Raisins and Almonds

'Oh, did you want to say something?' Phryne's social manner was unassailable. 'Do please forgive me. I was just chatting to your charming nephew.'

'He's a fool. So is his father. All fools.'

'Oh? Tell us about it.'

Phryne lit a gasper and exhaled the smoke, leaning back in the bench. There was a small cold lump in her stomach. She began to fancy that she could smell blood.

'That compound is going to make me rich,' said Chaim. 'All my life I've been working, working, and always events were against me, even God was against me, gevalt! I toiled and I starved and I never got nowhere. Then, just when I've got a good shoe business going, comes my brother back from France, rich as Croesus, rich for life from just one deal, and what does he do? He takes it off me, he takes my shoe business for his own, and then what can I do? He's got the money. He's got the power.'

'It wasn't like that,' protested Simon, and subsided as the knife nicked his throat.

'A slave in his house, that's all I was.'

Phryne watched in horror as a thin trickle of blood slid down the young man's smooth throat and puddled in his collarbone. Murder under the ground, the Rabbi Elijah had said. Death and weeping. Greed caused it. Here was murder and greed. But Phryne could have coped much better with being threatened herself. Watching this madman murder her lover was as terrible an ordeal as she could imagine. Such a beautiful boy. She had to keep Chaim Abrahams distracted and talking.

'That must have been awful for you,' she prompted. 'Then what happened?'

'I heard of Yossi's work. A clever boy, that Yossi. Clever and poor and mad about Zion, that pipe dream!

Palestine, what is there in Palestine but dust and camels and pogroms? Yossi wanted to sell the compound for guns, such a fool, he didn't realise what it was worth. For this formula he could have bought the British Protectorate and everything in it. Artificial rubber? The whole world wants it. He could have owned every yard of his precious Palestine! And he came to me, Yossi. To ask me to arrange a sale.'

'Why should he come to you?' asked Phryne, watching the trickle of blood overflow the collarbone and stain Simon's shirt.

'He thought I was sympathetic to his aims, what a meshugennerl No use talking to my so-clever brother, no, it was well known he was no Zionist. So he came to me! Of all people!' Chaim Abrahams laughed, a deep pleasant chuckle.

'I see,' encouraged Phryne.

'I knew people, I told him. Bring me the formula and I'll put you in touch with those who can deliver your guns. But I had to get rid of the go-between, see?'

'Not precisely,' said Phryne. 'Why didn't you just steal the formula?'

'Look how much you know,' sneered Chaim. 'Yossi would know when the Chaim Abrahams Rubber Plant started production. I thought that it was Yossi who would make the exchange, putting the formula in one book and getting his reward from another. So I took the place of the carter and delivered the box to the bookshop. Then, when Miss Lee was busy, I put the razor blade into the book and sprinkled on the poison which is crystals in office paste. Simple. Yossi dead from unknown causes and all I have to do is buy the book.'

'Except that it didn't work out like that, did it?' asked Phryne, sympathetically.

Chaim scowled. 'Who would have thought that it would be Shimeon who put his finger in the wrong place?' he asked rhetorically. 'Then the bookshop is closed and I cannot get to it, but I think, soon the woman will be hanged and the goods sold, and I will get it then. So I just wait.'

'You just wait?' asked Phryne. 'You don't go burgling houses?'

'Me, do I have the figure for burglary?' asked Chaim. 'Stay still,' he warned Simon, who had shifted on his knees. He must, Phryne thought, be in considerable pain. The cold lump was getting colder. She was running out of things to say.

Robinson rescued her. 'We've got men covering all the exits,' he informed Abrahams. 'You won't get away with this. Let the boy go. He hasn't done you any harm.'

'No harm?' screamed Chaim suddenly. 'No harm he's done me? If he hadn't been born, I would be the sole heir of my brother. All his life, he's been in my way.'

'Come on, Mr Abrahams, you can see you can't get away,' said Jack Robinson, almost kindly. 'You're not going to inherit now, are you? Let him go.'

'Never!'

Silence fell again. Time passed. Simon shifted from knee to knee, grimacing at the stinging of the blade in the little wound. The air grew almost solid with rotten fruit and static electricity. Phryne heard the crack of thunder overhead.

Jack Robinson was taking Chaim through his actions again, and sympathizing with his troubles. Delay was all. Time was on their side. Chaim must get weary. The hand holding the knife must eventually cramp.

Then, possibly, Simon would die because Chaim was too tired to stand.

An hour, perhaps, had gone past. Bert had tried his hand at negotiation. Phryne could not think of anything to say, so she sent a constable for some water, which she intended to drink. Chaim must be thirsty by now. If he saw her drinking, he might be moved to bargain. A glass of water, for Simon's life?

There was a flurry of feet on the steps and a woman's voice screamed 'Simon!'

'Stay back, Julia,' warned Chaim. 'Don't come any closer.'

'Simon, you're hurt ...' Julia came to a skidding halt next to Phryne. 'Chaim, what is this?'

'Julia, you are in time to watch your son die,' said the murderer.

'Why, Chaim, why?' she demanded, taking a step towards him. 'Bubelah, are you all right?'

'I'm all right, Mama,' he said valiantly.

'You chose the wrong man,' said Chaim. 'You know it now. When you had to choose, in Paris, between two poor men, me and my brother, you chose wrong, Julia.'

'No,' she said faintly. 'I chose right.'

'Wrong,' he snarled, and Julia jumped back from his contorted face.

'All right, I was wrong, I was wrong, now let Simon go,' said Mrs Abrahams. 'You let him go, Chaim, and I'll go away with you, I'll do anything you want. I'll lie down on this floor for you, let my son go!'

'Too late,' said Chaim. 'Once that would have made me happy, but not now. Come closer if you want him dead,' he added.

'Phryne,' whispered Julia Abrahams, 'do something!'

'I'm thinking,' said Phryne.

The police marksman would be in position by now. If she could get Simon away for only a second he would have a clear target and would fire, and police marksmen seldom missed. But Chaim was strong on his legs, had Simon in what looked like an unbreakable grip, and had more grievances to air. She doubted that he would kill Simon while he had a captive audience and further envy, malice and all uncharitableness to spill. Phryne pushed Mr Abrahams forward.

'You talk to him,' she urged. 'Get him to tell you how much he hates you.'

'Chaim?' asked Mr Abrahams. 'What are you doing, brother?'

'Brother?' snarled Chaim. 'What brother were you to me? You married the woman I loved, you stole my business, and you made me your slave. Find this, Chaim, fix this, Chaim, oh, Chaim will do it! He's got no head for business, Chaim, too visionary, a luftmensch, but good on the day-to-day details, keep the diary, arrange the appointments!' His mockery was merciless and instantly recognizable.

'Chaim,' said Benjamin Abrahams, 'Chaim, please, we're mispocheh! We're family!'

'Bennie, we're not related,' snapped Chaim.

'Then give me a great gift, stranger.' Benjamin Abrahams sank down onto his knees, eye to eye with his son. 'Give me this life.'

'I want you to mourn,' Chaim's voice was inhumanly gleeful and Phryne shivered. '"Oh, Absalom, my son, my son! Would that I had died for thee," that's what I want for you, Bennie, I want you to mourn.'

'I will mourn,' agreed Benjamin Abrahams. 'I will mourn the loss of my son. I will also mourn the loss of my brother,' he said. 'You want me to beg, Chaim? Here I am, begging. You want my wife to leave me and go to you? She's going right now. You want my business, every penny I own? It's yours. Only give me my son, Chaim. Give me Simon.'