breast. What did he lack? I couldn't find in him a fracture or sore, or break anywhere, only the indefinable enhancement.
Then I realized what it was. He had the prettiness of the young, but he was past fifty years! How dazzling it was. How wondrous the way age sharpened his physical virtues, and made the glare of his eyes so much the more strong.
"Speak to me, Gregory Belkin," said the old man with contempt, "and tell me why you've come, or leave my house now."
I was again startled by the old man's wrath.
"All right, Rebbe," the younger man answered, as if the tone and the manner were nothing new to him.
The old man waited.
"I have a check in my pocket, Rebbe," said Gregory. "I come to give it to you for the good of the whole Court."
By this I knew he meant the Hebrews of the old man for whom the old man was the Rabbi, the zaddik, the leader.
Flashes of memory came at me, rather like jagged pieces of glass- glimpses of my long dead Master Samuel. But it didn't mean anything and I pushed it aside. At this point, keep in mind, I could not recall anything of my past. Nothing. But I knew what this man was- venerable, powerful in holy ways, perhaps a magician, but if he was a magician, why hadn't he sensed that I was there?
"You always have a check for us, Gregory," said the old one. "Your checks come to the bank without you. We take your money in honor of your dead mother, and your dead father, who was my beloved son. We take your money for what it can do for those whom they once loved, your mother and father. Go back to your Temple. Go back to your computers. Go back to your worldwide church. Go home, Gregory! Hold your wife's hand. Her daughter has been murdered. Mourn with Rachel Belkin. Is she not entitled to that much?"
The younger man gave a little nod, as if to say, ah, things aren't going to improve here, and then he tilted his head to the right and shrugged respectfully and spoke again:
"I need something from you, Rebbe," he said. Direct as it was, it was smooth.
The old man lifted his hands and shrugged. He shifted in the light of the electric lamp, and sighed. His lips were full for the lips of an old man. A faint sheen of sweat appeared on the top of his head.
Behind him stood more shelves of books. The room was so crowded with books it might as well have been made of books. The chairs were big, with their frames hidden inside their leather, and all were surrounded by books. There were scrolls, and scrolls in sacks, and scrolls of leather.
One cannot after all burn or discard old scrolls of the Torah. These must be buried, and properly, or kept in someplace like this.
Who knew what this old man had brought through the world with him? His English was not pure and sharp like that of Gregory, but carried with it the speaking habits of other tongues. Poland. I saw Poland and I saw snow.
Gregory slipped his left hand into his pocket. There was the check, the piece of paper, the banknote, the gift that he wanted to give so badly. I heard it crackle as his fingers touched it. It was folded right beside the gun.
The old man said nothing.
"Rebbe, when I was very little," said Gregory, "I heard you tell a particular tale. Only once did I hear this story. But I remember it. I remember the words."
The old man made no reply. The loose folds of his skin were shiny in the light, but when he lifted his white eyebrows he lifted the folds of his forehead too.
"Rebbe," said Gregory, "you spoke once to my aunt of a legend, a secret ... a family treasure. I've come here to ask you about what I heard."
The old man was surprised. No. It wasn't that. The old man was surprised only that the younger man's words had some interest for him. The old man gave the silence a moment, then spoke in Yiddish as before:
"A treasure? You and your brother-you were the treasures of your mother and father. What would bring you to Brooklyn to ask me about tales of treasure? Treasure you have beyond any man's dreams."
"Yes, Rebbe," said Gregory patiently.
"I hear your church swims in money, that your missions in foreign lands are