe, Who creates the fruit of the vine. Amen.”

           
Then we switched to Yiddish and everyone took a turn with a verse, beginning with Young Lippman:

           
“Mighty is He. He will build His temple soon—”

           
“Speedily in our days,” said Eva, finishing the phrase.

           
“Soon, soon,” said Peshke the street cleaner.

           
“Soon, soon,” said Samec the
mikveh
attendant.

           
“God build His temple,” said Avrom Khayim.

           
“Speedily in our days,” said Freyde and Julie, with surprising strength. Some of the color had come back to their faces, and I wondered what miracle had brought about this swift recovery. “Soon, soon.”

           
“
Omeyn
!”

           
The tea that Anya brought them appeared to do a world of good.

           
The clattering of dishes aroused me from my ruminations, and my glance fell on the mugs of tea that Anya was removing from the dining table. She caught my eye and signaled to me, so I got up and followed her into the kitchen and over to the washbasin, where she handed me one of the mugs. When I didn’t do anything with it, she held it right under my nose. The dregs of the tea smelled bitter, and the pale green leaves stuck to the sides of the mug. I pulled one away and examined it. It seemed to be a wet leaf like any other.

           
Anya told me in a low voice that she had learned that Jacob Federn had been secretly supplying these herbs to a number of women in the ghetto who were using them to treat the symptoms of melancholia.

           
“I didn’t realize there was an epidemic of melancholia in the ghetto,” I said.

           
“Ghetto life can be very frustrating for a lot of women.”

           
“But why all the secrecy? What’s so special about these herbs?”

           
“Janek was sneaking them into the country so he wouldn’t have to pay any taxes on them.”

           
So these were the famous goods that Janek and Federn were distributing in their illicit partnership.

           
“So what do we do now, Mr. Investigator?”

           
“That depends. What news did you bring me about the locks on Janek’s doors?”

           
“I did better than that. I brought you one of his keys.”

           
WE STARTED WITH THE HOUSE at the sign of the Fat Milk Cow at the lower end of Embankment Street. Poor drainage had turned the alley into a marshland, and we had to slog through several inches of brackish water to reach the doorstep. I knocked on the soggy wooden planks, and my knuckles came away covered with greenish flecks of mold. I was brushing the mold off my fingers when the door opened, and I found myself staring into the fearful, pleading eyes of the woman who had come to Rabbi Epstein on Friday morning seeking protection from her husband’s cruelty.

           
Who knows what pain we could have prevented if we had only responded sooner?

           
A young girl who must have been her daughter was sitting on a wobbly stool sewing a patch on a rather tatty pair of leggings. Maybe it was the dim light, but she appeared to turn a little green when she saw me, and she hopped off the stool and ran into the other room.

           
“Yes, I must be quite a sight in these muddy clothes,” I said, ducking my head under the doorframe and stepping inside.

           
The woman’s name was Havvah, and she said that her husband the locksmith would be home any minute. The Fettmilchs’ front room was cold, and saturated with the kind of moist, chilly air that penetrates the bones. It was barely illuminated by a damp wood fire that produced little heat but plenty of smoke, and soot coated the furniture like the drifting remnants on the day after the plague of darkness.

           
This weak flower of womanhood didn’t stand a chance under these conditions, and it’s a good thing Anya was there, because Havvah wouldn’t even
look
at me.

           
So the two women huddled together by the fire and whispered things not fit for a man’s ears while I sat on the wobbly stool and soaked up the heavy sense of depravation permeating the room. I wondered how many houses felt this dreary, whether in the ghetto or among our Christian neighbors, then I closed my eyes and tried not to think about the minutes ticking away. I even started rocking back and forth and reciting the tractate Sanhedrin just to keep myself occupied.

           
I had made it all the way up to the words,
If one comes to kill you, be first and kill him
, when Anya tapped me on the shoulder and said, “I can tell that something truly awful has happened to her, but she can’t bring herself to tell me what it is.”