Page 6 of The Phoenix Bride
“Have you been eating?”
“As best I can. It is difficult to do anything but worry. Rabbi said I must allow myself grief, but all I can think of is the business, and how I shall manage it alone.”
The Cardozos import Turkish fabrics. “Your father retired years ago. You have already been managing it alone.”
“Certainly,” she replies. “But now that Father is gone, I have no man’s face to wear. I suppose I ought to marry.”
I laugh nervously. “Perhaps.”
There is an awkward moment of silence.
“Unpack those tarts, then,” Sara says, and she goes to the couch. She returns with a cushion, which she puts upon the floor. As she sits on it, I retrieve the basket. I pull up a stool opposite her.
“Have you had many visitors?” I ask.
“The entire neighborhood, it seems. But I remain in need of good conversation. Do you have any stories to tell?” She bites into a tart, humming in appreciation. “This is excellent.”
“Stories?” I ask. She seems genuinely happy I am here. I suppose I ought to be grateful for that.
“Perhaps of new patients, with odd ailments? I shall never forget the man who had been eating paint. What was his name?”
“Henry,” I say.
“Did he ever tell you why he did it?”
“No, he couldn’t. It was a compulsion.”
“When I was young,” she says, “and I saw the silks coming into port, all bright and shiny like fruit, I often thought they looked delicious. But I never ate them.”
“We all have thoughts such as Henry did. Transient impulses. The trouble starts when we let them dictate our action.”
“If only it were as simple as you make it seem.” She makes a shooing motion. “If only one could say, ‘Impulse, I see you, and you are absurd!’ And then drive it away.”
“Often, one can.”
She snorts. “If you are David Mendes, I suppose.”
“Well—I have no stories,” I say curtly. “No patients, certainly, that are eating paint.”
“There must be something you haven’t told me yet. You’ve always spoken so little of your work.”
There are things I haven’t told her, of course. There are things I prefer not to think of, things it would hurt her to hear. “Not really,” I reply.
Sara pouts, dissatisfied. Still, she doesn’t press. She permits me my silence, as she always has done. It is a great relief.
A wood pigeon coos outside the window, and Sara cranes her head to look at it. In the early afternoon, the sun filters dusty gray and hot through the glass. The weather is already very warm, and the stink of the city is unconscionable. Sara has kept the windows closed, with sprigs of rosemary bunched in small vases on the sills. As we stare, a bee floats toward the flowers from outside. It smacks into the glass and bounces back, before beginning another adamant approach.
We finish eating in silence. There is a single tart left, and I leave it in the basket, returning it to the table. As I close the lid, Sara sighs, rubbing her eyes with her hand. I suddenly feel unwanted.
“Shall I leave you?” I ask.
“Soon. Will you sit with me first?”
I slide down to sit beside her on the floor. She presses her arm against mine.
“I am glad you are here,” she says.
“As am I,” I reply. “I am sorry I didn’t come sooner.”
