The Last Kabbalist of Lisbon

of the store. She looks up with faded eyes as I climb inside. “In the night, I gave water to Farid like you told me,” she says in a dry voice. “And he ate two eggs I made.”

“Thank you. That was sweet. Are you okay?”

“Fine. Why don’t you stay home for a while? Eat something.”

“Listen, I’m going to go down to the cellar. You can come with me if you like. But then I’ve got to go out again.”

“To find who killed Uncle?” she enquires.

“Who told you that?”

“Beri, I’m not stupid. I hear conversations, know what…”

A single knock on the door halts her explanation. Without waiting for our reply, Senhora Faiam, our neighbor from across Temple Street, rushes in. Her black dress is torn at the collar, red scratches arc across her cheek toward her lips.

“The Old Christians?!” I shout, rushing to her, thinking she’s been assaulted.

“No, no,” she says. “Nothing like that.” She grips my hand. Her pale eyes are rimmed red with sleeplessness. Her jowls sag. “I saw you from my house,” she continues. “I’m sorry about Master Abraham.” When she lifts my hand to her lips and gives it a gentle kiss, I sniff at her odor of distress. “Beri, we need you,” she says. “Can you come to my house?” So Cinfa won’t hear, she tugs me down to her level, whispers into my ear, “Bring talismans. An ibbur has possessed Gemila and is clinging as tight as can be.” She grips my hand hard. “And Beri, the ibbur says he knows who killed your uncle!”

Chapter XIII

From our storage cabinet in the cellar, I gather what I need to exorcise an ibbur and head to Senhora Faiam’s house. Gemila, her daughter-in-law, sits bound with rope to a wooden bench in the kitchen, her hands tied together, breathing in gulps, famished for air. How to describe the victim of a possession? Twice before I have seen the symptoms: the white skin like waterlogged parchment; the tormented eyes; the rims of crusted blood inside the lips and nostrils. Gemila is no different, perhaps even worse; she has already ceded a good portion of her human shell, begun to take on the demon’s form. Her chestnut locks are matted with shit, stuck in clumps to her cheeks and neck. The pinky of her left hand has clearly been broken, sticks out to the side at an impossible angle. Her loose-fitting white frock is stained everywhere, looks as if she has been swimming in mud and blood. A being from the Other Side has slithered around her soul, I think, and my first urge is to run. But Uncle has taught me that ibburs are only metaphors—very powerful ones, it is true, but no match for even an incipient kabbalist. And if this demon truly knows who killed my master…

Gemila suddenly tilts her head back as if it is too heavy to control. When she gazes at me, her eyes lose their terror and connote only a contemplative depth of vision. They fix upon the wisps of incense smoke now rising from my censer.

Bento, Gemila’s husband, touches my shoulder and shows me a lost smile meant to ask for help. His black hair is tied back tightly with a blue ribbon, and a weeks growth of beard sprouts thickly on his cheeks. His forehead and hands, pants and shirt, are all streaked black with sweat and the grease of fleece. He earns a living as a traveling shearer and must have made it safely back into Lisbon only to find his wife like this.

Belo, their three-legged dog, normally tethered to Gemila by a fierce fidelity, has backed up against the door to the bedrooms and is staring at her with frightened eyes.

“Sente-se bem?, do you feel all right?” I ask Gemila in Portuguese.

It is a stupid question, I admit. She offers me only silence. Eyes as cold as obsidian resist my penetration. I lift her roped hands. Her pulse races unevenly, as if her essences are scurrying in all directions. She frowns and stares contemptuously at my touch. She gulps again for air. Cringing, she screams in Hebrew, “A bell is falling through my chest!” Her eyes roll white, then fix me with a frigid stare.

Senhora Faiam whispers, “She is ricocheting between our world and the demonic sphere. When I nod, she adds, “We have found that the ibbur speaks no Portuguese, only Hebrew.”

“When did this pain begin?” I ask Gemila in the holy language.

Her chest heaves, then stills. “There is no pain—this vessel is frail but adequate,” comes a voice. It is not Gemila’s. It is monotone, leached of warmth. The Hebrew is Castilian accented.

“Who are you?” I ask.

“White Maimon of the two mouths.”

I look away for a moment to gather my resolve; this is no ordinary ibbur, but a demon. “Why do you say, ‘two mouths?’” I ask.

“One to devour the children of Anusim, the forced converts. Made of blood. With needles for teeth.”

Biting at the air for breath, she suddenly spits red at me. Senhora Faiam gasps. As I wipe my neck, Gemila opens her mouth. Ruined teeth are coated with fresh blood. She laughs.

“God forgive her,” Senhora Faiam moans. “She ate glass just before I ran to you. I tried to stop her but the ibbur can only live on minerals. He’s…”

I wave away the Senhora’s cascade of words, face Gemila. “Why have you come?” I ask.

“Zedek is divorced from Rahamim.”

This demon knows kabbalah! He refers to the break between female justice and male compassion that has given rise to a reign of evil in our era.

“I come with Rahamim,” I say. “Together, Rahamim and I will marry this woman.”

“You may enter and ride me, but you will not emerge!” the demon warns.

It is a double entendre on Gemila’s sex and the chariot of mystical vision; few who ride it can return unscathed. Referencing a second-century Jewish sage who emerged safely back into our world after a journey in the chariot, I say, “I come in peace, like Rabbi Akiva.” Raising my middle finger over the girl, I invoke the power of Moses.

She rears back. With challenge grounding his voice, the demon spits out, “I am neither Amalekite nor asp! And Moses is dead!”

“It is always Passover,” I reply. “Moses parts the Red Sea even as we speak.”

“Then soon he, too, will be on the other side unable to help you.”

“So you refuse to let the woman guide her own vessel?” I ask.

“She has let me inside, and I will stay with her and give her the solace which your God has refused. Otherwise, I would be an ungrateful guest. Don’t you agree?”

“As you wish.” I turn to Bento. “Three things I will need. Cold water from the Tagus. Fill the largest tub or cauldron you can find with it. It must fit Gemila. We have one if you can’t…”

“We have one! What else?!”

“A sole. Bring me the smallest one you can find. And for God’s sake, keep it alive. And lastly, get Cinfa to show you where our magic dye is. Bring it to me and spill some into a plate.”

“What will we do?” Senhora Faiam asks.

“All filth and dirt heighten the Other Side. So the Zohar says. And so this demon knows. Gemila must be cleaned.”

“You may even pare my fingernails, it will do no good!” the ibbur hisses. “The Sabbath is just another sunset to me, and you are a shadow trying to hold a fire.”

“And the sole?” Senhora Faiam whispers, so the demon won’t hear.

“Fish are immune to the likes of Maimon,” I answer. “It will help us in the struggle.”

While Bento is out, I instruct Senhora Faiam on how we will chant Psalm Ninety-One to prepare Gemila. The Senhora grips the censer chain with both hands as she listens.

“Take that foul odor from me, you shit-filled goat!” the demon suddenly shouts. “And know this, Berekiah Zarco—if you attempt to remove me from my home you will never find your uncle’s murderer!”