By Blood (23 page)

The August hiatus was an orgy of self-recrimination.

I had thought I would be safe as long as I could hear the patient’s voice. Her story, my desire to know it, was all that was decent in me; all that kept me from the trail inscribed in my blood. Yet I had succumbed to the crows—or nearly. I had been on the brink of following her! Who knows what I would have done if not for the intervention of my frightening angel?

Dr. Schussler was gone. The patient was where? At home? On vacation? Traveling for work? How tempted I was to find 732 Alpine Terrace and watch for her. I locked myself in my cottage and forbade myself to go.

It was a time of the truest of lonelinesses (since loneliness is plural, various in its aspects and effects); and by this I mean not simply the absence of companionship but a complete estrangement from all feelings except self-loathing. The world tolerated me, I believed, only because of my subterfuge: the fraud I perpetrated which fooled them into thinking I was human.

Labor Day came, and ten days lay between me and the patient’s return. Was I worthy of her? Could I return to her? Each night my imagination was invaded by hideous images. In my dreams I opened my eyes yet remained blind.

Finally came Wednesday morning, the tenth of September. I awoke in a sweated puddle of fear. Yet, as if enchanted, I found myself dressing, leaving the cottage that had been my prison all the month long, climbing onto the N Judah for the long ride downtown. It was a blisteringly hot day. The wind came from inland, from the dry hot valley, and standing in the sun merely to cross Market Street was nearly intolerable. My gargoyles labored under the eaves. I came to the door; I entered the blind white of the lobby.

The guard was not there! The podium and desk: bare! The sign-in book: gone! Had the guard been let go? Fired? Had the building management decided it did not need a guard or could not afford one? Or had the guard never existed at all, his presence and intervention in my life having no more reality that the unnatural images of my nightmares? I knew I should have feared the disappearance of my observing angel. I knew I should have worried for my sanity. But a calm washed over me. For no reason at all, I was certain the good Eumenides had spared me. The guard’s absence, I felt sure, was proof of his Providential purpose: He had been sent precisely for the one duty he had performed.

In my pocket was the notice requiring me to renew my lease else vacate the office. I should have returned it weeks ago. Up until the moment I stood staring at the empty podium, I had not been certain if I would sign the form or tear it up, leave the building, leave the patient and all that tempted me. Now I climbed to the mezzanine up the narrow stair I had not traveled for more than a year—the marble steps worn yet more concave—hastily signed the form, and dropped it into the manager’s box. Then I rode up to my dear office.

The cool interior of the building’s breath enveloped me; the cold marble reassured me once again:
Everything will be all right
.

I took my chair as always. First came the bongs of the church bell, then the patient’s footsteps. At last: The extinguishing of the sound machine. The breathtaking silence that followed.

Into which the patient said: I found her. Michal Gershon. I found her.

The therapist started in her chair.

And immediately a chasm opened between the patient’s last words and those still to come.

Was the woman named Michal Gershon truly her mother? What was my evidence? Initials. A date. Historical patterns. Almost nothing.

The laughing voice of Mrs. Knobloch mocked me: Who am I to tell you what to believe?

Your mother, said the therapist. You found your mother.

No, said the patient. I can’t call her that. Mrs. Gershon. I found Michal Gershon.

(Please tell me she is your mother!)

Ah? How? What? piped the therapist.

Completely on impulse, said the patient. I bought a ticket from a travel agent, flew standby to Tel Aviv the next day.

And?

A mistake. A disaster. The worst experience of my life.

(No! This cannot be the whole of the story!)

The patient was silent for several seconds. Dr. Schussler’s venetian blinds banged against the sills in the faint hot breeze. The street was strangely quiet, deserted because of the heat.

There’s only one good thing about it, the patient went on. I don’t have to worry about mothers anymore. I’m free of all mothers. Adoptive, birth, natural, first, second, blood, not. She laughed. I’m
Mutterfrei
. You’ve heard of
Judenfrei
, free of Jews? Of course you have, being German. Europe cleared of all the Jews. Well, I did better than Hitler. I’m
Mutterfrei
.

(What a horrid way to express it. And a nice barb at the therapist, too. But yes, I thought from behind the protection of my wall. This is where you want to be, my dear patient: rid of them all.)

Suppose you tell me what happened, said Dr. Schussler.

What’s there to say? When someone says to you “Get out of here! Never try to contact me again!” what else is there to say? Want to hear it in her own voice? Here. I brought a cassette recorder. It’s all cued up.

There was a click, then a voice in a scratchy recording shouting:

Do not look for me again! I beg you: Never again try to contact me!

The patient immediately clicked off the recorder.

Okay, so I got it a little wrong. She didn’t exactly say, Never try to contact me again! She said: Never again try to contact me!

The patient said nothing more for several seconds. The venetian blinds rattled and bumped. All the while one could hear the slish of Dr. Schussler’s stockings as she crossed and recrossed her legs—one could almost feel the stickiness of her thighs as they suffered in their nylon casings. She was extemporizing: What should she possibly say in reply to that shouting voice?

Let us put aside the recording for the moment, the therapist said finally. First let us talk about your decision to go to Tel Aviv. Tell me how the trip came about, how you made your decision.

It was an impulse, said the patient. As I said. The city was fogged in. Andie and Clarissa went to Las Vegas, a place I hate. It would cost a fortune to fly to Tel Aviv at the last minute. But I’d just received a bonus. Why not go? I walked into a travel agency. Plane, hotel, done.

I had to change planes in New York, and all the while there was a little whisper in the back of my head saying, You can turn around; you don’t have to do this. Just the same, I kept going, in an out-of-body state.

The patient stopped, coughed, adjusted her position in her chair.

And so you went on, said the doctor.

Yes, I went on.

Then what happened?

Tel Aviv was not what I expected. I don’t know what I thought it would be like. But I wasn’t prepared for everything being new, white, concrete, a city built all at once, it seemed. And then there were the soldiers, young men and women everywhere in uniform, carrying Uzis. People my age and younger, walking around with machine guns slung over their shoulders the way kids here carry a book bag. There was a beachfront, also unexpected. Hotels lining a crowded shore on the Mediterranean. Sparkling sun.

The receptionist at the hotel told me how to get to Michal Gershon’s address. She didn’t live in Tel Aviv proper, but in a suburb. I had to take a long ride in a stifling, crowded bus. My stop was on a dusty road. There were no shops, only a drive-in restaurant advertising “shashleek.” The counterman spoke some English, and he directed me to a narrow street of three-story apartments. They seemed shabbily built, not old but already showing cracks. It was midday, the sun directly overhead. Cool breeze. Hot sun. I was the only one out on the streets. I found the house number, walked in, went up two flights, and was facing the apartment door: Mrs. Gershon’s last known address.

Again it was an out-of-body experience. I felt nothing at all, no fear, no anticipation, nothing, as if the concrete that built Tel Aviv was in my veins. I was just this body performing an action. Knock, knock, knock.

There was no reply. I knocked again and waited. Still no one.

Then a voice called out something in Hebrew, then in English, Who’s there? And the head of an old woman—about seventy, seventy-five—poked out of a neighboring door.

I’m looking for Michal Gershon, I said.

Who’s asking? she said.

I’m a friend from America, I told her.

She eyed me a moment, then said that Michal Gershon had moved to what she called “a nicer place in Jaffa.” I had no idea what she meant, where or what “Jaffa” was, and simply asked her if she would write down the new address for me. Which she did, finally saying, Tell Michal she could remember once in a while where she came from.

I thought it was a strange thing for her to say. I left with a noncommittal nod.

I went back to the hotel to rest, and fell asleep. When I woke up, it was dark outside; the clock said eight. With my jet lag, it took me a few seconds to remember that I was in Tel Aviv, and on the dresser was the real address of my birth mother.

Then the words of the woman at the door of the old apartment came back to me. Tell Michal she could remember once in a while where she came from.

It seemed to be a warning.

The patient paused.

A warning not to go. It told me Michal Gershon is a person who likes to leave her past behind.

Then the patient said nothing for several seconds. She sighed and shuffled about in her chair, scraped her feet on the carpet, withdrew a tissue from the nearby box, coughed, sighed, and coughed again. Moments floated by on the heat.

But you did go to Jaffa the next day, said Dr. Schussler.

Yes.

And there you found her.

Yes.

I took a bus to Jaffa, the patient continued. There were little cobbled alleys going off in all directions. I got turned around, lost. I sat down at an outdoor cafe, ordered iced tea, and handed the waiter the scrap of paper with Michal’s address. Did he know the way? He was a tall man of about fifty, an Arab, clean-shaven, wearing jeans and a shirt open at the collar. He laughed and pointed across the narrow street.

There is a courtyard, he said, just to the right. Michal’s little house is at the far end. Under the curving stone wall. And tell her Schmuel says hello.

You’re Schmuel? I asked him.

He laughed again.

No. But that is what she calls me.

He waved away my attempts to pay for the tea. I thanked him with the little bit of Arabic I knew.

Shokran
, I said.

Afwan
, he said, with a small bow.

This Schmuel suddenly seemed … well, propitious. I had no plan. I didn’t know what I’d say when Michal Gershon opened her door. I couldn’t say, I’m your daughter. Or Hi, Mom. Now I felt he’d given me a sort of passport. I could say, Schmuel says hello.

I followed Schmuel’s directions. I crossed the road. Went into the courtyard, turned right. And it was just as he said. A curving stone wall. Under it a house. Made of the same stone, so it seemed part of the wall. But with a door. And windows. A fairy-tale house.

The door was a hard, solid piece of wood. With an iron latch, an iron handle.

There was no choice now: Knock, knock, knock.

I don’t know how long I stood there until I heard steps, a voice, a young voice, with a thick accent saying something, maybe in German.

I said: Do you speak English? I’m here to see Michal Gershon.

The door opened a crack. A young woman looked at me. She had blond-gold hair, green eyes, white skin, cheeks like apples.

Schmuel sends his greetings, I said.

Ah, Schmuel, she said, laughing, opening the door and waving me in.

Schmuel: my magic word, my open-sesame.

Then I saw things in flashes. A dark room. Heavy wood furniture. Embroidered tablecloths. Doilies on chair arms. Bare walls. No pictures, not even family photos. I followed the young woman who’d let me in. A big strong girl. She called out in German to “Frau Gershon,” maybe saying someone is here, I don’t know, I’m guessing.

She led me around a corner, then into a small, dim room. The window shades were drawn, but there was a gap. A slice of light broke through it—brilliant, dusty, opaque—like a scrim. Behind it was a figure. All I could see was a shape, bent over, but otherwise only a shadow. For some seconds, nothing happened. The figure did not move.

Behind me, the girl sang out something in German.

Then suddenly a face burst through the light. Her mouth was frozen open. Her eyes were startled wide. They rolled back and forth over me.

Otherwise her face was still, a rictus. Then tiny muscle movements began rippling over her features—the muscles twitching but paralyzed, the way a dreaming dog trembles in its sleep—as if waves of emotions were running through her, but in fast-forward, so it was bizarre, almost comical.

What? I wanted to shout. What! What are you seeing! Because I knew whatever was going on was set off by the sight of me. I was a part of those racing expressions, a player, but with what role? The ripples of memory kept running across her face. Meanwhile, her body was fixed, hidden behind the beam of light, so that the whole drama was being played out with this head suspended in a cloud.

Gerda! she abruptly screamed, going on to yell curses in German at the girl who had led me in—even I understood they were curses.

Then she stepped forward through the light.

Now I could see her, head to toe, in the low, even shade of the room. She was sturdily built, broad-shouldered, of medium height. She had blond hair, high cheekbones, a broad, clear brow. She looked young except for her bent posture—I noticed now she held a cane. She would be beautiful, I thought, weirdly, if her face were not tied into a knot of rage. Suddenly a kind of fist grabbed my insides: disappointment. Dreadful disappointment. Until that moment, I hadn’t realized how much I’d hoped to look like her.

All the while, she kept screaming in German, walking toward me, waving her cane, until I understood she was trying to force me out, the way you’d use a broom to shoo a dog. I was instantly angry, thinking, How dare you treat me like this!

But you know me! I screamed at her, walking toward her, putting up my arm to ward off the cane. I saw it on your face. You recognized me immediately. You know who I am!

No! No! she answered me. Go away! How did you get in here?

You know me! I kept shouting. You know me!

The girl Gerda came up beside me.

Please to leave, she said, taking my arm.

I jerked it away and said, No! You know who I am!

Michal raised her cane as if to wave me away again. And then, all at once, she deflated. That’s the only way I can describe it. A long breath came out of her; her head and shoulders shrank down; her back slumped. She said, “Ay! What is the use?” then stumbled toward an upholstered chair and sank into it, head down, eyes focused between her knees, her left arm hanging limp over the cane, like a rope.

Gerda, bring me something to drink, she said in a mixture of German 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.