The Sea Beach Line (48 page)

She stood up. I didn't.

“Rayna?”

“Yes, Isaac.”

“When I first saw you, I recognized you from Galuth's painting. From the drawing of the painting.”

“I know. You told me.”

“I know now she was your ancestor. Your ancestor who ran away, and did what she wanted to do. But still, to me, it's a painting of you. It brought us together. It's sitting there, on the table. Will you look at it, once, before you go?”

“No. I refuse to.”

“Why?”

“Because.” She started crying. “Because if I see it, I will see what you saw, and I'll tumble right back into our world. I'll believe in it again.” She turned away from me. “Father,” she called. “We can leave now.”

Rayna, her father, and her brothers filed out the door. She didn't look back. The black SUV was parked outside. Rayna's brothers got in the front. She and her father got in the back, and the car pulled away into the dark night.

I walked away without saying anything to Timur or Roman, heading down West Eighteenth Street to the boardwalk. Due to the weather, almost no one was out in the streets, and no one but me went up on the boardwalk. The wind came off the ocean like a derailed train. The cold wind didn't bother me; I was already completely numb. Huge waves crashed on the shore.

“Isaac.
Malchik
.
Malchik
.” I turned, and saw Roman approaching me at a brisk pace. “I want to speak to you.”

“Why?” I said. “What else is there to say?” He was nearly upon me. I stopped walking, and leaned back on the metal railing that separated the boardwalk from the sand. He would catch up to me either way. I was wary, but not scared, exactly; the moment for a double cross had passed. But what more was required of me? Or did Roman want to approach me on his own accord, now that the situation was resolved? Maybe he wanted me to help with some crime.

“For one thing,” he said, “I'd like to express that I am impressed by the way you handled this predicament you found yourself in. Such a pair of balls you have on you. I did not say so today at the library, and I did not want to say so tonight in front of Timur and the rebbe, but I am very proud of you. These men that even I fear, you think nothing of pissing in their faces. And for what? The chance to speak with a pretty girl.” I didn't like the way he said “pretty girl.”

He came up beside me, moving very smoothly for such a stout man. He had spent his life working with his body, and knew how to control it. “Alojzy would have been proud. I myself am proud of you as if you were my own son.” He put his strong arm around my shoulders. I couldn't have moved if I wanted to, so I acted like I didn't want to. Surely Roman hadn't chased me out into the ugly, windy night just to compliment me. But he didn't seem to be mocking me either; he seemed genuine. What did he want?

“Do you have children, Roman?” I asked.

“No. Well, you know, I had a son. In Ukraine. I imagine he's still there.”

“Maybe you should look him up, instead of bothering me. It's cold. I need to get back before the trains stop running.” Roman's grip remained firm on my shoulder.

“Perhaps. But you see, I am here not on behalf of myself, but on behalf of the rebbe. He asked that I deliver a final message to you, after he is gone. I thought it better to wait until we were outside the museum, as it is very private.” This didn't make any sense. If the rebbe had something to say, why didn't he say it himself? Was it something
he didn't want his children to hear? “It is on the subject of sons, as a matter of fact. It is from the Torah, I believe. But I am sure it will not escape a learned young man such as yourself.” Roman reached into his pocket for the message. Then he stopped and hesitated, a sad look on his face.

“Nu?” I said.

“Yes, the message. The rebbe says to tell you: ‘If a son is disloyal and defiant, if he does not heed us, then thereupon the men of his town shall stone him to death.'” I tried to break away, but Roman was too strong. He pulled the screwdriver from his pocket and plunged it into my side. It really felt as if I had been struck with a heavy stone. “Thus you will sweep out the evil from your midst,” I heard him say as I wilted to the surface of the boardwalk. “All Israel will hear and be afraid.” And then, more softly, from somewhere in the spinning distance, just barely audible above my own gasping for air: “I am sorry,
malchik
.”

23

I CAME TO IN
a hospital bed. My brain was soggy and porous. Two other beds were packed into the small room with me, but we were separated by curtains, and I didn't know who lay in them. Behind the curtain I heard a stream of urine hitting a bedpan. A nurse spoke to the patient when he was done urinating, and though I couldn't make out the words, I flinched at her Russian accent.

After a while, a different nurse came in and explained my situation. This was Coney Island Hospital. Two policemen driving up the boardwalk in a patrol car, checking that the beach and surrounding area were completely evacuated before the storm made landfall, had found me and brought me in. I was lucky; they had apparently driven by me once without noticing, but on their return trip their headlight had landed on me for a moment, and I caught one of the policemen's eyes. If I'd stayed out until morning, I could have died of hypothermia or blood loss.

My left kidney was lacerated, though not too deeply. Roman had hit me pretty hard with a flathead screwdriver, but his aim had been a little high, and the edge of my rib had taken most of the impact. The
doctors who had sewn me up wanted to keep me for a couple days of observation, until they could definitively determine that they wouldn't need to open me back up and perform surgery. The phone system was too overloaded to allow personal calls, but I gave the nurse Becca's contact information, and she said someone would call and inform Becca of my location and condition. After her brief explanation, the nurse had to move on. There were numerous car accidents and injuries related to the storm, and the hospital was understaffed due to employees not being able to make it in. The storm was just fully hitting Brooklyn now—we heard the windows rattling behind the heavy plastic curtains—and things were only going to get worse.

A few hours later, a detective came in to ask me some questions about the attack. I told him it was just a run-of-the-mill mugging.

“Coney Island isn't safe,” I said. “I should have known better than to walk down there at night. Maybe a kid from the projects? I don't know. Doesn't matter now. It's done.”

“So the attacker was young?” the detective asked. He was forty or so, with a shaved head. His polo shirt and jacket were damp. He wrote on a pad in a leather case, but the speed and arc of his pen strokes suggested that he was sketching or doodling, not taking notes. “A teenager?”

“I don't know. I didn't get a good look at the guy, because he came up beside me, quick, and he had a handkerchief over his face. Besides, it was dark. And rainy, you know?”

“All right. It was rainy. It still is. Normally bad weather keeps teenage delinquents inside. They'd rather play video games than get their sneakers wet. What race was this attacker?”

“I just told you, I couldn't see his face.”

“What about his hand? What color was that?”

“He had gloves on.”

“Maybe he did have gloves on. See, the officers that brought you in recovered a weapon. A flathead screwdriver with the point filed down sharp, like something from a prison. Your blood was all over it. And there were no fingerprints on the handle. But they could have been wiped, or the rainwater could have cleaned them.”

“Okay.”

“You don't seem very interested in this information.”

“No.”

“If this was a mugging, why didn't he take your wallet?”

“I don't know. You'd have to ask him. Maybe it was his first time. He'll learn.”

“You aren't going to be very helpful, are you, Mr. Edel?”

“No. So you might as well go ahead and get the hell out of my room.” The detective shrugged.

“Hey, it's no skin off my balls either way. You look pretty felony assaulted to me, but if you don't feel like being helpful, I'm just going to write it up as a misdemeanor and let it go.”

A minute or two after the detective left, everything went black. I thought that I was passing out again, but it was just the lights. I was completely vulnerable. Anyone could kill me in the dark. The lights turned back on.

I pulled the IV out of my arm and stumbled out into the hallway. The ground was unsteady under my feet, and I had to lean on the wall as I moved. Down the hall, I found what I was looking for: an unattended nurse's cart. I rifled through it quickly, searching for a scalpel. No luck. There wasn't any particular reason for a surgical tool to be on a nurse's cart. I found a pair of scissors, like a nurse would cut bandages with. The serrated edge was pretty sharp. My gown didn't have pockets, so I slid the scissors into my sock. The excursion took all of my energy, and when I made it back to my bed I slept.

When I woke up again, a Hasidic man was sitting in a chair by the covered window, watching me. The first thing I saw was his long beard, black streaked with gray. I looked up at his eyes, trying to read his intention. Surely he was a Glupsker. How had he found me? Was he here to finish me off?

Pretending to be only half conscious, I slipped the scissors out of my sock under the sheets.

“Come closer,” I said, speaking in an exaggeratedly raspy voice. “I have to say something.”

The man scooted his chair forward and leaned in. When he was close enough, I grabbed him by his beard with my left hand and yanked his head toward me. I took the scissors out from under the covers with my free hand, and held the open blades to his throat. He seemed surprised, but not afraid.

“Why do you want to do that?” he asked.

“Did the rebbe send you to finish the job?”

“Which rebbe? What job? No one sends me here.”

“Don't play dumb,” I said. “The Glupsker Rebbe wasn't satisfied with Roman's handiwork? He wants more blood from me?”

“The Glupsker Rebbe?” The man blinked. “Do I look like a Glupsker?” On closer inspection, the man was dressed a bit more modernly than a Glupsker. He wore a normal-length suit jacket, not a long coat. His hat was a normal fedora, not short brimmed like the Glupskers favored. Still, one couldn't be sure. Roman didn't look anything like a Hasid—he was not only secular, but a muscleman—and he had done the rebbe's bidding.

“Okay,” I said, lowering the pair of scissors, but keeping it in my hand under the covers, in case I needed to pull it again quickly. “Go sit back by the window. Out of reach.” He complied. “So, why
are
you here, if no one sent you? What do you want from me? Are you a policeman or something?” I'd heard rumors that the NYPD had an entire Orthodox division, which filtered through the community. “I told that detective I didn't see anything.”

“No, no, nothing like that. I am a rabbi. I do this as
avodah
, as service. When there are new patients with Jewish names—especially those who have no family or friends visiting them—I come to visit with them. To see that they are all right.” The man had a slight Hebrew accent. My understanding was that Glupskers favored Yiddish, even in Israel, so this was another indication this guy was on the level.

“Well, you've visited me. I'm fine.”

“No, you don't seem fine.” He glanced at my battered body. “A man who is fine doesn't threaten a rabbi with sharp objects.” I ignored his comment.

“If you're not a Glupsker, what kind of rabbi are you?”

“A Torah-observing one.”

“Hasidic?”

“Yes, I'd say so.”

“But what dynasty?”

“I was ordained here in Brooklyn, at the Lubavitcher Yeshiva. But I studied at other yeshivas in Israel, when I first came to Torah. I'm not an adherent of one rebbe, if that's your question.” He smiled. “Certainly not the Glupsker Rebbe.” I wondered why he didn't ask why I was so concerned about Glupskers.

“So you're a
baal teshuvah
?”

“Yes.”

“You weren't raised religious?” Rayna had tried to escape the fold. She had almost succeeded. And this man ran right into the fold. A year ago, when I was reading holy texts at college, I could have imagined myself taking that path. But the opportunity for that in my life was now passed.

“No. I was raised without God. Pure Zionist. My family came from Iraq and Morocco. My Moroccan grandparents did folk things, rituals. My grandfather visited the graves of many
tzadikim
to ask for blessings. My grandfather from Iraq was a Marxist. He believed in the material world only. Yet even his Marx knew that material things would one day melt into air. My parents were good Zionists. I came to Torah on my own after the army. My name is Hayyim, by the way.

“But tell me about your family, Isaac.” I hadn't told him my name, but I recalled that he'd gotten it from the hospital's admission list before he came here. They had gotten it off my ID. The detective had said my wallet was still on me when they brought me in. “Are they religious?”