Falser Messiah
Tim Roesch
Lost in Grantville, 24th of Av, 5394 (T minus 5 hours and 43 minutes)
“I am not the Son of God!” he screamed at the library.
At least he thought he was screaming in the direction of the library.
With eyes red with tears, Shabbethai Zebi ben Mordecai spun about, glaring at the world which was suddenly bright and out of focus, frightening and repulsive. The world he could not wait to see each morning and wept over as he closed his eyes every night was suddenly wrong.
Or, maybe, he was wrong.
Memories came; out of focus, silent, out of any order.
He remembered his mother crying on the dock in Smyrna as he left on a ship, a real ship, with his father and elder brother.
His mother had not waved at him.
He remembered how eager he was to learn everything and show his father what he had learned and how hard it was, all of a sudden, to get his father to simply look at him.
There was the trip to this magical place, Grantville. Here, he had forgotten how often his questions went unanswered, his small discoveries went unnoticed, how often his father and elder brother seemed to talk quietly to each other and occasionally looked at him as if he had done something wrong.
Here was the town of Deborah and an entire community of Jews who lived and worked amongst non-Jews and not once, not even once, had he heard a single bad word or seen an evil look directed at any Jew, and how exciting it was and how he wanted to ask questions.
No Sabbath had ever been so beautiful as his first in Deborah. Never had he sung the Torah so fervently, so fervently he did not remember, until now, how his singing caused so much silence.
“Why, Abba?” he whispered, sniffing. Grantville had been a magical place and now it felt like it was burning and he was the fire. “Abba!”
No answer. No one looked at him. They told him what to do and where to be and conversations stopped when he entered rooms and there was arguing but never did anyone look him in the eye or ask him how his day went or what new and magical thing had he learned today.
Silence.
Even the other children viewed him with suspicion. Games ended when he joined them. Meals were quiet and even during prayer he felt he prayed alone.
So, as he had learned in the schools in Smyrna, the Jewish ones with dour old men who were quick with a harsh word to those who seemed inattentive, he went to answer his questions. He went to the library at Grantville.
He listened and heard his father and his elder brother and rabbis, learned men, arguing about him, about little Shabbethai Zebi and how his name was in the library, the great library in Grantville.
In a place where Jews could move about freely, it had been simple for him to go to the library.
And now?
Silence.
He tried hard in the silence of the library to translate an entry in a book, an entry that had his name in English.
A girl saw him and, miracle of miracles, she spoke Greek and this English that not even his own father could understand well, let alone read, and she had told him.
“You are the Messiah? You are the son of God?”
What was he to do? What could he do?
The silence shouted at him as he ran from the library and out into the streets of Grantville.
Shabbethai Sebi: Son of God. Messiah.
“I am not the son of God!” Shabbethai shouted, though his voice had less strength. He spun about looking for something familiar, something to hold onto, something not silent.
Grantville was not silent but its voice was not familiar to him. There were people and magical things called “cars” and horses, and children screaming.
Shabbethai sniffed and looked about, hunting the source of the screaming.
There had been a time when he had screamed like that, screamed with the pure joy of play and running and jumping.
Now, since that last view of his home in Smyrna and his mother standing motionless, crying on the dock, there had been silence.
“I am not the Son of God.” Shabbethai tried to smile, tried hard and the smile almost came to his face. His steps began tentatively, slowly but soon he was running again, running as if he was being chased or, maybe, he was chasing something.
He ran toward the sound of screaming, away from silence.
Grantville Public Library, 24th of Av, 5394 (T minus 5 hours 1 minute)
Julie Drahuta trudged up the steps of the Grantville Public Library.
The day hadn’t been that long. It was just that it was Friday, the end of the week, and her thoughts had been on the weekend until the phone call.
The work of a social worker slash police officer who specialized in child welfare in a town filled with seventeenth-century Germans and twentieth-century Americans—West Virginians, to be more precise—meant her work was rarely finished, weekend or no weekend.
If there was a minor problem or a major one and if it involved children, which it often did, Julie was called in. She had earned a reputation of solving difficult and delicate problems, of translating cultural languages and norms from one century to another, from one religion to another, from one family to another.
Julie’s Flying Mom Squad, made up of Protestant, Catholic, Lutheran and even Jewish mothers, multiplied her effectiveness but it also kept her on call twenty-four/seven.
Of course, what had truly brought her to the attention of almost everyone were the Pascal children; Blaise and his sister, Jacqueline. Their father had sent them to Grantville to protect them from their historical notoriety. Who would protect Grantville from them?
Julie Drahuta, of course!
The Pascal children were reminders to every up-timer just where and when they were. Blaise showed up in religious texts, math texts and almost every encyclopedia had an entry about him. Heck, even she knew of Pascal’s Triangles before the Ring of Fire.
Blaise embraced twentieth-century tech with a passion that was frightening, if not life threatening. Jackie liked to write and learn languages.
Were there more children hiding in the history books? Hopefully they would go somewhere else. The Pascals were enough.
It was Jackie Pascal who had called her. The girl’s problems rarely required police or fire intervention. This was why Julie didn’t bring backup with her as she trudged up the stairs.
Tina Jones, an assistant librarian, met Julie at the front door to the library; snapping Julie out of her day dreaming about the impending weekend and the relative dangers of the Pascal children.
Julie knew that the circulation desk was a throne to Tina and for her to come out from behind that desk meant something serious had occurred, something more serious than a misshelved book or an angry scholar who felt that his dignity had been assaulted because a child was often asked to translate for them. Jacqueline was really, really good at languages.
“What’s up?” Julie smiled. Julie rarely smiled when she was happy. This situation had the makings of unhappy written all over it.
“It could be nothing, nothing at all. Or it could be everything. I don’t know what to think.” Tina Jones was the one Jacqueline Pascal went to for permission to use the phone to call Julie away from her nice, neat and tidy “end of the week” thoughts. Jackie’s first two words over the phone were the words that brought Julie to the library.
“Officer Drahuta.”
Jacqueline only called Julie “Officer” when it was real serious.
“I have done something bad. Come quick. Oh, come to the library. Please.”
“Jacqueline is quite upset.” Tina’s voice shook Julie out of her thoughts.
“What did she do, Tina, misfile a romance novel, again? Was she loudly critiquing Chaucer or Melville?” Julie smiled. “Remember that time she was reading that Barbra Cartland novel? I thought we’d have to call the EMTs for a mass cardiac event.”
Tina Jones, library aide, averter of eyes when Jacqueline Pascal roamed the stacks of books far away from the children’s section, was not smiling. She was fiddling with her necklace, the one with the silver cross dangling from it.
“I hope it is nothing.” Tina hurried across the library’s main floor to the reference section. “I hope Jackie is wrong. She’s only eight. Maybe she’s imagining things. I hope she is. She does have an excellent imagination. Some of the books in this library will be authored by that girl, someday.”
Julie followed Tina to a far corner of the reference section. There, before a large study table crowded with books, some open, some closed, stood Jacqueline Pascal. The girl was standing straight, as if asked by a judge to stand and hear judgment.
“Have you been in ‘that’ section of the library again, Jacqueline?” Julie asked, smiling. Jacqueline loved historical romances. Worse, she seemed to be able to memorize entire passages and repeat them in at least four languages, loudly. Worse, she knew exactly what she was reading.
“No.” Jacqueline looked over at the table and lifted a large book. It was a volume from the Encyclopedia Britannica. There were other volumes from other encyclopedias on the desk as well. Jacqueline opened the book she had picked up and held it against her chest, the entries facing Julie.
“Right there.” Tina pointed at one of the entries.
Julie looked at both Tina and Jacqueline then carefully took the book.
“Sabbatai Sebi?” Julie asked finally, looking up.
“Keep reading,” Tina prodded.
“Sabbatai Sebi, born 1626, died 1676. That makes him forty years old when he died?” Julie asked. “Born in Turkey. So there’s a kid in Turkey...”
“Fifty,” Jacqueline whispered, correcting Julie.
“I’ll keep that in mind.” Julie frowned then continued reading. “Jewish mystic, whose Messianic claims produced an unparalleled sensation throughout the world, was born in Smyrna.”
“That’s in Turkey,” Jacqueline whispered helpfully, looking at a nearby atlas, open on the table. That was Jackie, Julie thought, thorough to a fault. “I think I translated the word Messiah wrong. I looked it up. Oh, Julie...I translated it into ‘son of God.’ How could I?”
“It says he thought he was Jesus Christ,” Tina whispered. “And people believed him. He was an ‘unparalleled sensation.’ ”
“He was trying to translate this entry into Greek. I helped him. I’m sorry,” Jacqueline added, close to tears.
Julie closed her eyes, hiding her face behind the open volume. “He’s eight years old. Was he eating in the library, pulling loaves and fishes out of thin air? Making wine flow from the reference shelves? Was he talking to God too loudly?”
Had another “historical” child come to Grantville?
“Julie!” Tina snapped. “It isn’t funny! Did you read the rest of it?”
“The boy would be, what, eight years old, Tina! It doesn’t matter what the rest says. He is not the man this book says he is. He is an eight-year-old boy.”
“And I told him he was the son of God.” Jacqueline looked prepared to be led to the gallows right this moment.
“Simple mistake. Could happen to anyone. Okay, where’s the kid? I’ll talk to him, then to Rabbi Yaakov, though I am certain Rabbi Yaakov and even Rabbi Fonseca know they got a Messiah running around somewhere. If people just communicate, so many problems just disappear. I should have been in the loop.”
“He said today was his birthday,” Jacqueline added. “I should have been careful. When I translated the word Messiah...he ran. I wasn’t thinking. I remember when Blaise found his name in that encyclopedia. I should have been more careful. Blaise ran away, too.”
“Yeah, and he came back, didn’t he? Why do you think it’s this Sabbatai Sebi?” Julie asked. “Maybe the kid was doing research on False Messiahs for a school project?”
“He told me his name,” Jacqueline said. “Why would he lie about that?”
Julie closed the book she held and set it down on the table. “Jesus Christ has the right to live in Grantville. Tina, let go of that cross before you bend it or cut yourself. Jacqueline, please go call Madam Delfault and tell her I am taking you out to Deborah to help me find the boy. I don’t think we’ll be disturbing their Sabbath Celebration if we go now. Sundown isn’t for a few hours yet. Sundown is like around 7:30 and it’s about 2:30 so...what? Five hours? And, Tina? I would appreciate it if you didn’t start a rumor that the Messiah has come to Grantville until at least I confirm that this boy is, in fact, the boy mentioned in this book. Okay?”
“I wouldn’t dare.” Tina looked like she wouldn’t.
“I am serious,” Julie added. “Jackie? Phone?”
Jacqueline ran off.
“I didn’t know?” Tina whispered.
“What? About false messiahs?” Julie asked, pulling her radio out of her purse, “The Jews believe Jesus was a false messiah. That’s one of the reasons they’ve been massacred all over Europe.”
“I thought it was about having the Sabbath on Saturday or something. I don’t know. I guess I never thought much about it. There weren’t many Jews in Grantville. I just didn’t think about it.”
“Somebody should go through the entire encyclopedia, twice, and make a list of the famous people who might show up so at least I can prepare. I’ve read up on Blaise. Seems there’s someone named Fermat who might walk into the library looking for a certain pain in the ass, but at least Fermat’s an adult now. He’s beyond my pay grade, thank God. Just a second, Tina. Central? This is Officer Drahuta, over.”
“Go, Julie,” came the answer over the radio.
“I’m heading up to Deborah with Jacqueline Pascal so she can help me ID someone. You heard anything about a missing boy, Mimi?”
“Not a word, Julie,” Mimi Rowland, the dispatcher on duty answered. “I know Blaise has been with Steve behind the fire station in his disaster containment shed all afternoon. This isn’t about that boy, is it? Do you need some back up?”
“No, Mimi, not that boy. Tell me if you hear anything about a missing child, okay? Over.”
“Gotcha, over.”
“What if it is, you know, Him?” Tina asked.
“Well, I will tell ‘Him’ to come back here and put away his books.” Julie shrugged. “My quiet weekend destroyed by an act of God.”
Somewhere in Grantville, 24th of Av, 5394 (T minus 5 hours 14 minutes)
“Hey! You! Come here!” A boy waved at Shabbethai. He was a good-looking boy with a welcoming smile, the sort of smile that did not suggest violence or cruelty.
Shabbethai had learned early to recognize that smiles were not merely smiles. Smiles required understanding as the word of God did. They were complicated and to misunderstand one could be deadly or worse.
Shabbethai approached with caution.
“You wanna play with us?” The boy who spoke now was smaller. Shabbethai could tell there was little in the way of cruelty in this younger boy.
The game seemed to involve a stick and a ball. That was comforting. Games with only sticks involved hitting and when hitting was involved, Jews got hit if they were available.
“He’s too little,” another, older boy said. This boy looked different from the one who had called him over. Shabbethai thought he would not like it if this boy smiled.
“He makes the teams even. So, you wanna play with us?” The first boy smiled and that settled it.
Shabbethai couldn’t quite understand the words. He understood “you” meant him and “us” meant them. It didn’t look like they meant to kill him. Besides, there were three girls watching. Boys rarely, in his wide experience of eight years, were cruel around girls.
So Shabbethai nodded his head and hoped for the best. Already the thoughts of being the son of God and curiosity and books being translated from English to Greek by some girl who had looked at him with wide eyes were receding.
“I don’t think he understands English,” one of the children said.
Shabbethai understood “English” and the head shaking meant “no.”
“No English good.” Shabbethai smiled hopefully, stringing some English words together.
“That’s okay,” the boy with the welcoming smile said. “My name is Joseph Drahuta. Call me Joe, okay? Joe.” The boy pointed at himself and said “Joe” again.
“Shabbethai Zebi,” Shabbethai pointed at himself.
“Sprecken she dutch?” the boy named Joe asked in very bad German. Even his German was not that bad, Shabbethai thought, very much to himself. It would never do for a Jewish boy, lost in a non-Jewish part of town, to laugh at a non-Jew or criticize them, no matter how deserved it was.
“Your German is funny.” One of the younger girls laughed and clapped. Shabbethai understood the “your” and “German” part. The word “funny” was not one his father had taught him.
“He doesn’t look German,” stated the other boy; the one with the smile Shabbethai knew he didn’t want to see. “No German would wear hair like that.”
“What does it matter what he looks like, Gabriel,” one of the girls, the older one snapped, her hands upon her hips. Shabbethai pretended he didn’t see her hips or even know what “hips” were. You had to be careful how you looked at girls, especially ones who weren’t Jewish.
“No Ger-man,” Shabbethai tried in English.
“Easy game,” Joseph said slowly, smiling at him. “Watch. I show you.”
Shabbethai watched very carefully, completely involved in the game.
The boy with the smile Shabbethai liked held a stick and looked determined to hit something or someone with it. Shabbethai was determined to make sure he was not that something or someone to be hit.
Deborah, 24th of Av, 5394 (T minus 4 hours 15 minutes)
“He’s the one who called me a boy when I asked him to teach me Hebrew. Rabbi Yaakov, him.” Jacqueline pointed, indicating the elderly man who was pretending not to see Julie’s car.
The fact that the good rabbi was doing a very thorough job of pretending that a car had not just appeared a few hours before the Sabbath with Officer Julie Drahuta inside, told her a great deal. Maybe she would not need Jackie to identify the boy.
“Julie, where the hell are you?” the radio blared.
“Chief.” Julie sighed. “I’ve got Jacqueline in the car and I’m about to talk to Rabbi Yaakov. You might want to modulate your vocabulary, Chief.”
There was a long, tense pause in which Rabbi Yaakov finally looked over at Julie.
“What, Officer Drahuta, in the name of God, is your present location, if I might enquire?”
“Deborah, Chief. I’ll leave the mike open. You’ll probably want to hear this as it happens.” Julie set the microphone on the dash and looked out of the windshield. Rabbi Yaakov looked back at her with a large smile on his kind face.
The old rabbi shared at least one common trait with her; they both tended to smile while under stress.
“I believe, Jackie, that the word he used was goy. It’s Yiddish and it means a ‘non-Jew,’ ” Julie said. “I guess their language hasn’t changed as much as English has. Anyway, how you ask is as important as the question. Maybe if you talk to Chana first and show up at one of their Sunday schools, which are on Saturday, you might have better luck than just marching up to someone and telling them to teach you Hebrew.”
“Chana just glares at me,” Jackie said. “I don’t think she likes me.”
“Your recitations of Barbara Cartland are rather graphic, Jackie. Chana wants to make sure you are serious. Hebrew is an important language to Jews. It was still being spoken four hundred years from now. The language has survived a lot. Ask her respectfully, Jackie. Now stay in the car.”
“Wow! I am told Jesus spoke in Hebrew. How many languages do Jews know, you think?” Jackie muttered. “The boy spoke Greek. I’ve never seen a Jew speak Greek.”
Julie shrugged, opened the door and climbed out of her patrol car. “Good Shabbos, Rabbi Yaakov.”
“Good Shabbos, Officer Drahuta.” The man bowed slightly. Rabbis didn’t bow easily to non-Jewish women in this century or in one almost four hundred years from now. This was looking more and more serious to her.
“Is there something special about this Sabbath, Rebbe?” Julie asked, smiling.
“All are special, Officer Drahuta.” Rabbi Yaakov smiled back.
Shit, Julie thought. His smile was as good as a red flag. “So special that you have groups of children hunting down by the stream and looking along the road? You haven’t lost something have you?”
Rabbi Yaakov looked away from Julie for a moment.
“Or someone?” Julie continued. “Are you missing a Messiah, perhaps?”
Fire blazed for a brief moment in the elderly rabbi’s eyes. “Julie, this is time for joke?”
“Purim is over, Rabbi Yaakov, so I am not joking. I don’t smile when I am joking.”
“Officer Drahuta...this is a difficult problem.”
“Why didn’t you come to me? Have we not worked well together? Have we not solved problems together? Have I not introduced you to the other men of God in Grantville? Have there been problems with the consecration of the new place of worship in Grantville? Have the Sephardim not been accepted? Non-Jews gathered money and helped Rabbi Fonseca to move here. Why do I have to learn of your problems from an eight-year-old girl?”
“Yes, and I thank you, Julie, but this is difficult. Yes, you have been very helpful. We have tried to be helpful in turn. For your help we have thanked God, Julie Drahuta.”
“You wouldn’t teach me Hebrew,” Jacqueline interrupted. Like her brother, Jackie saw rules as something less “rule-like.” The girl was, in this case, standing on the edge of the doorframe of the patrol car so, technically, she was still “in” the car.
“Jackie! Zip it!” Julie turned back to Rabbi Yaakov. She noted a loose ring of Jewish residents of Deborah standing just within earshot. “Jacqueline here had a little conversation with a young boy. I can have her describe him to you. She speaks Greek quite well. She and the boy had a short little talk. The boy seems to think he is Sabbatai Sebi and that name appears in a book or two in the public library.”
Rabbi Yaakov closed his eyes for a moment.
“He’s from Smyrna. That’s in Turkey...or, well, Ottoman Turkey...or whatever. Doesn’t that make him Sephardic? Am I missing something here? Are the boy’s parents here or in Grantville? Your place of worship is Ashkenazi, I think, correct? Why would the boy be living here? You are looking for him, right?”
“Shabbethai Sebi’s father and Rabbi Fonseca did not come to agreement on what was to be done about the boy. The father and elder brother are looking for him now,” Rabbi Yaakov stated. “The boy was told not to go to Grantville, so the father and older brother look for the boy here.”
“Ah. So the boy Jackie saw wasn’t this Sabbatai person. Good, I will be going...”
“Julie Drahuta, please. This is a difficult matter,” the man almost whispered. “God does not have a son. We must, first, be clear on this.”
“So, while the adults argue an eight-year-old boy wanders into Grantville and finds out he’s the son of God all by himself?” Julie asked quietly, aware of the audience.
“God can not have a son! That is...” Rabbi Yaakov calmed himself. “...that is...that is not right, Julie Drahuta. Do you understand?”
“I understand, Rabbi Yaakov.” Julie smiled. “I understand that Jews do not believe God may have children. Christians may not be so quick to deny God’s paternity though. If I had known of our guest from Smyrna, I could have at least smoothed over any problems. Now he’s running around in Grantville and you are spending time here in Deborah looking for him instead of thinking about the Sabbath because you told the son of God that he may not go to Grantville. I see.”
“It is the reason we hoped to handle this matter among ourselves,” Rabbi Yaakov sighed. “And I would like this very much if you do not call him the son...in my presence.”
“That I can do, Rabbi Yaakov,” Julie said.
“The Torah is very clear on who God is, Julie. This matter that you have brought with you from the future is one to be discussed carefully and completely. It is a matter of religion not...the protection of children. The boy is safe...do you think? That is the important thing now. Right now. He is very smart. He is very smart, but he is a boy.”
“I am pretty sure nothing has happened to him,” Julie said.
“How to understand this matter of Messiah is a matter for men of God to determine,” Rabbi Yaakov begged. “This should not be made into a joke.”
“Yes. Theology is easy. Have faith and believe in God,” Julie said carefully. “I have a Christian library aide thinking the son of God was in her library reference section. She calls a Christian dispatcher and now we have people in Grantville who are wondering if the son of God is wandering about Grantville. The chief is a bit upset. He feels someone should have at least discussed the appearance of such a boy, if for no other reason than crowd control. He wants to know what I was doing to allow this to happen. The people of Grantville wish to meet this boy who is not the son of, well, Him. This has become a problem of sociology and mob psychology and trust me on this one, sociology is much more complicated, Rabbi Yaakov. You can have faith in God, Rabbi, but to have faith in humans requires something like insanity.”
“Will harm come to the boy?”
“Worse, the crowd may believe him.” Julie shook her head and almost, almost, laughed. “And then what the Torah says or does not say about God and if He may have children or not will become a moot point. One of the little secrets of Christianity is that Jesus was a Jew. I learned early that to say that brought most religious arguments to an end. Sometimes the argument became centered on me, but I’m not eight, Rabbi. Next time, please, talk to me. Now I have to tell my chief that the Messiah is wandering around Grantville. He doesn’t like his Friday afternoons to vary from the regular round of drunks and brawls.”
Rabbi Yaakov closed his eyes and if he prayed then it must have been a very, very serious prayer, indeed.
“So, Chief...” Julie grabbed up the microphone and began, “about this ‘Messiah’ thing; you’re gonna laugh so you might as well get it out of your system now...”
Somewhere in Grantville, 24th of Av, 5394 (T minus 2 hours 10 minutes)
“Shut up, everybody! It’s the phone!” the boy named Joseph Drahuta shouted over the growing argument. “Hello? Mom? Yeah, we’re all here. Kubiaks, too. Blaise came over, too. No, Mom, Blaise is fine. Where are you? Oh. Sure. Yes, Mom. I was making a snack. No, we won’t make a mess. No. Sure. See you when you get home. Sibylla’s right here. You wanna talk to her?”
There had been a time when Shabbethai would have been very curious about a “phone” but after the library and now the boy who could translate Greek into English, all he wanted to do was hide.
“Sibylla, Mom wants to talk to you,” Joe shouted and Blaise translated. Shabbethai wanted very much to tell the boy to stop translating everything but Blaise wasn’t Jewish so he remained silent.
“Yes, Mother?” the older girl, named Sibylla, said.
It took a certain kind of faith to believe that there was a real person talking back. Shabbethai hunched under the drone of Blaise’s idle translation of almost everything being said in the room. It had been a rough and tumble game of stick ball. The smooth feel of the ball, made out of something called rubber and called a Pinkie had almost meant that he had not thrown it in time for an out.
English was a curious language.
Shabbethai was curious about how the phone worked. He was curious about why the Jews of Deborah looked at him funny. He was curious about whether the French boy could understand Greek. Look where that curiosity had left him.
The boy named Gabriel, the one with the smile Shabbethai didn’t want to see, asked if he was Jewish and Shabbethai said yes because lying never solved a problem and Blaise had translated his answer and now...
“Joseph, Mom wants me to make dinner,” Sibylla stated very firmly to everyone present. “Mom won’t be home until late and she put me in charge.”
Sibylla placed the phone down on its cradle. Shabbethai looked sadly at the phone then glared at that boy, Blaise. What sort of name was Blaise? He sort of looked like that girl in the library who had translated that English book into Greek and destroyed his life.
“Did you tell your mom you have a Jew in your house?” Gabriel Kubiak asked, looking at Shabbethai, not smiling.
Blaise kept translating and Shabbethai kept wondering about the game of stick ball and how he was ever going to face his father and the Jews of Deborah...or any Jew for that matter.
“So what if there’s a Jew in the house?” Joseph frowned. “What’s wrong with being Jewish? Isn’t like he’s a Croat or something. Jews are nice people. I like Chanukah and the candles. One of Mom’s friends is this lady named Chana. She’s nice and she’s Jewish. She comes to the house. She even ate here!”
Joseph Drahuta, once Blaise showed up to play stick ball and translate English into Greek, had introduced Shabbethai to Gabriel Kubiak and his sister, Dorothea. They both were orphans and their foster mother was Joseph’s mother’s sister.
Once the French boy who knew Greek told everyone that he, Shabbethai Zebi, was Jewish, Gabriel started watching him almost like the Jews of Deborah had been watching him.
Shabbethai wondered if people back in Smyrna knew about him, too.
“Jews are worse than Croats,” Gabriel muttered (and Blaise dutifully translated). “My father told me that Jews started the wars. Jews are evil.”
Shabbethai didn’t know what or who a Croat was. He hoped they weren’t a type of Jew.
“Mr. Kubiak didn’t say anything like that.” Joseph laughed. “You’re crazy! Your dad doesn’t care if someone is Jewish. I have known him longer than you.”
“I think he means his other father,” Sibylla said quietly, glaring at Gabriel. “I think Gabriel means his German father. His dead German father. I think Gabriel forgets that it was not a Jew who killed his first father. I think Gabriel should forget more of the past and remember more of the future here in Grantville. He owes his new mother and father that much!”
“My father said Jews aren’t to be trusted,” Gabriel looked at Shabbethai and Shabbethai weighed the danger in that look. “He said Jews were witches and sorcerers. They poison water and steal babies.”
Shabbethai flinched as the words were translated and wished, once again, that he hadn’t met the French boy who knew Greek while at the same time thanking God that he had. This would be worse if he could understand none of it.
“It does not matter,” Joe’s younger brother Ulrich, who was adopted like Gabriel and Dorothea and Sibylla were, said. “Shaba is in Grantville. Everyone is safe in Grantville. And he plays stick ball well. You are mad that we beat your team, twice!”
“But he is a Jew.”
“Shut up, Gabriel,” Joseph said, defending him. Incredible! “The kid ain’t a witch. You’re just mad he hit that ball over your head. You thought you could win by letting me have the new kid and we beat your butt. You’re just a sore loser!”
Shabbethai turned to look at the French boy who had ruined everything with his knowledge of Greek. He depended on that translation now. If he wasn’t very much mistaken, things could go real bad at this point. Even if Gabriel were the only one who hated Jews, he probably had friends and would Joseph Drahuta defend Shabbethai Zebi, the Messiah, the son of God, when Gabriel brought friends who hated Jews, too?
“Gabriel Vogel Kubiak! I will tell your mother you said that!” Joseph’s sister, Sibylla, shouted from her position of authority by the phone that was now lying on the small table near the door to the kitchen.
“You know it’s true, Sibylla,” Gabriel stated. “You were German once, too.”
“Who says I am not now?” Sibylla shouted and the argument began, in German, fast and angry.
Shabbethai knew that arguments were rarely good things for Jews. Somehow, when there was arguing and there was a Jew, the Jew became a target. He had seen that in Smyrna. Would that happen here? He was, after all, the only Jew available and everyone knew that because of the French boy who knew Greek.
“There will be no food until you stop saying horrible things about people! And that includes Jews who play better stick ball than you!” Sibylla yelled.
Shabbethai needed no translation. A girl, now standing in front of the door leading to what could only be a kitchen said two words that Shabbethai understood completely, no and food.
“He can’t eat regular food anyway,” Gabriel declared. “All I said was that he was a Jew. I heard you gotta be careful with Jews and food. They poison it.”
“If you think you’re going to be poisoned you can leave,” Joseph shouted. Shabbethai noted that Joseph’s younger brother, Ulrich, shouted encouragement to his brother. “You’re just mad that Shabbethai helped us win! You’re just a sore loser!”
“All I am saying is that he is Jewish and you should be careful around Jews. What do they plan in their secret meetings, in their communities set apart from good Christians?” Gabriel frowned.
“I see, Gabriel Vogel. Take your sister and go home to the Vogels, your first mama and papa, and eat there,” Sibylla stated. Shabbethai wasn’t sure why this seemed to strike Gabriel dumb. The older boy looked unable to speak. Dorothea looked ready to cry.
“Mama, our new mama, said we gotta stay here.” Dorothea looked very upset. “Mama, the mama who took us in when we would have starved, said she’d come and pick us up after work. We gotta stay at Auntie Drahuta’s house. And I don’t care if he’s a Jew. I want dinner. Our first Mama and Papa are dead and we can not go to them for dinner. That was mean, Sibylla. Your parents are dead, too. You go to them!”
Gabriel seemed unable to answer back. Shabbethai could see that there were words that wanted to come out but, for some reason, they did not.
“So, was it Catholics that killed your Protestant parents or Protestants that killed your Catholic parents? Or did anyone care to figure it out before they killed them? You of all people should know how foolish your words are, Gabriel. So what if he’s a Jew? There is religious freedom in Grantville. Go. Leave Grantville with your ‘he’s a Jew’ thoughts. There are people out there waiting for you, Gabriel Vogel. Just make sure you tell the right people the right religion or you may learn what it feels like to be a Jew. I have seen how Jews are treated and I will have nothing to do with that. Nothing!”
Blaise’s translation into Greek extended into the silence after Sibylla stopped talking.
Gabriel looked at Shabbethai but without anger. Was there, perhaps, a touch of shame, Shabbethai asked himself?
“Come,” Sibylla waved at Shabbethai and Shabbethai walked toward her as she opened the door to the kitchen. “Show me what you can eat and I will make it for you. Gabriel can watch, for all I care.”
Were Jews truly welcome in Grantville? Would his welcome change if they discovered he was the son of God? But there was no son of God? Was there?
“I don’t care if he’s a Jew,” Dorothea offered. “Can I eat too? I’ll eat what he can’t eat.”
Former IOOF Building, Grantville, 24th of Av, 5394 (T minus 4 minutes 32 seconds)
“I don’t care if he is the Messiah! Get those yahoos off the street!” Julie watched as Press tried to place the radio back in its holder with one hand and rub his forehead with the other. “We got a bunch of drunks wandering around with crosses made out of pool cues looking for the Messiah. We got a full house at both the Catholic and Protestant churches. Are you sure Blaise is at your house?”
“I don’t think it is fair to blame the boy for everything. Besides, he’s Catholic. Blaise wouldn’t be playing at being the Messiah, Chief.” Julie smiled at Rabbi Fonseca who was a few feet away listening politely to Jacqueline Pascal who was trying very hard to speak to the man. Julie wasn’t so far away that she couldn’t hear Jacqueline trying to speak Hebrew.
“What does Blaise being Catholic have to do with this?” Press demanded.
“Exactly, Chief. Exactly.” Julie turned to Chana and Gertrude, two of the women in her Flying Mother’s Squad. “Any word?”
“No,” Chana sighed. “There is no sign of the boy. I am most appreciative of the help we have received. I can think of few places where a lost Jewish child would have this effect. People want to find him to protect him.”
“We have seen the effect of religious bickering, Chana. I have lost family trying to find refuge in religion and being dragged out and killed anyway. Protestants killing Catholics. Catholics massacring Protestants and both killing Jews. Grantville has taught many the lessons we should have learned.” Gertrude crossed her arms and dared any to argue. “If the boy is to be found, we will find him. Being Jewish will not stop us. God help the one who might harm the boy!”
“I better go and save Rabbi Fonseca.” Julie sighed. “Hopefully her Hebrew is better than her Russian was at the beginning.”
Rabbi Fonseca was listening politely as Jacqueline tried to hold open a book and speak in broken Hebrew to him.
“Jacqueline has not said something wrong?” Julie asked as simply as she could. The Sephardic community in Grantville was quite young and its rabbi was not much older. Rabbi Fonseca spoke many languages but English was still new to him.
“No,” Rabbi Fonseca smiled at Jacqueline and gently pulled the soft covered book from her hands and looked at it. “Cannot think English word...Chana...”
There was an exchange of Hebrew and when it was over Chana nodded and turned to Julie.
“The rabbi is amazed to hold in his hand a book to teach Hebrew that was written many centuries from now. It gives him hope that great things can be done. He asks me to thank you for the things you have helped to be done. The idea of having a special place in the...synagogue for non-Jews was a good idea. Such a thing has helped much in bringing all together. He cannot think of a place in the world where a Jew can walk so freely amongst those who are not Jews,” Chana translated.
“And the boy?” Rabbi Fonseca asked, with what little English knowledge he had, giving Jacqueline the book back.
“You didn’t check the book out of the library, did you?” Julie sighed, looking at Jacqueline.
“We were in a hurry and I meant to. I will, Julie. I am sorry.” Jacqueline clutched the book to her.
“The boy will be found,” Julie assured Rabbi Fonseca.
“He knows where to come at sunset,” Chana translated for the rabbi. “He is a good boy and will find his way here if he can. And the rabbi agrees with you, Julie. You should have been told and so should the boy. This might not have happened if the boy had been told. And he...”
There was a long pause.
“Chana?” Julie asked.
“He says...” Chana looked at Rabbi Fonseca for a long moment. “He says that he has sat in the library and contemplated that entry in the...encyclopedia. He says the knowledge, yes, knowledge should not have been withheld. It was wrong to let the boy discover this thing without those who love him around him. The boy is too smart, too full of his love of God, to be allowed to find this thing out by himself. He should have not been the object of...of...I do not know how to say. Loshon Hora, bad speech. The boy was looked at from the corner of the eye, whispered about. This should not have been done. I agree, too, Officer Julie Drahuta. Someone should talk to the boy’s father. Possibly you?”
“I certainly will consider...” It was the prayer that caught Julie’s attention.
“Barukh ata Adonai Eloheinu melekh ha-olam,” Rabbi Fonseca began the blessing. Julie had heard blessings like that before the Ring of Fire when she worked in Wheeling, north of Grantville when it was still in the twentieth century and in America, and here, in Grantville, in 1634.
Who would have thought an IOOF building would have become a synagogue? Who would have thought a False Messiah would be something a social worker would have to worry about? What would they have done if the Ring of Fire and dropped them onto, say, Jerusalem in the year ten or fifteen?
God, a fifteen-year-old son of God...
Julie turned in the direction Rabbi Fonseca was praying in and, for a moment, didn’t know whether to scream, cry or just remain silent.
“I know, I know, Mom, let me explain.” Joseph had his father’s impish smile. Julie found it hard not to smile back. “I locked up the house, Mom. Shabbethai said he was lost and needed to go to church and since he is a Jew I had to bring him here. He’s too young to be wandering around by himself. Honest, Mom. That’s why we left the house. I know you said to stay there until you got home, but there, I said it. It’s my fault.”
“I just translated into Greek,” Blaise said. “I didn’t do anything.”
“Ha-gomel lahayavim tovot sheg’malani kol tov,” Rabbi Fonseca finished his prayer.
“Ah-men,” Chana added. Julie would find out later that this was the blessing for, amongst other things, surviving illness or danger.
“What’s wrong, Mom?” Joseph, truly his father’s son, had no clue what he had done, only that he had done something. “We played some stick ball. Is Shab in trouble?”
“I think you are,” Sibylla whispered loudly.
“What did I do?” Joseph looked around, his eyes fixed on the chief of Grantville’s police department.
“See? Blaise is involved!” Press shouted. “Is that the boy?”
There was a burst of strong Hebrew from the boy in the crowd of Drahuta and Kubiak children.
“He says—” Chana was trying not to laugh. “Shabbethai says we should all be glad of the Shabbos, not arguing. He wishes all a good Sabbath and that we should go inside. He tells us it is almost time of the Sabbath.”
With that Shabbethai Zebi ben Mordecai led his friends into the former IOOF building which was now the first Sephardic synagogue of Grantville, though Julie heard the Portuguese Jews, called it something else.
“And a little child shall lead them.” Julie shook her head. “Is that him?” Julie asked Jacqueline, who was hiding behind her.
“How does he do that? How does my brother get in the middle of everything? Yes, Julie, that is the boy.” Jacqueline nodded. “That is the False Messiah.”
“Let’s stick to Shabbethai Zebi for now, okay, Jackie?”
“Will come?” Rabbi Fonseca asked politely, indicating the front door with a smile.
“Certainly,” Julie smiled. “Would it break the Sabbath if I drove him back to Deborah after the service?”
“It would be better if you walked,” Rabbi Fonseca answered and Chana translated. “Or may he stay here for the night? There are certain laws to be followed, Julie.”
“I could put him up in the guest room.” Julie shrugged. “Would that tick off his father?”
“Yes.” Chana smiled. “Maybe it will teach the father not to lose his son. Yes, Julie, it would be good for the boy’s father to come to your house and speak to you about his son.”
“Don’t tell my father,” Blaise muttered as the sounds of the Sabbath service began inside the building. “He is still angry that I called Descartes a dinosaur. What will he think if he knew I went into a Jewish church?”