Surprisingly, the owner and his only wife showed no signs of revulsion, nor of anger at the way he had sullied the cabin of their memories, but rather of terror, as though the death that had struck their household once might succumb to the temptation to strike again. With hands experienced in childrearing they discerned a fever lurking behind the pallor, and so they hurriedly wrapped the little body in a blanket and laid a damp cloth on the eyes that stared at them guiltily. Ben Attar hastened up onto the bridge to tell Abd el-Shafi to send a sailor to clean up the cabin. And he dispatched the young pagan, who had just returned from the house on the other bank, to summon Rabbi Elbaz back from Master Levitas’s tabernacle, the splendor of which had driven all thoughts of his only son’s absence out of his mind.
But before Elbaz could arrive and take charge of the boy, who had fallen asleep, Ben Attar took advantage of the respite afforded by this chance occurrence to interrupt his self-imposed mourning in the bowels of the ship, if only for a short while, and to inspect the goods that were ready to leave the ship. He gratefully inhaled the cool night air of the Parisian isle, from which rose the smoke of many fires and sounds of merriment. Screwing up his eyes, he tried to discern on the other bank the place between the vines and the chapel where his young wife rested, waiting to take her last leave of her husband when the memorial was erected on her grave.
He shivered slightly. His wife’s hand was touching his nape. Though it seemed to him that her touch was firmer than usual, he was not certain, for ever since they had arrived at Worms they had avoided touching each other. He looked closely at the dear face that had accompanied him since his youth and that now invited him to descend to the cabin, which was ready for his return, cleaned and tidied and fumigated with lavender to dispel any unpleasant odor. Only the feverish child was still there. Should he be moved somewhere else, or stay there until his father arrived? Ben Attar decided not to touch the boy but to wait for Rabbi Elbaz, who indeed arrived after a short while, alarmed and breathless, stumbling on the rope ladder, and hastened to bend over the child curled up on the floor and call his name anxiously. Then the boy’s bloodshot eyes opened, and despite their tiredness they stared severely at his father’s face. Did he know about the sin he had committed? And if he did, could he save him from the harsh verdict?
At least it is not the cold arching spasm that draws the head toward its death. A strange hope burst forth in the Andalusian rabbi’s soul at the sight of his son curled up on the floor of the cabin like a soft bundle. Was it possible that the absent woman had sent an evil spirit to harm the rabbi, because of the permission he had given to transport her unburied from Verdun to Paris? Me, not him, he shouted bitterly at the spirit, and hurriedly picked the child up in his arms to take him away from the ship to the Jews’ tabernacle.
Yes, the rabbi from Seville had suddenly lost his faith in the ship’s owner, and even rejected rudely the compassion of the first wife, who offered to help him to cover the child. In this way Elbaz fell prey to an evil thought, for he suspected Ben Attar of trying to punish him for his unsuccessful speech in the synagogue in Worms. Since Ben Attar knew that it was forbidden to accuse a man in the midst of his grief or to impede him in his despair, he immediately told Abd el-Shafi to order his sailors to make a stretcher out of ropes so they could move the sick child safely to the opposite bank. The gates to the island were already closed, so they put out a boat and carefully lowered the boy, strapped to the stretcher, onto it, and also his anxious father, and in case of any mishap they also sent the black slave, for whom this was the third crossing to the south bank this day. There was something wonderfully graceful about the little boat pulling away from the colorful, wide-bellied Muslim ship onto the calm surface of the moonlit river, gliding over it almost without a ripple from north to south, toward the convent of Saint Germain des Prés, which was in the process of being rebuilt.
It was nearly midnight when a heavy knock sounded on the ironclad door of the Jews’ house, and the nephew and partner and his wife, who was now a partner despite herself, were asked urgently to take in a sick child with a secret abomination burning within him, lending his eyes a sunken look as though they were outlined with kohl and painting his cheeks with a porcine pinkness. Mistress Esther-Minna welcomed the sick child with great animation, which betrayed, despite her evident distress, signs of mysterious joy. It was as though by means of this sick child coming to be nursed back to health in her house she might be reattached to the members of the expedition, and above all to its leader, whose failure had brought her down as well. Despite the advanced hour, she spared neither her maidservant nor the sleep of her husband, although he immediately sank back onto his bed. She did not even spare the howling of the girl, who had returned from her outing excited and disturbed but not dejected. It was Mistress Esther-Minna’s aim now to be simple and generous, and not only clever and right. She welcomed her little guest by turning the sleeping arrangements upside down. First she moved Master Levitas to one side of the little tabernacle and put Rabbi Elbaz to sleep there too, so that he could share in honoring the commandment, and then she entreated Abulafia to take a coverlet and disappear into his daughter’s chamber to find his sleep by her side, all to enable her to set the boy down next to her in her husband’s bed, so that she could watch over him with her full attention until morning.
Mistress Abulafia lay awake and alert beside the motherless child from Seville, determined not to miss a breath or a murmur, a sigh or a groan, whether due to pain or to a dream. Outside, the kindly moon had sunk in the sky, and black velvet sailed slowly upon the Seine, which embraced between its two graceful banks the heart of little Paris. Then a new and terrible dread mingled with a gentle, uncomprehended happiness in the soul of this childless woman who was no longer young, as she swore to herself that she would not allow the angel of death to strike a second blow at these dark-skinned southerners, who had been dragged to Europe by the force of her repudiation. Instead, she would enlist the full force of her virtue and resourcefulness in the service of this sick child, to whom it was not only her duty but her desire to be a second mother.
So awake was Mistress Esther-Minna that she dispensed not only with sleep but with the lightest catnap. She rose from her bed and stood like a sentry over the sick child, who tossed and turned in his sleep as his sin donned and doffed various nightmarish forms. So deep was the silence all around that Mistress Esther-Minna felt that she could not only catch every rustle and creak of her house but even interpret it correctly. From the other side of the wall came Abulafia’s rapid breathing, as he tried to ignore his daughter’s disturbed spirit while she lay beside him. Below, in the little tabernacle, the rabbi was pouring out his prayers in a whisper, so as not to disturb Master Levitas’s sleep, perfumed as it was with the joyful command to dwell in booths. So wonderful was the silence all around her that she imagined that if she opened her window and strained her ears she would catch not only the thudding of the water against the side of the ship but even the idolater’s footsteps as he made his way longingly to the sculptor’s cottage. And if she tried very hard, closing her eyes and inclining her head and extinguishing every stray thought or wish inside herself, she might even hear the faintest sigh of the first wife as she sought love in the bowels of the ship.