has already happened.
An illogical sentence. Certainly not the usual way of hitting on a woman.
Picking up a spark in Keisha’s eyes, Lenox becomes aware of a twinge in his lower body. Was this young black girl tempted to leave it all behind for the promise of an olive green Cherokee?
After me, the flood.
Who said that? Lenox asks.
Keisha recoils. Lost her confidence all of a sudden. Maybe she got confused and it was actually Before me, the flood.
Who said that? Lenox insists.
I don’t know. It’s an expression, isn’t it?
She looks in vain for support from the young man, who has joined them, but he is impatient, rushing her to close up the store. She ignores him and turns her dark, warm doe’s eyes back to Lenox.
Is this guy important to you, Officer?
Lenox nods his head involuntarily. His muscles tense up again. Keisha’s giggle is back too. Nervous, yet full of charm.
You and him look alike. You related?
The young man turns off the lights in the store, and the three of them feel their way out in the dark, past the blinking alarm light.
IN HIS mind Lenox sets up a matchmaking business. An old dead Jewish Israeli and an old dead Native American wade through the mist, and Lenox records their negotiations in his notepad.
The Raven is the Creator, says the dead Indian woman. He is the one who pissed out the world.
And why should he create a world? asks the dead Jewish man to get the conversation going.
Out of boredom, the dead woman answers. His wife was badgering him—she was sick of living in the void.
The Great Spirit, the one responsible for the match, follows the disputation closely from up high.
LENOX’S GRANDMOTHER always insisted that when he was a child, she told him all the ancient secrets. He remembers nothing. Murder stories were far more interesting to him than native folklore.
She lay on her deathbed in a Jewish nursing home in Riverdale, in the Bronx. A lone Indian among Jews. He got her a room there through his connections with the commissioner. If you have to die, then do it in good company. Jews die gracefully. They leave the world without protest. Whereas Israelis—judging by this missing-person case—go out kicking and screaming, hoping their departure will arouse waves of remorse.
Bullshit! There should be equal law for Israelis. Lenox is unwilling to attribute any special virtues to them, in life or in death. Were he the celestial matchmaker, he would advise the deceased couple to find some common interests. They could rattle their bones, gossip about who has been taken out of his grave, who’s coming up soon, and who’s going down. For his grandmother, a final burial is the only way to get to the eternal hunting ground. But on this point, the match is doomed. The dead Jewish man will be horrified by the desecration of graves.
Lenox’s grandmother did not give an inch even when she was fading into complete delirium. Drugged up and dying, she still would not let go. A pathetic grip. Or perhaps it was extraordinarily brave?
Right before the end, Lenox was called to the nursing home. He stood under the Star of David engraved above the front door, clutching a few tobacco leaves in his fist. If his dying grandmother could have seen him observe the ancient Indian custom, she would have been pleased. Hearing everyone around her speak Yiddish, he wished he had tried harder to find her a more suitable place. But at least he made sure she got a room with a view of the Hudson.
He walked into her room with the nurse close behind him. His grandmother’s body was emaciated. Only her hands remained fleshy and pink like a girl’s.
Simon T., my White Raven, she murmured, looking out at the river through the window.
He gave instructions for her burial and never went back. Thirty days later he received a FedEx package from the Hebrew Home for the Aged. Inside were her false teeth. But where was her pipe? He meant to send a letter demanding a thorough search, but it slipped his mind. It was just a beat-up smoking tool.
She had also owned a faded belt, which was once embroidered with colorful beads. Lenox told them to throw it out. Later, he vaguely remembered that his grandmother had called it a “wampum belt.”
White Raven, she called him before the end.
Simon T. Lenox refuses to believe in a world excreted or a Creator unable to control his sphincters.
FULLY CLOTHED, he steps into the shower and turns on the faucet at full power. The scalding flow washes away the late-summer sediments, and Lenox allows the water to untie the knots in his muscles. He drops his clothes on the wet floor, where they block the drain, and the small cubicle starts to overflow. He thinks he might have peed, but the temperature blurs the difference between the fluids.
He doesn’t hear the phone chirping in his coat pocket. Only when he steps out of the steaming shower and enfolds himself in a fragrant towel does he see the screen: New Voicemail from Unknown Number.
INSPECTOR LENOX? It’s me, Keisha. From the outdoor gear store. I remembered something. Sorry if I’m making you crazy, ’cause this might just be nothing. Even though it’s none of my business, and I don’t even know what the guy’s called, the one who bought a ten-dollar raincoat and a map of New York. But I’m telling you, Inspector Lenox, if that asshole did something bad, then he deserves to be punished, and I don’t want him to get away, ’cause we can’t always recognize the assholes when they look like good guys. I knew this dude once with a sweet baby face, and then it turned out he was into hitting women with a baseball bat. So if this guy of yours is not what he looks like, and even if I’m wrong and he’s just your long lost brother, then I just want you to know that when I said his Cherokee was olive green, he laughed. He said he couldn’t tell ’cause he’s color-blind. That’s some kind of disease, isn’t it?
A short giggle.
Beep.
WHAT A headache.
Lenox plans to take two painkillers and dive into a white slumber, free of dreams about dead people who’ll never find their shidduch. Tomorrow he’ll take the day off. That Israeli and his olive Cherokee can end up wherever they end up. He would call Keisha back now, but his battery’s dead and he’s too exhausted to recharge it. Huddled in his towel, Lenox leans on the wall and calculates the steps required to reach the nearest Jack Daniels, when his brain picks up a buzz at the door.
Why didn’t the doorman let him know someone was coming up? Maybe it’s a neighbor.
Lenox crouches, hoping to make himself vanish. This is not the time for borrowing an egg or coffee. His fridge is empty anyway. He wraps the towel, which feels less soft now, around his waist and looks through the peephole. For one mad second he expects to see his Israeli.
At first he doesn’t recognize her. She stands there erect and tense, like a school girl sent to collect donations for the Salvation Army, her auburn head bowed.
A woman at the door.
A strange woman at the door.
A Jewish woman . . .
When she reaches out and raps on the door with her knuckles, Lenox finally opens it and realizes he doesn’t know what to call her.
JACKIE. JUST Jackie.
Why are you here?
To help you.
Lenox remembers his manners, but he can’t shake her hand because of the towel. Clumsily, aware of his bare private parts under the fabric, he chatters meaninglessly.
But you wrote Jacqueline on the note.
My mother adored Jackie Kennedy.
And your middle name? Winona? It doesn’t sound Jewish.
He’s