Page 74 of Margins of Love
“Areyou quite certain he’ll see us?” Arnold asked when Fave pulled the bar to open the heavy glass door to Pavel’s shop.
“I will give him no choice,” Fave said and entered first. He had left Rachel in her parents’ care, giving her some time to regroup.
The shop was empty, so Fave walked straight to the back room, Arnold following him.
“Vas vilstu? What do you want?” Pavel was hunched over his scratched workbench, a candle sitting on a pile of melted wax before him. He did not look up at Fave and Arnold.
“We are here for the emerald.”
“Of course, the competition. All you children think of is fame and money.” Pavel pushed himself up with what seemed his last bit of energy. The chair screeched. Fave flinched.
“Pavel, this is our chance and you know it.” Fave implored. “The competition is anonymous—”
“—Pah!” Pavel spat. “S'iz nishta aza zakh.There is no such thing.”
Fave shot a look at Arnold. But his cousin had picked up some stones from Pavel’s workbench.
“What happened here?” Arnold held a few shards of… it couldn’t be. Fave rushed to Arnold and took the magnifier from the workbench to inspect the chipped stone.
“Is this a Kimberley diamond?”
“Ikh hab es tsebrakhn.I broke it.” Pavel looked weary.
Fave sat down at the workbench. He picked up a rifler file and got to work. Pavel and Arnold stepped closer and watched him.
About an hour or so passed, Arnold and Pavel had shared some tea in the front of the store. Fave had salvaged what he could and brought the three stones wrapped in a small polishing cloth. He placed them on the counter for Pavel to see. Three evenly shaped, perfectly symmetrical hexagons with small indentations. Snowflakes.
“Ikh hab nisht gezen aza gute arbet zint deyn zeyde iz geven mit aundz. I have not seen such good work since your grandfather was with us.” Pavel patted Fave on the shoulder and turned to Arnold. “Is this what you boys learned at Oxford?”
“It’s just geometry,” Fave shrugged. Arnold smiled. Fave knew that he was not the only one who missed his grandfather. He had been the best diamond cutter of all times. He always told him stories of his and Pavel’s adventurous quests for gems around the world.
“He taught you well, my son.” Pavel was still admiring the gems, rolling them between his fingers.
“I have never seen such facets before, what is it called?” Pavel asked.
“I don’t know, I made it up,” Fave said. “The stone tells me how it plays with the light, I follow its lead.” He shrugged.
“He’s quite talented,” Arnold said. Pavel nodded and walked to the tresor.
Arnold’s eyebrows rose in anticipation.
“I know you boys want this emerald,” Pavel produced the large gem from the previous day, “but this one will win you a permanent place in court.” With this, he opened a leather pouch and removed a gem rough, a six-sided raw crystal.
“Is this…” Fave choked on his words.
“Yo.Yes.” Pavel handed it to him.
“But it’s stuck in a rock!” Arnold said.
Fave took the cluster and turned it gently against the light. “It’s not a rock, Arnold, it’s a quartz-pegmatite matrix.”
“I thought that only your grandfather could carve this out, so I never took it out of the tresor… but after today…” Pavel wiped a tear from his eyes.
“Pavel, this must be over sixty carats,” Fave mused.
“Your grandfather got over a hundred from these.” Fave’s eyes widened.
“You mean, I …”
