Rabbi Zindelman spent much of his weekend thinking about Dr Koekentapp. He agreed with Mrs Finkelstein. Something was very wrong. He could have sworn that Dr Koekentapp wasn’t Jewish when they first met, but why then could he sing so well in Hebrew? There also was no mistaking the absolute sincerity of his brocha, but there was something oddly familiar about his style.
It was only on Monday that it came to him. Rabbi Zindelman triumphantly banged his fist on his desk. ‘Peruvnick!’ he bellowed and grabbed the telephone directory.
‘Soft Blue Video. We tease to please. Peruvnick speaking.’
Rabbi Zindelman arched his eyebrows. ‘Is that a proper way to answer the telephone?’ he asked. ‘What happened to “Good morning, may I help you”, or even “Hello”?’
‘They don’t excite customers,’ replied Peruvnick. ‘Who’s calling?’
‘Rabbi Zindelman.’
Peruvnick put down his dumpy beer and switched off an illicit video.
‘Shalom, Rabbi,’ he said.
Rabbi Zindelman came to the point. ‘Tell me, Mr Peruvnick, do you happen to know Dr Jeremiah Koekentapp?’
Peruvnick’s mind raced. He decided to stall for time. ‘Excuse me, Rabbi, my other telephone is ringing.’ With a clarity of thought far exceeding his foresight at the race track, Peruvnick bet on the brocha. ‘My apologies, Rabbi,’ he returned, ‘how may I help you?’
‘I want to know when you qualified as a Hebrew teacher,’ Rabbi Zindelman replied.
Peruvnick managed a sick smile. ‘What makes you ask that?’ he queried.
‘A certain similarity of presentation,’ said Rabbi Zindelman. ‘I was privileged to see a master at work recently. It just now struck me that his style very much resembled your brocha at the Klevansky wedding. The lifting of the hands just so, the closing of the eyes.’ Rabbi Zindelman paused. ‘Only Dr Koekentapp was better. Very much better,’ he added.
‘He was?’ squawked Peruvnick.
‘Aha!’ Rabbi Zindelman exclaimed. ‘So you do know him?’
Peruvnick squirmed and took a hefty gulp of beer. ‘Yes,’ he admitted.
‘Thank you for a direct answer. I would appreciate another one.’
Peruvnick began sweating.
‘Dr Koekentapp’s brocha wasn’t just a blessing,’ Rabbi Zindelman continued. ‘It was an upliftment of his spirit. Of all our spirits.’
Peruvnick was astounded. ‘It was?’
‘Oh yes. Indeed it was. That is what makes it so astonishing.’
‘What does?’
‘The fact that Dr Koekentapp isn’t Jewish.’
Peruvnick opted for silence.
‘He isn’t, is he?’ Rabbi Zindelman insisted.
‘I don’t think so.’
‘You don’t think so? Is he or is he not Jewish?’
‘No.’
‘Thank you. So now we come to the important question. How did he manage it?’
‘I taught him the words,’ Peruvnick admitted shamefacedly.
‘That much I surmised. But just why did you teach him to make a brocha?’
‘He wanted to know what a brocha was. He had been asked to make one.’
‘Did you explain to him the seriousness of the blessing? That he would be fooling his hosts and abusing their hospitality?’ Rabbi Zindelman’s voice hardened. ‘That he would be mocking the Lord?’
Peruvnick considered this. ‘No,’ he said miserably.
‘So. We now have to explain why a non-Jewish Hebrew student of Mr Peruvnick was touched by the finger of God while singing a brocha. Can you explain that, Mr Peruvnick? In your capacity as a part-time Hebrew teacher, can you explain to a simple rabbi why such a thing should happen?’
Peruvnick sat huddled abjectly in his chair. ‘No,’ he said.
‘I thought not. Thank you for your time, Mr Peruvnick. Goodbye.’
Rabbi Zindelman grabbed his hat and coat and hurried to his car. He had something important to do.
When Elizabeth laddered her stockings and skinned her knuckles while trying to replace a punctured tyre with an equally flat spare, she just knew she was in for a Bowel Monday. Spending the next hour waiting for the assistance of the AA technician, delayed because he too had had a puncture en route, wasn’t surprising; nor was finding the lift out of order at Nedbank Gardens; nor the fact that the rooms’ new kettle was broken.
‘HE IS NOT IN YET!’ she screamed.
‘I know he’s not in bed,’ yelled Mr Mendel. ‘It’s eleven o’clock!’
‘He is not in the ROOMS YET,’ Elizabeth bellowed into the telephone.
‘Your womb’s wet? I am sorry to hear that, Anne. What an odd complaint!’
‘I’m not Anne, I’m Elizabeth!’
‘I know you are busy, Anne.’
When Dr Koekentapp entered, Elizabeth was holding her throat in a gargling half-strangle. The patients in the waiting room had their heads hidden behind their magazines and Anne, cruelly revelling in Elizabeth’s discomfiture, was crouched out of sight having hysterics in the filing room.
‘Is that Mr Mendel on the line?’ Dr Koekentapp asked. He had seen the scenario before. Elizabeth scowled and passed him the extension telephone.
‘It’s Bowel Monday,’ she said, ‘and things come in runs on Bowel Mondays.’
Dr Koekentapp pitched his voice as deeply as he could. Deaf people are usually more sensitive to low frequencies. Acutely aware of the imminent high volume of Mr Mendel’s voice, he held the receiver a few inches from his ear. ‘Hello,’ he rumbled.
‘Oh, doctor,’ roared Mr Mendel, ‘I’m so pleased you have the time to speak to me. It’s my bowels. I just can’t get a decent cleanout anymore. I am passing boulders.’
His voice boomed clearly from the earpiece. The tents of Cosmopolitan, Fair Lady and National Geographic hiding the waiting patients began to quiver, adding a papery rustling to muffled grunts and suppressed squeaks. Loath publicly to continue a conversation that could take any weird turn, Dr Koekentapp said, ‘Elizabeth, put this call through to my room.’
‘Yes, I know – it’s wet,’ shouted Mr Mendel. ‘Poor girl.’
Dr Koekentapp made a dive for the sanctuary of his consulting room and closed the door. The thin plywood panels gave negligible soundproofing, but at least he was alone.
‘I have been trying to speak to you all morning,’ boomed Mr Mendel.
‘I’m sorry, I was at a funeral of a patient who departed,’ Dr Koekentapp answered sombrely.
‘You are right, I am passing lots of wind,’ he roared.
Dr Koekentapp could hear weak gasping behind the closed door. ‘I will arrange for someone to come and give you a bowel washout,’ he yelled.
‘Of course I feel washed out; so would you if you had passed a watermelon.’
‘A BOWEL WASHOUT!’
‘I’m not shouting, I am very uncomfortable.’
‘AN ENEMA, A WASHOUT, A COLONIC LAVAGE!’ Dr Koekentapp bawled.
Unrestrained shrieks emanated from the waiting room as the magazine curtain tore.
‘That’s a good idea,’ said Mr Mendel, ‘could you arrange for someone to do that?’
‘YES!’ Dr Koekentapp screamed.
‘Thank you, doctor. Please wish Anne better.’
As Dr Koekentapp put down his telephone Mrs Levy lifted hers. She dialled Mrs Finkelstein’s number and waited for her to answer.
‘Hello, Naomi. It’s Dolly speaking. How are you?’
‘Fine for the critic wife of a nut-eater. How are you?’
‘Wonderful, thank you. So what do you think of Dr Koekentapp now?’
‘I think he is too good to be true. I think he wants to get into bed with your Sylvia.’
Mrs Finkelstein heard Mrs Levy spit three times.
‘That’s very interesting, Naomi,’ said Mrs Levy, wiping her mouth. ‘Would you like a chance to prove it?’
‘A chance to prove it? What are you talking about?’
‘I would like you to do me a favour.’
Mrs Finkelstein smiled. In her book, receiving a favour meant incurring a debt.
‘Why of course, Dolly. Anything for my loving sister-in-law. Just name it.’
‘I want you to consult with Dr Koekentapp,’ replied Mrs Levy.
Mrs Finkelstein was taken aback. ‘Me? What for? I’m not sick.’
‘You don’t have to be sick to have a check-up.’
‘But why should I have a check-up?’
‘To be able to ask Dr Koekentapp a few questions.’
Mrs Finkelstein thought about this. ‘So why don’t you have a check-up and ask a few questions?’ she replied.
Mrs Levy sighed heavily. ‘It would be too obvious. I don’t want it to look as if I am interfering in his business.’
‘But you are, aren’t you?’
‘Of course – what are mothers for?’
For the first time in years Mrs Levy and Mrs Finkelstein laughed in total accord.
‘I’ll do it!’ declared Mrs Finkelstein. ‘But I’ll take my maid to see him. She’s been crying, moping and spending half her time in her room lately. I can’t get her to do anything. And while I’m at his rooms perhaps I could do a little digging for things like the good doctor’s background. Is that what you had in mind?’
Mrs Levy rubbed her hands together in glee. ‘We understand each other. Bless you, Naomi,’ she said.
‘Thank you, Dolly. After all, what’s a family for? And who knows when I will need your help with a little problem?’
It was no secret that Elizabeth detested Peruvnick, so when he entered the waiting room on Bowel Monday she nodded understandingly to herself.
‘You don’t have an appointment,’ she muttered, glancing at her booking list, then glaring at him.
Peruvnick grinned weakly. ‘I don’t need one. I just came to settle my account.’
Elizabeth brightened and reached for her Bad Debt file. Dr Koekentapp entered the waiting room.
‘Your account?’ he queried. He turned to Elizabeth. ‘Don’t worry, Elizabeth, I’ll handle this.’ Ignoring her ‘but, but . . .’ he gestured that Peruvnick should follow him, made for his consulting room and closed the door behind them. He turned to face Peruvnick. ‘Exactly what account have you come to settle?’ asked Dr Koekentapp icily. ‘I understood we were square. I am getting sick and tired of your welshing. I have written off what you owed me. What more do you want?’ His fists balled as he glowered at Peruvnick. ‘You surely don’t believe I owe you anything?’
Peruvnick slumped into a chair. His face reflected his utter misery.
Dr Koekentapp was unmoved. ‘So Peruvnick, what do you want of me now?’
‘I’m telling you I just came to pay what I really owe you,’ pleaded Peruvnick. ‘I can’t accept our deal. I feel that I still owe you money and I want to settle my debt.’
Dr Koekentapp bent forward towards Peruvnick. Their noses almost touched.
‘You? Peruvnick? You feel obligated to me? You actually want to pay me? There has got to be a catch. Speak!’
Peruvnick capitulated. ‘It’s Rabbi Zindelman,’ he said. ‘He phoned me today. He knows everything. He knows you aren’t Jewish and he knows I put you up to making a brocha.’
‘You put me up to it? But you said it was a great honour!’
‘I saw it as an easy way to settle what I owe you.’
‘Peruvnick, exactly what have you done to me?’
‘I’m afraid I’ve rather dropped you in the shit,’ Peruvnick replied. ‘I think the Levys may be a bit upset with you when they hear.’
Dr Koekentapp was appalled. He grabbed Peruvnick by the collar and shook him violently.
‘Please don’t hit me!’ Peruvnick shrieked.
Dr Koekentapp hauled Peruvnick up out of his chair. ‘You swine,’ Dr Koekentapp hissed, ‘you absolute bloody swine.’
Frogmarching Peruvnick across the room, Dr Koekentapp yanked open the door.
‘Pay Elizabeth, then get out,’ he barked, thrusting Peruvnick down the corridor, ‘and never come back! Ever!’
He turned and stared unseeingly out of the window. How could he explain to Sylvia and her family? There was no point in getting Peruvnick to offer an apology; they would never believe him. Dr Koekentapp pressed his intercom button. ‘Elizabeth. Make me an appointment to see Rabbi Zindelman as soon as possible. Get his number from Peruvnick before you throw him out.’ He paused for a second. ‘Preferably down the stairs,’ he added.
A little later Dr Koekentapp sat listening to Mrs Finkelstein.
‘I can’t tell you how impressed I was on Friday night,’ Mrs Finkelstein enthused. ‘You were wonderful. I’ve been telling all my friends about it. They all want to meet you.’
Dr Koekentapp squirmed miserably.
‘You are going to get a lot of new patients you know,’ Mrs Finkelstein continued. ‘Religious people, like me,’ she said coyly.
Dr Koekentapp showed her his teeth. He was incapable of smiling.
‘Now about today – it’s my maid,’ Mrs Finkelstein said. ‘She’s sitting in your waiting room and she’s been crying and carrying on for days, but I just can’t make out what’s wrong with her.’ She looked around to ensure that they were alone, then whispered, ‘I know everyone thinks I’m a very kind and generous person, but I promise you it’s not easy looking after people with different cultures. She isn’t Jewish like we are, you know. It’s Sheldon’s bar mitzvah next week and I can’t do a thing without her because we are strictly kosher at home. I am absolutely finished. I just can’t anymore. I thought I’d speak to you before you saw her. Will you charge her consultation to my name on my account so I can claim from the medical aid?’
Dr Koekentapp frowned as he gazed at Mrs Finkelstein. He wasn’t sure what being ‘absolutely finished’ had to do with defrauding a medical aid company and wondered why Mrs Finkelstein believed her maid to be essential to a kosher home. He sighed. ‘I’ll see her with pleasure, Mrs Finkelstein, but I can’t bill her in your name. It would be both unethical and criminal.’ He almost bit his tongue. Look who’s talking, he thought.
‘Ethics-shmethics, criminal-shmiminal,’ retorted Mrs Finkelstein. ‘I pay good money to the medical aid company every month. Why shouldn’t I be able to claim? Anyway, you could trust me not to tell anyone.’
Dr Koekentapp shuddered at the thought of entering into clandestine fraud with the voluble Mrs Finkelstein and then depending on her silence for his future career. He had enough problems as it was. He could already hear her at one of her tea parties: ‘Your maid’s been ill for a week? So why didn’t you say so before? Take her to see my doctor, the brocha-singing goy. He charges your domestics to your medical aid, but you must promise not to tell anyone.’
‘No way, Mrs Finkelstein!’ he almost shouted.
‘Don’t get so excited,’ she said. ‘Your receptionist also seems very excitable,’ she added. ‘I must say, she wasn’t very nice to that man with the sore neck who was paying her.’
‘Elizabeth had a personal problem with him,’ Dr Koekentapp replied.
‘Shiksehs,’ Mrs Finkelstein sniffed, bobbing her head from side to side, ‘what can you expect? So your father was a British soldier?’ she asked, getting to the point of the visit.
‘Yes,’ replied Dr Koekentapp, ‘but he’s in business now.’
‘Business? That’s nice,’ said Mrs Finkelstein. ‘What kind of business, may I ask?’
‘Industrial air conditioning,’ Dr Koekentapp answered.
‘I see,’ said Mrs Finkelstein, who couldn’t differentiate between an extractor fan and an interplanetary space probe. ‘Tell me, is he a religious Jew?’
Dr Koekentapp stared at her in horror. The consequences of Peruvnick’s deceit were already facing him. ‘No,’ he muttered.
‘But he does go to a synagogue?’
‘No, I can’t say he ever does.’
‘Never, ever?’
‘No.’
‘Oh!’ Mrs Finkelstein paused. ‘War does that to some people, you know,’ she continued, vaguely waving an arm about to symbolise military-induced spiritual metamorphosis. ‘They sort of . . . change.’
‘I suppose so,’ retorted Dr Koekentapp, bleakly trying to imagine his father wearing a yarmulke.
‘I was so sorry to hear about your mother,’ Mrs Finkelstein continued. ‘It’s so sad when a young woman passes away in childbirth. Do you have any brothers?’
‘No,’ he replied, ‘nor any sisters.’
‘Shame.’ Mrs Finkelstein clucked her tongue sadly. ‘It’s so hard to be an only child. Forgive me for asking, but what was your mother’s maiden name?’
Dr Koekentapp felt trapped. ‘Gilchrist,’ he replied through clenched teeth, ‘her name was Mary Catherine Gilchrist.’
Mrs Finkelstein nodded mournfully but her eyes were glowing. Have I got news for you, Dolly, she thought. Mary Catherine Gilchrist! ‘I’ll call my maid now,’ she said.
Martha entered the consulting room slowly, hands clasped demurely in front of her and eyes fixed on the carpet.
‘You don’t need me now. I’ll wait outside and talk to your receptionist,’ Mrs Finkelstein said brightly. Asked the right questions, even the shikseh might know something important, she thought.
Dr Koekentapp took in the neatly pleated scarf binding Martha’s hair and her maturely rotund figure filling the freshly pressed maid’s uniform.
‘Please sit down,’ he said.
She did so, fingers still entwined and her gaze fixed on her shoes. Dr Koekentapp rubbed his jaw and studied her for a moment. Her cheeks bore the tracks of recent tears and her downcast lids were swollen. She looked up and gazed sorrowfully at him through reddened and anguished eyes, then covered her face with her hands.
‘What’s been troubling you, Martha? Are you in pain?’ he asked.
She looked up again, tears streaming from her eyes. ‘It’s my arse,’ she replied.
Dr Koekentapp weakly considered how accurately Elizabeth had forecast Bowel Monday. ‘I see,’ he said. ‘How long has it been troubling you?’
‘Three days.’
‘Have you had any diarrhoea, constipation, or any bleeding?’
‘No, but my arse is running.’
‘I see,’ he said sagely, in his mind running through the possible causes of a watery stool. ‘Have you had any cramps, any vomiting or biliousness?’
‘No,’ she retorted, ‘but my arse is very itchy.’
‘Hmm, have you lost any weight?’
‘No.’
Probably an anal fissure or a fungal skin infection, Dr Koekentapp thought, eliminating preliminary differential diagnoses in his head. ‘Martha, I want you to go into the examination room,’ he said, indicating with his hand, ‘and get undressed.’
She gave him a somewhat perplexed look, wiped away the tears, rose and made for the room. Dr Koekentapp closed the sliding door behind her and asked Anne to fetch a proctoscope from the steriliser in the sluice room. When he entered the examination room, Martha was lying on the couch and holding the tightly stretched change gown closed over her ample belly. Tears poured from her reddened eyes.
She must be in severe pain, Dr Koekentapp thought. This is much more than an itch. He parted the edges of the gown from her belly. Rolling folds of fat covered her abdomen. He began palpating, pressing deeply to discern an enlarged spleen, a swollen liver or an abdominal tumour.
‘Well, so far so good,’ he said reassuringly when everything felt normal. ‘I’d like to test your urine now.’
Martha looked blankly at him through inflamed eyes.
‘Your urine,’ he repeated, ‘you know, a sample of urine, your wee wee, number one.’
Martha shook her head uncomprehendingly. ‘It’s my arse,’ she said.
‘I know, but I want you to make a little peepee,’ Dr Koekentapp repeated. He proffered her an empty conical glass. Receiving no response, he gritted his teeth. ‘Piss in this,’ he commanded.
She took the glass from him and, swinging her legs over the edge of the bed, stood up.
Dr Koekentapp left her to produce her specimen. When he returned, wearing a rubber glove on his right hand, the sample was discreetly placed under the bed and Martha was on the examination couch. Tears continued to pour from her eyes.
‘Don’t be so frightened, Martha,’ he said while testing her urine, ‘you will soon be better. I am going to examine your bottom now.’
‘Hau, doctor!’ Martha exclaimed. Her expression was one of sheer incredulity.
Dr Koekentapp firmly pulled the glove onto his hand. ‘Roll onto your left side, Martha,’ he instructed, flexing his fingers. ‘Pull down your panties and lift your knees towards your chest.’
Muttering bitterly to herself in rapid Zulu, Martha tugged down her underwear and turned, exposing a broad expanse of dimpled buttocks.
The doctor reached for the proctoscope and showed it to Martha. ‘This tool is used to examine the inside of your rectum,’ he explained.
Martha stared in terror at the gleaming phallus-shaped stainless steel instrument.
‘Try and relax, Martha,’ Dr Koekentapp said. ‘Don’t tighten your muscles – pretend that your tummy wants to work and press down as I insert it.’
She took a hissing breath as Dr Koekentapp introduced the cold domed end of the proctoscope into her anus.
‘Just breathe normally now,’ he said, pushing in the tube to its full length.
‘Yo, yo, yo!’ yowled Martha.
Dr Koekentapp withdrew the plunger. Martha began to ululate.
‘U-lu-lu-lu-lu!’
‘Don’t worry,’ Dr Koekentapp reassured her while shining a torch into her passage, ‘this examination distresses lots of people.’
‘It’s my arse, doctor, my arse!’ shrieked Martha.
‘But your bottom looks absolutely normal, Martha,’ Dr Koekentapp declared.
‘U-lu-lu-lu-lu,’ Martha yelled as he slowly withdrew the proctoscope.
Dr Koekentapp discarded his glove and began washing his hands, his forehead furrowed with puzzlement. ‘Let’s start again, Martha. When did the problem with your bottom begin?’
Martha stared at him in desperation. She frantically pointed with her index fingers at both eyes.
‘It’s not my bottom. It’s my eyes!’
While Martha dressed, muttering wildly in Zulu and feeling particularly insecure about the safety of any medication this crazy white doctor might prescribe, Mrs Finkelstein watched disapprovingly as Dr Koekentapp sat at his desk and wrote a prescription for eye drops. She clicked her tongue against her teeth as he wrote Martha’s name on the script.
‘Couldn’t you at least make out the script in my name?’ she wheedled.
Still thoroughly shaken by the enormity of his approach to Martha’s conjunctivitis, Dr Koekentapp gratefully seized on a valid reason to reassume professional dignity. He glared at her.
‘No. That would be fraud.’
Mrs Finkelstein tried another tack. ‘Doctor, I recommended two of my closest friends to your practice today. Doesn’t that count for anything? You know, give a little, take a little?’
Dr Koekentapp blandly looked at her. ‘It counts for a great deal, Mrs Finkelstein. Thank you for your referral. I appreciate your trust.’
‘So?’
‘So, what?’
‘So, what about putting my name on the script and charging Martha’s examination to my medical aid?’
‘I told you, Mrs Finkelstein, I can’t.’
Her lips tightened angrily. ‘I see,’ she said. Mrs Finkelstein initiated her last-ditch approach. It had never failed her in a discount crisis. She made eye contact with Dr Koekentapp, then allowed a tear to trickle down her cheek. Dr Koekentapp easily resisted by remembering that Peruvnick had landed him in the shit. Martha appeared, still grumbling loudly to herself. Mrs Finkelstein looked heatedly at Dr Koekentapp. ‘What is she so uptight about?’ she demanded.
Martha glared at her and Mrs Finkelstein shook her head irately.
‘Maids! I’ll never understand what gets into them sometimes.’
‘What happened there?’ Anne asked a few minutes later. ‘First Mrs Finkelstein tried pumping Elizabeth for your most personal details and then she just stormed out without even saying goodbye!’
‘Nothing much,’ replied Dr Koekentapp evasively. ‘She wanted me to do a little fiddle.’
‘With her?’ Anne was incredulous.
‘No, no, with her maid.’
‘With her maid!’ cried Anne. ‘Why, the dirty old pervert!’
Just before twelve Elizabeth tentatively approached Dr Koekentapp. ‘Don’t forget you are going out to lunch. I’ve also made your appointment with Rabbi Zindelman. It’s for this evening at seven at his synagogue. Here is the address.’ She placed the written details on Dr Koekentapp’s desk.
Dr Koekentapp shook his head. ‘You are very efficient, Elizabeth. You most definitely are a very special breed.’
Elizabeth smiled. ‘It’s nice of you to say so. As a matter of fact, that’s what Rabbi Zindelman said about you. Or words to that effect.’
Dr Koekentapp shook his head again. ‘He did?’
‘Yes. He seems very nice and is looking forward to seeing you again. I told him that I got his number from Peruvnick, who had come in to pay his account. Then he said something strange. He said that black eagles catch weasels after all.’
‘Eagles?’ Dr Koekentapp mumbled. He felt like a defeathered vulture.
‘Yes. That’s exactly what he said.’
At one, Dr Koekentapp entered Fidelio’s restaurant. Fidelio was having a heated argument with a pot-bellied businessman whose peroxided date wanted a burger plus all the trimmings. Dr Koekentapp stood and blinked as he waited for his eyes to adjust to the darkened interior of the restaurant. Fidelio abandoned his indignant pleading that his restaurant did not offer American fast foods and, smiling hugely, hurried to greet Dr Koekentapp.
‘Dottore, your beautiful lady is here already,’ Fidelio whispered. He pursed his lips and closed his eyes in a gesture of ecstasy. His voice rose as he announced, ‘I have given you my very best table. A private cubicle!’ He bowed and motioned that Dr Koekentapp should follow him. ‘I will serve you personally. I am your humble servant. Nothing is too much for such glowing beauty!’ He pranced before Dr Koekentapp to the single private cubicle at the far end of the room.
‘I didn’t know you had to be a bloody poofter to get good service here,’ commented the pot belly.
‘Oh shaddup,’ retorted his date, ‘if you looked like him maybe I’d get my burger.’
Fidelio waved Dr Koekentapp to his seat. ‘Your princess awaits you,’ he announced.
In the darkness of the cubicle Sylvia regarded Dr Koekentapp with unconcealed delight. He sat down and wordlessly drew her into his arms. They kissed, a warm caress of each other’s lips that became electric as their tongues touched. Neither heard Fidelio draw the curtain closed behind him as he departed with a happy sigh.
‘I’ve missed you,’ Sylvia whispered as they drew apart.
‘I’m glad,’ Dr Koekentapp replied. ‘I’ve missed you too.’
Her eyes were misty and her face flushed with pleasure. Dr Koekentapp thought he had never seen anyone so beautiful. He kissed her softly on the tip of her nose and, as her eyes closed, he kissed them too, a butterfly touch on each of her eyelids.
Sylvia smiled and reluctantly moved away.
‘Do you greet all your dates this way?’ she asked.
‘Oh, yes. It works like a charm, don’t you think?’
Sylvia reached out a hand and gently slapped his cheek. ‘I think I believe you, you beast.’
Dr Koekentapp shook his head in mock amazement. ‘Here I am kissing you and I don’t even know what you do for a living,’ he said.
‘You never asked,’ Sylvia replied.
Dr Koekentapp took her hand and regarded her intently. ‘Miss Levy, what is it that you do to earn your daily bread?’
‘I’m a life assurance underwriter at Quality Life.’
‘Really? That’s unusual. I’ve never met one before.’
Sylvia smiled gently. ‘There’s a lot about me that you haven’t met before.’
Dr Koekentapp grinned and kissed her hand. His eyes remained fixed on hers. ‘I’m looking forward to meeting every single one of those lots.’
Sylvia’s smile widened. ‘We’ll see. I’m on leave for a month. That gives us plenty of time for introductions. Now tell me about your day. I want to know more about you.’
A kaleidoscopic conglomeration of Mr Mendel battling with volcanic constipation on Bowel Monday, while Elizabeth loudly denied that her womb was wet before contending with Peruvnick, who wanted to pay his account because he had dropped Dr Koekentapp in the shit, before Mrs Finkelstein pried into his life and pleaded with him to defraud her medical aid company for a kosher maid, who wept with pink eye as he earnestly gazed through a proctoscope into her rectum, flashed though Dr Koekentapp’s mind.
‘You wouldn’t believe it,’ he said.
‘Try me,’ Sylvia replied confidently.
A few minutes later she was helplessly shaking with laughter.
‘Her eyes! I don’t believe it!’ she cried.
‘I told you so,’ Dr Koekentapp replied. He carefully looked at Sylvia. ‘I haven’t told you whose maid she was.’
‘Whose?’ Sylvia asked curiously.
‘Your aunt’s.’
‘Naomi’s?’
‘That’s right. Mrs Finkelstein’s. She really wanted to know about my background. That’s why she brought her maid.’
‘The prying old bag!’
Dr Koekentapp sighed. ‘Look, Sylvia, there is something I have to tell you.’
Sylvia looked anxiously at him. His expression was utterly doleful.
‘You’re not married?’ she asked quickly.
‘No, no.’
‘Divorced? Engaged? You’ve got children?’
Sylvia rapped out possibilities while Dr Koekentapp shook his head.
‘You aren’t ill I hope?’
‘No.’
Sylvia frantically grabbed Dr Koekentapp’s arm. ‘So what then? Tell me!’
‘I’m not Jewish.’
At that precise moment, Mrs Levy was in her kitchen holding her cheek and staring in horror at Mrs Finkelstein. Behind her, the onion rings frying on the stove went unnoticed as they began to shrivel and blacken.
‘Mary Catherine Gilchrist?’
‘Yes,’ replied Mrs Finkelstein, breaking off a piece of beigel and dipping it into the remains of Levy’s chopped liver.
‘Gilchrist? He said that? You’re sure?’
‘I’m sure. As sure as I’m eating this beigel.’
‘I think it may be a little stale,’ Mrs Levy commented. ‘Should I warm it in the microwave?’ She didn’t expect an answer. She thought she might be going into shock. Bitterness cloyed in her throat as she realised she couldn’t even call her doctor for advice or to order a tranquilliser. The scheming bastard was out having lunch.
‘He’s with Sylvia!’ Mrs Levy shrieked.
Mrs Finkelstein nearly choked as an unchewed piece of beigel entered her windpipe. She coughed violently and clawed her dentures out of her mouth. Her cheeks collapsed into a sunken pouch around wrinkled lips. ‘What?’ she spluttered. ‘What are you talking about?’
‘I’m talking about Sylvia. She is having lunch with him.’ Mrs Levy’s control broke completely. ‘He is going to contaminate her with goy diseases! They carry them under their foreskins!’
Mrs Finkelstein frenziedly used a dish cloth to clean her dentures, then thrust them back into her mouth. ‘Where are they?’
‘How should I know? I am only her mother, for Christ’s sake!’ Mrs Levy quickly touched the wooden top of her chopping board to negate the negative effect of invoking Christ. ‘They are at some filthy restaurant!’ she shrilled. ‘They are eating pig’s flesh. They are sucking meat boiled in milk! My Sylvia is finished! I am going to report him to the medical council! I’ll have him struck off!’
Mrs Finkelstein curled up her nose as she sniffed. ‘Your onions are burning,’ she said. ‘I’m phoning Rabbi Zindelman. He’ll know what to do.’
Sylvia stared uncomprehendingly at Dr Koekentapp.
‘I don’t understand. You made the most beautiful brocha in the world. How could you do that? Why did you do that?’
‘I didn’t want to disappoint you. Peruvnick told me it would be a great honour. He taught me.’
Sylvia shook her head in bewilderment. ‘Who’s Peruvnick?’
‘A filthy cheating swine. An ex-patient of mine. I asked him for help after you called.’
‘But why didn’t you tell me?’ Sylvia pleaded.
‘I thought I’d lose you before I even got a chance to know you.’
‘So it was all a show? You put on a practised religious performance just to impress me? That’s despicable!’
Dr Koekentapp grabbed Sylvia’s hand. ‘No!’ he insisted. ‘Something moved me. I have never experienced anything like it in my life!’
Sylvia savagely pulled her hand free. ‘You expect me to believe you? How do I know this isn’t just another of your talented performances? You knew you had to tell me. You knew Naomi had smelt a rat. She had. You!’
Dr Koekentapp sighed. ‘Come out with me tonight. I have an appointment at seven to try and sort this out.’
‘Go out with you!’ Sylvia faced him with utter contempt. ‘Where could you take me that would even remotely interest me?’ She stood up abruptly and, without a backward glance, walked rapidly from the cubicle. Her stride faltered for just a moment as she heard his answer.
‘To Rabbi Zindelman.’
‘Sylvia! You’re alive!’ screamed Mrs Levy when Sylvia got home. ‘Are you alright? Did he try and touch you? Did he hurt you?’ She grabbed Sylvia by the shoulders and looked anxiously into her eyes. ‘He didn’t God forbid . . .?’
‘No, Mom,’ Sylvia muttered, ‘he didn’t do anything. He just told me he wasn’t Jewish.’
Mrs Levy stared at her daughter. ‘He told you? He actually told you that?’
Sylvia looked at the pink roses Dr Koekentapp had brought. Arranged in a cut-glass vase they had come into full and fragrant bloom. She suddenly felt very cold.
‘Yes,’ she said and began to cry.
Mrs Levy embraced her. ‘Now, now,’ Mrs Levy murmured. Not really knowing what else to say, she settled for, ‘Everything happens for the best.’
Levy stood glaring irresolutely as the women in his life hugged each other. He decided he should make his presence felt in this family crisis.
‘I ought to kick the bugger in the balls,’ he said.
‘Don’t swear in front of the child, Aaron,’ Mrs Levy reflexively chided him as she led Sylvia to the lounge and sat her down.
Satisfied that her daughter had in fact escaped sexual molestation and dire prenuptial contamination, Mrs Levy turned her mind to less harrowing things.
‘I hope he didn’t force you to eat pig?’ she asked.
Despite herself, Sylvia smiled. ‘No, he didn’t. As a matter of fact, I walked out before we had a chance to eat or drink anything.’
Sylvia suddenly became indignant. ‘The man is such a liar! Do you know what else he told me? He told me he had an appointment with Rabbi Zindelman tonight. Can you believe that?’
‘A liar remains a liar,’ Mrs Levy said sagely. ‘Your aunt Naomi is on the telephone at this very minute. She has been trying to speak to Rabbi Zindelman for the past hour. We were so worried about you. She should be back any minute now.’
She had hardly finished speaking when Mrs Finkelstein entered, shaking her head bemusedly. Her eyes widened at the sight of Sylvia sitting safely next to her mother.
‘I eventually got hold of him,’ she said to Mrs Levy. ‘Believe me when I tell you it’s easier to speak to the Queen of England! You won’t believe it, but Dr Koekentapp is meeting Rabbi Zindelman tonight.’ She grunted in dissatisfaction. ‘He wouldn’t give me any details.’
Sylvia and her mother looked at one another in astonishment.
‘That settles it! I must know what’s going on! I will not be made a fool of. He asked me to go and I’m going!’ announced Sylvia.
Mrs Levy nostalgically gazed at the roses. Their colour really was so exact. ‘We both are,’ she decided firmly.