Lieberman's Law (5 page)

“First, Rabbi,” said Lieberman. “I am here in my capacity as building committee chair. Calling me was a logical thing to do.”

“But the repair of desecration doesn't come under the building committee,” said Rabbi Wass. “At least I don't think so. You are a policeman. I called you. There is no precedent. I mean no precedent in our congregation, not in my father's time, not in my …”

They entered the rabbi's study, bookshelves along both walls, desk near the window, small conference table near the door. Seated at the end of the conference table, looking up at the two men who had entered, was Albert Timms. Albert was very black and very old and remembered being hired by the Old Rabbi Wass when the old temple in the converted grade school had opened. The present Rabbi Wass had been a toddler when the Old Rabbi hired Albert Timms.

Albert always wore clean, sturdy blue slacks, a crisp, clean denim shirt—except on Jewish holidays when he dressed up and on Sundays when he went to the same Baptist church he had gone to on Harrison Street since long before his wife died more than twenty years ago. Albert had suffered at least two heart attacks, but Dr. Ira Shulman, cardiologist at Rush-St. Luke's and member of the Temple Mir Shavot congregation, had said that retiring Albert Timms would probably kill him faster than letting him continue to work.

“I didn't do that,” Albert said as soon as he saw Lieberman come through the door. “Had nothing to do with it, Mr. Lieberman. You know that.”

“That, Mr. Timms, I am very sure of,” said Lieberman.

Albert looked relieved. Lieberman moved behind Albert Timms to the rabbi's desk, picked up the phone, and dialed a number he got out of the small address book in his pocket. The custodian and the rabbi exchanged looks of confusion and fear as Lieberman dialed.

“Detective Benishay,” Lieberman said. “Thanks.” Lieberman put his hand over the mouthpiece and said, “We're in luck. He's there. If … ,” and then he removed his hand from the mouthpiece and said, “Leo, Abe Lieberman. I'm over at Mir Shavot. We've had some overnight vandalism. You think you can take the call yourself? … Good … I'm here with Bill. A favor: no sirens, no lights, no marked car. Good.”

He hung up and looked at the two men. “He'll be right over. You and Mr. Timms just sit down, don't come out and touch anything. Detective Benishay will be here soon to have a look.”

“Abraham, there have been threats,” said the rabbi softly, hands folded before him.

“Threats?” asked Lieberman.

“Since the madman in Israel murdered those praying Arabs. I've had calls, against me, against the congregation, against the temple.”

“And you didn't tell me? Didn't call the police?” Lieberman asked with a weary sigh.

“Many rabbis, many congregations have received such threats over the years. Even Jewish schools and community centers. There have just been more since the shameless massacre. And until this … Should I call Mrs. Lieberman?” asked the rabbi.

“Yes,” said Lieberman.

Bess Lieberman, Abe's wife, was the president of Mir Shavot, a job Abe had deftly maneuvered to her when it looked as if he were going to be backed into the position. Bess had proved, as Abe knew would be the case, that she was a much better president than he would have been. Thin, well groomed, and looking fifteen years younger than her fifty-eight, she had been a rallying dynamo, attending meetings, pushing the building committee that Abe had been tricked onto, mediating disputes, raising funds, and taking care of their own two grandchildren.

Lieberman returned to the chapel and looked across the aisles at his partner who shook his head. Hanrahan had not found the missing Torah.

“I'm going to find whoever did this,” said Lieberman, turning his eyes to an unfurled Torah, the sacred first five books of the Jewish Testament, the holy word.

“
We're
going to find him,” Hanrahan corrected.

Lieberman nodded. There was nothing to say. Mir Shavot was a Conservative congregation and Lieberman had really only become an active member a decade ago when he was fifty. His grandfather had been a stern Orthodox Jew, complete with long black coat, hat, and beard. His grandfather, his mother's father, had refused to speak the language of America just as he had refused to speak Russian in the old country. He spoke and read Hebrew in his prayers and spoke Yiddish in his home and that of Abraham's mother and father. He had insisted that the boy and his older brother, Morris, accompany him to services, hours of standing and sitting, praying in a language the boys didn't understand, dreading the knock of their grandfather at the door to take them back to the mysterious boredom of the synagogue on the West Side. Neither Abe nor Maish had ever had faith. And when their grandfather had died, and old men and an ancient rabbi had told them that their grandfather had been a great and pious man, both boys decided that they had seen their last days as practicing Jews.

When he had married Bess, who came from a Conservative Jewish family, they had agreed that she would continue her practice and he would be left alone. At first he had joined her in only a few annual social events. Then he had decided to accompany her once to Friday night services, just to see if it brought back the same feelings, the ghost of his grandfather.

There were no ghosts at the service. There was almost as much English as there was Hebrew and though he thought he would feel uncomfortable at praying and thanking a God in whom he did not believe, Abraham Lieberman found himself briefly at peace. He could still read the Hebrew he had learned more than thirty-five years earlier. He still could not understand what he was reading, but it gave him a meditative calm, and gradually, it put him at peace with the ghost of his grandfather. There were even times when Lieberman had gone to services alone, especially when the horror and pain he was forced to witness in his work made him wonder at the meaning of his own life. There were never answers, but there was solace and comfort.

And now, he looked around the chapel, his refuge, and knew the fear, memories, and images of the Holocaust would slap each member of the congregation, would sting.

Leo Benishay arrived speedily with a team of photographers and techs and they set to work, Leo giving Abe a sorrowful and sympathetic look as he surveyed the damage. Leo Benishay was a devout Jewish atheist, as Abe had once been, but he would work at this because, atheist or not, he was a Jew and he was a good cop. That, however, was not going to stop Lieberman from finding who had done this in the very room where his grandson was to be bar mitzvahed, the room where he had found some peace. What Lieberman felt was more powerful than Hanrahan's rage; it was a resolve that no one could be allowed to come into his home and that of his people, and get away with doing this. No one. Somewhere in the Torah it was written that the wrath of the Lord could, when He deemed it, be swift, powerful, and without mercy.

Even if the Lord didn't tell him what to do, and Lieberman was certain that the Lord would not since He had never done so before, he would emulate the Lord.

And then, in the middle of the desecration, he thought of Eli Towser, the unforgiving rabbinical student he had fired no more than an hour ago. And Lieberman knew that even with what he saw about him now, he would still have fired the wild-eyed young man.

Within half an hour, they began to come to Mir Shavot. The first to arrive were Abe's brother, Maish, an older, heavier, even sadder version of Abe, and Maish's wife, Yetta. With them were the Alter Cockers, the klatch of old Jews and one Chinese, Howie Chen who, it had been established long ago, was a distant cousin of Iris Huang, Hanrahan's fiancée. Terrill, the new short-order day cook, was with the Alter Cockers, Terrill had spent three years in Stateville on a drug count. Lieberman had set up the job for Terrill after his release, and he turned out to be the best short-order cook the T & L Deli had ever had.

“Clean-up squad,” said Syd Levan.

“Let's get to work,” said Herschel Rosen, a gnome in a Cubs baseball cap.

“We're ready,” said Al Bloombach, who suffered from asthma, was almost eighty, and shouldn't have been there.

“Howie's kids and a few of the grandchildren are coming over,” said Syd. Howie Chen nodded solemnly.

“We've got to wait till the Skokie police are done with the photographs and fingerprints,” said Lieberman, holding back the rising number of congregation members and friends who were now choking the corridor.

“Leo,” called Herschel Rosen.

Leo Benishay stepped through the door into the corridor and looked at the growing throng. Bess was trying to get through with a group of women, some of whom were the wives, daughters, and granddaughters of the men who had first arrived.

“Mr. Rosen,” Leo called back. “If everyone will just wait a minute or two more …”

“I was at his bris,” Herschel told those around him. “He was a little pisher. Now he's a policeman giving orders.”

“We've got the photographs,” said Benishay softly to Lieberman. “No point in trying for prints except on the things that were torn and thrown around. Lab says the walls are so full of prints it would take us forever to get them and check them against the FBI lists and we'd have to fingerprint every member of this congregation. My men are gathering the things that have been tossed and torn. We'll call the FBI and have them go over them. Might take some time.”

“Take some time?” Lieberman said, as Bess made her way through the crowd and moved to her husband's side taking his hand.

“Five synagogues were attacked last night,” said Benishay, suddenly looking very haggard. “This one and four in the city. One in your district, B'nai Zion. The FBI is going to be very busy.”

“So …?” asked Lieberman.

Benishay shrugged. “We seal off the chapel. Wait for the FBI. They give the OK and your people can clean up.”

Rabbi Wass suddenly appeared from his sanctuary. The noise level was high. An old woman in the back was shouting something about Arabs. Wass looked at Bess, who took him in her arms and said, “Be strong, Rev. Be strong.”

Rabbi Wass shook his head, wishing his father were here, that his father were still the rabbi of Mir Shavot, but he was over a thousand miles away in Florida with a weak heart. Wass shook his head and stood up straight.

“The police still have work to do,” Bess shouted. She was wearing a yellow dress, her cleaning dress. Her short silver hair was perfectly in place and she had taken a moment to put on makeup while she made her phone calls.

Some in the front heard her. Those in the back shouted, talked.

“Please,” shouted Rabbi Wass. “Quiet.” They grew silent.

“The police still have work to do,” Bess repeated. “They'll tell us when we can start cleaning up.”

“What did they do?” shouted someone.

“Graffiti on the walls,” said Lieberman. “Some pews and prayer books damaged. The podium on the bema smashed.” Lieberman looked over at the rabbi who adjusted his glasses and stood erect.

“They destroyed three of our Torahs,” Rabbi Wass said. People gasped. A woman began to weep. “And they stole the velvet Torah.”

Now there were wails, people clutching each other in confusion and fear, a few, both young and old, with a look of anger on their faces Lieberman had never seen before. Herschel's daughter Melody stood at her father's side. She was a quiet woman, who had lost her husband in a car accident almost ten years earlier. Now she worked at Bass's Department Store on Devon not far from Maish's T & L. There was anger, death, and determination clear and frightening on her face.

“We'll go into the small chapel,” said Rabbi Wass. “I think we can all fit. Mr. Timms can bring extra chairs.”

“And what do we do there?” said Bloombach in asthmatic exasperation.

“We pray,” said Rabbi Wass. “We pray, talk, and wait and let the police do their jobs.” There was some grumbling but they had all heard. When giving his sermons the usually soft-spoken rabbi could project with clear enunciation.

“When will it end for us, Abe?” Syd Levan said, as he filed past with the rest.

“Probably never,” said Lieberman.

Syd, the youngest of the Alter Cockers, had lost a son who had moved to Israel and become a soldier and the victim of a terrorist bomb. He shook his head and looked very old.

Maish, a bulky bulldog with sad eyes, had not prayed or come to a service since the murder of his own son by a robber a year earlier. Not only that, but his pregnant daughter-in-law had been shot and lost her baby, Maish's grandchild. He paused when the others were finally in the chapel. He and God were engaged in a bitter feud, a feud which helped to give some sense of meaning to his damaged life. He had lost his faith in God as a young man, regained it before his brother and had it still, but he no longer believed that he could understand the pain of the innocent, which God could stop. He would not quite pray at home, alone, but he would talk to God, imagining answers to his questions, debating them, pointing out God's errors in thinking. It sustained him.

Benishay had returned to the large chapel. Bess and Abe stood facing Maish and the Chen clan.

“Why don't you all go back to the T & L?” Bess said, taking her brother-in-law's hand and looking at the Chens and Yetta who, she was certain, did not wish to pray in the small chapel. “I'll personally call as soon as the police let us clean up.”

“They took your most valuable Torah,” said Sylvie Wang, Howie's granddaughter, a nice-looking girl in thick glasses. “I heard the rabbi tell someone.”

“We'll get it back,” said Lieberman, thinking, “I'll get it back if it still exists.” There was a chance the vandals, the anti-Semites, had not destroyed the blue velvet Torah. There may have been some among them, perhaps only one, who knew its value. Simply put, the missing Torah was priceless. More than four hundred years old, about a yard long, made by Spanish Jews during the reign of the Moors, when Jews were allowed not only to hold office in Spain but to worship as they chose. Each of the first five books of the Old or Jewish Testament, the Torah, had been meticulously and beautifully written out in a fine hand with the first words of each chapter in real gold.