Safekeeping (18 page)

“Yes, I guessed as much. You're so excited about the brooch, Avrom, you're not thinking.” Mrs. Weisberg dropped her gaze to Adam. “He's been going on and on about this brooch since you sold it to him. You know, it's worth a lot of money. I told him not to give it back to you.”

“Please, Miri, don't rush me. If we're busy and you need my help, I'll come out. But otherwise, please, don't rush me. This is really important.”

The wife said something in Yiddish, and Mr. Weisberg glanced behind him. When Mrs. Weisberg closed the door behind her, he got up, taking the brooch. He shut the safe he'd left ajar and turned its lock. Adam sucked in air while the jeweler's back was to him. He couldn't make his move right now, not with him having just told his wife he needs time. And what should he do about the wife, right there, outside the door? Could he wait until she went for lunch or something? Should he point the gun at the jeweler and tell him to call her in here? Jesus, did he have it in him to do that?

Back in his seat, the jeweler straightened his vest. “If I were you, Benjamin, I would give the brooch to the Jewish Museum, not the Cloisters. Gems are an extremely important part of our history. We say the world is getting smaller because of television and telephones and all that, but for the Jews the world's been a village for over three thousand years already. When this brooch was made, Benjamin, Jews in India sold gems to Jewish caravans from the Middle East who brought them to Jewish merchants in Venice.
These merchants then sold the gems to Jewish goldsmiths in Antwerp and Lithuania, and they turned the gold and gems into crowns and swords for the princes in England and elsewhere. Jews were constantly being expelled from one country and fleeing into another and then being allowed back into that other country again, so we had the languages and the connections to pull off this international business. Not to mention, Benjamin, and this is important, so pay attention, when you constantly have to get up and go at a moment's notice, jewels can be a good means of preserving wealth. They're easy to carry and have value anywhere. Without gems, you'd have to flee with nothing. There are cynical Jews today, and I am one of them, who think this is still a good idea, even in America. Even in Israel. Who knows what
mishigas
could happen tomorrow? Tomorrow Andy Martin could become president. And Israel, I don't think there's anyone who really believes it can last. Before, Europe held up signs saying
GO BACK TO PALESTINE
! Now it's
GET OUT OF PALESTINE
! Israel is just the latest ghetto, and sooner or later they'll liquidate that one too. If there's anything history teaches us, it's that everyone hates the Jews, always have and always will. Remember that, young man, everybody hates you. You must always be ready to run.”

Adam, trying not to let fear contort his face, moved his hand back toward the pistol again. “Listen, Mr. Weisberg, I do appreciate the history lesson. I really do. If you knew me, you'd know that I love history, but we should get down to business.” He stalled. He couldn't quite do it yet. “So, um, how much did you say the brooch was worth?”

“Worth? You heard my wife. A lot! But I'm a man of my word. How many times do I have to say it? I'll sell it back to you for the twenty.”

Adam's hand calcified in a twisted claw at his side. It felt like it wasn't attached to his body, his brain. Until now it had only been about him and his zayde. He hadn't thought about the line of ancestors. He hadn't thought about the jeweler. Not as a person anyway, only as an obstacle. Not only was Mr. Weisberg about to lose a lot of money, but he was going to be made a fool, a fool for trusting him.

“I know. I know you said you would do that, Mr. Weisberg. And . . . and I think that's big of you. I mean it. I just want to know how much it's worth, you know, just because.”

Come on, Adam thought, do it. Now. If you don't do it now, you're never going to do it. Come on, grab the gun! Though he still didn't know how he was going to keep the jeweler from calling out to his wife as he
left the store. Maybe he could tell him that if he didn't stay quiet, if he heard him crying for help before he was out the door, he'd shoot Mrs. Weisberg. Fuck. That sounded terrible. And what if he said that, that he would fucking shoot Mrs. Weisberg, and the jeweler still didn't stay quiet? He'd go to prison and the brooch would be lost.

“Well, sticking a price tag on a thing like this isn't easy, Benjamin. It has sentimental value, which is difficult to quantify, but not impossible; it had great sentimental value for you, and you were willing to sell it not so long ago for twenty thousand. Then we have the value of its raw materials, which is easy to calculate. How much is a sapphire worth of this size and clarity? After that, there's the workmanship, which is sublime, although one floret is irregular, missing a petal. And lastly, there's the rarity of the piece, which in this case is extraordinary. If I were forced to make an estimate right now, I'd say, oh, three hundred thousand dollars, or thereabout. But it could be worth three million. Of course, you will need—”

Mr. Weisberg's eyes raised to the pistol. Adam was on his feet, holding the gun, shakily, very shakily, pointed at the jeweler's chest. The jeweler remained still, looking up at Adam. “You don't want to do this, Benjamin.”

“I don't.” Adam's voice shook as much as the pistol. “But I have to. Give me the brooch.”

“You don't want to do this. I can tell. You're a good kid at heart. The kind of kid who wants to get his grandmother's brooch back.”

Instead of calming him down, the kind words enraged him. He was a good kid at heart! He did hate doing this! He fucking hated it! He extended the gun. “Put the brooch down on the desk, Mr. Weisberg. And your hands in the air.”

“Why don't you go home, Benjamin, get some sleep, and then come back, and we'll talk? We can figure something out.”

Adam wished the jeweler would take him seriously. It would go a lot quicker if he did. If the old man were being held up by a black kid, he'd be pissing in his wool pants right now. Adam needed him to be pissing in his pants. He needed him to hurry.

“I mean it, Mr. Weisberg. Put the brooch down and your hands up! Or I'm going to have to shoot.”

“Come now.” Only Mr. Weisberg's mouth moved, the rest of his body frozen, including the hands that held the brooch. “I'll keep it for you as long as you need. I told you that. Didn't I?”

Please please please please please, he couldn't take this, he needed this to be over. “Put down the fucking brooch!”

“Didn't I say that? Didn't I say I'd keep it for you, Benjamin?”

“Now!”

When Mr. Weisberg opened his mouth again without handing over the brooch, Adam swung the pistol. The steel butt smacked the side of the old man's head.

Adam stepped back, clutching at the chest of his T-shirt.

The jeweler leaned on his desk, blinking behind his bifocals, before going down like a trapdoor.

Adam swiveled, pointed the gun at the office door in case the wife heard the thud and came running. He waited. She didn't come. He heard voices in the front shop.

He scrambled around the desk and grabbed the brooch from the floor. He crouched beside the jeweler. His yarmulke had fallen off. Blood seeped into the white hair. Adam whispered, “I'm sorry, Mr. Weisberg. I'm so so sorry. It wasn't even loaded. It wasn't even loaded!”

He headed for the door, afraid he might faint before he got there. He paused before opening it, trying to calm his breath, trying to look normal. The calendar on the back of the door still showed the month of March, a photo of matzah on a pink background. A heart was drawn around March 21st, Yiddish scribbled inside it. Adam stuffed the gun into the back of his jeans. Natural, he had to act natural.

He pushed open the door, saying, “Thanks, Mr. Weisberg! I'll be back.”

He walked down the narrow store toward the glass door through which he could see yellow cabs stalled in traffic. Watching the back of Mrs. Weisberg's shiny black wig, he had to use all his willpower not to run. She was showing a businessman a watch. Would it be more or less natural for him to say goodbye to her? He had to think quickly.

“Bye, Mrs. Weisberg!” He glanced back as he pushed open the door. Her small eyes in her white face regarded him, but she said nothing.

As soon as he was on the sunny sidewalk and out of sight of the store, he walked as fast as he could, afraid that breaking into a full-on run would draw suspicion. Maybe plainclothes officers lurked all over the Diamond District. He pushed past suited men and high-heeled businesswomen and dodged Mexican delivery guys carrying half a dozen plastic bags. He shoved against the flow of people pouring out of the Rockefeller Center
subway stop. He had the brooch. He had it. Now he'd go home, grab his passport and Dagmar's note, and head straight to the airport.

Adam and Golda reached the gate of Sadot Hadar. Recognizing him, the woman inside the guardhouse waved him in. He reentered the kibbutz, thinking he had to find Dagmar for the jeweler's sake too. He was sure he'd only knocked him out, at most given him a concussion—he hadn't hit him that hard, had he? People didn't die from a minor blow to the head. Still, the jeweler's suffering would be for nothing if he didn't get the brooch into Dagmar's hands. He had to do it for Mr. Weisberg, for Anna and his ancestors, for his grandfather, for himself, and, he was increasingly coming to believe, for the brooch itself. Once he'd done that and was back in New York, working and making money, he'd send the jeweler anonymous envelopes of cash. Yes, that's what he was going to do. He'd send cash until he was all paid up. And even after that.

“W
e'll start with the pillowcases,” Ziva said, pushing a canvas cart loaded with linens toward a folding table.

Today they were working in the laundry house. On one side of the room hummed washing machines and dryers the size of jet engines; on the other side, rows of cubbyholes filled with folded clothes and sheets awaited pickup. The middle of the room, where most of the work got done, was a jumble of blue ironing boards, steamers, wooden folding tables, and carts overflowing with clean laundry to be folded.

Dana, the kibbutz's head laundress, turned the knob on an old radio. A Queen's English filled the room:
Russia qualified for the World Cup and will be competing independently for the first time since the dissolution of the Soviet Union.
Dana smiled at Claudette. “For you, the BBC.”

“Never mind the radio.” Ziva held up a yellow pillowcase and pointed at a small blue iron-on with the number 37. “You see this number, Claudette? Every towel, every T-shirt, everything has a number and has to be folded so that the number remains visible. I hope you can handle that. Because I've had enough of your staring into space.”

Claudette nodded. In the three and a half weeks they'd worked together—picking avocados, chopping vegetables in the kitchen, weeding the sidewalks, feeding the heifers—not one day had passed without Ziva losing patience and upbraiding her. Claudette hoped today would be different. When it came to laundry, she should be able to keep up no matter what was racking her mind.

Yesterday, South Africa held its first multiracial election, marking the final end of apartheid
. . .

For the last twenty-four hours Claudette's mind had been on her bathroom sink. Since washing her hands in the sink after working with Ziva in the cowshed, she had disinfected it six times with rubbing alcohol, sticking Q-tips into the ridges around the taps, but what if she had missed a spot? Left a trace of fecal matter that could poison Ulya? Maybe even kill her? It didn't make sense—if manure were so dangerous all the kibbutzniks would be falling sick—but she still felt the need to go home and sterilize the sink again.

Dana helped Ziva and Claudette carry the folded pillowcases over to the cubbyholes, explaining, “This is where people come to get their clothes, Claudette. Everyone has a number assigned to them. Put the pillowcase in the cubbyhole with the corresponding number.” She set her pile down on a table and picked up the topmost pillowcase. “This one, you see, is 64. That's Talia, Shlomo's daughter. I don't want to know how many boys have had a good time on the 64 sheets!”

Ziva snatched the pillowcase from her. “Really? It seems to me you do. Go check the dryer. It's beeping.”

Dana lifted her eyes to the ceiling and stomped off.

Ziva took the pillowcase to cubbyhole 64. “That woman is intolerable. Of all the things she could have told you. She could have said: ‘Isn't it nice, Claudette, how a member of the kibbutznik doesn't have to come home after a hard day's work and do his laundry?' No, he just comes here and picks up his clean clothes. He doesn't have to cook his dinner, either, or do his dishes. Until recently, he didn't even have to raise his children. All this, of course, is most liberating to women. I understand in the United States, career women still do all the house chores.”

Claudette wasn't sure she had put the right pillowcase in cubbyhole 19. Actually, she was sure, but she had to double-check anyway. She walked back and peeked in: yes, that was pillowcase 19. The second she turned away, however, the feeling of uncertainty reappeared. She would have to check one more time. As she peered into cubbyhole 19 for the third time, she heard Ziva gasp. Afraid she had been caught being inefficient again, she turned. The old woman was buckled over with her hand on her back.