“Takeh,” said the second. “As you say, we killed him only once, though he deserved to die many times.”
“As he caused many deaths.”
“He sat on his horse gnawing cheese and commanded his men to kill thousands from our village, even as they brought them food,” the third said. “Our babies were snatched and broken against rocks. Cuffs, blows, cudgelling. They killed our families. They cut legs and arms off our sisters and mothers, our sons and daughters and fed them to their dogs.”
“I cannot forget. My heart tastes it. I breathe its memory,” she said.
“I, too, have seen such things,” Moishe said. “In worlds both old and new.”
The woman considered him.
“We escaped by hiding in a latrine pit covered by palm leaves,” she finally said. “I would not recommend it. Then we travelled by night in a canoe. We travelled for many nights, not knowing where.
“Then we came to a small island. For years, we lived there alone and were silent. We did not want to remember even the words for what we knew.”
The larger woman continued. “We saw where had once been a small tribe of Jews, but sometime before, they had been murdered: their houses razed, their synagogue burned, their bones, some shoes, candlesticks, all that remained. Except for this parrot.” She indicated the parrot on her shoulder. “Which spoke many of their words.”
“Oy vey iz mir. Oy vey iz mir,” the parrot said with impeccable timing.
So, nu, it was a parrot, but though its feathers were brighter than mine, it strutted and fretted like an idiot, full of sound and mamaloshen, but signifying nothing.
“We also found some books of their writing hidden in a tree stump. And so we began to speak again,” she said. “These strangers’ words.”
The women sat with Moishe in the sand. From a small sack hanging around her neck, the first woman retrieved some dried leaves and tobacco that the women assembled. The second woman removed some strands of dried grass, a small stone and a well-worn stick from a similar sack. Then she spun the stick between her palms while the first woman blew. Takeh, like this they could bring even the clay shvants of a Golem to life.
Curls of smoke, then fire. Each woman lit a cigar. The third gave one to Moishe.
They sat together for a few minutes, breathing slowly, exhaling clouds, looking out through the white, almost-creamy smoke.
Then the first woman spoke. “After some years,” she said, “the great schooner of Narváez sailed to our island, anchored off the shore, and soldiers landed. We hid deep in the forest but it was a small island and they searched everywhere, digging and overturning. Finally we were found. But our skins were not their quarry. They wanted the Jews’ books. We showed them such books as we had, but they threw them away. They sought others. Then they took us as prisoners.”
“The devil himself would not say what they did to us,” the second woman said. “How they punctured our insides with their shlechteh barbs. Who would wish to remember?”
“Miseh meshuneh,” the third said. “Curse memory. The past poisons every future.”
“And dos hob ich oykh in dr’erd. The hell with the present too. It fills with both the past and the bitter future,” the first said.
The second woman continued. “We were taken to their ship and chained below with others. For months in the dark, they raped us. Then we were brought to this island. And this trap was set for you. We did what we were asked. They had broken our bones and picked their teeth with the splinters.”
“After you escaped, Narváez and each of his sailors raped and beat us,” the third said. “And fought and drank and raped and beat us again. As every day. So when they lay shikkered, asleep as if dead, we took their knives, pulled their breeches to their knees and cut off their shlongs.
“They soon woke—who would have expected it?—blood between their legs, pain rampaging through them, each tied to each and the three of us standing before them with arquebuses and swords ready to make portholes in their chests for their souls to breathe the sea air.
“ ‘The good news,’ I said to them, ‘is that you do not have to eat your own shlongs. The bad news is you must eat each others’.’
“The first clamped his mouth shut and refused. So we sliced his throat and pushed the shmuck through the slit.
“After that, none refused.
“Then we took a canoe and sailed around this island. We knew we would find you.”
They had left the Spanish tied together on the shore, one large, emasculated bracelet, a wounded chew toy, soon to be eaten by dogs. Or left to the retributive devices of the islanders for Columbus and his crew had taken a skiff and rowed to their ship, then set sail in search of our ship and Eden.
“It is time for us to leave this island, also,” the first woman said.
So we climbed into the canoe.
Moishe. Three übermoyels. Two parrots. An African Grey and the parrot he had blinded.
Without reason.
Did that parrot have a soul?
Feh.
So, nu, I’m like the Spanish now, counting souls and deciding whose blood to spill?