The Ghost of Hannah Mendes

by Naomi Ragen

  “Food?” a vendor offered her. “Ham, and blood sausages.”

  “I’m a vegetarian.” She shook her head.

  “There’s this Buddhist-vegetarian restaurant around the corner. Why don’t you go there?” the woman said helpfully. “That is, if you’re hungry.”

  “I’m starving,” she said.

  “Well, what are you waiting for, then?”

  What am I waiting for? she thought.

  There it was. The pickle barrel. The fringes of the red lanterns, a bit more frayed now. She ordered large bowls of steaming food and ate slowly, tasting nothing, simply anxious to feel some relief from the craving for sustenance.

  She left with the ache of hunger gone, but feeling emptier than ever. She wanted to crawl back into bed and cover her head with a pillow and weep for all the vanished riches of a life that had almost been hers; for the rough, dark clouds hovering above her that would never part. Reluctantly, she climbed the steps back to her apartment.

  There he was, sitting with his back up against her door, his elbows on his knees, palms over ears, fingers pressing into his scalp in an attitude of utter desolation.

  She dropped to her knees and sat back on her ankles, resting her hands softly on his shoulders. His arms were around her, filling the emptiness, overflowing with an abundance that made her want to laugh, to cry out that it was too much, too much. And when he looked up at her, she saw the clouds part and the shining beauty of the world come through again.

  41

  “Well, how does she look?” Francesca fluffed the stiff netting of the white veil over Suzanne’s shoulders and spread the long satin train in a perfect arc.

  Janice, a little weepy, stood on one side of Suzanne, their father, Craig Abraham, on the other. “Beautiful!” they chorused.

  Catherine da Costa sat up in her wheelchair. She looked at her blossoming granddaughter, touching her rosy cheek and drinking in the whiteness of her smile. “More than that! She looks…” Catherine caught her breath, watching Suzanne straighten her shoulders and lift her chin with the calm dignity of a young queen about to be crowned. “…like a true descendant of the House of Nasi.”

  Suzanne knelt, putting her fragrant young arms around her grandmother’s frail, thin waist. “Gran, Gran. Thank you,” she whispered, her voice breaking. Catherine leaned into her granddaughter’s warm, full breasts. When they parted, both felt as if some great secret had passed between them.

  “There is something we need to do. Carlotta!”

  “Here, missus.” She put a tooled-leather case into Catherine’s hand.

  “And here is the pen and ink. Come. Let’s begin.”

  She opened the case and carefully removed the family Bible. With trembling fingers, she turned the pages until she reached the tree with its golden boughs. “Janice, your hand is steadier than mine. Write it in.”

  Janice took the pen and dipped it into the peacock-blue ink. Beside her daughter’s name she wrote in carefully: “Gabriel Fonseca, m., 8.6.96.”

  Catherine looked at it, her eyes brimming. “And when the baby comes, don’t forget to fill it in. And when Francesca marries…”

  Suzanne put her hand gently on her grandmother’s shoulder. “You’ll be here to remind us, Abuela.”

  Catherine patted her hand and smiled. No, she thought. I won’t.

  From inside the synagogue came the faint strains of the band beginning to tune its instruments.

  “You’d better go in, Madre,” Janice urged.

  Carlotta pushed the wheelchair toward the front, positioning it in a spot right near the wedding canopy.

  The great central chamber of the old Spanish and Portuguese synagogue in Manhattan was filled with lilacs, hyacinths, and roses of every hue. The polished wooden pews gleamed with a warm, homey light. The music began: Mozart and Beethoven, some Hebrew melodies, and finally, when the family began the long procession down the aisle toward the wedding canopy, traditional Ladino melodies.

  Gabriel entered first. Tall, golden-haired, wearing a black tuxedo beneath which a gold embroidered Spanish vest flashed with little bursts of light as he walked. His face was light, filled with such utter and complete happiness that it could not be mistaken for anything else, anything less.

  A group of Gabriel’s cousins came next, the little girls in apricot organza with lacy collars and wide puffed sleeves, their shining hair crowned with wildflowers.

  Then came Francesca and Marius (who had arrived from London two hours before), the maid of honor and best man. In a tiny-waisted dark peach dress with a full skirt and puffed sleeves, her hair falling to her shoulders in a mass of lovely curls, she looked like an older version of the children. Or like the sweetest angel Botticelli ever conceived, Marius thought as he kept pace with her. He looked very distinguished in a formal black tuxedo and striped cravat, which every now and again he picked at as if it were choking him.

  And then came Suzanne.

  There was a hush in the room, like a collective inheld breath. Oh, the shine about her! Catherine exulted. A light like a golden sphere. It sparkled and blurred and finally divided, becoming a number of golden spheres that hovered on the ground and in the air.

  Catherine closed her eyes, pressing her fingertips gently to the lids, hoping to clear her vision. But when she opened her eyes, the spheres had multiplied, filling the entire synagogue, thousands and thousands of them, hovering points of light containing in each the figure of a man, woman, or child.

  The synagogue was packed now, she saw, as the rabbi read out the seven blessings. Relatives, friends, living and dead, some she remembered, and many more she had never met joined one another in the pews, up on the ceiling and over the doorways, bathing the young couple in a warm glow as they stood giving and receiving those ancient, sacred vows of fidelity and honest love that bring mankind its truest blessings.

  There was her Grandmother Nasi, wearing her flowered synagogue dress; and her mother, Elizabeth, her kind, patient face full of thoughtful happiness. There was Carl’s young niece, and Carl’s parents. And there was Carl himself, waiting by the door, handsome in his favorite sweater, his pipe in his hand as he waved to her.

  She let out a soft moan.

  “Gran?” Francesca turned, looking at her in concern.

  “I’m fine. Fine.” She patted her granddaughter’s smooth, young hand.

  And now, another contingent of spheres blew in, their light glowing with a richer patina. They wore sandals and togas, pointed yellow hats and farthingales. In the middle were Gracia and Francisco Mendes.

  They moved slowly down the aisle until they stood on either side of the bride and groom. Catherine saw all four climb up together to the tevah until they stood beneath the prayer shawl.

  The rabbi began: “Soon may you hear in the cities of Judah, and in the streets of Jerusalem, the voice of joy and gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride. Blessed art Thou, O Lord, who makes the bridegroom to rejoice with the bride.”

  She watched Gracia and Francisco repeat the blessings and sip the wine as if they, too, were getting married again. And when the glass was broken, and the cries of mazel tov rose up like incense, Catherine found Gracia standing beside her.

  “You’ve done well, Rivka. Everyone’s quite pleased. They’re all waiting to welcome you. Are you ready?”

  Catherine looked at her granddaughter, resplendent in the regal white gown. And what of the baby, her great-grandchild? She wanted so much to hold it in her arms, to be at the celebration of its birth. To know if it was a boy or a girl. And then she looked at Francesca. The contours of her young face were sensitive and vulnerable as she looked at her young man sitting in the front pew waiting for her.

  Marius and Francesca. She laughed to herself, shaking her head. But opposites often made the best partners, forming the strongest bonds of completion. They would have their chance, anyway, which was the most anyone can hope for. How she wanted to know if they would marry, to attend their wedding, to s
ee their children.

  How she wanted to live forever!

  She gasped. The pain, both terrible and familiar, hit her full in the stomach with the punishing force of an instrument of torture. Her face turned white as she clutched herself against it, waiting for it to pass. When it did, she smiled wanly.

  No, not forever. Not this way, she thought, tugging on the ugly tubes that stretched from her arms to the metal post. Not another minute, this way.

  The spheres moved and floated and danced around her. She watched them, fascinated. They were corpuscles, she realized. Some remnant of each one of these men and women flowed through her veins, just as some part of her flowed through her granddaughters’. And each time a family celebration took place, something of her would be there, too, encased in her own golden sphere.

  “I’m ready now,” she said out loud.

  “Madre?” Janice bent down to her. “Did you say you were ready?”

  She looked at Janice, startled. “Yes. I’m ready to leave. You and Craig go on to the party. Carlotta and that Fredericks nurse will take good care of me. I’ll see you all in the morning.”

  Janice bent over her, her face puckered with concern. “Sure?”

  Catherine reached up and touched her daughter’s face. Craig was also in the middle of a divorce. Maybe they’d get together again. Who knew? “Mazel tov. Now it’s your turn to become a grandmother.”

  “Never!” Janice cringed.

  “Wait. You’ll love it more than anything else in the whole world, Janice. You’ll see.”

  “Gran, let me drop you off. I don’t mind,” Francesca urged.

  “Francesca, I think there’s a young man waiting over there to talk to you. Go to him! I’ve always liked Marius.”

  “He’ll wait,” Francesca said. “El mundo pertenese a los pasensiozos. Isn’t that what you always told us?”

  She winked. “Who says I always know what I’m talking about! Now, go, go.” She smiled, blowing them all a kiss as the competent Mrs. Fredericks wheeled her toward the exit.

  “When did you get in?”

  “Just in time to make it to the ceremony. I’ve got so many frequent flyer miles, they don’t allow the plane to take off until I arrive…. Brings back memories, no?” he said, glancing around at the Spanish-inspired decor.

  She nodded dreamily. “Toledo. Córdoba. I guess you can take a Sephardic Jew out of Spain, but you can’t take Spain out of a Sephardic Jew. Wherever the Jews of Spain wound up, they brought with them a little of the world they’d left behind.”

  “Marry me,” Marius murmured.

  “What?”

  He took her hands eagerly into his. “I tried calling you in Venice. But you’d already left.”

  “Why did you leave me in Venice?”

  “Because I had to see the notes in the margin of that manuscript myself.”

  “Were they important?”

  He whistled. “You might say that. They were in Hebrew. I think it means the whole manuscript might have been translated into Hebrew. It might be in some collection of medieval Hebrew manuscripts.”

  “You’re impossible! That’s all you think about! You shouldn’t have left me in Venice. It was our moment.”

  “All the moments can be our moments,” he said softly.

  “Did you go see Elizabeta?” she said, changing the subject.

  “There was no one at that address but an elderly caretaker who didn’t have a clue as to what I was talking about. But a professor friend of mine told me Elizabeta Bomberg of Venice died fifty years ago. Apparently, she’d been working for the Italian underground and was caught and tortured by the Nazis.”

  “What? That’s impossible. Elizabeta Bomberg took us to a costume party! Sh…she…” She stopped. Cold chills ran up her spine.

  “I think someone said, though, that she had a niece with the same name, a professor of history in Venice…. Let’s not talk about that, though. I want an answer!”

  “I also want an answer! About the other things, the things I asked you in my letter.”

  “You mean about marrying you for your money…? You can’t be serious!” He shrugged, amused.

  “Yes, I am,” she said stubbornly. “I have to know! Were we set up? Did Gran discuss dowries and who knows what else with you behind my back? Don’t lie, Marius. Gabriel already told Suzanne he didn’t meet her by accident.”

  “Of course he didn’t. Your grandmother approached my uncle, who approached me. It was my idea to introduce my best friend to your lovely sister. Although when your grandmother first saw Gab, she was ready to execute us both,” he chuckled. “I guess he didn’t have that settled, Semitic look about him. So what? I think it turned out rather well, don’t you?”

  “Can you answer me?”

  “The answer is yes. I discussed the idea of forming a relationship with you with my uncle and asked him to intercede with your grandmother and gain her permission. I did this the first day we met, out of respect for tradition and for your family. Because this is the way things are done. Your grandmother was all for it, by the way. But Uncle thought it was a terrible idea….”

  “He did?” she said, swallowing hard.

  “Yes, indeed. You struck him as a very fine, sensible girl. He thought I’d be very bad for you.” He grinned.

  “Well…then…” she sputtered, beginning to feel embarrassed and foolish. “And you never once…I mean…Gran never once told you that you’d get something if you and I…if we…wound up…” She took a deep breath.

  “Actually, it wasn’t your money I was after,” he deadpanned. “It was your grandfather’s book collection.”

  “This isn’t funny! At least not to me.”

  “My dearest Francesca—you look so ravishing! Have I mentioned that? Promise me you’ll wear this dress on our honeymoon? Ah, yes. You’re waiting for an answer. Let me think of how to put it best. Hmm…Okay. It is true that I will go into Brazilian rainforests, climb Carpathian mountains in January, and sneak through secret police roadblocks to get my hands on something I want. But there are certain things even I won’t do, because they’re much too dangerous. Marrying you, if I didn’t love you, is one of them.”

  He put his arms around her and pulled her close.

  She hesitated. “Can we sit down a minute?”

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Marius, how would we live?”

  “Happily ever after.” He shrugged.

  “No. Seriously. I mean, where, for one thing. I suppose I could get a job in London, but I don’t know if I’d want to leave the States. And…and…” This was hard. But it had to be said. She couldn’t start out a life together with him without saying it. “How long do you plan to keep running around the world like some pirate, or treasure hunter? What are your plans for the future?”

  “You mean, what am I going to be when I grow up?” He wasn’t smiling.

  “No. I mean…Yes. Exactly.”

  His face went ominously dark.

  “I think I could help,” she said hurriedly. “We could open up a store in Manhattan, something similar to your uncle’s. I mean, I could crunch some numbers, and call some real estate friends…”

  “Francesca…” He got up and put his hands into his pockets. She could see the outlines of his tightly squeezed knuckles bulge through the material.

  “I’m not a shopkeeper. I earn a very respectable living at what I do. And I’m good at it. I’m the best. Do you think Picasso should have given up painting and opened a nice little shop selling framed clown prints? Home by six, supper at six-thirty? That’s not who I am.”

  “But I think…I know…that is who I am.”

  They stared at each other across the empty pews, the sound of celebration suddenly gone, replaced by an eerie silence.

  “Can’t I change your mind?”

  “I don’t know,” she said honestly.

  42

  Letter, found on the desk of Catherine da Costa on the morning after her death, addressed: To
All My Children. Read, together with her last will, in the presence of her family in the offices of Schnader, Lipton, Morrison, and Siegel, Attorneys at Law.

  It is late. The wedding was beautiful, worth everything I did to keep me alive a little while longer.

  Tell that suicide doctor I think he’s an ass.

  I’m sitting in my living room; my music is playing and there’s a good fire on the grate. I’ve had a lovely glass of wine, and some of those chocolates I adore but haven’t eaten in ages. I think I’ve eaten four or five. I’ve lost count.

  Gracia’s with me, of course. She calls me Rivka and tells me to call her Hannah now, as that was always her true name. She wore the name Beatrice like clothing; Gracia like skin. Hannah was the name that echoed in her soul; the name she heard G-d call her. She’s sitting on the couch keeping me company, supplying me with words when I need them, ideas when I can’t think.

  I have my pen and paper ready. I think I understand Gracia at last. I, too, wish to leave behind something to keep you all safe and happy forever. I don’t have her noble, exciting history, but I have certain things I know, and others I’ve learned. I have a history that I, too, would like to share.

  My mother, Elizabeth Nasi, valued family and education. She raised her husband’s nephew. In addition, she had living in her home her unmarried sister (who was a school principal, and later the head of an academy that trained many fine teachers) and her father, who was crippled in a railroad accident. She supported many other family members in a quiet way.

  Recently, someone told me that she slipped money to a Sunday-school student for him to donate to charity, as the child was embarrassed not to have anything to give. A refugee from Hitler’s Germany told me she taught him English, and a neighbor said she came daily to read to a dying child to amuse him and relieve the family.

  She taught Sunday school, and each year the highlight was a model Seder, which she made as beautiful as possible by bringing all of her finest dishes, silver, and the most delicious food.