The Diamond Setter

by Moshe Sakal

  “That doesn’t make sense to me,” he said. His hand was still on mine.

  “What doesn’t?”

  “It smells fishy, your story. Forget it, I don’t want to see the diamond. Forget I asked. Give me the ring, tell me how much I owe you, and I’ll be out of here.”

  “No.”

  “What do you mean, no?”

  “Don’t start up with superstitions now. You’re not leaving before I show you Sabakh.”

  “Excuse me?” He stared at me. “What do you mean? You can’t tell me what to do!”

  “Whether or not I can, I just sat here for half an hour working on your ring without getting a penny. I told you stories, you drove me crazy with your questions: What’s the most expensive thing here? What do I put in the safe and what don’t I put in it? And now you start with the superstitions? So please, I’m going to show you the diamond now.”

  He nodded, then looked up until his eyes met mine. “You’re crazy.”

  I moved my hand out from under his and started turning the key in the lock.

  And then he drew.

  And the minute he drew his, I drew mine, and we were facing each other with our pistols aimed.

  “What are you doing?!” he shouted. “Have you lost your mind?”

  “Why didn’t you listen to me?” I was breathing hard. I remember thinking that if he ran away I wouldn’t be able to chase him, and it was the first time in my life I regretted not being in shape.

  My thief said, “There are some things in life you’re better off not knowing. I told you that before, when you told me your story about the grave robber.”

  “He wasn’t a robber! Did you even listen to the story?”

  “That doesn’t matter now. You calm down. Put that gun down, goddamn it.”

  “God damn you!”

  “No.” He took a step closer to me and I could see that his eyes were bloodshot. “God damn you and your lousy diamond. I don’t need anything from you, I’ll tell everyone this is a lousy shop with crappy service, I’ll give you bad publicity, you’ll regret the day you let me in.”

  “I didn’t let you in, you came in on your own,” I said.

  “Put the gun down! Nothing’s going to happen, put down the gun and I’ll leave.”

  I put the gun down on the table.

  “Very good,” he said, and started backing out toward the door. He reached out behind him and was already touching the handle. But a second before he left, I picked up the box and decided I wasn’t giving in: I was going to show him that diamond.

  “What are you doing?” He let go of the handle and walked back to me.

  Now the two of us were holding the box with Sabakh. He held his gun in one hand, and with the other tried to stop me from opening the box.

  “Don’t you open that box!” he yelled.

  “Don’t tell me what to do.”

  “You’re forcing me to take the diamond. I don’t want it, but I’ll take it if you don’t let go of the box and put it back in the safe.”

  I wouldn’t give in. In the end he managed to grab the box and get to the door.

  “Wait!” I said before he left.

  “What now?”

  “You forgot your ring.”

  “I don’t need your lousy ring,” he practically whispered. Then he slammed the door behind him.

  I leaned against the display window and watched him hurry away. I waited a minute or two and then pressed the panic button. Dalia came running from the pharmacy. When she saw me she let out a shout. I pointed to the gun lying on the table and said, “I’ve been robbed.”

  “Was it the man who was here, Menashe?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why didn’t you say anything when I came in before?”

  “He had a gun.”

  When the police came, they fenced off the place and told me not to move anything. They took fingerprints and asked me loads of questions. They verified over and over again: “He only took the diamond?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did he know it was a famous diamond?”

  “Yes, he had information. It’s a miracle he didn’t shoot me.” That’s what I told them.

  Today, when I think about it, it seems to me that I had to do it that way. It’s like a genie got into me and I simply had to get rid of that diamond. That’s how it seems to me today. Anyway, at night the war broke out and Scud missiles fell on Tel Aviv. The next morning, when I got to the shop, there wasn’t a dog on the streets. I waited an hour, two hours, and in the end I went to visit my parents. I didn’t want to tell them about the robbery over the phone, especially on a day when missiles were falling.

  When my parents heard about the robbery, Mom said to Dad, “Rafael, go to synagogue and say a gomel blessing. That diamond is cursed, I always knew it would kill us in the end.” But Dad refused to say the gomel blessing. He said, “You don’t understand anything, Adela. That diamond saved your son’s life. There’s nothing to get angry about. Just as Sabakh left, it’ll be back one day.”

  4

  When Menashe had finished telling us the story of the robbery once and for all, from beginning to end, he was interested in only one thing: “What’s going on with your book, Tom?”

  “My book?”

  “Yes. The Diamond Setter.”

  “First of all, I’m not sure that’s going to be the title anymore.”

  “Why? It’s a good name.”

  “I was actually thinking of calling it The Diamond.”

  “The Diamond is too general,” Honi interjected, “it sounds a little meaningless.”

  “But it’s not just any diamond,” I reminded him.

  “Then how about The Blue Diamond?”

  “To tell you the truth, it doesn’t matter what you call the book,” Menashe announced. “The Jeweler, The Diamond, for all I care you can call it The Third Hand. Whatever you decide. But I want you to know that there’s a whole shelf in this shop waiting for the book. And I hope your piano teacher didn’t steal my thunder. After all, it’s a book about a jeweler, not a pianist.”

  “Don’t worry, Menashe, you have a place of honor in the book,” I told him.

  “I’m glad to hear it. So tell me, Tom, when can I read it already?”

  “I’m doing revisions now. And then all I have left is the end.”

  “Don’t get too bogged down with these stories,” Menashe advised. “Remember what my thief said? You don’t have to know everything. And my mother always said you have to know everything, but you don’t have to say everything. That’s the whole thing.”

  I wasn’t going to argue that point with him. I myself hadn’t decided what one needed to know and how much, and if there really were things better left unsaid. The farther I got in the book, the more I knew about certain things and the less about others. Every time I uncovered a secret, another, larger one turned up behind it. Eventually I started doubting even the smallest facts.

  “Tom,” Honi said with a laugh, “I think Menashe’s afraid you’re going to give away his deepest secrets.”

  “Who told you such a thing?” Menashe raised his eyebrows.

  Honi ignored him. “Well, whatever you decide to do, I would advise your readers to be suspicious. Always be suspicious: Every time they get close to the truth, it runs away from them.”

  “What difference does it make anyway?” Menashe asked. “I mean, in any case it all comes from your imagination, doesn’t it?”

  “Precisely,” said Honi. “Remember, we’re talking about a work of literature, not the Channel 2 news. So let’s settle it: Everything the reader believes is the truth. Maybe not the absolute truth, but the Diamond Setter’s truth.” There was a brief silence, and then Honi gazed at me with his beautiful brown eyes. “What are you thinking about now, Tom?”

  “I’m thinking about my characters. And about the book, and the ending, which I haven’t written yet. It always seems like a momentous battle: Who will finish off whom first — me the book, or the book m
e?”

  “Maybe both?” Honi suggested.

  “Maybe.”

  Menashe went back to his work, Honi to his cell phone, and I adjusted my safety glasses, pressed a button on the machine, and began polishing the pile of rings I had to get through. After work, Honi and I walked to the café, as usual.

  Honi was contemplative. “Are you thinking of spending your whole life working at the jewelry shop?” he asked on the way.

  “If your father doesn’t throw Menashe out first. Why do you ask?”

  “Why don’t you come to Berlin with me?”

  “And leave the jeweler on his own? Just like that?”

  “I’ll speak with Kadosh. Maybe we can do something about it.”

  “Like what, exactly? Your father will never give up on his boutique hotel.”

  “I’ll think of something.”

  “From your lips to Kadosh’s ears. So tell me, did you go to the Garden of the Two in Jaffa?”

  “No, why?”

  “But we talked about it!” I gently slapped the back of his neck. “You’re a lost cause, Mr. Hanan.”

  “We did? When?” He stopped and looked at me, befuddled.

  “And you have the gall to boast about your phenomenal memory?”

  “I swear, Tom, I have no recollection of talking about this.”

  “All right, never mind. You promised me you’d go to the Garden of the Two and talk with the people who set up tents there. Will you do that for me?”

  “If it’s important to you, then of course. Although I want you to know that I’m getting a little fed up with this social protest. I don’t have enough material for a program. I mean, I have lots of material, but nothing that can hold together a show.”

  “Go there, and then we’ll see,” I said. “Maybe we’ll even kill two birds with one stone.”

  “Okay.”

  “But listen, Honi. I don’t want you to just go there.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “When you get to the park, turn on the app.”

  “What app?”

  “Grindr.”

  “But you know I don’t use it anymore now that we’re going out, Tomi…”

  “I know. But I’m asking you to log in. And not just that: If someone contacts you while you’re there, someone located very close to you, answer him. And if he wants to meet up, arrange it.”

  “I don’t get it. Are you trying to set me up with someone, or have you started pimping me out as a side gig?”

  “Very funny. Just do this for me, okay? I’ll explain afterward.”

  CHAPTER NINE

  LAILA

  1

  ON THE DAY FAREED TURNED NINETEEN, he went to visit his grandmother Laila in the Almaza neighborhood of Damascus. She served lentil soup on the balcony, and while they ate she told him about his grandfather, Abed. Her eyes grew distant as she talked about the man she had lived with for over fifty years until his sudden death, and it was clear her thoughts were sailing far away.

  “I told you how every summer I used to go with my mother to Aley, right?” she asked her grandson.

  “Yes.” When he was a child she had told Fareed how she looked forward every year to those trips, and about her Yafa days, when she would sit on a rock by the sea and look out north.

  “Do you know how beautiful Lebanon was? Back then they called it ‘the Switzerland of the Middle East.’”

  Fareed nodded. “And what about Yafa? Do you miss it?”

  Laila thought for a moment. “No,” she said finally.

  “Really? But you grew up there — how can you not miss it?”

  “When a tree is cut down, does it miss its roots?” she asked contemplatively.

  “What sort of a girl were you, Grandma?”

  “I don’t know. Just a girl.”

  She said those last words with a childish smile and a nostalgic tone, and Fareed could suddenly see her as she once was. And he felt very close to her, even more than usual.

  “Are you angry?” he wondered.

  “At who? The Zionists? No, I’m not angry.”

  “How can you not be angry?”

  Laila did not answer. She thought about the day she’d left Yafa with Abed and his family, and about their arrival in this foreign city. They had managed to integrate in Damascus over the years, thanks to family connections and Abed’s flourishing career.

  It was not long after their arrival that Laila had learned of her mother Suad’s death. After that, she met with her father, Sami, in Paris every year. Sami gave Laila all the news from Yafa, which had changed unrecognizably. He told her about the Jews who lived in the homes she knew, the new neighborhoods they were building, the houses that had been destroyed, the orchards now owned by the Jewish National Fund. He described in great detail his struggle to keep the house on Sha’arei Nikanor Street in the family. The house was locked up now.

  Laila listened to her father’s stories. She gave him a picture of her son, Shaker, so that Sami would have a souvenir from his grandson. Finally, she could not resist asking about Rafael and Adela.

  Sami described Rafael’s jewelry store on Plonit Alley, and told her about Menashe, their dreamy little son. Finally, and not without trepidation, Sami confessed his relationship with Gracia.

  At first Laila said nothing. Sami examined her expression curiously and wondered if she understood what he was saying.

  “Have you kept in touch with her all these years?” Laila finally asked.

  “Yes.”

  “So you met with her while Mother was still alive, after our trip to Lebanon?”

  “No, we corresponded by mail.”

  “Does her family know about your relationship?”

  “Only Rafael’s son, Menashe. He’s exactly Shaker’s age.”

  Laila thought about Shaker, whom she had been carrying when they left Yafa. She pursued her train of thought: “And Rafael…Did he ask you about me?”

  “I never see him. Gracia doesn’t want her family to know me. Rafael’s son came to visit one day when I was there and surprised us together. Apart from him, no one knows.”

  “What about people in Yafa? Do they know you visit Gracia?”

  “No.”

  “Do you want to live with her?”

  “I don’t know, Laila. All those years I lived with your mother, I was alone. She wasn’t really there with us. Gracia is the only woman who was always there when I needed her.”

  Laila’s eyes glistened for a moment. It was difficult for her to hear these things about her mother, though she knew her father was being truthful.

  “If you only knew how difficult it is to be far away,” he said, and she didn’t know if he meant the current distance between him and his daughter and grandson, or the years when Gracia had been far away from him.

  They said goodbye, Sami returned to Yafa, Laila to Damascus. The following year, Laila brought Shaker to Paris to meet his grandfather.

  2

  In those years when Laila met her father in Paris, Gracia lived near Yafa, Laila in Damascus, and Rafael and Adela in Tel Aviv. It all fell into place almost as though an invisible hand had intervened. Now, at the age of eighty-five, on her grandson Fareed’s birthday, Laila felt she had the opportunity to revisit those times and places, to ruffle things up a little, to disrupt the natural course of things and wipe away the borders, at least the ones in her mind’s eye. She felt a burning urge to talk openly with her grandson, although she feared the conversation. She looked at him and asked, “Fareed, tell me, do you have a girl?”

  He blushed, looked down, and fiddled with his cell phone. “No,” he finally said. He took a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket and lit one.

  “When I was twenty, I fell in love for the first time,” Laila said. She finished her soup, leaned back in the chair, and gazed out at the high treetops in the courtyard. “Up until then, men had fallen in love with me, but I had rejected them all. My first true love was a slightly peculiar love. But what can you do, tha
t’s how things happened.”

  Fareed said nothing, only looked tenderly at his grandmother.

  It was hard for Laila to imagine what was going through her grandson’s mind, and she decided to pick up his original question. “Do you really want to know what I miss, Fareed? It’s difficult to say exactly. Sometimes a person can miss themselves. Do you think that’s possible, to miss yourself? After all, you could say that you are the closest you can be to yourself — you don’t even have to reach out very far. You never leave yourself even for a second! And yet you can be very distant from yourself. And one day you can discover that you have grown so distant that you can no longer go back. You have nowhere to return to. The place you left behind is no longer the same place: the smell, the air you breathe, the things you touch, even the sights. Nothing is the same.”

  Fareed looked at her questioningly. He reached out and put his fingers in her hand, and she softly kissed his fingers with her warm lips. Then she told him stories he had never heard before: about her trips to Aley and her meetings with Rafael and Adela, the long nights in their hotel room, the blue diamond. Laila spoke firmly and somewhat urgently, and Fareed leaned back in his seat and listened.

  After some time, Laila got up and went into the living room. She opened one of the glass cabinet doors, took a box off the top shelf, came back to the balcony and sat down next to her grandson. When she removed the lid, Fareed saw a bundle of photographs tied with elastic thread. She untied the knot and placed the pictures on the table. Fareed looked at them silently.

  The first picture showed a very young woman sitting in between another woman and a man. Behind them was a window showing a strip of sky and a few treetops, and above the window was a rolled-up screen, open just enough to reveal a different landscape. It seemed the photographer had not had time to roll down the artificial landscape, or perhaps this was a practice photograph. Fareed looked at the people in the picture. The young woman in the middle had a necklace twinkling on her chest, which he immediately recognized: It was the pendant his grandmother always wore, with three delicate lines engraved horizontally.