He helped Morrell scrape the plates into the garbage, then went to the back porch for another cigarette. While Morrell loaded the dishwasher, wiped down the counters, and wrapped leftovers in airtight containers, I went into the living room to turn on Channel 13, Global Entertainment’s Chicago station. The evening anchor, Dennis Logan, was just finishing his summary of the upcoming news.
“Events turned stormy at times at the conference on Jews in America being held today at the Hotel Pleiades, but the real surprise came at the end of the afternoon from someone who wasn’t even on the program. Beth Blacksin will have the whole story later in our broadcast.”
I curled up in the corner of Morrell’s couch. I started to nod off, but when the phone rang, I woke up to see two young women on-screen raving about a drug for yeast infections. Morrell, who’d come into the room behind me, muted the set and answered the phone.
“For you, sweet. Max.” He stretched the receiver out to me.
“ Victoria, I’m sorry to phone so late.” Max’s tone was apologetic. “We have a crisis here that I’m hoping you can solve. Ninshubur-that blue stuffed dog Calia takes everywhere-do you have it by any chance?”
I could hear Calia howling in the background, Michael shouting something, Agnes’s voice raised to yell something else. I rubbed my eyes, trying to remember far enough back in the day to Calia’s dog. I had stuffed Calia’s day pack into my case, then forgotten about it in the harassment of getting her to Max. I put the phone down and looked around. I finally asked Morrell if he knew where my briefcase was.
“Yes, V I,” he said in a voice of long-suffering. “You dropped it on the couch when you came in. I put it in my study.”
I set the receiver on the couch and went down the hall to his study. My briefcase was the only thing on his desk, except for his copy of the Koran, with a long green string marking his place. Ninshubur was buried in the bottom, with some raisins, Calia’s day pack, and the tale of the princess and her faithful hound. I picked up the study extension and apologized to Max, promising to run right over with the animal.
“No, no, don’t disturb yourself. It’s only a few blocks and I’ll be glad to get out of this upheaval.”
When I returned to the living room, Don said the suspense was mounting: we were on the second commercial break with the promise of fireworks to come. Max rang the bell just as Dennis Logan began speaking again.
When I let Max into the little entryway, I saw he had Carl Tisov with him. I handed the toy dog to Max, but he and Carl lingered long enough that Morrell came over to invite them in for a drink.
“Something strong, like absinthe,” Carl said. “I had always wished for a large family, but after this evening’s waterworks, I think I didn’t miss so much. How can one small diaphragm generate more sound than an entire brass section?”
“It’s the jet lag,” Max said. “It always hits small ones hard.”
Don called out to us to hush. “They’re finally getting to the conference.”
Max and Carl moved into the living room and stood behind the couch. Don turned up the volume as Beth Blacksin’s pixieish face filled the screen.
“When the Southern Baptists announced their plan to send a hundred thousand missionaries to Chicago this past summer as part of their plan to convert Jews to Christianity, a lot of people were troubled, but the Birnbaum Foundation took action. Working with the Illinois Holocaust Commission, the Chicago Roman Catholic archdiocese, and Dialogue, an interfaith group here in Chicago, the foundation decided to hold a conference on issues that affect not just Illinois ’s substantial Jewish population but the Jewish community in America as a whole. Hence today’s conference, ‘Christians and Jews: a New Millennium, a New Dialogue.’
“At times, it seemed as though dialogue was the last thing on anyone’s mind.” The screen shifted to footage of the demonstrations out front. Blacksin gave both Posner and Durham equal sound bites, then shifted back to the hotel ballroom.
“Sessions inside the building also grew heated. The liveliest one covered the topic which sparked the demonstrations outside: the proposed Illinois Holocaust Asset Recovery Act. A panel of banking and insurance executives, arguing that the act would be so costly that all consumers would suffer, drew a lot of criticism, and a lot of anguish.”
Here the screen showed furious people yelling into the mikes set up in the aisles for questions. One man shouted the insult that Margaret Sommers and Alderman Durham had both made earlier, that the reparations debate proved that all Jews ever thought about was money.
Another man yelled back that he didn’t understand why Jews were considered greedy for wanting bank deposits their families had made: “Why aren’t the banks called greedy? They held on to the money for sixty years and now they want to hang on to it forever.” A woman stomped up to a mike to say that since the Swiss reinsurer Edelweiss had bought Ajax, she assumed Edelweiss had their own reasons to oppose the legislation.
Channel 13 let us watch the melee for about twenty seconds before Blacksin’s voice cut in again. “The most startling event of the day didn’t take place in the insurance session, but during one on forcible conversion, when a small man with a shy manner made the most extraordinary revelation.”
We watched as a man in a suit that seemed a size too big for him spoke into one of the aisle mikes. He was closer to sixty than fifty, with greying curls that had thinned considerably at his temples.
“I want to say that it is only recently I even knew I was Jewish.”
A voice from the stage asked him to identify himself.
“Oh. My name is Paul-Paul Radbuka. I was brought here after the war when I was four years old by a man who called himself my father.”
Max sucked in his breath, while Carl exclaimed, “What! Who is this?”
Don and Morrell both turned to stare.
“You know him?” I asked.
Max clamped my wrist to hush me while the little figure in front of us continued to speak. “He took everything away from me, most especially my memories. Only recently have I come to know that I spent the war in Terezin, the so-called model concentration camp that the Germans named Theresienstadt. I thought I was a German, a Lutheran, like this man Ulrich who called himself my father. Only after he died, when I went through his papers, did I find out the truth. And I say it is wrong, it is criminally wrong, to take away from people the identity which is rightfully theirs.”
The station let a few seconds’ silence develop, then Dennis Logan, the anchor, appeared in a split screen with Beth Blacksin. “It’s a most extraordinary story, Beth. You caught up with Mr. Radbuka after the session, didn’t you? We’ll be showing your exclusive interview with Paul Radbuka at the end of our regular newscast. Coming up, for fans who thought the Cubs couldn’t sink lower, a surprising come-from-ahead loss today at Wrigley.”
IV Memory Plant
Do you know him?” Don asked Max, muting the sound as yet another round of ads came up.
Max shook his head. “I know the name, but not this man. It’s just-it’s a most unusual name.” He turned to Morrell. “If I can impose on you-I’d like to stay for the interview.”
Like Max, Carl was a short man, not quite as tall as I am, but where Max smiled good-naturedly on the world around him-often amused by the human predicament-Carl held himself on alert-a bantam rooster, ready to take on all comers. Right now, he seemed edgier than usual. I looked at him but decided not to quiz him in front of Don and Morrell.
Morrell brought Max herbal tea and poured brandy for Carl. Finally the station finished its lengthy dissection of the weather and turned to Beth Blacksin. She was talking to Paul Radbuka in a small meeting room at the Pleiades. Another woman, with wings of black hair framing her oval face, was with them.