The Tribe

by Bari Wood

  Fog rolled in from the Sound, and the night turned heavy all at once, spooky. They heard their footsteps on the pavement. As they passed the shul, Rachel saw a light in the basement, but didn’t think about it. It was eight-thirty, the boys wouldn’t be home yet, so Rachel walked the rest of the way with Willa. The afternoon paper was at the door; it had been ten days, and the only mention of the fight at the school was half a column on page ten.

  “Thank God,” Willa said.

  They had omelettes and brandy, and by the time Tom Jr. and Eric got home they were high all over again.

  Tom Jr. stopped at the door when he saw Rachel. He still had the bruise from the fight on the right side of his face. It was yellow at the edges and a star of blood still showed in the corner of one eye.

  “I didn’t mean to hurt anyone,” he said. “It wasn’t me that hit him. I’m not even sure anyone did. That cafeteria’s all chrome and glass and sharp edges. He could’ve fallen from someone shoving him and gotten hurt like that.” Rachel was nodding. Tom started to cry; he was so tall, so well built, she forgot he was only seventeen. Still a boy.

  “I didn’t even know who he was. It was rousting, that’s all. Just rousting. It was the white kid . . . the Brodsky kid had the knife. We wasn’t even doing real punching till he pulled that knife . . .” he sobbed. “Oh, Rachel . . . I swear, I never hurt him. He was fifteen,” Tom sobbed. “A little kid next to me. Shorter’n you. I never, never . . .”

  “Michael Brodsky had a knife?” Rachel asked. Tom Jr. looked into her eyes.

  “I swear it.”

  No one said anything about Luria’s grandson having a knife. She’d tell Jacob; maybe he’d feel better about Tom. Maybe it would change things.

  Levy was still up, and dressed, even though it was ten and he was usually ready for bed by now. He looked terrible, flushed and vague like someone with a high fever. But he said that he felt fine. He’d just started watching Notorious on the TV and couldn’t stop. She sat with him and tried to watch too. But all the actors’ gestures seemed bizarre to her, their problems trivial; she was going to tell Jacob about the knife, and she turned to him to do it, then saw that he wasn’t watching the screen but was staring at the wall, concentrating on nothing, like a man in a trance. She sat back in her chair while Ingrid Bergman and Cary Grant kissed for what seemed like the last time in their lives, and she realized that it didn’t matter about the knife. It wouldn’t have mattered if Mike had carried a gun or a bomb. He was mishpochah and the Garners were not. The blacks could never be, and that was all the justice and reason there’d ever be to it. It wasn’t justice that mattered to Jacob nor to any of them, it was . . . affiliation. In the movie, Claude Rains’s Nazi mother understood that. Why should she, Rachel Levy, have so much trouble with it? She went upstairs before the movie was over, and fell asleep sitting up in bed with her book open on her chest and the lights on. At midnight, Willa called her.

  “I’m sorry, honey, did I wake you?”

  “Half and half,” Rachel said. “Anything wrong?”

  “No . . . just fog and feeling down and kind of spooky.”

  “Kids sleeping?”

  “Yeah . . .”

  “Want me to come over?”

  “No, just talk a few minutes.”

  They talked about the wedding. Rachel wanted to wear a suit, Golda said she should wear a gown, but Willa said a short dress was best. Rachel was too short for suits, she said. Especially with the new big shoulders and short skirts. Ivory silk, Willa said, and as she said it, Rachel saw it, half full skirt, not too short, and a beige veil, maybe some sparkles on it.

  “Sparkles,” Willa laughed, then she said, “something just fell downstairs.” She sounded scared.

  “Go see, Willa, I’ll wait.”

  The other end was quiet for a minute, then Willa said, “I think it’s that exhibit Eric’s building for the science show. He’s got it propped up in the foyer.”

  “You okay?”

  “Fine. I’ll make him take care of it in the morning.”

  Rachel hung up, turned off the light, and fell asleep. She woke later, the fog was still thick against the window, and it must have turned cold because crystals of ice had formed in the corners of the windows. She sat up and listened. She thought she heard Levy’s door close, and she got out of bed, wide-­awake all at once, and opened her door. She felt the tail end of a draft and went downstairs; the foyer floor was freezing, she felt the cold through her slippers. She bent down and touched the tile. It was damp, too, but the heat was on; she could hear the furnace and the radiator was hot. Levy must just have opened the door. She opened it and looked out. The fog was freezing and so dense she could barely see. A light from his bedroom made a halo in the mist above her, and as she looked up the light went out. Fog settled on her hair, but something kept her on the doorstep with the door open, listening. It was just a feeling—the fog, the cold, the sense of the water on one side and the woods on the other. Willa was right, it was creepy. Fog moved on the road and she went in and shut the door.

  She didn’t fall asleep until three, and again the phone woke her; it was five and on the other end Golda was screaming; her voice mad, “They’re dead, oh my God, they’re all dead!”

  “Who?” Rachel screamed back.

  “Willa—the boys . . .”

  Rachel slammed the phone and ran down the stairs. She flung her raincoat over her nightgown and ran across lawns and around hedges. The fog was gone, a cold wind blew off the Sound through her coat and nightclothes and she shook and sobbed as she ran. She had to stop to catch her breath, and when she did she realized that Golda had been hysterical. They might not all be dead. One of the boys might have lived. Or Willa. Or all of them. What could kill three people all at once? Fire; but there was no fire. She’d have heard the truck, seen the blaze. What else? The furnace exploded; but she’d have heard that too. What else? Plague. Mother and two sons dead of plague on Long Island. She kept sobbing but she had enough breath to run the rest of the way, and she knew as soon as she saw the house, even from a distance, that no one was alive in there. It was a dead house; the door hung loose, the front windows were broken. The house had aged a hundred years overnight and was haunted now. A ghost house in six hours.

  The whole Laurel police force was there, cars, a few men, and when they saw her, three came up to her. They were pale. One was young and handsome with thick blond hair; he talked for them.

  “Were you a friend?” he asked.

  “Best friends,” Rachel sobbed.

  The men looked at each other.

  “What happened?” she asked.

  “We’re not sure.”

  “Are they dead?” she asked.

  “Yes. Three people. A woman and two young men . . .”

  Rachel nodded. Her mother would have screamed, her grandmother would have wanted to see. Rachel wanted to see and she pushed past the men and ran up the path toward that silent house. The blond cop grabbed her.

  “You can’t go in there,” he said. He didn’t expect her to resist or to be so strong, and she pushed him away and ran up the path. He ran after her, but she held her nightgown up and ran as if demons chased her. Up the stairs, across the brick porch-­patio to the splintered door hanging loose, by a thread of hinge. She smashed through it, slipped on the slick floor of the entrance hall, fell and skidded. The cop reached her, pulled her to her feet.

  “Please, lady, please,” he gasped, but she was staring at the front of her beige raincoat which was streaked with gray. So was her nightgown, so were her shoes. She had slipped in gray mud that streaked Willa’s parquet floor. The mud led away from the door, into the living room, across the celadon carpet.

  She touched the front of her coat; it came off on her fingers and she rubbed them together and smelled clay.

  ‡‡‡ Oaf.

  PART THREE: B
ELZEC

  Chapter 1

  Hawkins leaned on the windowsill and looked out at the promenade next to the river. It was eight-­thirty Sunday morning, but the fags were already out in force. They walked arm in arm along the path against the backdrop of the Manhattan skyline. It was a real walk they took, a slow and stately march, like the women in hoop skirts and men in frock coats must have taken a hundred years ago. The baby carriages were missing, but the feeling was the same. A warm Sunday morning in April, after a night of balls, parties, at-­homes, cruising the bars, drumming up trade; and no matter how the night had come out, they dressed up and walked out to show the world. Hawkins felt a wave of tenderness for them. They didn’t care about the Puerto Ricans who swarmed over Red Hook and spilled into the Heights. They didn’t get bitched off about busing and move to the suburbs.

  He watched them for a while, then turned back into the room. Alma was still asleep. He kissed her and she murmured but didn’t open her eyes. He lay next to her for a few minutes, then he got up, got dressed quietly, and stopped at the door to look back at her. They’d had a good time last night—good food and talk with Mo and Peggy. Just enough to drink and just enough good sex. Most nights were good with her now and as he watched her in the morning light he thought that he liked her better than he ever had. Mo said that was all that mattered. Love was for afternoon TV.

  It was warm outside, the first really warm day of the year, and the breeze that came off the river was fresh for a change. Hawkins drove slowly across Brooklyn to Queens, keeping to the side streets. He saw clusters of little girls dressed up like brides, on their way to their first communion. Their white dresses and veils blew in the wind and their families walked behind them, the women holding their hats. He smiled when he passed them, and waved, and one little girl in a swirl of white organdy waved back at him.

  He hit the Expressway and even here the air was fresh. The bay didn’t stink for once, the park along the abandoned fairgrounds had turned green overnight, and the little phony lake was blue in the sun. He started feeling absurdly pleased with himself.

  He was making forty-­five thousand a year. Alston said it was time for him to run for something. City Council, or State Legislature. Even Washington wasn’t too far to go for a smart, handsome, black ex-­cop, Alston had said. Hot stuff, Hawkins thought. The Congress, the Senate . . .

  Of course, Alston had said, he had to get married. Single men had a hard time in politics. Everyone figured they were gay or fuck-­arounds. Alma’d marry him, he thought. She’d have married him years ago, if he’d asked her. City Council meant good money. She wouldn’t miss the alimony. Elections meant some celebrity, too, and his daughter might read about him and come to see him after all these years. Maybe they’d move to Manhattan. . . .

  He turned into his street and saw the van in his driveway. It was a Dodge, the same color inside and out, and he couldn’t believe it was the same but he knew it was. He remembered how much he loved Jacob, how he missed him; he thought of Rachel again and realized that he’d never really stopped thinking about her. He wasn’t confident anymore, or happy. A second ago he could have told himself the whole story of the rest of his life. Now he didn’t know anything.

  He stopped in front of the door of the house and told himself he should go back to Brooklyn until Rachel Levy couldn’t wait anymore and went home and forgot about him. But his hands shook as he put the key in the lock and he knew it was because he couldn’t wait to see her. He opened the door and stood in the hall listening. He heard murmuring, but couldn’t identify the voices and, with his heart pounding, he went to the living room and stood in the doorway.

  His mother sat in her wing chair, a little white girl was sleeping on the couch, and Rachel Levy sat next to her, holding a cup and saucer and watching the door. Her hand jerked when she saw him, the cup rattled as she put it down, and she stood up quickly and came across the room to him. He couldn’t do anything but wait for her to reach him. She looked older than he remembered, and very, very tired, but it was still the best face he’d ever seen. She got to him, and put her arms around him. Her face touched his, her cheek felt hot on his skin, and he could smell her hair. He couldn’t hear the TV anymore, or see the shocked look on his mother’s face. He raised his arms stiffly like a man in a space suit, and with the feeling that he was finishing something he’d started a long time ago, he put them around her.

  She wanted to talk to him alone and he took her into the dining room and closed the sliding double doors his father had built. He could see how nervous she was and he tried to get her to drink some brandy, or more tea, but she didn’t want any. He sat down across from her and waited for her to explain why she was there. She was so shaky he thought she’d have trouble getting it out. But she took a breath and, almost as if she were challenging him, said, “They killed a family in Laurel last night.”

  He didn’t have ask who they were and he kept quiet and let her talk.

  They were beaten to death, she told him, like the boys in Brooklyn . . .

  The clay was there too. It got on her coat and nightgown, on her hands. She had been wiping her hands and crying and the cop was pulling her out of the house, but he didn’t move fast enough and she saw Willa’s legs sticking out from behind the grandfather clock. One leg was bent up casually, as if she could straighten it out, but the other was turned all the way around with the kneecap pressed into the carpet. Rachel gagged and the cop got her out of there. She thought she’d throw up and she bent sickly over the grass, taking deep breaths until she got some control. Then she looked up and saw Golda standing in her driveway watching, and Rachel shrieked and ran across the road to her. Golda flinched and would have run away, but Rachel grabbed her shoulder and shook her as hard as she could.

  “What happened to them?” she screamed at Golda. A couple of the pink plastic rollers in Golda’s hair came loose and fell. Her hair flopped in her face.

  “I don’t know,” she sobbed.

  Rachel shook her again. “What do you mean you don’t know?”

  The cop pulled at her. “Please, lady,” he said desperately, “give her a chance to talk.”

  “Why did you call me?” Rachel yelled again, but she let Golda go. Golda bent down and picked up the rollers. She was still sobbing.

  “Something woke me up. I don’t know what. Some­thing. I thought it was the front door and I tried to wake Sam to go and see but he was out like a light. So I went. Our door was closed, everything was fine, and I went back . . .” She wiped tears and cream off her face. “Then, just as I’m ready to get back in bed, I looked out the window. I don’t know why, Rachel.”

  “What did you see?” Rachel asked.

  “A light in Willa’s house. Only a light. But something was wrong with it. . . . And I knew I wouldn’t sleep until I figured it out; I don’t know why, I tell you. Just a feeling. So back I go to the window and this time I realize it isn’t the porch light I see, it’s a half-­burnt-­out-chandelier. . . . But I couldn’t see the chandelier unless the door was open, right?” Rachel and the cop nodded. Golda wiped her running tears with the sleeve of her robe. “But her door’s not supposed to be opened at four-thirty in the morning. Still, I didn’t want to be an asshole and call the cops in the middle of the night only to find out that she just forgot to change the bulbs and the door’s open because she’s taking out the garbage or walking in the garden ’cause she can’t sleep. And then, oh God, the wind blew; and that door swayed sideways and I knew, even from here, that it was busted. So I called the cops.”

  Clay everywhere, Ableson had said. He thinks your father-­in-­law . . . your whole mishpochah, killed the boys in Brooklyn.

  Rachel stared at Golda, then looked up at the dark house.

  “Is your father home?” she asked.

  “Of course he’s home.”

  Rachel turned and ran down the road. One shoe came off, so she took the other one o
ff and ran barefoot. Golda and the officer yelled at her, but she didn’t stop until she got to her house.

  Everything looked the same. She went up to Levy’s room, and stood outside for a moment, then she opened it slowly. He was sleeping on his back and breathing hard, like a man who’d had too much to drink. What if he and the others had gotten drunk, nothing else? What if he woke up and saw her standing barefoot with her hair tangled like a Medusa and her muddy nightgown flopping at the hem. He’d cry out and cover his face. But the blue comforter over him rose and fell rhythmically and after a minute she came all the way into the room. She opened the closet; his dark jackets and trousers hung neatly, his shoes were on the floor in a row. She touched them quickly, then stopped and felt one pair again. They were wet. She turned them over and saw traces of wet mud in the stitching.

  She left the room and stood in the hall for a minute, then she went downstairs, out of the house, still barefoot. She went around the side, opened the trash can, and saw something slick and wet inside. She pulled out a wad of gray plastic and unfolded it. It was a disposable raincoat that folds to fit a pouch and it was streaked with gray.

  “The gray stuff was clay,” Hawkins said.

  Rachel nodded.

  “So he was there.”

  “Yes.”

  “He killed them.”

  Rachel didn’t answer. In the living room, Leah woke up and started to cry. Hawkins leaned across the table and asked softly, “How’d he kill them, Rachel?”

  Out of nowhere she thought of the clay man in Prague, Rabbi Loew’s golem. It was too insane to mention.

  “I don’t know,” she said.

  Leah started to scream and Rachel ran for the living room. He followed her.

  “Why did they do it?” he shouted over the noise.