and English, still looking at the floor. Tea, she said. And whiskey. Then she looked up at me and said, And something for … something for this girl.
I don’t have a recording of this—I didn’t buy the cassette recorder until the next day. So what I’m telling you is from memory. What happened next was that I sat down—there was another upholstered chair, catty-corner to hers. She looked straight ahead, not at me, and we said nothing. This gave me time to look at her more closely, and I saw that her eyes were very brilliant, maybe blue or green—I couldn’t tell exactly in that light—and that her skin was exquisite, pale, translucent, without lines except for a few delicate sketches at the sides of her eyes. At first, because of the cane, she seemed older than Mother, big-M Mother. Then I realized that without it, without the cane and bent posture, Michal would look younger, probably five years younger.
Suddenly it came to me: Big-M Mother wanted me to be pale like Michal, pale and blond and light-eyed.
I don’t know how long I sat in that chair wishing I were dead. Two blond mothers and there I was: an alien, not appearing to be the spawn of anyone.
The tea appeared on a tray. The whiskey. Teacups and saucers and little pitchers of cream. Gerda served me a cup, put in sugar and cream without asking. She did the same for Michal, but with a shot.
Michal took her first sip. Then she said, very slowly, each word like a stone hitting concrete:
I hoped you would never know about me.
She had a beautiful voice: low, resonant, accented with a smooth blend of several languages I couldn’t identify—a voice so beautiful that the meaning of her words did not penetrate for several seconds.
So you just wanted to be rid of me, I said.
She winced. That is not it at all, she said.
She sat back and sighed. How did you find me?
A librarian at a Catholic adoption agency in Chicago.
You are an American?
Yes. I live in San Francisco.
Too bad, she said. Americans. Ignoramuses all. Ill-educated, overconfident people. I had planned for you to be a European. How did you get to America?
All I know, from my mother—my adoptive mother—is that the Church was looking for Catholic homes for babies, some of them Jewish, who had been sheltered with the Church during the war. Europe was in tatters, and there were more takers in the U.S. than in Europe.
I see, she said, staring away from me.
Well, she went on, at least you are a Catholic.
No, I said. I was brought up Presbyterian.
Ah! Even better!
What do you mean? I asked.
Now she turned to look at me, calmly, surveying me for the first time. Emotions played across her face again, but slowly now. Tiny frowns, surprised eyebrows, fleeting smiles—they might have meant anything. Then she simply gazed at me. She looked at my hair, my mouth, my chin. And then into my eyes. On her face was an expression of love so powerful, so open, that I realized I had never been loved in the whole of my life. Then the emotion moved on.
I wanted to make sure you would not be a Jew, she said.
70.
I was shocked, the patient told Dr. Schussler.
(I, too, was shocked, and nearly gave myself away by starting in my chair.)
I mean, there she was in Israel, the Jewish State, the patient went on. Why wouldn’t she want me to be Jewish? But when I asked, she only laughed and said, That would take more than a teatime to explain, my dear!
Then Michal turned to me with that tender look again and said, So tell me. What is your name?
And I told her. After which she sat thoughtfully for a moment, then said, Very nice. Very good. I am very happy for you—she gave a nod with each “very.”
(Why did you not say your name aloud to the therapist! I wanted to cry out from behind my wall.)
I realized right at that moment that I might have had another name, said the patient. So I asked her.
Her face went through those changes again, memories running over her features—more like lightning strikes this time. Finally her eyes went cold, and she said, No. Never. After which she sat back in her chair, stone-faced, and looked away from me.
Somewhere in the house a clock was ticking. Children were playing in the courtyard; I could hear their squeals of delight. I knew she was lying,