The Golem and the Jinni

  “A few hundred years,” he said. “Unless some mishap ends me, I’ll live another five or six hundred.”

  “Then you’re also young for your kind.”

  “Not as young as some.”

  She frowned. “You hold my age against me?”

  “No, it explains much. Your timidity, for instance.”

  At that, she bristled. “I make no apologies for being cautious. I have to be. As do you.”

  “But there’s caution, and then there is overcaution. Look at us. Walking at night in a park, far from home. And yet the moon doesn’t fall from the heavens, and the ground refuses to tremble.”

  “Just because nothing has happened doesn’t mean that nothing will happen.”

  He smiled. “True. Perhaps I’ll be surprised. And then you can declare that you were right all along.”

  “It would be small comfort.”

  “Are you always this humorless?”

  “Yes. Are you always this exasperating?”

  He chuckled. “You really should meet Arbeely. You two would get along wonderfully.”

  She did smile at that. “You keep mentioning him. Are you very close?”

  She’d expected him to launch into an enthusiastic description of his friend; but he only said, “The man means well. And he’s helped me, certainly.”

  “And yet?” she prompted.

  The Jinni sighed. “I’m less grateful to him than I should be. He’s a good and generous man, but I’m not accustomed to relying on someone else. It makes me feel weak.”

  “How is relying on others a weakness?”

  “How can it be anything else? If for some reason Arbeely died tomorrow, I’d be forced to find another occupation. The event would be outside my control, yet I’d be at its mercy. Is that not weakness?”

  “I suppose. But then, going by your standard, everyone is weak. So why call it a weakness, instead of just the way things are?”

  “Because I was above this once!” he said with sudden vehemence. “I depended on no one! I went where I would and followed my desires. I needed no money, no employer, no neighbors. None of this interminable good morning and how are you, whether one feels like it or not.”

  “But weren’t you ever lonely?”

  “Oh, sometimes. But then I’d seek out my own kind, and enjoy their company for a while. And then we’d part ways again, as we saw fit.”

  She tried to imagine it: a life without occupation or neighbors, without the bakery and the Radzins and Anna. With no familiar faces, no set pattern to her days. It felt terrifying. She said, “I don’t think golems are made for such independence.”

  “You only say that because you’ve lived no other way.”

  She shook her head. “You misunderstand me. Each golem is built to serve a master. When I woke, I was already bound to mine. To his will. I heard his every thought, and I obeyed with no hesitation.”

  “That’s terrible,” the Jinni said.

  “To you, perhaps. To me it felt like the way things were meant to be. And when he died—when that connection left me—I no longer had a clear purpose. Now I’m bound to everyone, if only a little. I have to fight against it, I can’t be solving everyone’s wishes. But sometimes, at the bakery where I work, I’ll give someone a loaf of bread—and it answers a need. For a moment, that person is my master. And in that moment, I’m content. If I were as independent as you wish you were, I’d feel I had no purpose at all.”

  He frowned. “Were you so happy, to be ruled by another?”

  “Happy is not the word,” she said. “It felt right.”

  “All right, then let me ask you this. If by some chance or magic you could have your master back again, would you wish it?”

  It was an obvious question, but one that she had never quite asked herself. She’d barely known Rotfeld, even to know what sort of a man he was. But then, couldn’t she guess? What sort of man would take a golem for a wife, the way a delivery man might purchase a new cart?

  But oh, to be returned to that certainty! The memory of it rose up, sharp and beguiling. And she wouldn’t feel as though she was being used. One choice, one decision—and then, nothing.

  “I don’t know,” she said at last. “Maybe I would. Though in a way, I think it would be like dying. But perhaps it would be for the best. I make so many mistakes, on my own.”

  There was a noise from the Jinni, something not quite a laugh. His mouth was a hard line; he stared up beyond the trees, as though he couldn’t bear to look at her.

  “I said something to offend you,” she said.

  “Don’t do that,” he snapped. “Don’t look into me.”

  “I didn’t need to,” she retorted. An unaccustomed defiance was rising in her. She’d given him an honest answer, and apparently it had repelled him. Well, so be it. If he didn’t want her company, she could find her own way home. She was no child, whatever he thought.

  She’d half decided to turn back toward Broadway; but then he said, “Do you remember what I told you before? That I was captured, but have no memory of it?”

  “Yes, of course I remember.”

  “I have no idea,” he said, “how long I was that man’s servant. His slave. I don’t know what he made me do. I might have done terrible things. Perhaps I killed for him. I might have killed my own kind.” There was a tight edge in his voice, painful to hear. “But even worse would be if I did it all gladly. If he robbed me of my will, and turned me against myself. Given a choice, I’d sooner extinguish myself in the ocean.”

  “But if all those terrible things did happen, then it was the wizard’s fault, not yours,” she said.

  Again, that not-quite laugh. “Do you have colleagues at this bakery where you work?”

  “Of course,” she said. “Moe and Thea Radzin, and Anna Blumberg.”

  He said, “Imagine that your precious master returns to you, and you give yourself to him, as you say you perhaps would. Because you make so many mistakes. And he says, ‘Please, my dear golem, kill those good people at the bakery, the Radzins and Anna Blumberg. Rip them limb from limb.”

  “But why—”

  “Oh, for whatever reason! They insult him, or make threats against him, or he simply develops a whim. Imagine it. And then tell me what comfort it gives to think it wasn’t your own fault.”

  This was a possibility she’d never considered. And now she couldn’t help but picture it: grabbing Moe Radzin by the wrist and pulling until his arm came free. She had the strength. She could do it. And all the while, that peace and certainty.

  No, she thought—but now, having started down this path, her mind refused to stop. What if Rotfeld had made it safely to America with her, and the Rabbi had noticed them on the street one day? In her mind, the Rabbi confronted Rotfeld—and then she was dragging the Rabbi into an alley, and choking the life from him.

  It made her want to cry out. She put the heels of her hands to her eyes, to push the images away.

  “Now do you understand?” the Jinni asked.

  “Leave me alone!”

  It rang across the square, echoing from the stone facades. Startled, the Jinni backed away, hands raised—to placate her, or to ward off an attack.

  Silence descended again. She stretched her fingers wide, trying to calm herself. The things she’d pictured were imaginary. She hadn’t hurt the Radzins or Anna. There was no reason why she would. Rotfeld was dead; his body lay at the bottom of the ocean. She would never have another master.

  “All right,” she said. “Yes. I see your point.”

  “It wasn’t my intention to upset you,” the Jinni said.

  “Wasn’t it?” she muttered.

  A pause. “If it was, then I was in the wrong.”

  “No. You were right. I hadn’t considered it like that.” She looked away, feeling guilty and uncomfortable.

  They heard the footsteps at the same time. Two policemen were jogging toward them from down the path, their wool greatcoats flapping at their boots. In the slee
ping square, with no one else about, their concern for the Golem struck her with almost physical force.

  “Evening, miss,” one of them said, touching his cap. “Is this man bothering you?”

  She shook her head. “No, he isn’t. I’m sorry, you needn’t have come.”

  “You yelled awful loud, miss.”

  “It was my fault,” the Jinni said. “I said something I shouldn’t have.”

  The policemen were looking from one of them to the other, trying to read the truth of the situation: a man and a woman, clearly not vagrants, out together at this hour, in the freezing cold . . .

  She had put them in this position. Perhaps, if she said the right thing, she could get them out of it again.

  “Dearest,” the Golem said, placing a hand on the Jinni’s arm, “we should be getting home. It is rather cold.”

  Surprise flared in the Jinni’s eyes, but he stifled it quickly. “Of course,” he said, and tucked her hand into the crook of his elbow. He smiled at the men. “I apologize, officers. My fault entirely. Good night.”

  And they turned and walked away.

  “Good night,” one of the officers called halfheartedly after them.

  Silently they walked back through the park, the air tense between them. Not until they were at Broadway did the Jinni risk looking back. “We’re alone,” he said, dropping her hand.

  “I know. They didn’t follow. They wanted to go back to their precinct-house and get warm again.”

  “That’s a strange gift you have,” he said, shaking his head. Then he smirked down at her. “Dearest?”

  “It’s what Mrs. Radzin calls her husband when she’s angry at him.”

  “I see. That was clever.”

  “It was a risk.”

  “But it worked. And still the sky hasn’t fallen.”

  So it hadn’t, she thought. No lasting harm had been done. For once, she had said the right thing at the right time.

  They walked on, retracing their path south. The thin traffic on Broadway was changing: no longer elegant broughams, but delivery wagons hitched to workaday horses, pulling the day’s goods to the heart of the city. On a corner a shoeshine boy set up his box, then huddled in on himself, blowing on his naked fingers.

  They’d just passed Union Square when the snow began to fall. At first it was only a thin sleet, but then it grew heavier, turning to clumps of flakes that blew into their faces. The Golem pulled her cloak closer about herself, and noticed that the Jinni had quickened his pace. She had to hurry to catch up. She was about to ask him what was the matter; but then she noticed that his face wasn’t wet, despite the driving snow. As she watched, the flakes landed on him and instantly disappeared. She recalled what he’d said when they were arguing: I would sooner extinguish myself in the ocean.

  “Are you all right?” she asked.

  “I’m fine,” he replied; but his distracted tone clashed with his words. And she would have sworn that the glow of his face had dimmed.

  Quietly she asked, “Are you in danger?”

  His jaw tightened, in anger or irritation; but then he relaxed, and gave her a rueful smile. “No. Not yet. Did you see it, or did you guess?”

  “Both, I think.”

  “From now on I’ll remember that you’re far too observant.”

  “The winter must be dreadful for you.”

  “I certainly haven’t enjoyed it.”

  They moved to walk under the protection of the awnings; but even so, by the time that they reached Bond Street he was looking pale indeed. The Golem couldn’t help casting worried glances in his direction.

  He muttered, “You can stop looking at me like that, I’m not about to perish.”

  “But why don’t you wear a hat, or carry an umbrella?”

  “Because I can’t stand either.”

  “Are all your kind so stubborn?”

  At that he smiled. “Most of us, yes.”

  Near Hester they stopped beneath the awning of an Italian grocer’s; in the window hung enormous red sausages suspended by twine, next to twisted strings of garlic bulbs. A warm and pungent smell came from the open door. “I can go the rest of the way on my own,” she said.

  “You’re certain?”

  She nodded. They were only a few blocks from the Bowery, and beyond it her own neighborhood. “I’ll be fine,” she said.

  They stood there together, both uneasy.

  “I don’t know if we should see each other again,” she said.

  He frowned. “You’re still uncertain of my intentions?”

  “No, your tolerance. We angered each other.”

  “I can stand a little anger,” he said. “Can you?”

  It was a challenge, but also an invitation. He had angered her, and made her feel ashamed; but she’d also talked freely with someone for the first time since the Rabbi’s death. She felt something loosening inside her that had nothing to do with her body’s stiffness.

  “All right,” she said. “On one condition.”

  “Yes?”

  “If the weather looks threatening, you must wear a hat. I refuse to be responsible for your ill health.”

  His eyes rolled heavenward. “If I must,” he said, but she caught a hint of a smile. “Next week, at the same time?”

  “Yes. Now please, find somewhere dry. Good-bye.” She turned and walked away.

  “Until next week,” he called after her; but she was already around the corner, and he couldn’t see her smile.

  “I told you I would come again,” the Jinni said to the dreaming Fadwa. “Did you doubt me?”

  In her dream, they stood together on the ridge near her family’s camp, where she had first seen his palace. It was nighttime, and still warm. The ground was soft beneath her feet. She was wearing only a thin shift, but she felt no self-consciousness.

  “No,” she said. “Only—it’s been so long since I saw you last. Weeks and weeks.”

  “A long time for you, perhaps,” he said. “My kind can go years without seeing each other and think little of it.”

  “I thought perhaps you were displeased with me. Or . . .” She paused, and then burst out, “I’d convinced myself you were just a dream! I started to think I was going mad!”

  He smiled. “I’m real enough, I assure you.”

  “Yes, but how can I be certain?”

  “You’ve already seen my palace once.” He pointed down into the valley. “If you were to ride in this direction, and were lucky in your aim, you’d find a clearing swept clean of brush and rocks. That is where my palace is.”

  “Would I be able to see it again?”

  “No—it’s invisible unless I choose otherwise.”

  She sighed. “You must live in a very different way, if you think this is a reassurance.”

  At that, he laughed. Surprising, that a human girl could make him laugh! But she was still frowning, clearly unhappy. Perhaps he’d waited too long, as she said. There was still so much to learn about these brief human lives, their constant sense of urgency.

  He reached out, still not quite knowing how he did so. A blur of stars and desert—and then they were in his palace again, among the dark glass walls and embroidered cushions. This time, atop the cushions, a feast: platters of rice and lamb and yogurt, flatbreads and cheese, and pitchers of crystalline water.

  Fadwa laughed, delighted.

  “It’s for you,” he said, gesturing. “Please, eat.”

  And so she ate, and chatted, telling him of small victories, a sick lamb nursed to health, the summer that was proving relatively mild. “There’s even still water at the spring,” she said. “My father says it’s unusual for so late in the season.”

  “Your father,” the Jinni said. “Tell me more about him.”

  “He’s a good man,” she said. “He takes care of us all. My uncles look up to him, and all of my tribe respect him. We’re among the smallest of the Hadid clans, but when we gather together, others will seek out his advice before bringing important ma
tters before the sheikh. If his father had been the first son of my great-grandfather, and not the third, then my father might be the sheikh himself.”

  “Would your life have been very different, then?” He was not quite following all this talk of tribes and clans and sheikhs, but the fondness in her voice and her eyes intrigued him.

  She smiled. “If my father were sheikh, then I would not exist! He would have been promised to a different woman, from a more important clan than my mother’s.”

  “Promised?”

  “Betrothed. My father’s father and my mother’s father agreed on it, when my mother was born.” She saw his confusion, and giggled. “Do jinn not marry? Don’t you have parents?”

  “Of course we have parents,” he said. “We must come from somewhere. But betrothal, marriage—no, these things are unknown to us. We are much more free with our affections.”

  Her eyes widened as she took this in. “You mean . . . with anyone?”

  He chuckled at her astonished face. “I prefer women, but yes, you have the sense of it.”

  She colored. “And with . . . human women?”

  “None as of yet.”

  She glanced away. “A Bedouin girl who did such things would be shunned.”

  “A harsh punishment for acting on natural impulses,” he said. This, he thought, was growing ever more intriguing—not the human ideas, which were ridiculous, rigid, and unnecessary, but the push and pull of their conversation, the way he could elicit blushes from her with only the barest mention of a plain fact.

  “It’s our way,” she said. “How much harder would our lives be, if we must worry about love affairs and jealousies? It’s better this way, I think.”

  “And you,” he said. “Are you also promised? Or will you choose your own mate?”

  She hesitated; she was, he sensed, uneasy on this subject. And then—a sharp jolt, as though the ground beneath them had shuddered.

  Fadwa clutched at her cushion. “What was that?”

  It was the morning. He’d stayed too long. Someone was trying to wake her.

  Another shudder. He reached across and took up her hand, pressed it briefly to his lips. “Until next time,” he said, and let her go.