there is no reason under God for me to have hurt Esther. What can I give you for the answer to my question? Do you remember this story, this thing, this Servant of the Bones? Did it have a name, was its name Azriel?"
The old man was stunned.
So was I.
"I never spoke that name," said the old man.
"No, you didn't," said Gregory, "but someone else did."
"Who has told you about this thing?" the old man demanded. "Who could have done such a thing?"
Gregory was confused.
I leant my weight against the shelf of books, watching, my fingers catching the loose flaking leather of the bindings. Don't hurt them. Not the books.
The old man sounded hard and contemptuous.
"Has someone come to you with the legend?" asked the old man. "Has someone told you a pretty tale of magic and power? Was this man Moslem? Was he a Gentile? Was he a Jew? Was he one of your New Age fanatic followers who has read your abracadabra about the Kabbalah?"
Gregory shook his head.
"Rebbe, you have it wrong," he said with solemn sincerity. "It was only your talk of this that I heard when I was a child. Then two days ago, someone else spoke the words before witnesses: Azriel, Servant of the Bones!"
I was afraid to guess.
"Who was this?" asked the old man.
"She said it, Rebbe," Gregory told him. "Esther said it as she was dying. The man in the ambulance heard it from her lips as she died. Esther said it, Rebbe. Esther said, 'The Servant of the Bones.' And the name 'Azriel.' Esther said it twice aloud, and two men heard her. Those men told me."
I smiled. This was more of a mystery than I had ever imagined. I watched them intently. My face teemed with heat. And I knew that I trembled as the old man trembled, as if my body were real.
The old man drew back. He was not willing to believe. His anger vanished. He peered into the younger man's face.
Then came the voice of Gregory, purposefully and cleverly tender. "Who is he, Rebbe? Who is the Servant of the Bones? What is it, this thing, that Esther spoke of? That you spoke of? When I was a child playing on the floor at your feet? Esther said this name, 'Azriel.' Is that the name of the Servant of the Bones?"
My pulse throbbed so loud I could hear it with my own ears. I felt the fingers of my left hand bear down slightly on the tops of the books. I felt the shelf against my chest. I felt the cement floor under my shoes, and I didn't dare to look away from either of them.
My god, I thought, make the old man tell, make him tell so I will know, my god, if you are still there., make him tell Who and What is the Servant of the Bones? Make him tell me!
The old man was too stunned to reply.
"The police have this information," said Gregory. "They guard it jealously. They think she spoke of her killer." I almost cried aloud in denial. The old man scowled, and his eyes moistened. "Rebbe, don't you understand? They want to find who killed her- not that trash with the ice picks who stole her necklace, but those who put them up to it, those who knew the value of the jewels!"
Once again, the necklace. I saw no necklace then and I saw none in my memory now. There had been no necklace around her throat. They had taken nothing from her. What was this diversion of the necklace?
If only I knew these men better. I couldn't tell for sure when Gregory lied.
The voice of Gregory grew lower, colder, less conciliatory. He straightened his shoulders.
"Now let me speak plainly, Rebbe," he said. "I have always, at your behest kept our secret, my secret, our secret-that the founder of the Temple of the Mind was the grandson of the Rebbe of this Court of the Hasidim!" His voice rose now as if he couldn't quiet it.
"For your sake," he said, "I've kept this secret! For Nathan's sake. For the sake of the Court. For the sake of those who loved my mother and father and remembered them. I have kept this secret for you and for them!"
He paused, the tone of accusation hanging there sharply, the old man waiting, too wise to break the silence.
"Because you begged me," said Gregory, "I kept the secret. Because my brother begged me. And because