Teresa, tense, implacable, breathing only slightly, intent on being a statue of salt, neither moved nor answered. Alejandro knew that his wife’s will was inflexible, as did the twins. But when the black pulp of an old banana smashed against her stubborn face, my grandmother opened her ferocious eyes, roared, leapt like a wild beast, smacked the head of one of the dogs with her suitcase, caught the biggest boy, pulled down his pants, and turning him over her knee, slapped his buttocks until they were red. She let him loose when she thought the punishment was enough, so he could catch up to his pals who were fleeing at top speed.
With that terrible face that could stop an army, Teresa stared at her husband, sank Fanny and Lola between her breasts and said, trying to give her words the hardness of stone, “A-le-jan-dro-Jo-do-row-sky, it’s your fault we are where we are. That insanity about the Rabbi has led us to misery. Here, the advice of your ghost means nothing. And I don’t want us to go on living as parasites on the Jewish community. The past is done and gone! New world, new life! This is the last time I’ll ever accept help from that freak. I’ll line myself up as you ask, and we’ll march up to the top of the peak. Let’s see if up there the Most High Villain gives us the help we need in exchange for half a kopek. But I swear on my life that if nothing happens, I’ll leave Jaime and Benjamín with you, take the girls with me, and we’ll go to a bar in the port and be whores forever!”
Alejandro swallowed hard, tried to kiss Teresa’s hand, though she pulled it back in fury, and arranged the family in a line. Next to Teresa, Fanny, and next to Fanny, Lola on the far left. Next to him, Benjamín, and next to Benjamín, Jaime on the far right. The Rabbi stood in the center. “Now we have formed the golden candelabra. Our souls are the seven flames. Now, holding hands, we shall climb up to deposit the half kopek in the Temple.”
“First ask your Rabbi if he’s going to be the one who carries the bags.”
Fanny and Jaime laughed. The Rabbi immediately whispered to Alejandro, “The wise Hillel said: ‘If you wish to possess everything, you must not posses something that is nothing.’ Leave what you have behind!”
“Teresa, sweetheart, as a wise man said, in order to possess everything you must possess nothing. We have to abandon our baggage.”
“Is that what your Rabbi advises you to do? Let people rob the little you have left? Let them throw salt in your eyes, pepper in your nose, and stones in your heart! Let them pull your guts out of your belly, wrap them around your neck, and then hang you with them from a tree! I hope you turn into a bird and he turns into a cat so he can eat you alive, choke, and you both die together!”
“Enough, Teresa! You promised to obey him one last time!”
“It’s pretty certain we’re going to prostitute ourselves. You will ruin your life and the lives of your daughters. You will die of shame.”
“I believe in him. Let’s go!”
The street snaked upward among small, one- or two-story houses with window boxes filled with geraniums or ferns. Compared with the other hills, where mansions, gardens, and churches were clearly visible, this one had to be the most modest in Valparaíso. The Chileans were not aggressive. From their rooms, they watched the family march up the middle of the street holding hands as if they were part of a parade that had lost its body with only the head remaining. They smiled, held out glasses of water or wine or slices of melon. Teresa, huffing and puffing, forced the twins to accept nothing despite the fact that, under this sun that was stronger than anything she had felt before, she too was parched, her lips cracking.
The gray, rectangular building, with a tin chimney spouting white smoke, turned out not to be a temple but a military barracks, with two soldiers standing guard at its metal doors. Barely hiding his despair, Alejandro looked more carefully and realized that the chimney did not belong to the barracks but was attached to a run-down wooden house with a clay oven and a tavern with chairs. A bald old man showing his last three teeth was offering his merchandise, pointing to two baskets covered with empty flour sacks.
“Have faith,” said the Rabbi. “Nothing is given to us, we have to earn it. God hides so we will search for Him. By learning to see Him in everything, we are born. The temple is a military barracks because obeying the law of God is the only freedom. And this modest shack that has summoned us with the smoke of its purifying oven is a holy place, the altar of sacrifice. Give me the half kopek of ransom so that, in the name of the Jodorowsky family, I can deposit it in consecrated hands.”
When Teresa saw Alejandro fall into a trance, adopting the refined gestures, the high-pitched voice, and the burning gaze of the Rabbi, she began to tear out her hair. “Once upon a time I would have said My God, but now what can I say? I’ll kill myself! It’s better to be a dead lioness than a mangy, living dog.”
The Rabbi, with the smile of one blessed, responded, “If God gave us thirst, he will give us water. If He gave us teeth, he will give us bread. Come to the altar.”
Teresa, overcome with fatigue, followed her husband. The old toothless man took a triangular patty out of each basket and said, “Cheese, meat.”
The Rabbi had no knowledge of empanadas, a Chilean dish made of baked dough stuffed with chopped meat or cheese, but he shouted in astonishment, “Praised be He!” God was speaking to him in symbols. The most sacred sign, the Shield of David, was there before them! He sniffed the meat empanada: “This is the Eternal One manifest in matter.” He sniffed the cheese empanada: “And this is the Eternal One manifest in spirit.” From the hands of the old man he took the two triangles, and placed one on top of the other to form a six-pointed star. The Magen David, the union of heaven and earth, fire and water, body and soul. “God is the food we will never lack. And he asked each member of the family to take a bite at each of the six points. Then he let them eat until the symbol disappeared.
The old priest then began to recite in Spanish a psalm of gratitude, incomprehensible to the others: “Who’s going to pay for the two empanadas?”
The Rabbi asked the family to repeat, in a chorus, the holy words. Their mouths, perfumed by cheese, onion, and meat, sang thankfully.
“Who’s going to pay for the two empanadas?”
The old man stretched out his open hand, shaking it urgently. The Rabbi began to leave. “I’ve completed my mission. Give him the obolus, and the Eternal One will manifest Himself.” The Rabbi disappeared. Alejandro, smiling happily, deposited the half-kopek in the old man’s dried out fingers. The old man stared at the tiny coin. His face turned into an ocean of wrinkles, his mouth transformed into a grimace like a fallen half moon, and he was about to hurl an insult. But before he could open his mouth, the ground began to shake.
The shack’s lantern, hanging on a dark wire covered with fly shit, bounced around furiously. A rain of dry leaves fell; the dogs barked so loudly they seemed to cough up their intestines; out of the ground emerged monsters of dust. Then came a gigantic howl, accompanied by much more intense aftershocks. A few houses collapsed. The human screaming began, a mix of horror and pain. The entire port began to waltz. Immense waves threw the ships against the sea walls. No one could keep his footing. The peaks split open like ripe fruit, showing dark red cracks. Horses fell down the hillsides.
Thousands of citizens blackened the streets, running from one place to another, keeping clear of the falling walls. Gas tanks split open. Explosions and huge flames magnified the hysteria. The shaking began again, even more ferocious this time. The entire harbor leaned to starboard and to port like a ship in a storm. No building was left undamaged. The military structure collapsed. The two soldiers stood at attention until a flying piece of sheet metal cut off their heads.