Jacob's Folly

by Rebecca Miller

  The fuel light came on. Leslie pulled into the first station he saw. Infuriatingly, there was a line for every pump. He inched forward as the cars filled up and drove away. At last he was next. The emaciated woman pumping gas in front of him was clinging to an inverted umbrella, hair wet, staggering in the wind. The narrow protective roof over the tanks did nothing against this horizontal rain. Leslie pulled on his baseball cap and sighed. He was going to get soaked. The woman struggled into her car and drove off. Leslie pulled up to the tank and stared at the pumps lined up there: Regular, Plus, Premium. His hand on the door latch, he was stopped dead by a memory: Masha lying beside him in that orange bikini, black hair shimmering in the sun. He felt yearning flood him, then quicken like concrete. He couldn’t move. The horn blasting behind him sent a thrill of fear through his belly. He looked in the rearview mirror. It was some jerk on his phone, some ass in a new Beemer, gesturing at him impatiently. Leslie whipped around in his seat and glared at the guy, who honked again. Climbing out of the truck, Leslie was drenched immediately. He strode up to the BMW, rain coursing down his neck, dripping from the brim of his cap. Leslie saw the man on the phone register his size as he approached him, but the guy didn’t get off the phone, he just grimaced at Leslie with an expression of anger, impatience, and condescension, pointing to the gas pump with an open hand raised to the sky, a sort of jab, like, Pump the gas, you idiot. Leslie didn’t realize he was going to get into the BMW until he was in it, soaking the leather seat. The man still had the phone glued to his ear.

  “What are you doing?” he cried. The man was small, dark-haired. Smelled of aftershave. His green rain jacket looked brand-new. “You’re ruining my seat!”

  “Would you mind getting off the phone, please?” asked Leslie quietly.

  “What was that?” asked the man.

  “Get off the phone, please,” said Leslie, touching a seam in the leather gearshift thoughtfully.

  “Jeff, I have to get off, okay? I’ll call you back in five,” said the man. He shut off his phone but kept it in his hand.

  “I need you to get out of my car now,” the man said, his back against the door.

  Leslie continued to fiddle with the taut leather gearshift. Beautifully made. “What’s your name?” asked Leslie.

  “My name.”

  “Yes.”

  “Richard Demos.”

  “Is that … what kind of name is that?”

  “It’s a Greek name.” A tremor ran through one of Demos’s eyelids.

  “Well, Dick. You shouldn’t honk at people. It’s unpleasant.” Demos shook his head, looking at his Rolex.

  “I realize you’re in a big hurry.” Leslie sighed. He imagined reaching across the seat and grabbing Demos by the throat of his new rain jacket.

  “That’s right,” said Demos.

  “I’m just advising you not to be rude,” said Leslie. “Your horn is really more of an emergency tool. To be used as a warning.” Leslie locked eyes with Demos. The eyelid twitched again. The small man’s fear was gratifying to Leslie; he couldn’t help it.

  “I take your point,” said Demos in a tight voice. “Now can you pump your gas? Please?”

  “Absolutely,” said Leslie, getting out and leaving the car door open as he walked over to the gas pump, ignoring Demos’s entreaties to close it. Through the window of his truck, on the narrow backseat, he saw Stevie’s baseball bat. In his mind, he reached in and grabbed it, turned and walked, unhurried, up to the guy’s car, and, with one expert swing, caved in his passenger window. Then he walked back to his car, threw the bat into the cab, shut it, and started prepaying for his gas, just like nothing had happened. Immersed in the fantasy, Leslie fitted the pump into the mouth of his tank, squeezed the lever, and squinted at Dick Demos, who was backing his Beemer up. Leslie watched him retreat with a level stare. Demos flipped him the bird.

  Leslie ran up the back steps of the Coe house and knocked on the door. Mr. Cruz, the butler, opened it.

  “Mr. Senzatimore,” he said, smiling.

  “Hi, there, Mr. Cruz. Masha said she wanted to work a couple hours on the boat—could you tell her I’m here?” His face was soaked.

  “Masha and Shelley went into the city with Mr. Nevsky, they have auditions.”

  “Oh.”

  “Sorry. Masha didn’t tell you?”

  “She probably texted me. I haven’t checked,” he lied.

  “They won’t be back till tonight,” said Cruz apologetically.

  “No problem, I just thought she wanted the hours,” said Leslie.

  “Come in, get dry. Have coffee.”

  “Thanks, I’ll get some later,” said Leslie, trying to cover his disappointment. Cruz’s sympathy for him was unbearable. He turned quickly, running through the rain to the garage, and yanked open the door, which yawned with a clatter.

  The black boat hulked over him, a sulky presence in the gloom. He flipped on the lights. The hum of the fluorescents mingled with the dull drumming of rain on the shingled roof of the building. Since Stevie, sound meant more to Leslie. It made him feel guilty that he could hear what Stevie could not. At least he should appreciate it. He sat on a stool and listened, staring out the open garage door at veils of rain billowing over the lawn. He thought of her, in the city, high up in some skyscraper, raindrops zigzagging down the plate-glass windows. She was Being Noticed. Making an Impression, no doubt. The desperation that had been gathering around Leslie like a poison ground fog was drifting closer, rising. Soon he would be engulfed.

  My old-fashioned fire rescue concoction stole into the hero’s mind as he sat listening to the rain—but he embellished it: he imagined driving over to Masha’s Victorian, saying he was there for a fire inspection. The workers let him into the basement. In his mind’s eye, he saw himself taping open the lock on the basement door leading outside, then checking the back of the dryer for the gas pipe. That night, on duty at the firehouse, he crept into Masha’s unlocked basement silently. On his knees, Leslie loosened the gas line feeding the dryer. He set a small fire in the laundry basket at his feet.

  In his mind, Leslie drove to the edge of his district, five miles east, picked a random house, called 911 from a pay phone, reported a fire in that house, to divert the department. Sitting on the stool in Ross Coe’s shed, Leslie’s heart sped up: he saw himself ramming open Masha’s front door, running through the smoke, up Masha’s stairs, swinging open her door. He lifted her up, smashed open the window, held her face to the fresh air. Regaining conciousness, she opened her great, wet, black eyes and recognized him.

  “Leslie,” she whispered.

  In Manhattan, high up in a glass building, Masha was staring at rivulets of rain weeping down the high window. She was auditioning for a musical film called My Alchemy. Bridget had gotten her the meeting.

  An elfin person sat behind a desk before her. Masha was not sure if this person was male or female. The name didn’t help: Rathgar Kennet. Masha was looking at the window to avoid staring at the director too hard.

  “I came to your show as a last-minute notion,” it said. The tight voice was high for a man, but low for a woman. “Because a friend of mine did the lighting design. I wasn’t expecting to find such a powerful performer.” Masha looked back at the androgynous person: lank blond hair fell over a pale forehead, piercing eyes seemed to pin her to her seat. It worried Masha that she found this person attractive. So—male?

  “Where were you trained?” Rathgar asked, glancing at Masha’s CV.

  “The Bridget Mooney School of Acting,” Masha said.

  “Will you read for me, Masha? And then maybe sing a little?”

  “Sure,” Masha said. She held the script pages before her, turning to the reader, a dark form in a red sweater. Masha focused on him for the first time now, noticing a set of beautiful white teeth.

  The emotion buried in the text surprised her. She didn’t think it would make her so sad to read those words in front of someone.

  “Good. Now. I’
d like you to sing.”

  Masha had planned to sing a song from the Charcot musical for this audition. But when she took in her first breath, she realized she was going to sing K’vakoras, the exquisite Hebrew prayer she had sung in front of the men at her parents’ Shabbat table, when she tore the napkin, all that time ago—when she was a child, it seemed. Like a shepherd who seeks out his flock, passing the herd under his staff, so do You make pass by, and number, and take account of, and notice the spirit of every living being. She disappeared into the song, losing herself gratefully in its dark, winding passages. There was a moment of silence when she went quiet.

  “Beautiful,” Rathgar pronounced. “I’m just at the beginning of the casting process for the film, Masha. So …”

  Masha nodded, stood up. She was used to being told no by now. Expected it. “But whatever happens with this movie,” Rathgar Kennet added, “I’m glad I found you.”

  36

  Running from the Comédie-Italienne, the shots of the crazed count still echoing in my head, my lungs burning, I instinctively fled to my old neighborhood in the Jewish quarter.

  I walked down the middle of my dark street. The moon shone on the wet cobblestones. An old lame peddler appeared from the shadows, his basket of rags strapped to his back. He gaped at me in my wig and livery. I tipped my hat, which seemed to frighten him. He hurried past me, limping up the street. I stopped at my parents’ door. The street was silent. All good people were asleep. I thought with yearning of my old corner of the bed. Shlomo had it to himself now. I imagined sneaking in beside him. He would let out a bellow. I chose a dark doorway across the street, a few doors down, and waited for my father and brother to emerge for morning prayer. The night felt eternal. I kept dropping off, then waking with a start when my cheek felt cold, wet stone. I was so hungry. At last, at dawn, the Jews began their day. Men striding to prayer, women setting off with baskets of rags or used clothing. The door to my building opened, and my father, stout, glowering, officious, emerged, followed by the scarecrowlike Shlomo, whose gaze was always trained on his own feet. My father was explaining something to my brother, his arm waving. Once they had walked up the block, I scurried into the building and up the stairs.

  The door to our apartment was open. My mother was sewing below the back window when I stepped in. She didn’t hear me. Buttery light softened her pointed features, made her look young. I stood very still, watching her, her head bent low to see the stitches. The room was bare; the furniture had been pushed to the walls, and an iron tub stood in the center of the floor, as it always was when there was a body to purify. As I have mentioned, my father was among those who prepared our dead. When someone found the body of a Jew, it was my father who was notified. The dead were washed, shrouded; then, the regime suffered us to bury them in cover of darkness, without fanfare, in silence.

  “Who died?” I asked. My mother looked up. Nearsighted, she gasped at the liveried figure in a powdered wig standing there, incongruous as an apparition. Then, squinting, she stood. Her darned sock fell to the floor.

  “Jacob …” It was almost a growl.

  “Mother,” I answered. She walked toward me, into shadow. Reddish pockets under her eyes made her look haggard. I opened my arms, expecting to embrace her, to drink in the scent I knew so well. Tears sprouted from her eyes as she approached me. A low moan escaped her lips. She walked up to me, looked me level in the eye, and hit me in the side of the head.

  “You’re supposed to be in jail! What happened? I’ve been going there for months! They told me you had been released, but I didn’t believe them. I didn’t believe you could disappear like this!”

  “Please, Mother, can I sleep here for the day, while Father is out? I am very hungry and tired.”

  “Are you crazy?” she shrieked. “You’re going back to your wife! Take off that ridiculous costume.”

  “I’m not going back to that maniac,” I said.

  “What kind of a man are you?” she whispered with frightening disdain, turning and opening the bread basket. She took a challah roll, cut it in two with a furious sawing motion, then hacked a thick slice of cured beef off a haunch hanging from the ceiling. Pressing the sandwich into my hand contemptuously, she drew me to her, kissing me hungrily all over my face, then pushed me away, tears running down her cheeks. I ate like an animal.

  Just then we heard footsteps on the stairs. My ear was still hot from her slap as she shoved me into her bedroom. I heard shuffling, something being dragged along the floor. My father’s stentorian voice boomed out a few orders. My mother came back into the bedroom carrying a bowl of stew, handed it to me furiously, and bolted us in.

  “Who died?” I whispered between mouthfuls.

  “Chayim,” she answered.

  “Chayim Levi?” I asked.

  “Be quiet,” she said, her eyes ferocious. She sat down in a chair opposite me and watched me eat. It was unnerving, but still I licked the plate clean. In the next room I heard the sound of water being poured over the body. The purification had begun. This could take ages, I knew, and it was making me thirsty. My mother would return me to Hodel, probably that afternoon. I would be yoking up my peddler’s box by morning. I had to get out. I stood and walked to the door. My mother’s exhausted eyes seemed to bulge from their sockets as she beseeched me silently to stay in the room. But what was there to lose? I unlocked the door and walked into the kitchen.

  My father and Shlomo were standing on stools holding beakers of water. The tall, wasted body of Chayim the petty criminal was on a slanted board, held up by two strong men.

  The board was propped inside a metal tub. My father was pouring a cascade of water over the naked dead man, washing his sins, the only things that had distinguished him, away. Poor Chayim, the rake. His jaw was tied shut with a strip of white muslin. In life, he had never shut up. He had loped around the neighborhood whenever he was in Paris to sell some gems or seed pearls, his coat flapping open, ragged slippers on his feet, his deep-set eyes glimmering with anarchic humor. It didn’t seem fair to cleanse him like this without his permission. The water glided, shining, over the wasted flesh, gradually filling the metal tub. My serious brother stood at the ready with his beaker. The flow of water over the body must not be interrupted. My father looked up and clapped eyes on me. He took me in slowly, from head to toe. The flow of his beaker thinned. My father turned to Shlomo, who was now staring at me, and told him to begin pouring. When Shlomo began, my father got off his stool and turned his back to me, watching the proceedings. I could hear my mother sobbing in the next room. I thought about going in to her, but I couldn’t bear to.

  I was almost down the stairs when I heard her shouting my name. I turned. Her face swollen from weeping, she ran down the steps, stuffed a few coins into my hand, kissed me on the mouth, then ran back upstairs.

  I spent a week in flophouses or sleeping in parks. I wrote to Solange, begging her to meet me at eight o’clock at night one evening, any evening, at a certain fountain in the Tuileries, with my earnings from the bet. Every night for two weeks I waited for her. I began to get to know the night life there. Once the sun set, figures moved silently, furtively, through the hedges. Fine carriages slowed and were approached by silken shadows. Figures alighted and were dropped off, flitting back into the darkness. A great deal of money was exchanged as I waited, hungry, for Solange. One night a well-dressed man sat beside me on the cool stone rim of the fountain. He wore a powdered wig. His face was very pale in the moonlight. He was looking at me intently from under long lashes. I said nothing.

  “I’ve had a long night,” he said. “But my rod is ready.”

  “Excuse me?” I asked.

  “Let’s go,” he said, grabbing my hand. I looked at him stupidly.

  “Are you deaf?” said the man. “I’ll pay you thirty sous!” At that, a man with an enormous mustache, a rarity in those days, emerged from behind a neighboring shrub.

  “You are both under arrest!” he pronounced. Beside him, an of
ficer of the watch shook his leg, trying to get his circulation back after squatting in that bush for hours, I guessed. My companion on the bench turned to me with a withering look. “Sale mouche,” he muttered, then rose to meet the inspector with great hauteur.

  “I am the Marquis de Saumane, second cousin of the Duc de Condé,” he said. “Do you still want to arrest me?”

  The inspector was flustered and bowed his head. “In this case, monsieur, I will be happy with your pledge that you will no longer indulge in the Italian vice, at least not in such a public way. Our sovereign has made it clear he will not abide by it.”

  “What is your name?” asked the man.

  “Inspector Marais. I act on the pleasure of the king.”

  “You are the famous Inspector Marais?” said the marquis, smiling. “I hear the king sits in bed with Mme de Pompadour and reads out your reports on the intimate habits of the noblesse. I hear that the royal consort finds it all very entertaining.”

  “The king wishes me to keep track of the nobles of Paris, and I do so. What he does with the information I give him is his own affair,” said Marais, raising a low-slung chin. It was dark, but I imagined he was blushing. The marquis gave a little snort and walked off. Marais dismissed the officer with a shrug. The man walked off to find more scenes of Sodom, still limping slightly. Marais looked down at me.

  “I really was just sitting here,” I said.

  “I know,” said Marais.

  “You’re not going to arrest me?”

  “No,” said the inspector, sitting down beside me, his large behind drooping over the rounded rim of the fountain. He eyed my livery. “You are in service?”