Wasn’t coffee supposed to inhibit such thoughts? But even coffee was no match for the thrill of Hannah’s conversation. He had always thought the girl no more than a simple and pretty thing, charming but empty. Now he knew it had all been for show, an act to placate her husband. Give the woman a bowl of coffee, and her true self blossomed. How many other women, he wondered, merely played the fool to escape the notice of their men?
The thought of a world peopled with cunning and duplicitous women did nothing to calm his spirits, so he said his afternoon prayers, adding his silent thanks to the Holy One, blessed be He, for having disposed of Joachim without all of the Vlooyenburg knowing of his business.
Miguel soon learned his thanks were premature.
He had thought it fortunate that Joachim had pulled his impudent prank while the men of the Vlooyenburg were scattered about the city in pursuit of their business, but he had forgotten to account for the women, women who sat in their parlor chairs and stood in their kitchens with their eyes upon the streets, praying that this day heaven would release them from their tedium by manifesting the miracle of scandal. Joachim’s crude behavior had been witnessed: from doorways and windows and side streets. Wives and daughters and grandmothers and widows had seen it all, and they had talked eagerly, to one another and to their husbands. By the time Miguel saw Daniel that evening, there was hardly a Jew in Amsterdam who did not know that a strange man had threatened Hannah and her maid and that Miguel had driven him off. Supper creaked under the weight of the incident. Miguel’s brother hardly spoke a word, and Hannah’s weak attempts at conversation failed utterly.
Later, Daniel crept down to the cellar. He took a seat in one of the old chairs, his feet slightly lifted out of the damp, and remained silent long enough to expand the discomfort that already crept over them. His eyes half focused on Miguel while he poked at a back tooth, all the while making sucking noises.
Finally he extracted his finger. “What do you know of this man?”
“It does not concern you.” The words sounded feeble even in Miguel’s own ears.
“Of course it concerns me!” Only rarely did Daniel lose his temper with Miguel. He might condescend and lecture and express his disappointment, but he shied away from anything like anger. “Do you know that this encounter is so upsetting to Hannah that she will not even speak of it? What horrors have befallen my wife that she will not gossip?”
Miguel felt some of his own anger subside. He had asked Hannah to protect a secret, and she had done so. He could not let himself worry about what damage he had done to his brother’s domestic quiet. Daniel, after all, only believed his wife upset.
“I’m sorry Hannah had a scare, but you know I would never let her come to harm.”
“And that foolish maid. Every time I try to inquire of her what happened, she pretends not to be able to understand what I say. The girl understands my Dutch well enough when I go to pay her wages.”
“You are more practiced with those words,” Miguel suggested.
“Don’t play the fool, Miguel.”
“And don’t play the father with me, my younger brother,” Miguel boomed.
“I assure you, I am not playing your father,” Daniel replied tartly. “I am playing the father to an unborn son and I am playing the husband, a role that would have taught you much had you not botched your agreement with Senhor Parido.”
Miguel almost lashed out with some hateful words, but he checked his tongue. In this case, he knew, his brother’s grievance had merit. “I am truly sorry that anyone unpleasant should have had contact with the senhora. You know I would never consciously expose her to any danger. This matter was nothing of my doing.”
“Everyone is full of this, Miguel. I cannot tell you how many conversations broke into harsh whispers at my approach today. I hate hearing people talking of my business, of how my own wife had to be saved from a madman set upon her by your doings.”
Perhaps that was the source of Daniel’s anger. He did not like that it was Miguel who had saved Hannah from the madman. “I had always believed you had larger concerns than what wives and widows say about you.”
“Make sport if you like, but this kind of behavior is a danger to us all. You have threatened the safety not only of my family but of our entire Nation.”
“What madness is this?” Miguel demanded. “Of what threat to our Nation do you speak? Your wife and Annetje were accosted by a madman. I fended him off. I hardly understand why that should be fodder for scandal.”
“We both know there is more to it. First I hear you have dealings with the heretic Alferonda. Now I have heard that this man who accosted Hannah was seen speaking to you two weeks ago. I have heard he is a Dutchman with whom you have an irresponsible familiarity. And now he lashes out at my wife and my unborn child.”
“You have heard a great deal,” Miguel answered.
“I might even go so far as to say it hardly matters if it is true-the harm may be the same either way. I have no doubt the Ma’amad would regard these transgressions very seriously.”
“You speak very authoritatively for the Ma’amad and its outdated policies.”
Daniel looked worried, as though they were in public. “Miguel, you go too far.”
“I go too far?” he snapped. “Because I disagree with the Ma’amad in private? I think you have lost your ability to judge the difference between power and wisdom.”
“You mustn’t criticize the council. Without its guidance, this community would be lost.”
“The Ma’amad was instrumental in creating this community, but now it rules without accountability or mercy. It threatens excommunication for the slightest offense, even the act of questioning its wisdom. Shouldn’t we be Jews in freedom rather than in fear?”
Daniel’s eyes widened in the flickering candlelight. “We are foreigners in a land that despises us and needs only an excuse to cast us out. The council stands between us and another exile. Is that what you wish? To bring ruin upon us?”
“This is Amsterdam, Daniel, not Portugal or Spain or Poland. How long must we live here before the Ma’amad understands that the Dutch are not like these others?”
“Do not their clergy condemn us?”
“Their clergy condemn us, but they condemn paved streets, and lighted rooms, and food with flavor, and sleeping while lying down, and anything else that might bring pleasure or comfort or profit. The people mock their preachers.”
“You are naive if you think we cannot be expelled here as we have been elsewhere.”
Miguel sucked his teeth in frustration. “You hide in this neighborhood with your countrymen, knowing nothing of the Dutch, and so you think them evil because you cannot trouble yourself to learn otherwise. This land rebelled against its Catholic conquerors, and then allowed the Catholics to continue to live among them. What other nation has done such a thing? Amsterdam is a stew of foreigners. The people thrive on having aliens around them.”
Daniel shook his head. “I’ll not say you are wrong about these things, but you are not going to change the Ma’amad. It will continue to act as though we are in danger at every moment, and it is better for it to do so than grow complacent. Particularly when Solomon Parido is a parnass, you must treat the Ma’amad’s power with respect.”