The Sea Beach Line (44 page)

Though it hurt me to leave Boro Park once again without having seen Rayna, I had to retreat to Manhattan for the time being. I went up to the roof of Becca's building with a bottle of brandy to think over the situation. Hearing the rebbe's marriage plans for Rayna had hammered home the urgency of the situation. I needed to act before she was sent away. Seeing the Galuth portrait in the rebbe's office not only confirmed Rayna's connection to the Galuth painting, but also clarified the connection between the Gluspker Rebbe and Goldov, and by extension Roman and Timur.

I opened Al's sketchbooks to Galuth's painting of the woman falling from the train. It had seemed to be a strange coincidence that I should find Rayna, whose face appeared in the sketchbooks, on West Fourth Street. Coincidences abounded only in crime novels, not in the world. But it wasn't actually a coincidence; it was
bashert
, preordained in heaven, that we would meet. Since the six days of creation, Hashem's attention had been devoted to creating couples. Rayna and I were meant to meet. We would have been pulled together across continents.

Or maybe not. There was ultimately a practical explanation to why Rayna's face appeared in the painting, one that didn't involve unseen forces, only a natural family resemblance. I had been eager to get to know Rayna because I recognized her face from Al's sketchbook, had, in fact, gone out of my way to forge a connection with her. Hundreds of pretty girls passed by my table. Many of them were runaways. I had searched for every face from the book; it was only a matter of time until I found one on the street.

The rebbe said that the informer saw Rayna on the street too. If he had said the informer had seen her at the storage unit, that would have pointed to Zoya, Roman, and Timur, but none of them were directly connected to West Fourth Street. Barring the unlikely possibility that a party unknown to me had happened to see Rayna in the Village, this implicated Goldov. I remembered how he had watched Rayna on the street the day he delivered my money. This wasn't to say that Timur hadn't been consulted about me and provided the unit number, after Goldov provided the lead.

What the rebbe said about Al was disturbing. In the heated moment, I had taken it as mere insult, born of frustration, and meant to further discredit my point of view. But as soon as I left, it started to bother me: Did the rebbe know Al, or at least know who he was? Like everyone else, the rebbe had used the past tense. I wondered about Al's connection to everything. He worked with Goldov, and he worked with Roman and Timur. He was just as guilty as the rest of them. Or he had been. Timur and Roman were the ones who convinced me that I was right to believe he was alive, but they were not
trustworthy men. Goldov must have had some reason for writing to my family in the first place. He must have known something about Al's disappearance he didn't divulge. Goldov had been eager enough to tell my family that Al was dead. I hadn't wanted to listen to what Goldov had to tell me before. It was time for another visit to the Galuth Museum.

I slept in the evening, then went down to the storage space at four o'clock in the morning to pull the boxes out of the small unit they were packed into. I'd gotten them pretty well organized when I shifted units, so I knew what was what. A lot of the space's contents were worthless, old radios and bits of rope and other debris, as well as books that wouldn't sell for very much due to their title or condition. No one needed all these paperbacks. I carted the junk out to the curb.

Al was not coming back. I was done maintaining a strange shrine, like Asher had tried to do for his mother. There was no more time to linger and avoid doing anything concrete to help Rayna. I needed to take drastic action. Burning this bridge was the first step. If I couldn't go back, I would have to go forward.

On the way back inside, I stopped at the front desk to inform the facility that my storage space would be empty by the end of the day.

“We can't refund this month's fee,” the kid at the desk said. “Or next month's.”

“That's fine,” I said.

“It looks like you're paid up until the end of the year, though, so you will still have six months' rent refunded. Would you like us to mail you a check, or charge it back to the card?”

“Charge it back to the card.” Timur could keep his money. I had now severed all my ties to him and Roman.

All that was left in the storage unit was the dozen boxes of books worth saving, which I carried down the corridor by hand to Mendy's storage unit. I could have left the boxes outside my vacated unit, or at least used the cart, but I wanted to pour my nervous energy into
labor. When I was done, I took one of Al's old belts that I'd put aside especially for this purpose and ran it through the trigger guard of his sawed-off rifle. I fastened the belt diagonally across my neck and chest, so the gun hung down on my side, under my arm, and pulled on a loose sweater and a raincoat. Satisfied that the gun was fully concealed, I left the unit unlocked and went and sat down on one of the boxes to wait for Mendy. He was a man of routine, and I knew he would arrive soon.

“Isaac?” he said, when he turned the corner with his little luggage cart and saw me waiting. He came closer and the light snapped on. “Good morning.” We shook hands. “I was listening to the weather radio on the way over. There's going to be rain today. Not just rain, a pretty big storm actually. I wouldn't recommend trying to go out today.” He appraised my stack of boxes. “What is all this?”

“I'm out of the business, Mendy.”

“I see. So you are. I didn't think you'd be down here forever. But I'm sorry to see you go.”

“Thanks. I'll miss talking to you.”

“Did you find what you were looking for?” he asked.

“Not really.”

“Yeah. I didn't think you would. I sure haven't. Did you find a job in the straight world, or are you just taking off?”

“Just taking off.” He nodded, and didn't ask any more questions. He didn't mention Rayna. Maybe he thought she left me, and it was a sore subject. “Can you use my back stock?” I said.

“Well, let's see. Let's see.” He tugged on his beard with his right hand, and gripped his bent right elbow with his left hand. His eyes scanned the stack of boxes. “What did you want for it all? I mean, I'd have to see the titles, but knowing the general quality of your books . . .” I noticed he called them my books, not Al's. “I'm sure I could go four, four fifty.”

“No. I don't need any money. I want to give them to you, Mendy.” I was done with the buying and selling, and just wanted a clean break. But I also wanted to do something for Mendy. Since I came down to the street, he was the one person, other than Rayna, who'd been
genuinely kind to me. I wondered if he had a grown son or daughter somewhere who he never saw.

“Oh. I see. That's very nice of you, Isaac. I know you mean it. But the thing is, there ain't really such a thing as a gift. Everything comes with an obligation. It's better to pay it off as it comes. So that people can part as friends, with nothing owed.” I was happy that Mendy considered me a friend. He didn't use the word lightly.

“Tell you what,” I said. “Give me fifty for the cart, and I'll throw in the books as part of the deal. To sweeten it.”

“I meant four hundred only for the books. That cart is worth at least a hundred alone. On top of what the books are worth.”

“The wheels are practically useless. The rubber is ground down, and one of the cotter pins is rusted in place; it'll be a hassle to get it popped off when you do replace that wheel. Half of the books are too esoteric to sell quickly, and we have to factor in your storage costs. Fifty for the whole lot is a fair price.”

“Okay,” Mendy said. “You drive a hard bargain. Usually people drive bargains in the other direction, but hey. Fifty it is.” He slid me two twenties and two fives. Pocketing them, I turned to leave. I felt his hand on my arm and turned back toward him.

“Isaac,” he said. “Take care of yourself.”

I got the Q train down at Canal and rode it all the way to Coney Island. I spent the long ride looking through Al's sketchbooks. The images on the pages no longer seemed as foreign or as frightening to me as they had when I'd first encountered them. I'd been living with them for a little while now.

Stillwell Avenue was crawling with cops. As I passed through the terminal, I folded my arms to pin the gun to my side as tightly as I could. The police didn't pay me any mind.

When I got to the museum, I pounded on the door until I heard Goldov shout, “I coming! I coming! What is so urgent so early in the morning?” He pulled the heavy door open. “Oh. It's you. Edel's boy.”

“May I come in, Goldov?”

“Why not?” He stepped back into the gallery and I entered, pushing the door closed behind me.

“Goldov,” I said. “I have come to settle accounts with you.”

“Oh? You are here to pay the money old Al owed me? Come on up. For this I have been waiting.” He was already heading up the stairs to his apartment.

“I know you have.” I thought of the note he'd sent my mother a few months earlier, and the comments he made the first time I came down to the museum. “But that's not my account to settle. I'm here because of what you took from me.”

“What I took from you? I took nothing from anybody. Always people have taken from me. Go home,
malchik
, if you have nothing for me.” We were standing in Goldov's kitchen now, surrounded by his terrible paintings.

I pulled the gun out from under my big sweater. Goldov watched with confusion as I struggled to unbuckle the belt with one hand. When I did get the gun free, and pointed the barrel at his face, his expression changed. I unclicked the safety with my thumb and held my pointer finger against the trigger. A thin layer of sweat instantly appeared between my fingertip and the trigger's flat metal surface. I had never pointed a gun at a human being before. I realized that it meant I was in control of the situation. I didn't need to be nervous or afraid anymore. Goldov did.

“Okay,” Goldov said. “Fine. So maybe I skimmed a little off of what Roman gave me to give to you. A courier fee. Maybe I took more than I should have. It's still far less than what Edel owed me. But there's no need for guns. This is a civilized country. I'll give you your money.”

“You're damn right you'll give me my money. But that's not why I'm here.”

“I am not understanding.”