40. HAKHAM FERRERA

Rabbi Ferrera, in a fez and with a goatee, sat on the balcony sipping coffee with his eyes almost shut. In the tradition of Sephardic rabbis, he was known as “Hakham Ferrera”—“Ferrera the Wise.” He fiddled with his prayer beads, and when his lips weren’t touching the cup, they moved in a ceaseless mumble—the Psalms?—and his large Adam’s apple, poking out of a thin, slightly twisted throat, went back and forth like a piston.

“Who’s he waiting for over there, like a bird on a branch?” Madame Marika asked.

“You won’t believe it: he’s waiting for Joseph Hamdi-Ali,” Robby’s grandma whispered.

“Joseph Hamdi-Ali with Hakham Ferrera? Tsk tsk tsk. Now that’s something!”

“And where is Monsieur Hamdi-Ali?” asked Alice, all atwitter for the early Saturday game (she told Isidore she was going to visit a sick friend).

“Went downstairs for a newspaper,” said Grandma, then added the startling news: “David’s going to ride in the race tomorrow. Joseph’s getting a paper to see what the betting situation is. He’ll be right back.” Not that she knew for certain what Joseph was reading in the paper about the race, and what the “betting situation” meant exactly, but she pretended to be fully informed.

“Why didn’t he send the servant?” wondered Madame Marika.

“Joseph Hamdi-Ali goes to get the paper himself each morning.”

“Those people from Cairo are strange!”

The ladies shook their heads and went to greet the rabbi. The wise man jumped up on his feet to honor ces dames, all smiles, and in his lyrical, chivalrous French, which contained some archaic vocabulary from past centuries, asked how their husbands were, and why they weren’t also attending this friendly get-together, blessed by the sanctity of the Sabbath. The ladies admitted with downcast eyes that they’d convened to play cards.

“On a Saturday?” the rabbi said, shaking a reproachful finger at them. Then he sighed and continued: “Must you play cards on the Sabbath, too? It’s forbidden.”

He didn’t expect an answer. Since he’d done his duty, he allowed himself to return to his coffee cup. He knew very well that his words made no impression on the ladies craving their card game. When his father, God have mercy on his soul, was the head rabbi of the community, people would be ashamed to be seen taking part in sacrilege. Times have changed, and Jews have changed. He was different from his father, too. He, who as a young man in his parents’ house was more fanatical than his wise, tolerant father, had adjusted against his will, compromising, dragged after his flock, afraid he might lose it. He glanced at the women once more and sighed. In the meantime, Geena and Livia joined the group. The table was crowded. Including Robby’s mother and grandmother, there were six women playing, while the maximum for each game was five. The hostesses decided to play associées instead, until a few more women showed up and they could fill a second table, with at least four in each game.

While they played, the rabbi finished his coffee, opened his eyes a slit and saw Robby. “Robbico, take this empty cup and tell your mother yisalem ida, bless her hands.”

Robby took the cup, though he was angry at the rabbi for not summoning a servant for such an inferior task. While he was walking to the kitchen, the rabbi called him back again. “Robby, come here, Robby. Viens ici.”

Robby returned to the old man.

“You want to be a mezamer at the synagogue?” he asked, fixing his brown and kindly smiling eyes on the boy.

“What’s a mezamer?”

“A mezamer is a choir boy.”

“And what do they sing?”

“Prayers, Psalms, things from the Bible.” The rabbi knew how to speak to laymen.

“But I don’t know the words. I don’t even know any prayers.”

“You’ll learn. Come to the synagogue next Saturday and we’ll teach you everything. But you know what? Wear nice Sabbath clothes. That’s a mitzvah!”

Robby wanted to ask what a mitzvah was, but said instead: “But I can’t sing.”

“Do you think the other children can?” the wise Ferrera winked. “They don’t know how to sing either. You move your lips in time. The main thing is to make them think you’re singing. We need a lot of kids in the choir, you see? As many as possible. And maybe this will bring your parents to the synagogue. Here, have a piece of candy.” He fished a sour candy wrapped in cellophane from his pocket.

Robby didn’t like sour candy, but he didn’t want to hurt the kind old man’s feelings, especially since a career as a singer appealed to him in spite of his shyness. He could picture himself in a white suit and a loud red tie, a newsboy cap atop his head (because your head must be covered in the house of prayer), standing there, singing. Singing, yes. He was no longer ashamed, and promised himself to sing loud and clear, his voice rising above the rest. Nonetheless, one thing was certain—this would not draw his atheist father to the synagogue!

Joseph walked in with the newspaper under his arm. Seeing the rabbi, he hurried to put down the paper and walk over. “Rabbi, I’m sorry to make you wait.”

“I was early, Yusef, ya habibi,” the rabbi said good-naturedly. “Besides, I wasn’t wasting my time. I was recruiting for our new choir. Here, Robby’s going to join us as a mezamer.”

Joseph turned to Robby, smiling. “Good boy, good boy.”

It was one of the few times that Joseph Hamdi-Ali spoke to Robby. For a moment, the boy saw the old man’s smiling eyes, two islands lost in a storm of wrinkles. Not the appeasing wrinkles of old age, those little ditches channeling intelligence and experience, but cracks in the heart of boiling lava, the geyser of tears about to erupt.

Joseph turned to the rabbi and said, “Rabbi, I thank you for agreeing to see me. I see you were already served coffee. I’ll get straight to the point then.” He shot Robby a quick look.

Robby, well-raised boy that he was, took the hint and left.