The Library Paradox (29 page)

‘This all happened when my father was very young,’ he explained. ‘He did not intend to be a professor; as a young man, he entered the Army. When he was only in his early twenties, he fell in love with my mother, who was the daughter of the captain of his regiment out in India. Something happened – I can’t explain it,’ he went on,
blushing. ‘But the captain was furious with him. Right around that time, the regiment sent a small group of soldiers out to reconnoitre, and they had fallen into an Indian ambush. The captain accused my father of having colluded with the enemy, and having given them information. There was a court martial. Had he been found guilty, he would have been executed. But the charges were patently false, there was obviously no proof of any kind. In the end he was accused of negligence and disobedience, and given a dishonourable discharge. He returned to England an embittered man, and started a new life, attending university. My mother and I returned to England only several years later. She looked everywhere for him, but when she finally found him, he was married to someone else. He had had no idea that I existed. It was too late. Yet he did what he could for my mother and me, discreetly. It was thanks to him that I became interested in studying history. He has been a father to me in spite of everything. I – I cannot criticise him for what happened when he was barely twenty. He has been in a difficult situation for the last twenty-five years, and he has handled it with as much dignity as he could.’

‘So that explains why the Dreyfus affair rouses him to such fury!’ I exclaimed, suddenly enlightened.

‘Oh yes. The injustice and the shame of his dishonourable discharge left him with a bitterness that has never been effaced,’ Edmund replied.

I was touched by his spontaneous defence of Professor Taylor’s behaviour, and disinclined to make any moral judgement. Indeed, it was difficult to see how the professor
could have acted differently, once the mistake had already been made. He almost certainly thought that he would never be allowed to see the young girl again, knew nothing of the coming child, and could be justified in leaving the error behind him and beginning a new life on a solid basis of scholarship and marriage. But how dreadful for him when the young lady suddenly appeared, having borne all the terrible consequences of the mistake alone, still in love with him, the mother of his eldest son – and he could do nothing for her, or almost nothing, for what is a little help and friendship to a woman who loves?

‘Did Professor Ralston know about this?’ I wondered suddenly.

‘He did, because my mother told his father why she could not and would not marry him, and he told his son. I don’t think Professor Ralston cared much. But he liked knowing, and let my father know that he knew.’

‘Blackmail?’ I said quickly.

‘Oh no. He neither used nor even mentioned the situation except for a hint here and there. As I said, I don’t think it meant much to him. Ralston’s mind was on other things. However, it made my father uncomfortable. He was afraid that Professor Ralston might have written something down somewhere – in a diary, or something – and wanted to search his papers to find anything of the kind. He was really afraid that if some document were found by the police, or by whomever should sort Professor Ralston’s papers later on, the story could not but come out, and his wife and all his colleagues would learn of it. The first few days after
the murder, he couldn’t search, he could only wait, because even though he had the keys, the police were there every day, and they left a constable at night to keep the place safe. But it seemed that they found nothing; at least they questioned no one about it. Then he became hopeful that there was nothing, only I knew that my mother had written a letter to the professor – that letter there. But the police clearly never found it, for I am mentioned in it explicitly, and they would certainly have questioned my mother and me about it. When the police finished their work, my father began to search for it. He could not risk it during the day, there were too many people in the library, but he managed it once or twice at night. He looked through the flat and the study before you arrived, especially through the letters. The day you came, he searched through all of the articles and publications. But he found nothing, not even my mother’s letter. Professor Ralston might have destroyed it, of course, but we were sure that he had not. He was proud of never destroying any document. My father was convinced that the letter was hidden somewhere, and became more and more nervous about its being found. He gave me the key to the flat and asked me to search for it. I did, many times, after hours, but I never found it until today. I used to wonder if it wasn’t hidden in the pages of some book, even though it seemed impossible that he would leave such a letter in a place where anyone might find it – but I used to take every opportunity to open the books in the library and look inside them, except that there are far too many of them, and usually I just ended up reading them for pleasure.
That’s what happened the evening you were here, studying medieval saints. I couldn’t help getting interested in what you were looking up.’

‘And where was the letter in the end?’

‘It was hidden behind a framed photograph of his father. It’s an odd thing to do, to have put it there, isn’t it? It’s almost like he thought perhaps his father was lonely.’

Edmund had become strangely loquacious; I felt that it was a relief to him to tell me all this. He came towards me, and reached to take the letter back.

‘This belongs to my mother,’ he said. I read it through again quickly, fixing its contents in my mind, before handing it over to him.

‘Edmund,’ I said, ‘could that key have ever left your father’s possession? Do you realise that anyone who held it could have shot the professor and then quickly run upstairs?’

He looked surprised.

‘Nonsense,’ he said, after a moment. ‘My father had this key all the time, and found it where he had put it. But in any case, everybody knows that the police opened the door with the key that was in Ralston’s pocket and searched upstairs. There was nobody.’

‘Windows?’ I said tentatively.

‘These enormous windows don’t open,’ he said. ‘They’re the same upstairs. I’m sorry, but I’m afraid you must look for your murderer elsewhere. Come – there is nothing more for us to do here. Let me get you a cab.’

I followed him outside, seething inwardly. Whether or
not the strange story of his mother constituted a motive (and it was not clear that it did, barring the hypothesis of blackmail), Edmund was right. It was impossible for the key to have been used for the murderer to hide upstairs. I had known that already. The case abounded with motives – if anything, there were too many of them by now. Yet the paradox remained complete.

I sat over my breakfast tea, smoothing out and marvelling over the telegram which had only just been delivered for me, and which excited me so much that Edmund and his story were pushed to the back of my mind. The message was from Bernard Lazare, according to his promise, and fitted like a puzzle piece into the scheme that had sprung up in my mind while I was talking to him.

David pronounced his rabbi’s name as Moyshe Avrom, but I hoped that the difference was but a matter of pronunciation, and hastened to David and Rivka’s house to show it to them, and to prepare for my visit to the rabbi. David, who had remained home from work to celebrate the
festival, confirmed this. ‘Avrom, Avrohom,’ he said, ‘it’s our Ashkenazi pronunciation that changes some a’s to o’s. The correct transliteration is Avraham; the English would say Abraham. As for Moyshe, it’s the Ashkenazi pronunciation of Moshe, the Hebrew form of Moses.’

Rivka pressed her hand to her heart nervously, reading the telegram over his shoulder. ‘But David,’ she said, ‘doesn’t it seem strange that a rebbe from some little
shtetl
in Poland would be in contact with the chief rabbi of France?’

‘I think it must be the same man,’ he said. ‘He may come from a little
shtetl
, but according to what Ephraim has heard about him, he is considered to be one of the most learned rebbes of his generation; “his fame has travelled far and wide”, as they express it here. He studied both in
yeshiva
, the school for the study of the Talmud, and in a regular Polish gymnasium, obtaining the highest honours in both. They say he speaks seven languages. I can very well imagine him never leaving his own tiny community, whether in Poland or here, but corresponding with well-known personalities all over the world. That is important for you, Vanessa,’ he added, turning to me, ‘because it means that he will have studied English. He may not speak it too well, because he would not have much daily opportunity to speak it, even here in London, as strange as that may seem. But it solves one of our problems for this afternoon. If you get to speak to him at all, you won’t need a translator.’

‘If only this turns out to be the proof that Jonathan
is telling the truth,’ said Rivka, taking the telegram from David and clutching it. ‘And what about Uncle Baruch? What happened yesterday, Vanessa? Were you able to see him? Were you able to ask him anything?’ She sounded nervous and I hastened to reassure her.

‘Yes, I was. And Rivka, he said that he never asked Jonathan to see the professor, and never would have. I made him understand what had happened and he said he would have rather died. And then he lost consciousness.’

‘What can it all mean?’ she said wonderingly, as though not daring to be hopeful.

‘I sincerely hope and believe that it means Jonathan – is in the clear,’ I said, hesitating a little crossly as I remembered his annoying refusal to tell me the
whole truth
, but completing my sentence anyway, out of kindness. ‘At any rate, the rabbi holds the crucial piece of evidence, and we must find out exactly what he knows today, for Jonathan is to appear before the magistrate tomorrow morning, and he
must not
be committed to trial. It is too dangerous; juries are too unpredictable, and even at the very best, a trial means many days of painful accusations and public revelations.’

‘No – anything but that!’ said Rivka.

‘Well, then let us decide how I am to approach and talk to this rabbi, and what I am to say.’

‘Yes, we must think,’ said David. ‘I’ve already told you why it will be difficult. It would be simply unthinkable for you, a strange woman – and you are obviously a stranger and an Englishwoman here, even if we do cover up your hair – to simply go up and speak to him. First of all, he
will certainly not be alone, but surrounded by devoted members of his family and the students and disciples you saw. The trouble is that even if you do get into the room and approach him, chances are they will treat you more or less in the same way they treated Ephraim the other day, before you ever get a chance to say a word.’

‘But Ephraim provoked them,’ I said. ‘If I were to speak calmly and tell them that I have something important to say to the rabbi, would they not behave more reasonably?’

‘Vanessa – no! You, an unknown
woman
pushing your way into their group would be perceived as far more offensive and provoking than Ephraim’s silly words.’

‘But you said that for today’s festival there will be all kinds of people going in and out of the house. That means women as well as men, doesn’t it?’

‘Yes. Doors will stand open today for the mummers and players going from house to house, and the people watching them. That will certainly help, as it means that you will probably be able to enter the rebbe’s house, and slip into the part of the room reserved for the women. But what then?’

‘Could I give him a written message, perhaps? Asking to speak with him alone?’

‘Vanessa, you really are naive! I keep telling you that the rebbe would not go anywhere, alone, with you or any other woman, except for his own wife, of course. Not even into the next room. In fact, he would not so much as look at you directly.’

‘Bother being a mere woman! I simply
must
speak to him, come what may!’ I cried impatiently.

Unexpectedly, David burst out laughing at my words. ‘I never heard the Bible so aptly paraphrased,’ he said. ‘That’s just what Esther said, in a nutshell!’ Suddenly, he stopped laughing and stared at me. ‘Why, of course,’ he said. ‘It’s so simple. What you should do is go to the rebbe’s house disguised as Esther.’

‘Disguised? Is it all right for her to wear a costume?’ said Rivka quickly. ‘The men here usually do, but the women?’

‘Well, now that you ask me, it is true that one does not see many women in disguise, though little girls certainly do it,’ answered David thoughtfully. ‘Yet there are some, I am sure of it. It must be all right. Let me just check something,’ and he went to the shelf containing books in Hebrew and lifted down one or two heavy volumes, through which he shuffled rapidly.

‘Mateh Mosheh
1014, Yehudah Mintz says that women may disguise if they do not take the guise of men,’ he announced after a few minutes. ‘And look – here in
Hagim uMo’adim,
Maimon writes that women may even disguise as men, and men as women, if it is purely for the purpose of entertainment.’

‘Then it must be all right,’ said Rivka.

‘But who is this Esther I am to disguise as?’ I said curiously.

‘Esther? Don’t you know who Esther is? Oh, how stupid I am! You don’t know what the Purim festival is, do you? It’s the festival commemorating the death of Haman; it’s in the Bible.’

‘Oh – you mean the Book of Esther!’ I exclaimed. ‘Of course, I should have realised it when you mentioned the Bible.’

‘Disguised as Esther, you can pretend to be a player, and stand up and tell a tale! People will be running all over the streets in disguise today, dressed up as Vashti or Esther in old silks and veils, or wearing crowns as Ahasuerus, or three-cornered hats like Haman, or even just dressing up as clowns with jangling bells and playing instruments and singing wild songs – sometimes they even dress as Hassidim – those who are not actually Hassidim, I mean – and rush about making fun of them, imitating their wild ways, the way they rock back and forth when they pray, and go into trances. Players in groups go into the houses and sing songs, or make music, or act out the Purim play itself. Dressed as Esther and wearing a veil, you could simply stand up and speak out like a performer. It would have to be English, of course, but that may be just as well. It may prevent some of the students from realising what’s going on. Rivka – can we disguise Vanessa as Esther?’

‘I would have to borrow some things,’ she said, looking me over. ‘Let me run over to Sheyne’s, her husband is the rag-and-bone man, she has a lot of old robes and dresses and things.’

She hurried out, the baby bouncing on her arm. Little Samuel followed her quickly, clinging to her skirt.

‘I will need to think about what to say and how to say it, if I am to make myself clearly understood by the rabbi, but not by the people around him,’ I said thoughtfully, visualising myself standing in front of the rabbi and a roomful of people, disguised as a veiled queen. ‘This is even stranger than yesterday, when I had to communicate with
Baruch Gad in code. I seem to be doing this every day now. Well, what would Esther say?’

‘If I perish, I perish!’
he quoted. ‘Those are her most famous words. How well do you know the Esther scroll?’

‘Scroll?’ I said.

‘I mean the book in the Bible,’ he said. ‘We have it printed out on separate scrolls for this festival. Rivka has one in English, somewhere, I know she does. She does not read much in Hebrew yet, except for the basic women’s prayers. She is putting her best efforts into learning Yiddish.’

‘Oh,’ I said, as he scrabbled about in the heap of books again, and dug out what he wanted from underneath the tomes he had just put back. ‘Well, Esther is not one of the books in the Bible I know well. We Christians seem to greatly prefer Job, for some reason.’

‘I can imagine. Well, here it is, read it, so you can see what it was like to be Esther,’ he said. ‘It is not long.’

The quaint scroll was written out in many columns along a long, thin rectangle of paper which was all rolled up on a wooden rod attached to one of the short sides of the rectangle. The other short side was attached to a second wooden rod, around which one continuously rolled the part of the scroll one had just read.

‘What an intelligent system,’ I observed, after getting used to the motion.

‘All books were this way in antiquity,’ said David. ‘The sewn parchment codex – that’s a book with pages – was invented by the Romans.
Caudex
is the trunk of a tree, you know, and the pages were called “leaves”, as they still are.
They found it took up less space, and you could write on both sides of the parchment.’

‘Well, I like this method,’ I said, beginning to read the sacred text and rolling it up progressively as I went.

‘Well, well,’ I thought. ‘This sounds like quite a familiar story.’ Some words of Shakespeare’s came into my mind:

The Taming of the Shrew
is a play for which I have always entertained a sincere and spontaneous dislike, in spite of a sneaking conviction that Shakespeare wrote the entire thing with his tongue in his cheek. The same cannot be said of the Bible, I suppose, yet it contains its own form of humour. Vashti humiliates the king, and instead of hushing it up quietly, he makes a tremendous song and dance about it, with the result that every woman in the world for all of the countless following generations knows exactly what Vashti did and feels an irrepressible sympathy for her. Well, I expect that Vashti had to pay the price of her independence, as women always have had to from the dawn of time. Memucan continues his lecture:

Ha, my mind thought, running irresistibly upon its own track as I read. Good riddance. She probably found him
repulsive. ‘Better than she’, indeed. More docile, or more slavish, you mean. Ahasuerus, meanwhile, continued to behave in unsurprising ways for a biblical king.

This is followed by more typical behaviour by Ahasuerus: Mordecai discovers a plot against the king to which he responds by immediately hanging the conspirators from a tree, after which he proceeds to honour and promote Haman the son of Hammedatha the Agagite to the highest
position in the land and promise him anything he wants. And what does Haman want?