The kosher diner lay on Stanton, and was situated between a deli that was popular with flies, judging by the number of black corpses in the window, and a tailor who had clearly never met a piece of polyester that he didn’t like. Epstein was already at the restaurant by the time I arrived: the sight of one of his goons on the door gave his presence away. This one wasn’t wearing a yarmulke, but he fitted the type: young, dark-haired, Jewish, and built from bricks and protein. He would be armed too, which probably explained why his right hand was buried deep in the pocket of his navy coat while his left was not. Epstein didn’t carry a gun, but the people who surrounded him and ensured his safety most certainly did. The kid didn’t seem surprised to see me approach, but that was probably because I’d passed one of his buddies two blocks earlier, and he’d kept watch on me to make sure nobody was following. Angel, in turn, was a block behind him while Louis shadowed him from across the street. In this way, Epstein and I provided gainful employment for at least four people, and thus ensured that the wheels of capitalism kept turning.
The restaurant was as I remembered it from my last visit: a long wooden serving counter to the right, beneath which was a series of glass cases which would usually have contained overstuffed sandwiches and some carefully created specialties – beef tongue polonaise in raisin gravy, stuffed cabbage leaves, chicken livers sauteed in white wine – but were now empty, and a handful of small, round tables along the left wall, on one of which a trio of candles flickered in an ornate silver sconce. There Rabbi Epstein sat, similarly unchanged. He had always struck me as a man who had probably been old before his time, and so his later years had simply accrued without altering him unduly. Only the death of his son might have added to his white hairs and the fine wrinkles on his face, the young man put to death by those who shared something of the beliefs of Brightwell and his kind, if not their nature.
Epstein rose to shake my hand. He was elegantly dressed in a lightweight black silk suit, and a white shirt with a carefully knotted black silk tie. It was another unseasonably warm evening, but the A/C in the restaurant was off. Had I been wearing something similar to Epstein’s suit in this heat I’d have been leaving puddles on chairs, but Epstein’s hand was dry to the touch, and there was not even a hint of moisture on his face. By contrast, my shirt was stuck to my back beneath my blue wool sport coat.
From the back of the restaurant a woman appeared, dark-haired, brown-eyed, and silent: the deaf mute who had been present on the first occasion that Epstein and I had met here years before. She placed a glass of ice water in front of each of us, and some sprigs of mint. Her eyes turned to me as she did so, and she looked at me with something like interest. I watched her walk away. She was wearing oversized black jeans belted at her slim waist, and a black camisole top. Her hair hung in a single braid down her tanned back, tied with a length of red ribbon at the end. As when last we met, she smelled of cloves and cinnamon.
If Epstein saw the direction of my gaze, he did not acknowledge it. He fussed with the mint, crumbling it into his water, then stirred it with a spoon. There was silverware on the table. Soon food would start to arrive. It was how Epstein preferred to conduct his business.
Epstein seemed distracted, almost as though he were in some discomfort.
‘Are you okay?’
Epstein waved a hand in dismissal. ‘An unfortunate incident on my way here, nothing more. I was paying a visit to the Stanton Street Shul, and a man not much younger than I called me a “mockey bastard” as I passed him. It’s been many years since I heard that term used. It troubled me: the age of the man who said it, the obsolescence of the insult. It was like stepping back to another time.’
He recovered himself, stretching as though the memory of the insult was a physical thing that he could force from his body.
‘Still, ignorance has no sell-by date. It’s been a while, Mr Parker. It seems that you’ve been busy since last we met. I continue to follow your entertaining career with much interest.’
I had a suspicion that whatever Epstein knew about me, he hadn’t gleaned from the newspapers. Epstein had his own sources, including the senior FBI agent named Ross at the New York field office, a man whose responsibilities included maintaining a file with my name on it, a file that had come into existence following the deaths of my wife and child. A lesser man might have felt paranoid; I just tried to make myself feel wanted instead.
‘I wish that was reassuring to know,’ I said.
‘Oh, I’ve tried to help you here and there, you know that.’
‘Your help has nearly got me killed.’
‘But think of the life-changing experiences that you’ve had as a result.’
‘I’m still trying to avoid the most life-changing one of all: dying.’
‘And making a success of it, I see. Here you are, alive and well. I await the reason why with much curiosity, but first, let us eat. Liat has prepared food for us, I believe.’
And although she could not have heard him, and his back was to her so that she could not read his lips, the woman called Liat emerged from the kitchen at that very moment carrying a tray covered with stuffed cabbage and derma, a selection of sweet and hot peppers, three kinds of knishes, and two bowls of salads. She moved another table close to ours so that we would have space to eat.
‘No fish,’ said Epstein. He tapped a finger to the side of his head. ‘I remember these things.’
‘My friends think I’m phobic,’ I said.
‘We all have our peculiarities. I knew a woman once who would faint if someone sliced a tomato in front of her. I have never been able to discover if there is a medical term for it. The closest I’ve come is “lachanophobia”, which appears to be an irrational fear of vegetables.’ He leaned forward conspiratorially. ‘I must confess that, on occasion, I have used it as a way to avoid eating broccoli.’
Liat returned with a bottle of Goose Bay Sauvignon Blanc, poured each of us a glass, then a third for herself. She took the glass with her and sat on the counter, her legs crossed before her. She placed on her lap a book, a copy of Norman Maclean’s
I tried the wine. It tasted good.
‘Kosher?’ I asked. I couldn’t quite keep the surprise from my voice.
‘You could be forgiven for thinking otherwise as it’s remarkably palatable, but yes: it’s from New Zealand.’
So we ate, and talked of families, and the troubles of the world, and steered scrupulously clear of darker matters until Liat came to clear the table, and coffee was brought with a separate jug of milk for me, and always I was conscious of how she kept her eyes on my lips, all pretense of not watching me now set aside. I noticed that Epstein had turned slightly so that she would be able more easily to see his lips as well as mine.
‘So,’ said Epstein, ‘why are you here?’
‘Brightwell,’ I said.
‘Brightwell is . . . gone,’ Epstein replied, leaving the ambiguity to hang between us; not dead, but ‘gone’. Epstein knew better than anyone the nature of Brightwell.
‘For now?’ I said.
‘Yes. We might have achieved a more permanent solution had you not shot him to death.’
‘It was satisfying nonetheless.’
‘I’m sure that it was. So is hitting a cockroach with your shoe, until it starts to crawl again. But what’s done is done. Why bring him up now?’
So I told him the story that Marielle Vetters had passed on to me, leaving out only the identities of those involved, and any reference to the town in which they lived.
‘An airplane,’ said Epstein, when I was done. ‘I know nothing about any airplane. I will need to consult. Perhaps others have heard. What else do you have?’
I had made a copy of the list of names that Marielle had given to me.
‘The woman’s father took this from the plane,’ I said, as I slid the photocopy across the table. ‘It was part of a cache of papers in a satchel under one of the pilots’ seats. He left the rest in the wreckage, according to his daughter.’
Epstein took his wire-framed spectacles from his pocket and carefully hooked the ends over his ears. He had a way of appearing frailer than he was, a pantomime of squints and grimaces. It was a role he played even with those who knew better than to be taken in by it. Perhaps it was just habit by this point, or maybe even he could no
