Yet as she settled a blanket across his knees, and placed his neglected cup of coffee into his thin hands, a question rose in her: what if she herself could converse with de Spinoza—a man who dared challenge the rabbis?
She knew in an instant what she’d ask. She’d demand explanation for what none, not even the rabbi, had yet been able to explain to her: how a just God might willingly make a youth—a child—an instrument of death. Isaac, her Isaac, was all the proof she needed that God was either indifferent to human life, or else must have no power to alter its course. Had de Spinoza come to believe God—God-or-Nature—indifferent? The God the tradition spoke of must necessarily wish for the well-being of His creations. Either there was no such God, then . . . or perhaps there existed only a God who could do nothing to alter the world’s evils.
Then did God quake in helpless fear at the roar of fire, the cry of a mob? Did God too tremble at times with rage and confusion?
It was for the rabbi, she told herself, that she added to her letter to Amsterdam an inquiry about contacting de Spinoza. Should the response be positive, she’d surprise Rabbi HaCoen Mendes with permission to write to his former pupil. So she persuaded herself, as she addressed the letter to one of the very Amsterdam rabbis who had banished de Spinoza. And perhaps, she reasoned as she watched the ink dry and lose its shine, the Amsterdam community’s ferocity toward de Spinoza had been in part a show, meant to serve as a warning to others. For could those rabbis truly be possessed of such fury for a fellow Jew—for his mere ideas? Wasn’t such lack of tolerance the manner of the Christians, rather than the Jews?
She sealed the letter with a pang. None yet had been able to answer the questions that blew in her sometimes like hail. She’d seized now on the hope that the heretic de Spinoza might.
She’d carried the letter to the courier this morning, her brother’s words rumbling within her even as she walked, forgiving her. You’re like a coin made out of stone . . . a house made out of honeycombs or feathers or maybe glass. If only Isaac’s impish spirit could steal its way into her, replacing the clenched, balking soul she herself possessed. The wrong one of them had lived, for Isaac had been finer than she.
She’d sent the letter to Amsterdam; there was no calling it back.
She stood at the threshold, the Mahamad’s pamphlet in her hand . . . nor shall they allow strangers to see their hair but instead shall keep it covered on the byways of the city. Nor shall the members of the community take their entertainment in the theaters.
Stepping indoors, she closed the heavy door behind her and shed her cloak; then dropped the pamphlet into the rabbi’s fire and watched as its edges curled. Yellow flames with dark cores danced through the words, two at a time, ten at a time. Then the page heaved, blackened and whitened at once, and dissolved.
“It’s a puzzle.”
A soft sound escaped her. She’d thought the rabbi asleep.
He sat in the shadowed corner. His face was raised toward the empty light of the window across from his chair. He reminded her of a bird awaiting a current that would lift him into the white sky. He spoke softly. “Why does God create in fire a hunger for paper . . .”
She tensed.
“. . . and yet that hunger is never sated while the fire lives?”
He waited for her response, then sighed. “I will pray to understand God’s mysteries.”
“I was burning a proclamation of the Mahamad,” she said softly. “It regarded only women’s clothing and theater and such matters.”
“I am certain,” said the rabbi, “that you burn only what must be burned.”
She didn’t answer. She let the noise from beyond the window reign. A laden dray passing down the narrow street, a cart edging past in the opposite direction. A clamor of iron-clad wheels on stone. “A woman visited here while you were out,” the rabbi continued. “The widow Isabella Mendoza. She’s in London to see a cousin, but wished to speak to me. She claimed she’d sent more than one letter this past year proposing that she find a match for you. She was sorely insulted to receive no reply.
“Perhaps,” the rabbi said, “her letters were lost in the delivery?”
Outside, a vendor calling for kitchen scraps: Any kitchen stuff have you, maids, any kitchen stuff, any—
“I’m sorry,” she said.
He considered, then nodded. “I believe you, Ester. And forgive.”
She waited.
“I told her I would think about her offer and give my reply.”
She stiffened, her spine a stave. She pushed her palms away from her body as though to shove away the words. “I don’t want it,” she said. “Not now.”
The rabbi’s face was turned toward her. She felt the growing weight of his thoughts.
Could she walk out right now without his knowledge? Leave him to address the empty room?
“Then what is your wish for the future?” he said.
She spoke more quickly than she’d intended. “I have no wishes.”
A flicker of a smile crossed his face at her defiance, but gave way to solemnity. “But what of marriage?” he said.
The sounds from the street had drained away.
“I will die,” said the rabbi in the silence.
She took a step toward the door but could not bring herself to leave him alone.
“This household will dissolve,” he said. “My nephew will not maintain it after my death.” He raised a hand to his temple, and his splayed fingers prisoned his face. “I’ve been selfish. I’ve ignored your well-being for the sake of my own.”
“But—”
He lowered his hand. “The skills you’ve practiced here are useless to a wife. They will repel suitors, as I’ve known. And yet I’ve let you continue, and so dimmed your prospects. Ester, you are”—he gestured—“a remarkable pupil. Perhaps you don’t know it, but I, who have taught many, do.” His mouth worked. “To study with an able mind is to escape prison, for a time.”
With a resolve that filled her with dread, he continued. “I so prized your love for learning and my own, I let myself forget the cost to you. Marry, Ester. You have my permission, my urging. And my apology.”
“For what?”
“For allowing you to blight your life.”
“It was my wish,” she said. “It is my wish.”
He shook his head. “It’s fear that speaks in you now. You’ve lost much, so you fear losing this home as well. I understand. But Ester, there is no other future for you. After my death, Rivka can go on to wash or bake or labor in the household of a wealthy family. And you? Is your constitution strong enough to labor all your days for bread? Rivka thinks it isn’t, and I believe she speaks honestly. She reports you grow dizzy with the exertions such labor requires.” Slowly, slowly, he shook his head. “I cannot be selfish any longer. I cannot condemn you to such a life or such a death.”
His words closed on her, a heavy lid.
“In years to come,” he said softly, “you’ll be glad of the choice. You’ll have someone to see after you in your old age, Ester, as I’ve had you.” He turned in his seat, and raised a hand toward her. “I won’t deny you the blessing that you and Rivka have given me. I say it even though I know the loss of our study together will grieve you.” He pressed his lips together. “It grieves me.”
“Perhaps,” he began, and halted. “Perhaps long after I’m dead, after you have raised children, if it is the will of God, you may find some small leisure for study once more.”
She spoke, the words hollow. “You’ll be left in darkness.”
He nodded. Then added, “I’ll do what is in my power to secure you a good match.”
She laughed aloud.
Startled, he seemed to choose his words with care. “Your mother was spoken of as a beauty. Surely you cannot be so ill favored that a husband wouldn’t wish your care.”