by Roger Herst
It rang three times, then stopped. But the caller tried a second time, and Gabby immediately sensed it was something that couldn't wait until the morning.
Kye lifted the receiver, didn't bother talking, and simply passed it across his chest to Gabby as though it were a choreographed routine.
"Rabbi Gabby," a female voice said the moment Gabby answered. "It's Carey Sylerman. Is this a bad time to talk?"
Remembering that Carey also interrupted her love making in New York City, she said, "You must have a sixth sense about interruptions." She giggled without irritation. "This is the second time, if you remember what I told you in Brooklyn."
"Oh, no, Rabbi. I'm awfully sorry. I'll call you back in the morning."
"I thought you weren't supposed to speak on the phone after 10 p.m."
"I'm not. But even a perfect Jewess like me breaks the rules once in a while. I just pulled up your story about Mordecai Yoelson on the Internet. I went back and read the previous two episodes. You said Yoelson was originally from Ottynia. Why did you write that, Rabbi?"
Gabby placed a soft hand on Kye's shoulder and let her fingers wander down his chest to the nipple, gently massaging it to keep him interested. She thought of asking Carey to call back in the morning, but feared playing phone tag and time was essential. "Ottynia is in the western Ukraine," she said. "The Nazi attack on Ivano Frankovsk region came at the beginning of the German offensive in Eastern Europe."
"That area is important to our prayer center at Sh'erit ha-Pletah. We have a room with stained glass windows depicting major Jewish communities annihilated during the war in the Ukraine."
"Now I don't understand," Gabby said. "Why is that of interest to pious Brooklyn Jews?"
"Rabbi Olam v'Ed teaches us to keep in touch with the devout who preceded us, so that we may merit from their virtues. He says that they were so pious that they accumulated more of God's grace than needed for their own use. Our men study Torah in a room called Z'chut Avot to make contact with their ancestors and acquire the residue of their undistributed Divine merit. Only the chosen may enter the chamber of Z'chut Avot, but people have spoken about it often."
The subject was of interest to Gabby, who said, "I'd like to talk with you about this, but it isn't quite the right time. I said in my message, Carey, that I have something very important to tell you. It could wait, but I'm not sure I can. Will you hear me out?"
"If one of the girls in this apartment house doesn't turn me in for using the phone."
"I'm sure your father's told you that your mother has relapsed and is in the Substance Abuse Unit at Suburban Hospital. She's upset about you and there isn't a shred of doubt in my mind that your distance from her is a significant cause of her worry. Carey, all the doctors, rabbis, psychiatrists, and people in Alcoholics Anonymous can't do a fraction of what you can for your mother."
"What do you expect of me?" Carey turned hostile.
"Visit your mother in the hospital."
"If you think I'll renounce Sh'erit ha-Pletah and Rabbi Olam v'Ed to make her feel better, I won't do that."
"I'm not suggesting anything of the kind. You have your convictions and are entitled to live your own life. Your mother doesn't need a clone of herself for a daughter. She needs nothing more than a hug and a kiss and to know that you love her. Nothing more, but nothing less."
"I have obligations here."
"You have obligations at home, Carey. Don't make me ask you to repay the favors I bestowed upon you when you were growing up. If I did that, you could and most probably would turn me down, but you wouldn't be happy either. I prefer not to call in my chips, young lady. I ask you for nothing more than what any daughter should readily do for her mother."
Carey was silent.
"Are you still with me, Carey?"
"Yes," Carey sounded distant.
"If I were sick, I'd expect a visit from my daughter."
"It's easy for you to say. You're a rabbi and are supposed to help people in trouble."
"And you, my friend, intend to enter Sh'erit ha-Pletah, the holiest order of obedience to God. Remember the Fifth Commandment. If you've forgotten, it says to honor your mother and your father. To me, respect for our parents is even more important than making babies. And when you hang up, I'm going to have to do some fancy explaining to my husband, who at this moment, you can imagine, isn't a very happy camper."
"I'll think about it, Rabbi Lewyn. How many more days do they expect my mother to be in the hospital?"
Gabby took a gamble and said what she felt not what she knew to be true. "If you come and give her a heartfelt hug, Carey, she'll be out the next day."
"That's all that it would take?"
"Believe it or not, yes, that's all that's required to get her out of the hospital. To keep her out will take a bit more."
Upon hanging up, Gabby immediately snuggled back against Kye, who made no attempt to resume cuddling. He responded but not with enthusiasm. Already he was beginning to fall asleep.
"I'm sorry, Love," she whispered. "This was a real emergency. It just couldn't wait until the morning."
"Nothing ever can with you," he said sarcastically. "I heard half of the conversation. You were good, Gabby, real good. But my guess is that Carey won't come. Too much bad water has already passed under the bridge."
"You're probably right. I feel sorry for Norma. She doesn't have a clue about what is in her daughter's heart. It's a miserable harvest for parents who don't understand their kids."
He rolled over on his side to look at her in the dark. "You know, Gabrielle, it's time for you to get off this merry-go-round and get a life for yourself. He who attempts to cleanse the world chases one project after another with little to show for it."
She aimed a kiss for his cheek, but, in the dark, planted it on his nose. "This is my life, Kye. Chuck always ribs me for attacking windmills. I know it's a bad habit. I wouldn't recommend it for others, but I'm an addict."
"There are lots of windmills in California, honey."
"I don't doubt that."
Early the next morning, Gabby left an email message for Chuck.
Please make an E-Ticket round trip reservation for Carey Sylerman on the Delta Shuttle between LaGuardia and Reagan National. Charge it to my American Express account, then call Carey Sylerman at this phone number and tell her that all she needs to do is pick up her ticket at the Delta Shuttle check-in counter. Tks.G.
When she opened her email an hour later, there was a reply from Chuck.
Carey's father is the CFO of Originela and can certainly afford to fly his daughter home from New York. Why should you foot the bill?
Gabby answered in memo form.
At this delicate moment, it's better she doesn't ask her father for money. I doubt Sh'erit ha-Pletah will pay for her travel. Gabby.
Punctuality was not Chuck's strong suit; still Gabby knew that he put in close to a 50-hour week, mostly in the evenings. Only on a rare occasion would he be at his desk when she arrived in the morning, and this morning was no exception. In fact, he didn't turn up until a little past ten. To his credit, he made no attempt to slip behind his desk and pretend he had been there on time. Rather, he poked his head into Gabby's study and, without the slightest suggestion of guilt, greeted with a cheerful good morning.
Gabby's eyes rose over her glasses and lazily studied him in the distance. Her dimples punctuated in a sad Mona Lisa smile.
"Neu?" He could look like a protective Jewish mother. "You look depressed, Rabbi Gabby. Want to tell me why?"
She shared with him as much about her private life as with anyone and did not withhold the fact that she and Kye were trying to conceive a child. "I'm upset because I was positive I was going to get pregnant when I met Kye in the Big Apple last month. We did all the right things at the right times, I know now that it isn't going to happen. It would have been a day to remember. You know, Chuck, we all remember and celebrate our birthdays, but very few of us know of a more important date – the mome
nt when we were conceived."
"Are you suggesting that, rather than celebrate our birthdays, we celebrate our conception days?"
She cocked her head in a raffish manner. "They're more important, if you follow my drift. Hell, if our parents never got together in 'an intimate way,' so to speak, think what we'd be. Not even a memory. Or more astounding: think what we'd be if they never met in the first place, never mind the hanky-panky in bed."
"My, my, how philosophic you've become. You're ahead of me on this one, but I promise to give it some thought. Come to think of it, I have no idea what my parents had in mind when I was conceived. I don't know where or exactly when. My sister is a bit more in tune with family history. But I'll wager she doesn't know more than I do in that department. Incidentally, I've left a pile of phone messages logged on your e-calendar."
Frustration over the surfeit of work that seemed to pile up faster than she could dispatch it usurped the playfulness on her face.
"Senator Zuckerman's secretary called to say that he's making a very good recovery. He's been recuperating in Cleveland, but is scheduled to return very soon to chair his Senate committee on Domestic Security. She said you were a great help to him."
"Not much, I'm afraid. But I came away thinking he possesses more substance than I suspected. When you strip off his political persona, he's got natural Mid-Western charm, even when sedated and intubated."
"Did he disclose anything revealing?"
She held little back from Chuck, but withheld that he had revealed his trick for impressing the voters. "Sorry, friend. Some things I can't repeat."
Chuck didn't like being shut out and experimented with a question meant to draw Gabby out. "So he's not the pompous political hack he appears to be on TV?"
"No comment, friend," she didn't go for his bait and looked back at the papers on her desk.
A few minutes before eleven, Chuck returned to Gabby's office, announcing the arrival of an officer from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission who wanted to ask her questions. This was an unannounced visit and Gabby didn't have the slightest idea what business the NRC might have with her. Chuck usually discouraged her from seeing people without an appointment, but she enjoyed the informality of "drop in visits." Not many of her congregants availed themselves of the opportunity, so her disagreement with Chuck over the matter had little practical significance. "Okay, please show the man in, but first let him know I only have fifteen minutes to spare."
"Let's see if we can find you a place to sit down," she greeted Jack Merken with a friendly handshake. "I'm not the tidiest person in the best of times, and this definitely isn't my best hour." She cleared the morning newspapers from a chair opposite her desk.
Merken, a mousy-looking silver-haired man with a receding chin that appeared to get lost in the button-down collar of his shirt, opened a writing pad and uncapped an old-fashion ink fountain pen. He hadn't expected Gabby to be so attractive and was mentally comparing her appearance with familiar Semitic stereotypes when she gestured for him to tell her why he had come. It took a few extra seconds for him to find the right page for inscribing notes. "Dr. Gideon Ganeden has given us your name as someone who knows him pretty well. That's true, isn't it?"
"Yes. His family's been a member of this congregation for at least ten years."
"So you know him professionally. And personally?"
She stiffened in her chair, thinking to herself she must be careful not to reveal anything she had learned in confidence, particularly what Melanie Ganeden had disclosed during her recent medical examination. "Yes. It would be unfair to characterize my relationships with members of the congregation as entirely professional, say like a doctor or lawyer. Many folks in the congregation think of me as both their friend and their rabbi, not necessarily in that order."
"And is that also true from your point of view?"
It was a good question that required a moment's reflection. "It's a strange form of friendship. Obviously, I can't share with my congregants as much as they share with me."
"That brings me to the purpose of my visit," he said. "You're aware that Dr. Gideon Ganeden runs New Frontiers Industries in Germantown, Maryland. What you may not know is that his firm has a license to handle radioactive materials and we're required to make routine checks on people who are responsible for potentially dangerous substances. I'd like to ask you about Dr. Ganeden's character."
"I've always found him to be a highly responsible individual. I know he has a sterling reputation in the scientific community."
Jack Merken eased forward in his chair as though he were about to deliver a very important piece of information. "New Frontiers manufactures electrons in linear accelerators which are buried in vaults below the ground. When they turn off the accelerators at the end of each day, no further radiation is produced and you can actually walk right into the pathway of these particles without any danger. Of course, all employees are required to wear radiation sensitive badges to monitor their exposure, but the amount of escaping radiation is infinitesimally low. We haven't had any incidents of significant exposure at New Frontiers. The accelerators themselves are big, heavy, and buried so deep in the ground they're almost impossible to move, let along steal. But New Frontiers also uses the radioactive element Cobalt, an older substance used for irradiating food products. It's a relatively low-grade source of radiation, but can be removed from the plant easily and, in the wrong hands, could be quite dangerous. Dr. Ganeden is responsible for this stuff."
Gideon never mentioned Cobalt to Gabby, though she had to confess that their conversations dealt with other matters. She knew his advocacy of irradiating foods had been quite controversial. Two years before, picketers from the health food industry stirred the press into a frenzy over stories about potential dangers of irradiating food products. A dozen unruly partisans showed up with placards on the front steps of the Ganeden home, accusing Gideon of causing cancer in babies. The incident so incensed him that he lost control and said uncomplimentary things about the scientists with whom he disagreed, particularly erstwhile colleagues who held posts at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. He came off looking like a greedy industrialist willing to take health risks for the sake of profit. Gabby knew this wasn't true, but was powerless to combat the public's perception it was.
"How long have you known Dr. Ganeden, Rabbi?" Merken asked.
"Nearly twelve years, almost from the beginning of my tenure here at Ohav Shalom."
"Could you tell me his role in the congregation?"
"We're training his daughter, Cynthia, for Bat Mitzvah at the end of this year. His youngest, Torry, is in our religious school. Gideon was born in Israel and taught Hebrew conversation to our kids. I've been available to his family for life-cycle occasions. His wife is currently my personal physician."
"Have you noticed anything unusual about the family – you know, out-of-the ordinary stresses in Dr. Ganeden's life? Special illnesses? Financial problems?"
Until her talk with Melanie, Gabby believed the Ganedens were a model family in an era when 62% of the children Ohav Shalom's religious school had divorced parents. They had, in fact, been held up as a model family and it was a blow to learn she had fallen into the trap of idealizing what was far from ideal. Her personal feelings aside, Merken's question drove her toward a breach of rabbinical confidentiality. She could have refused to answer on such grounds alone, but any hesitation would have been interpreted as an attempt to protect Gideon. Moreover, she didn't believe that private sexual problems between Gideon and Melanie were anybody's business but theirs. And they certainly had nothing to do with his ability to operate New Frontiers or handle low-grade radioactive materials. To the question she answered no, and immediately felt a pang of remorse for the falsehood. She saw in her mind's eye the needle of a lie-detector machine inscribing an ink line to mark the deception.
"Any drinking problems?" pursued Merken, seemingly unaware that she was protecting Gideon.
"Not to my knowledge."
"Drugs?"
"Not that I've observed."
"How about the children?"
"Torry, the youngest, is a soccer freak. Cynthia plays violin and has participated in some of our music events here."
"Anything unusual about Dr. Ganeden, other than his public persona? We're well aware of his outspoken positions."
Merken's question again breached a curtain separating what information was confidential and what wasn't. Gabby knew she should have drawn this line earlier, rather than allowing herself to be dragged into additional prevarications. But having crossed a line of no return where there was no alternative except to fib again. "No," she said, feeling her cheeks flush.
Merken didn't seem to notice her dilemma. "Rabbi, can you tell us anything about Dr. Ganeden's spending habits? Have you noticed him purchasing expensive things lately? You know, indulgences such as luxury vacations, expensive toys, big gifts for friends… perhaps even an unexpectedly large donation to a charity, or this synagogue?"
"The Ganedens have never withheld from the congregation, but there are families that give far more than they do. We don't have any idea about the total resources available to any given family, so we can't estimate who gives from the deepest bottom of the pocket, if you know what I mean."
Merken leisurely wrote the answer before raising his eyebrows high over the rims of his glasses. "That covers donations to this synagogue. How about the other things like expensive cars or trips?"
Melanie had told Gabby how her husband had taken at least two short-term loans from their bank. Jack Merken had not specifically asked her about these loans, though his question implied them. Because the question was not specific, she hid behind the ambiguity. "Not to my knowledge."