“Ana.”
“My sister said that I should watch for a curly-haired little girl,” the man said. “Garine, you know her?”
With what seemed the last of her strength, Ana nodded again.
“Come then,” the man said, and took her hand. “Come with me.” He smiled. “You are my daughter now.”
~ * ~
Lexington Avenue, New York City, 2001
“The man’s name was Helmut Klein,” Alma said. “He was a German spice trader who lived in Baku. My grandmother lived with him for two years, where she picked up Yiddish and Hebrew. A skill Klein recognized as quite extraordinary, so he decided to send her to America to be educated.” She smiled. “I am told you know the rest of this story.”
“He does indeed,” Danforth said.
With that, he abruptly rose, and in that rising seemed to declare his long and difficult mission at last accomplished. “I am tired now, Paul. Forgive me if I must say goodbye.”
I got to my feet and offered my hand.
Danforth took it and shook it gently.
I drew on my coat and within seconds stood outside Danforth’s building; the snow was still falling. Alma came up behind me as I turned uptown. “I’ll take the bus back to my hotel,” I said. “I’m sure my flight’s been canceled.”
“I’ll walk you to the bus stop,” Alma said.
She turned, and I fell in beside her; shoulder nearly touching shoulder, we strolled toward the avenue.
“One thing,” I said as we walked to our destination. “What happened to your mother?”
“She died when I was born,” Alma said. “I never knew her.”
I nodded, since I had nothing to say to this, and for a time we walked on silently.
Then, for no reason other than to continue the conversation, I asked, “And Ana’s father?”
“He was killed,” Alma said.
“By Kulli Demir, or someone like him, I suppose,” I said.
“No, Ana’s father wasn’t killed by Kulli Demir or someone like him,” Alma said. She stopped, turned to me, and with her eyes told me that we had truly reached the end of my own quest for Anna Klein. “He
She saw the utter shock in my expression. “Ana’s mother told her to take her mother’s family name, not her father’s,” she said. She looked at me with an odd tenderness, then added, “My grandfather asked me to give you something.” She reached behind her neck and unsnapped a silver chain from which hung a star and crescent moon.
“I wear this to honor my grandmother,” she said as she dropped the chain into my hand. Her lips smiled but her eyes bored into me with the accumulated fire of Danforth’s simple parable.
“Especially now,” she added.
For a moment, I couldn’t speak. Then I said simply, “Thank you.”
“Goodbye, Paul,” she said.
With that farewell, she turned and strolled southward down the avenue, her body framed by the great emptiness of where the Towers had once stood, a wound in our hearts, barbaric and infuriating, crying out for a response both passionate and reasoned, and whose grave balance now seemed more complicated than before.
