The Last Kabbalist of Lisbon by Richard Zimler Read Free Book Online

andwhen we do go out, I’ll need to pass by New Merchants Street. I promised Esther I’d deliver the Book of Psalms she’s just finished.”
    My master had a way of turning business transactions into disputations on the sex lives of angels and other esoteric matters. “You have precisely the time it takes Diego and me to down a cup of wine at the Attic Inn!” It was a tumbledown garret, but it served kosher wine on the sly.
    His lips sculpted a dismayed but amused frown. “Look who’s giving orders!” he observed.
    I met his challenge with the bored expression I used to practice to irritate my father when he spoke of Talmud classes. He nodded his agreement. “All right, no more than a half hour.” He motioned for me to bend so he could bless his hand over me. Then, as I picked dyes and colors from the storage cabinet, he unlocked the genizah ,the traditional hiding place for old books in a synagogue. Ours was a pit—three feet wide by four feet long—sunken into the floor at the western perimeter of the prayer mat. Its contents were constantly changing; books smuggled out of Portugal were soon replaced with others my master discovered and either bought or begged.
    Uncle stepped one foot down into the genizah to retrieve our work. By the time he’d climbed back out, I was at my desk, arranging my brushes and dyes. Placing my manuscript neatly on the slightly inclined surface of the desk in front of me, he circled his hand around the back of my neck and advised me with a parable on the coloration for my most recent illumination, one of the tales from the famous collection of “Fox Fables.” As I began to offer an analysis of his words, his lips began to tremble and his hand grew cold against my skin. “What is it, Uncle?” I asked.
    He rubbed his eyes with both his hands, like a child, took a long inhale of breath as if to ready himself for a challenge. “You’re so grown up,” he said gently. “Already my equal in so much. And yet in other matters…” He shook his head, smiled wistfully. “There is so much I’d like to tell you… Beri, God may soon demand that we take separate paths.” He reached into his pouch and took out a scroll of vellum. Handing it to me, he said, “Be so kind as to accept this little gift.”
    The scroll unfolded into a vellum ribbon on which were scripted both our Hebrew names in elegant golden lettering. “Esther made it for me,” he continued. He gripped the back of my neck and, in an urgentvoice, added, “If ever you should need me, wherever you are, no matter how far or how desperate the circumstances, send this ribbon to me and I will come for you.” He placed his other hand atop my head, stared pressingly into my eyes. “And if, for any reason, you find me beyond your earthly reach, pray over it and I will make every effort to appear before you.”
    So touched was I by his grace, by my master’s generosity, that my throat parched with a kind of desperate yearning. Tears clouded the room. I had to swallow several times just to whisper, “But we will never be separated. I will always…”
    Uncle told me, “Youth is meant to be separated from age for a time. You will go your way as it should be, then return. But no demon, however powerful, shall stand in my way if you are in trouble!” He took his hand from atop my head and caressed my cheek. “Now come, let’s work together.”
    “But is there nothing that I can…?”
    He held up his hand and pointed to my manuscript. “Woe betide the kabbalah master who answers every question posed by his apprentice ! Now get to work!”
    A few minutes later, as I was highlighting the powerful legs of a young dog in my illumination with minute strokes of black, a shriek like shattered glass cut the air. “Go!” my master yelled.
    I bounded up the stairs. The kitchen was empty. Harsh voices from outside pounded against the walls. I climbed through my bedroom window into the store, dashed out onto Temple Street. As I