In the months after Abe disappeared, Sheldon took it hard but Mirabelle took it the hardest. It had never occurred to her that Abe would abandon her. She learned painfully that much of her strength and sarcasm, her wicked humor and irreverent attitude, had been made possible by the knowledge that she was safe and protected by her older brother. Her own mother, after all, had died in a terrible fire and her father was a distant man. It was Abe who was her bedrock. Without him, she became unsettled.
From the end of June until that Christmas, she and Sheldon grew much closer. They talked more. She stopped being sarcastic and superior, and opened up to him. She told him about the carrier pigeons and the biology class, and asked him whether he thought a girl could be a scientist. She talked about the music she liked, and she often confided her personal thoughts to him. The love that Sheldon had always had for her blossomed. Abe’s absence was a hole in his life too, but Mirabelle filled it with a warmth he had not felt since his mother had died.
One night in December, when the trees outside their window were catching the first flurries of snow, she and Sheldon sat on the blue sofa listening to the radio while Nate was out. Kate Smith was singing a new song by Irving Berlin called “God Bless America.” The Ku Klux Klan didn’t like the song because it was written by a Jew, but that didn’t stop it from being the third most popular song in the country. It was unabashedly patriotic, and people across the land were learning it by heart.
“Isn’t it strange,” Mirabelle had said in a far-off voice, “that this is the third most popular song on the pop charts, and the fourth one—just after it—is ‘Strange Fruit’ by Billie Holiday.”
It was the kind of observation she had become more inclined to make since Abe left, observations about contradictions, about how the world doesn’t fit together as one cohesive puzzle, and about how the results create strange mosaics that only the attentive can see.
It was a song about black bodies swinging from trees in the South. It was a song about the very worst of America.
“What do you think it means?” she asked Sheldon.
Barely thirteen then and still wanting more than anything to make her happy but not knowing how, he said, “The song’s about murder.”
“I know. And it’s number four in the charts. And it’s next to the most patriotic song ever written, which was written by a Jew who isn’t wanted here either. One song is about the pain, and the other acts like the pain doesn’t exist. And they’re right next to each other as two of the most popular songs in the land. It must be a clue to something. Right?”
“Is there a mystery?”
“Sure. Who are we? What are we going to become? How are we going to get there? I think these are mysteries. I think the clues are in art. I think we know who we are from the art we make.”
Sheldon knew the Billie Holiday song. He’d heard it many times. It sounded less like a song than a testimony, a lament. A strange and bitter crop, Holiday sang. He wondered what Abe would make of the song. Was that why he read the papers? Not only to be informed but to be a witness? But Abe wasn’t a person to stand on the sidelines and witness something. Then again, how do you fight back on your own?
“Why do Jews write patriotic songs, Sheldon?” Mirabelle turned and brought a knee up onto the sofa. Her voice had become more present and directed. “Why do Jews write these patriotic songs, and make jokes, and sing and dance like your friend Lenny, when only thirty-nine percent of Americans think Jews should be treated like everyone else, fifty-three percent think we’re different and should be restricted, and ten percent think we should all be deported?”
They had heard these numbers at synagogue. They were from a national survey taken in 1937. Some of the categories overlapped, making the numbers hard to follow. Still, the rabbi thought things were only getting worse because no one on the radio or TV or in Congress wanted to speak out against the Germans because it might bring America closer to war. So, Goebbels’s propaganda was going unmet and unchecked all across the country and much of the world. Nazi propaganda was working.
“What do you think?” Sheldon asked, to buy himself time.
“I think we want people to like us, so we try to be likable. So we can blend in. So we can stop being different.”
“I don’t think that’s it.”
“What, then?”
“I think it’s because we love America.”
Mirabelle lay back on the sofa and considered his simple statement, and Sheldon didn’t interrupt. He liked watching her think. It was a dramatic and expressive show that played across her face.
“That would make it an unrequited love,” she finally said.
If the conversation had ended there, Sheldon and Mirabelle would still be talking to this day, bonded even closer. But Mirabelle shared a secret that shouldn’t have been a secret and Sheldon couldn’t forgive her. That was when they fell apart.
“I think that’s why Uncle Joe signed up to fight in France,” she said, laconic again. “And now Abe.”
“What? Now Abe . . . what?”
* * *
They hadn’t heard from Abe since he’d left in June. Or that was what Sheldon believed.
Mirabelle unfolded a letter from the right pocket of her skirt. It had purple and orange stamps in the corner and a large rectangular blue one that said BY AIR MAIL, PAR AVION. The return address was in Canada. The name at the top was Abraham Horowitz.
“What is that? Is that a letter? How long have you had that?” Sheldon asked.
“A few weeks.”
“A few weeks!”
“Don’t yell at me.”
“Why the hell not? You’ve had that for a few weeks, and you didn’t tell me? Why would you do that? What’s wrong with you? Are you deranged?”
Sheldon never talked this way to Mirabelle. Never wanted to risk pushing her affections away, but this was a step way too far. There was no negotiating with betrayal.
“Nothing. I mean—”
“Where is he? When’s he coming home? Does Uncle Nate know?”
Mirabelle didn’t answer.
“I can’t believe you’re sitting here all moody wondering about song lyrics when you’ve got Abe’s letter in your pocket!”
“OK, already!” she said, reaching her limit.
“Just . . . give it to me.” He snatched the letter out of her hands.
“He’s in Canada.”
“Canada?” Sheldon had slid the letter out of the envelope but hadn’t looked at it yet.
“He joined the RCAF.”
“The what?”
“The Royal Canadian Air Force.”
“The Royal Ca—are you fucking kidding me?”
“Calm down, Sheldon!” Mirabelle yelled back.
“No! You’ve known for weeks. I’m only hearing about it now.” He looked down at the letter. It was handwritten on onionskin paper with a blue pen. “Is there more or is this it?”
“That’s it.”
The radio was still playing, but Sheldon had switched it off in his mind. He stood up from the sofa and walked to the dining-room table, where the overhead lamp cast a bowl of yellow light. Sheldon held out the letter and read as Mirabelle stayed seated behind him.
* * *
The letter began “Dear Mirabelle and Sheldon.”
That did it. “It’s addressed to me too! It wasn’t even yours to hide!” Sheldon shouted.
“Oh, stop being such a . . .”
But Mirabelle ceased to exist. Why he’d tolerated her bullshit this long he had no idea. How close can you be to someone if all that was needed for them to slip away was for you to let go of the rope? He wasn’t even sure she had genuine human emotions anymore. Honestly, to keep this from him?
“You’re a monster,” he whispered, as he started to read.
Abe’s voice filled the space left behind by Mirabelle’s absence, and Sheldon fell into his letter as though into Wonderland.
Dear Mirabelle and Sheldon,
I’m sorry tha
t I didn’t write earlier. I didn’t mean to run away and leave you both behind, but if I stayed in Hartford one more minute, I would have said things I would never have been able to take back, and that would have ruined everything for both of you who still have to finish school.
You know about the war, of course. What you might not know is that Canada declared war on Germany a few days after it started in September. I was in Buffalo at the time because my friend Alan has grandparents who live there, and he had a summer job lined up painting houses. I needed somewhere to go and it seemed as good as any and they let me stay in their basement for free and I got to work with my friend. Once the Germans attacked Poland and Britain went to war, though, I changed my mind.
Mr. Fowler was right about America not wanting to get into this. Maybe we never will. But I can’t stand it and I can’t stand watching it. I saw a photo in the newspaper of a girl in Austria wearing a dress like one of Mom’s. They said she was a Jewess, which sounded like something foreign and dirty and mystical, but she was none of those things. She was pretty and young, and even though it was a foreign country, she was wearing the same clothes as everyone in Hartford, and she reminded me of Mirabelle. The Nazis were making her kneel on the pavement and scrub the street in Vienna with a wooden brush. Around her was a circle of laughing Austrians. I imagined Mirabelle on her bloody knees and it made me boil with hatred.
And then Kristallnacht came along and I thought—that could have been us. All those people there are exactly like us. The difference isn’t them. It’s where we live. It’s the people around us.
Every time I read the papers, they talk about Jews being scared and terrorized and worried and weak and pathetic. The thing is, I don’t feel those things. That’s not me. That wasn’t Uncle Joe. That isn’t you two either. What I feel is a rage that’s like the righteous hand of God calling out for vengeance from heaven.
God wiped out Sodom and Gomorrah for less than what’s happening now. I can’t imagine what’s stopping Him from erasing these people from the map. So, if He isn’t going to do it, I will.
I took a bus up to Toronto and I joined the Royal Canadian Air Force. They said I might lose my American citizenship, and I said I would rather lose that than my honor.
The Canadians are great. The guys are all really friendly, and no one seems to have a chip on his shoulder. They put me in a training program for bomber recon over the Atlantic, but I don’t know where I’m going to end up. Things are moving pretty fast now. I’ll write more later. In the meantime, you can write me back at the return address that I put at the bottom. They’ll forward things on.
I hope you aren’t too mad to write back. I want to know you’re both doing OK.
I’m sorry again for letting you both down. But I need to stand up for what’s right and take the fight to them, and America’s not willing to do that. And we think we’re such heroes.
I love you guys. Tell Dad I’m not angry anymore. Not in the way I used to be. I know where to put my energy now.
Love, Abe
The Truth
AT GROSSINGER’S, SHELDON WAS pushing De Marco’s suitcases past reception when Miriam said something to him, but he was too preoccupied to hear it properly. His mind was filled with the sound of his own voice yelling at Mirabelle and calling her names that would have scandalized a sailor. The longer he chewed her out, the worse the insults became until he landed on the word “traitor.” It arrived like a punctuation mark as he stopped at her door.
Room 112.
Sheldon opened the lock. It was the same as so many other rooms, yet it seemed like a den of sin and a torture chamber for his own heart. He was perfectly aware that he wouldn’t be so angry at Mirabelle if he didn’t love her, but knowing that changed nothing. If anything, it only made him angrier.
The idea that this man was going to have sex with her in here made him sick. How could the room be so bright and airy?
Joseph had once said that even in war some days are sunny and the birds sing.
Sheldon tried to think of some way to make his presence felt. Maybe short-sheeting the bed would work. That was a classic. Or clogging the toilet, or just waiting like Bogart to slap the guy around a little and call him a rapist. Sure, Alan was bigger, so Sheldon would lose the fight and get fired and Lenny would get angry, but . . .
He had no plan. He had to admit it. Usually, he was good at looking at a blank canvas and painting a solution, but he was dressed like a bellhop, he was furious, and he had no plan. It was a terrible feeling.
Grudgingly, he did his job and placed the suitcases on their respective stands and stared at them trying to think of what to do. Then he opened the suitcases and rummaged around in them. In hers, he found enough jewelry to fund a revolution.
This was not pawn shop loot. These were not gifts given to a beautiful girl. This was the kind of jewelry he’d seen in windows where the men inside the stores carried guns.
There must have been thousands of dollars’ worth of diamonds and rubies and emeralds on necklaces, bracelets, and earrings. The jewelry was so exquisite that it couldn’t even be worn in a place like this. Some of the people here had money, and some people here paid more than fifty dollars a week when they could be in Monticello paying twenty-two. But this suitcase contained Rockefeller jewelry. This was Queen of England booty.
This was stolen.
Sheldon replaced it and zipped up the bag a second before Mirabelle burst into the room and slammed the door behind her.
“What the hell are you doing here?” she asked him, hands on her hips, as though he’d been caught with the last cookie.
“You first!” he shouted.
“I’m doing whatever I want! I’m nineteen years old. I graduated, and I’m living it up! Now you.”
“Oh yeah? Well, I’m . . . working!”
“Did you follow me? How did you know I was going to be here?”
“I was here first. How can I follow you if I was here first? Maybe you followed me.”
“Keep your voice down. Sammy could hear us.”
“Sammy?” said Sheldon, remembering the register and his conversation with Miriam. “Not Alan? What’s his real name? Shlomo?”
“What the fuck is it with you, Sheldon, seriously?”
Sheldon plopped down on the bed to claim his spot. He crossed his legs. He took the stupid hat off his head—the one that made him look like an almost-fifteen-year-old Jewish bellhop—and then puffed up his chest, making him look like an almost-fifteen-year-old Jewish bellhop without a stupid hat.
“There are a lot of Jews here,” he said. “I thought you were trying to get away from all this rather than deeper into it.”
“You know what, Sheldon? Mr. Fowler was right. You’re either moving your way up the mountain or you’re not. And I am.”
“Sleeping,” he said. “Sleeping your way up the mountain.”
“You’re calling me a slut now?”
“Yes. You are a slut.”
“Screw you, Sheldon. We’re in an adult relationship. I’m an adult now. I’m in an adult relationship with a man with money, and you’re still a kid and it kills you, but that’s the way it is.”
“Apologize,” he said. He crossed his arms for effect.
“I beg your pardon?” Mirabelle said, shifting her weight even more aggressively to one leg.
“If you’re not going to apologize for abandoning me and leaving me alone with Uncle Nate for a year, or leaving without a word, or changing your name, or pretending you’re not related to me, or generally being a bitch on wheels, you WILL apologize for lying to me about Abe. At least for that.”
“I didn’t send him away. It wasn’t my fault. You know how much I—”
“No, that wasn’t your fault, but don’t change the subject. You lied to me and the only reason you’re angry with me is because you feel guilty, but you’re too proud or self-absorbed or whatever to admit it. You think that if you do, you’re weak. Well—it’s not true. You dumped me and left m
e alone the way that Abe dumped us. But at least Abe apologized and knew he did something wrong. You’re the weak one. And now you’re with some gangster? Is he actually Mafia? You know what they did to our family.”
“They didn’t do anything, Sheldon.”
“There was a black car outside our window in Hartford—”
“It wasn’t the Mob.”
“I saw the car with my own two eyes, Mirabelle. So did Abe. I know exactly what that guy looks like. And if you don’t like that example, how about Lorenzo? The guy who drove me and my father off the road? And you’re sleeping with one of them?”
Mirabelle knew what the man in the car looked like too. “The man in Hartford was handsome but a bit pudgy. No facial hair. A hat he wears slightly tilted back. Blue eyes that are actually quite soft and sad. I know what he looks like, Sheldon. Better than you. I saw him up close, and he was not the Mob. I know because I walked out to the car one night, tapped on the window, and demanded to know who he was.”
She explained.
It was two nights after Mr. Henkler was killed when the story had hit the paper. The roads were still littered with the debris from the storm, and Mirabelle was shaking with the possibility of what Abe might have done. When her father was out and Abe was in the bathroom and Sheldon upstairs, Mirabelle wrapped her blue overcoat around her and marched out barefoot into the street and rapped on the window of the Chevy.
The man was reading a newspaper by the light of the streetlamp and tried to look casual when Mirabelle knocked on the window.
Arms crossed over her chest, she demanded, “Enough. Who are you?”
How to Find Your Way in the Dark Page 19