Zaddik, page 7
Taylor stared at the rebbe’s house, at the heavy wooden door. Why am I nervous? he asked himself. Walking over from the subway, he had expected the hostility of the Hasids for an assimilated Jew like himself. Goyishe Yidn, the Hasids called them scornfully. But Taylor had been in hostile situations before. In fact, until two years ago they had been his life.
Of course, thought Taylor, that’s it. I’m nervous because I’m on a cop’s errand.
And also because I’ve never before met a Hasidic rebbe in the flesh.
No Hasid, Taylor remembered Rabbi Kalman telling him, would dream of marrying, buying a house, choosing a career, or going into a business without consulting his rebbe. And no Hasid would dream of ignoring his rebbe’s advice. This relationship with his rebbe was what defined the Hasid and separated him from all other Jews.
In his own community, the rebbe was as powerful as any medieval king. And, like a medieval king, the rebbe inherited his throne. The Satmarer reb, the Lubavitcherreb, the Belzer reb, the Gerer reb, the Lelover reb, the Talner reb—all named for the city in Poland or Russia or, in the case of the Satmarer rebbe, in Hungary, where they originally held court—could all trace their lines back to the Baal Shem Tov or to one of his disciples.
The rebbe’s power was absolute. His every word, his every gesture, was considered by his followers to have profound religious and cosmic significance. Indeed, many Satmarer Hasidim did not wear watches, Rabbi Kalman once mentioned, simply because the Satmarer reb did not wear one.
And why not? Taylor asked. Who knows? said Rabbi Kalman. The point is, because their zaddik does not wear a watch, they believe that there is something holy about not wearing one. A Hasid believes that his zaddik is perfect, and that how he lives his life is the way the Holy One wants all men to live.
Taylor felt uneasy as he began moving up the walk to the rebbe’s door, but he smiled broadly at the two Hasids guarding the entrance as he reached for the bell. From behind, one of the Hasids grabbed his arms and pulled them down to his side, pinning them. The other Hasid put his hand on his chest.
“Tell him to let me go,” Taylor said calmly. He had been expecting something like this and began calculating whether it would be better to grab the man’s balls and squeeze or to bring his foot down into the man’s instep.
“Easy,” said the Hasid. “No trouble. We know who you are. But this we must do. You understand.”
“Sure,” said Taylor. “Nobody wants any trouble. But tell him to let go of me right now. Right now.”
The Hasid looked into Taylor’s eyes and then said something in Yiddish. Taylor felt his arms released.
“Okay,” said Taylor, lifting his hands. “No trouble.”
The Hasid ran his hand lightly over Taylor’s torso, under his arms, down his legs, and up into his groin. A good, professional frisk, thought Taylor.
“What have you got there, under your coat?” he asked the Hasid.
The Hasid closed his eyes and leaned back against the rebbe’s brownstone, elaborately bored.
“I mean, what kind of gun?” Taylor asked.
The Hasid unbuttoned his kaftan and allowed Taylor a peek at the eight-and-three-quarter-inch-long barrel of the .44-caliber Smith & Wesson Model 29 sticking out from an oily, low-slung, brown leather shoulder holster. It was a cannon for cutting people in half. The Hasid closed his coat.
“Just like Dirty Harry,” Taylor said.
“What is Dirty Harry?” asked the Hasid.
“Forget it,” said Taylor. Different worlds, he thought.
The Hasid shrugged and, folding his arms over his chest, resumed his watch, dismissing Taylor from his mind, from his world.
Taylor rang the Satmarer rebbe’s doorbell. The door swung open. A young, pretty, stylishly dressed woman wearing a curly red sheitl, or wig (married Hasidic women cut their hair short and covered it with wigs as an act of modesty), said, “Come,” and ushered Taylor inside. They turned off a short hallway and entered a large parlor filled with about twenty people. The shades were drawn, and every chair was occupied by a fidgeting Hasid waiting for either an audience with the rebbe or a chance to submit to him a question or request on a piece of paper. As the woman led Taylor through the room, he could feel their eyes upon him. Who was this goyishe Yid, he imagined them thinking, being treated like someone important? Nervously he touched his yarmulke to make sure it was still on his head.
The woman led Taylor to a broad, polished wooden staircase lined with gaudily framed oil paintings of Israel and Jerusalem and one full-length portrait of a rabbi wearing a white silk robe. To his left, Taylor saw a door opened to a large dining room dominated by a long mahogany table surrounded by leather-backed chairs and, beyond that, a gleaming white kitchen, one of four in the house: one for milk, one for meat, one for the Sabbath, and one for Passover.
“Go up,” the woman said, and Taylor saw a small bearded figure standing at the top of the stairs waiting for him.
When Taylor reached the landing, the man extended a moist, limp hand. “Dov Taylor?” he asked. Taylor nodded.
“Nice guys you got down there, guarding the door,” said Taylor.
“Yes, very good, very pious. So. I’m Pinchus Mayer, the rebbe’s gabbai. I spoke with you, yes? Tell me, you speak some Yiddish?”
“No.”
“No? How sad. Well, Rabbi Kalman tells me that you’re the great-great-grandson of Rabbi Hirsh Leib. That’s good, yes? The rebbe was very pleased to hear it. A blessing. We are honored. Tell me, what was your mother’s name?
“Silberstein. Luba Silberstein.”
“From where?
“Rumania. Bucharest.”
“And what was her mother’s name?”
“Rebecca.”
“Rebecca what?”
“Rebecca Silberstein.”
“No, her mother’s name.”
“You know,” said Taylor, “I don’t know. I never thought about it.”
“You should find out, yes?” said Mayer.
“Excuse me,” Taylor said, “I don’t mean to be rude, but why are you asking me about my mother and grandmother?”
“You are offended?” the gabbai asked.
“No, it’s not that,” said Taylor. “I just don’t understand.”
“That’s all right,” Mayer said casually, as if to say that as there were so many things Taylor didn’t understand, one more would hardly make a difference. “Now come with me to meet the rebbe.”
“Is there anything I should know?” asked Taylor, irritated by Mayer’s condescending attitude. “I mean, what should I call him? Your Holiness? Your Rabbiness?”
“His name is Joel Teitel,” Mayer said mildly, ignoring Taylor’s sarcasm. “He is the son-in-law of the alter rebbe, Menachem Isaac, may his memory preserve us. You may call him Rebbe. Come.
“Oh, yes. Do not attempt to shake his hand. It is not done.”
Mayer opened a door beyond the landing and led Taylor into a large, smoky, dusty office. The shades were drawn against the dying September light. The Satmarer rebbe sat on a leather chair that rose a foot above his head. His desk was a vast, teak altar piled high with books and papers. Behind him, and on all four walls, were floor-to-ceiling bookshelves crammed with books and scrolls, gold and silver kiddush cups, and polished brass menorahs. Taylor saw at least a dozen Torah scrolls, their tattered and worn velvet coverings contrasting with the silver medallions draped over them.
Flanking the rebbe’s desk, two young men sat at two small, battered New York City public school desks. They did not look up from their books as Taylor entered, nor did they look up now as he stood in front of the rebbe.
In his black silk kaftan and large, dark brown fur hat, his shtreiml, Rebbe Joel Teitel had plenty of malkhus, imperial sternness. His long, wiry, untrimmed white beard reached to his waist. His eyebrows were gray, thick, and bushy, and his eyes were small and bloodshot. Dark bags hung beneath them.
Mayer left Taylor and walked around the desk to whisper in the rebbe’s left ear as the rebbe stared at Taylor, looking, it seemed to him, at a spot on his forehead. The rebbe nodded several times and then addressed a few words of Yiddish to the two young scholars. They stood up simultaneously and, their eyes cast down, left the room by a door set into the bookshelves that Taylor had not before noted. As they went through the door, Taylor caught a glimpse of another, smaller office containing several typewriters, steel filing cabinets, and a video terminal.
They never looked at me, thought Taylor. Not once. If I murdered their rebbe right now, they could never describe me.
Mayer followed the two young men out of the room without looking back, without saying good-bye. Taylor suddenly felt abandoned and berated himself for being so unsure of himself. Alcoholic thinking, he told himself. Poor me. Next thing you know, you’ll be wanting to “pour” yourself a drink.
The rebbe gestured for Taylor to seat himself on an old leather library chair directly opposite the rebbe’s throne.
Taylor sat, and still the rebbe stared at his forehead, saying nothing. In the silence, Taylor imagined that he could feel a hole being bored in his head. This is an old cop’s trick, he thought suddenly. Wait out the suspect. Well, I’m not going to play.
He coughed. “Rebbe—”
The rebbe immediately held up his hand in a clear signal for Taylor to remain silent. Then the rebbe cleared his throat and began speaking in a voice so soft that Taylor had to lean forward to hear him, annoyed that the rebbe had won the first point in the war of nerves.
“It is just as I thought. I cannot speak to you, Mr. Policeman,” the rebbe whispered. “We cannot talk, you and I. It is an impossibility. You are not only ignorant of the language of your own people, you are a murderer. You have the mark of Cain on your forehead. It is there for anyone to see. You can see it yourself. The blood of assassins flows in your veins. Right now, you have blood on your hands. I can smell it, you know.”
Taylor felt his face grow hot; the vein on his forehead began to throb. He felt anger and shame fill his stomach. He wanted to punch this old man in the mouth, and at the same time he wanted to fall on his knees and beg for forgiveness. So, instead, he stood up to leave.
“Sit!” the rebbe thundered in a voice as loud as it had just been soft. “Be quiet! There are matters here far more important than your feelings.”
Taylor found himself sitting back down.
Now the rebbe’s voice again grew soft, softer even than before. “You know, Mr. Policeman, that I am right. How can you and I talk? Can you understand me? Of course not. And I have no interest in trying to understand you.
“But, Mr. Policeman, it is zeyer important, very, very important, that I be able to tell you something.”
“So tell me,” said Taylor, his composure regained, now wondering if this rebbe were mad.
“But I have just told you I cannot. It is a problem. You are the problem, Mr. Policeman.”
“So write me a letter,” said Taylor.
“You see? You are making a joke. I am telling you something is important, and you are making a joke. You are joking about something you do not understand because you are a fool.”
“Listen, Reb Teitel—”
“Shah. Shtil. Be quiet. Fortunately, with the help of the Holy One, blessed is He, I arrived at a solution this afternoon. I was in the study house, and a holy voice spoke to me. Do you know whose voice it was?”
I am sitting here, swallowing insults, listening to this nonsense, for Rabbi Kalman’s sake, Dov Taylor told himself. But when this is finished, I’m going to tell him I can’t help. These people are lunatics. And they hate my guts.
The rebbe rapped on his desk as if calling Taylor to attention. Then he looked up at the ceiling.
“It was the voice of the Zaddik of Orlik, my comrade Hirsh Leib. You carry his holy spark, and it is to him I must speak.”
The Satmarer rebbe paused, then began: “My friend, my brother—”
“Wait a minute,” said Dov Taylor. “You’re going to talk to Hirsh Leib while I just sit here?”
“Please, Mr. Policeman. Permit me to continue.”
“I mean, if you’re going to talk to Hirsh Leib, why not speak Yiddish? I’ll just take a snooze.”
“Again a joke. Unfortunately, Mr. Policeman, your great-great-grandfather can only help me through you, using you as his vessel, unworthy though you are. So if Rabbi Leib is to help me, and help you, you must listen and understand.”
“By the way, Rabbi, I’m not a policeman anymore, and Mr. Policeman is not my name,” Dov Taylor said.
“Enough!” shouted the Satmarer rebbe. “Just listen.”
“My name is Dov Taylor.”
“My friend, my brother, my teacher, Hirsh Leib, wise man of Orlik and Lublin, I have a problem,” Teitel began in a strong, clear, conversational tone. “My daughter Esther was to be married to the son of the Lubavitcher rebbe, may God show him the error of his ways. Her dowry was to be a diamond, a diamond you remember, my old friend. It was the jewel once possessed, and lost, by our teacher, the holy Rebbe Jacob Yitzhak, the Seer of Lublin, may his memory be blessed. It was recovered by my father-in-law’s father, Rebbe David Isaac, may his memory protect us, and my father-in-law, Rebbe Menachem Isaac of holy memory, who used it to save himself and his Hasidim from the Nazis. Then it was taken back from those murderers and returned to our holy community.
“Now, it has again been lost, stolen. I gave it to a righteous man, a pious man, although not a scholar, Zalman Gottleib, may his blood be avenged, because he knew of diamonds, and I was going to ask him to fashion it into a crown for my Esther. And for this, Reb Leib, he was most horribly slaughtered, and the Seer’s stone is again in the hands of the evil ones.
“If it is the Lubavitchers who have done this, seeking to stop this marriage, then they have achieved their evil aim. There will be no wedding, and no peace between us, until the jewel is returned to our community. I declare in your presence this shidukh null and void. As it is written in the law, I repeat this three times. Null and void. Null and void. So, it is done.
“If it is the Nazis, or their accursed children, or some others we know not of, I beg you, Reb Leib, in the name of the Holy One, blessed is He, to help this Dov Taylor, son of Luba, the daughter of Rebecca, this one that carries your spark. Lead him to the Seer’s stone. Use him to bring your wrath down upon the evil ones who have murdered and thieved. Help this one to see his destiny, for he is ignorant and foolish and even now he puts himself before his brother Jews. Help him understand that, as it is written, ‘Neither shalt thou stand idly by the blood of thy neighbor.’ And as our sages tell us, ‘He who saves one life in Israel is considered as if he had saved the whole world.’ Help him, Reb Leib, Zaddik of Orlik, and I will bless your memory ten thousand times.”
The Satmarer rebbe fell silent. Taylor felt as if the curtain had just fallen on a play. Should he applaud? How much of what he had just heard had any relation to reality? Was it all meant to be taken metaphorically? And what about this diamond? Had he just been told the motive for the killing?
“Do the police know?” Taylor asked.
“Do the police know what?” asked Rebbe Teitel.
“About this diamond.”
“Why would they? No one knows of it now but you, me, my daughter, and Hirsh Leib.”
“You showed it to your daughter?”
“Of course. It was her dowry.”
“Did you tell her you gave it to Gottleib?”
“To make for her a crown.”
“So who did she tell?” said Taylor.
“My daughter is a good daughter,” said the rebbe, “a brilliant girl, and not any such stupid shiksa as you may know, Mr. Policeman.”
Taylor sighed. Even rebbes could be foolish when it came to their children. “Maybe the police already have it,” he suggested. “The diamond.”
“Impossible.”
“Why?”
“If the police had it, I would know.”
“How would you know?”
“I would know.”
“Do you know what Mr. Gottleib did with it before he was killed?”
“How would I know?”
“Describe the diamond to me.”
“What’s to describe? A diamond is a diamond. Hirsh Leib has seen it, so you will know it when you see it.”
“I’ll need to describe it to the police.”
“Takeh, truly, it is hard to believe.”
“What is hard to believe?”
“It is hard to believe,” said the Satmarer rebbe, his voice growing loud, “that a descendant of Hirsh Leib could have such a goyishe kop! Look, Reb Leib! See how far Israel has fallen!
“Try to understand, Mr. Policeman, try to get it through your kop, that if I had wanted to tell the police about the Seer’s stone, I wouldn’t be talking to you, I would be talking to them.
“I forbid you to speak of the Seer’s stone with anyone. For the rest, you may speak with my Hasidim and do whatever it is that policemen do. As it is written: ‘The things that have been permitted thee, think thereupon; thou hast no business with the things that are secret.’ ”
“But, Rebbe—”
“Our seance is finished, Mr. Policeman. With the help of the Holy One, blessed is He, and your forefather, Hirsh Leib of Orlik, may we meet again to pronounce the benediction, ‘Blessed art Thou, O Lord our God, King of the Universe, who hath wrought a miracle for me in this place.’
“Go in peace, Dov Taylor. May the Holy One protect and preserve you.”
“Amen,” said Dov Taylor.
“Good!” shouted the Satmarer rebbe, clapping his hands. As if by a prearranged signal, the door in the bookshelves swung open and Pinchus Mayer and the two young men emerged. The scholars sat down at their desks and resumed their studies, and the gabbai walked over to Taylor, said, “Let’s go,” and almost lifted him out of his chair.
