Shadows of Berlin полностью

“I’m not. She doesn’t know I’m here. Nobody knows.”

Now he faces her with a mild frown. “So why then?”

“Won’t you sit, Mr. Williams? It’s hurting my neck looking up at you.”

His expression says he’d rather not. But maybe he’s just too well mannered, so he sits, leaving a few steps separating them.

“I’m sorry to hear about Mr. Yaakov,” she says. “About his heart attack.”

The frown stays. “How’d you know about that?”

“The boy with the glasses told me.”

“Pete,” says Tyrell.

“What?”

“That’s the name of the kid with the glasses. Pete.”

“Were you there when he died?” she asks.

“There? I was playing him,” Tyrell says with a small snort at grim fate. “We were in the middle of a game.”

“A rematch?”

“I guess you could call it that.”

“It must have upset you.”

He shrugs at this. Maybe, maybe not. “It’s not like I’d never seen a person die before.”

“The boy said that chess pieces flew everywhere.”

“Yeah, well. That’s true. What’s also true is that I was getting creamed. Lucky for me, the old man dropped dead before I had to resign.” He says this and then removes a chess piece from his pocket. The black king.

“This was yours?”

“Nah. This was his.”

“Oh. So you were white,” says Rachel.

And now Tyrell surrenders half a smile. “Yeah. I was white.”

“And this is your trophy?”

“Not trophy,” Tyrell decides, absently twirling the king by its crown. “More like a memento mori I guess you could call it.” A talisman of the dead.

Rachel pauses and expels smoke from her cigarette before she says, “Naomi is still very devastated,” she says.

Tyrell expels a heavy-­bottomed sigh. “Mrs. Perlman…”

“Please call me Rachel.”

“She doesn’t understand.” He’s certain on this point.

“No? She’s very smart.”

“Not about this. Naomi is wonderful. Beautiful. Brilliant. Yes, I know. But she has no idea what it would be like for us in the long term. What it would be like for us out of the bubble we’re in. Here, things are easier. Possible. But the world is not Greenwich Village.”

“No. The world is Mississippi.”

“Exactly,” Tyrell agrees.

Rachel agrees. She nods lightly, but she has started staring blankly at the pavement.

“Rachel?” he asks.

She looks up at the sound of her name. “Ikh bin mit kind,” she says aloud.

Tyrell blinks. Shakes his head as if he’s gone deaf maybe. “I’m sorry, what did you just say?”

“I’m with child,” Rachel repeats, this time in English. “I’m going to have a baby, and I’ve told no one. Not even my husband.”

Tyrell looks flummoxed. “Yet you’re telling me?”

“I tell you because you will understand why I’m so terrified. I’m terrified because the world is Mississippi and sometimes worse. Because it eats children alive. Poisons them. Burns them up and casts their ashes into the pits.” She shakes her head, smears the dampness from her eyes. “It’s just so strange. And so frightening. To have another human being, separate from you, yet growing inside you.”

“You should tell your husband,” says Tyrell. “He’s got a right to know.”

She nods. “Yes. I’m sure you’re correct,” she agrees. Then, “What time is it?” she asks and then balks at the answer. “Oh, I have to go. I have an appointment. Thank you for listening to me. And for your understanding.”

“Sure,” Tyrell tells her. “Sure.” Covering it all.

“And you should think about calling Naomi. I believe the two of you need each other. More than you are willing to see.”

He straightens. Expels a breath. Gazes off toward the tall marble arch. “Yeah,” he answers quietly. “Sometimes… I dunno. Sometimes I think that’s true. How stupid are people in love, Mrs. Perlman,” he wonders.

She sticks out her hand to shake, like at the end of the chess game. He takes it.

“How stupid is the world, Mr. Williams,” she answers.

It’s been how long? A week since their argument in the Orchard Café? But the telephone call came, as Rachel knew it would. “Nisht gefonfit, Feter!” she’d insisted. No hedging. No double-­talk. She wanted an apology.

So here they are, not at one of her feter’s usual preserves but at the Bickford’s on East 23rd Street. Bickford’s, where the grisly yellow fluorescent lighting competes with the daylight washing through the tall glass windows. Rachel is reserved. Maybe she is here for his apology, but what is he here for? The coffee steams in a cheap ceramic Bickford’s cup. It tastes overcooked and slightly vinegary. A skim of oil greases the dark-­brown surface with a purplish rainbow. Feter dumps sugar into it, gulping it down, drinking it like a punishment. He speaks to her now in Yiddish.

“I must make an admission, Rokhl.” Du bist geven gerekht. “You were correct,” he says. “I was attempting to exploit your talent. It’s true, and I only hope you can forgive me,” he tells her. “But it is also true that you have your mother’s gift. And I do believe,” he says carefully, “that for your good, and yes, for my good as well—­I can find a gallery for your work.”