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holmesticeTitle: Astrakhan, I Perceive
Recipient:acorn_squash
Author:iwantthatcoat
Verse:ACD Canon
Characters/Pairings: Sherlock Holmes&John Watson, Mycroft Holmes
Rating: Gen
Warnings: Period and Location-Typical Antisemitism, War References
Summary: It is said that an angel was carrying foolish souls back to heaven for repair. It is also said that an angel was given instructions from G_d to evenly distribute the fools of the world over the Earth. Which one was it? Feh! Do I look that old to you that I should know? Anyway, the point is, the angel’s sack tore open while they were flying over a town called Chelm, and all the fools spilled out. And there they stayed.
An Ashkenazi Sherlock Holmes tale…
You’ve started this story expecting a mystery, no? And why shouldn’t you? That’s what Holmestice is all about. The Mods look at the offers and at the requests and they hope, with some work and some luck, that they will match up well—just like any good shadchanit does. But I forget myself. You probably don’t know what a shadchanit is, and to spare you the hassle of googling every other sentence, I promise to stick to English, im yirtzeh Hashem. (Okay, that didn’t count. Starting … now.)
Anyway, once the matches are made and posted and we all start reading, we are right to expect a story with some meat on its bones—a puzzle worthy of being solved by the great detective, Sherlock Holmes. Or, maybe Gregory House. Or maybe Shirley Holmes, if you are so inclined. But I bet you weren’t expecting Shelach Bayit. No. That is as unexpected as the Spanish Inquisition (which, in fact, wasn’t unexpected at all, being that they always issued an Edict of Grace a month before they burned you at the stake). But here you are. About to read a Shelach Bayit story. The first one ever written. And as you’ve already put in the effort to read nearly two full paragraphs, surely you can try just one more to see if you like this sort of thing. Or maybe you’ve already had enough and want to stop here. That’s fine. I won’t judge.
Shelach Bayit: the wisest of the wise throughout The Pale and far beyond. Maybe you’ve heard the story of the Athenian and His One-Eyed Slave? No? Well, an Athenian was returning home from Jerusalem and bought a slave to assist him in his travels. The seller had assured him that even though he lacked an eye, he more than made up for it with his remarkable cleverness. A sort of Columbo of the Ancient World, if you will. So, as soon as they left the city, the slave advised his master to hurry and join up with the party ahead of them. No travelers could be seen along the sparsely-vegitated stretch of desert, so the Athenian asked his slave to tell him more about this supposed group of travellers. The slave provided him with a detailed description: the party included a one-eyed female camel, pregnant with twins, who was bearing a pack filled with wine on one side and a pack filled with vinegar on the other. They were less than four miles out.
The Athenian, shocked by the level of detail, asked how he had arrived at these conclusions. The lowly Jewish slave replied, “That the animal is one-eyed you can see from the way it grazed from only one side of the road. The imprint of the twins in her belly is visible here, where she has crouched on the ground. The liquid cargo has dripped, the wine absorbing into the sand while the vinegar still bubbles on the surface. And everyone knows that camel tracks are no longer discernible beyond a distance of four miles.”
Shelach Bayit makes that guy look like an idiot.
For one, Shelach Bayit could probably have found camel tracks at least six miles off, though to be fair he had the aid of a hand lens while the best the slave could have done at that time was to use a curved emerald, like the Emperor Nero did to watch gladiator fights … and let’s face it—if he had a giant emerald lying around, he probably wouldn’t have been a slave. And for two, he would have found a way to have obtained his freedom before the trip even started. How? I don’t know. I’m not Shelach Bayit. I don’t know how he would have managed it, but I do know he would have. You can’t expect me to just make up stories like that.
But I can tell them.
And this one happens right at the start of it all, while he was still young and not yet famous. Even before he … Well, I’ll just start already, shall I?
Now you may have heard of Chelm, but if not, I will tell you plain and simple; it is a village of fools. To find the dimmest of them would be a difficult task indeed, for it was a place where every dunderhead and shlemiel in the Russian Empire was inexplicably drawn. The village idiot, if they even saw value in such a term, was, in a moment of surprising perspicacity, deemed to be the oldest of them, for that person had been an idiot for the longest time. If he had instead been determined by merit, Yankel was, perhaps, the worst of a bad lot. And so it was that Yankel, just before he had become a rabbi and married the beautiful Rivkah (a tale for another day) and just after he had become a thief, had tried his luck at becoming a detective.
That went just as well as one might expect, by which I mean not well at all. Upon hitting an unsolvable case (his first one, in fact) he walked a full day to Katerynosláv to send a telegraph to a well-known rabbi in England, asking for help.
Rav Hermann Adler was known far and wide both for his tireless effort to help Jews who had managed to leave places like Chelm adjust to London’s East End and for his friendly meetings with other faith leaders, discouraging antisemitism. It was said that during a lunch with British Catholic Cardinal Herbert Vaughan, the cardinal asked the rabbi, "Now, Dr. Adler, when may I have the pleasure of helping you to some ham?" The rabbi had responded, "Most certainly. At Your Eminence's wedding." Such a man … such a man could solve any problem.
Yankel was a fool, yes, but he wasn’t stupid. He knew Rav Adler was unlikely to travel to their little village from so far away for a trifling matter of petty theft. And while Dr. Adler spoke so eloquently on the struggles of their people in Britain, he was said to have had little experience or patience with the turmoil and tribulations of life in Eastern Europe, and thought it a noisy, untidy sort of piety.
Yankel was nervous. Perhaps there was some truth to this. Certainly Chelm was nothing like Minsk, for example, with its fancy theatres and its library and its paved streets. In fact the whole of Galicia, what would now be Eastern Poland and Western Ukraine, of which Chelm was only a small part, didn’t have what one might call a stellar reputation. The Litvaks to the north thought Galitzianers were irrational and uneducated and they, in turn, thought the Litvaks were as soulless as a toaster and not half as warm.
Dr. Adler and his father before him had seen Jewish freedom steadily expand in England to include the ability to engage in retail trade inside the capitol, join fully in the legal profession, and hold civil and military office. Such equality was still a dream for the people of Chelm. Their equivalent of “holding military office” was conscription into the Russian army at the age of 12 instead of 18 like the Russians. It was believed that by preventing Bar Mitzvah and contact with their parents during the teen years, the young men would be “Russofied.” An advisor to the czar had suggested that one third of the Jews should be starved, one third driven from the country, and one third baptized. Forbidden to own their own property, or even to settle on rented parcels of the rich agricultural land outside of their clusters of small towns, land where the wheat grew strong and tall, Chelm was nothing but hungry tailors, bakers, peddlers, and small store owners. Would a great man such as this ever journey inside the Pale of Settlement? No. But perhaps … perhaps he might offer Yankel some advice.
***
Now where was I?
Oh, yes, Yankel had walked a full day to Katerynosláv.
He walked up to the counter of the telegraph office with three messages, one scrawled in Yiddish which he had dictated to his rabbi (as Yankel, and indeed most of Chelm’s residents, could write no more than a few words at best), one in Polish written with the assistance of the local tax collector, and one in German aided by the fishmonger. No one spoke English. It would cost three times as much to send, but he didn’t know which language the good rabbi could read, and it simply did not occur to him that the Chief Rabbi of the British Empire, Commander of the Royal Victorian Order, might have better access to a translator than Yankel himself.
Yankel took a seat on the hard, wooden bench at the telegraph office and waited for the old woman in front of him, bundled against the coming onslaught of winter, to finish collecting a parcel.
He approached the counter and pushed the three notes forward with tattered gloves. The telegraph operator spoke to him in Yiddish. “You wish to send these to Dr. Hermann Adler, London, England?”
“Yes.”
The operator looked at Yankel again, then shrugged and began his work.
Yankel paid the fee and sat down once more on the bench in hopes of a quick response. He did not have long to wait. The man gestured for Yankel to come to the counter and handed him the reply.
“THE MAN YOU WANT IS SHELACH BAYIT STOP IF YOUR CASE IS OF INTEREST HE WILL WAIVE HIS FEE STOP IF IT IS NOT NO PRICE CAN ENTICE HIM STOP HE IS IN KIEV”
Yankel looked puzzled, for two reasons. The first was he had no idea what the telegraph actually said. The second was, given what he did recognize—a name and the city of Kiev, and the words “man”, “want”, and “price”—it simply made no sense. Or rather, the words made sense separately, but not together. Shelach Bayit was a Hebrew name. Of this he was certain. Kiev was outside of the boundaries of Jewish settlement. Of this he was also certain. The rest was probably just filler, thanking him for thinking of him but he was a very busy man and couldn’t possibly help with his little problem and so on, but that didn’t matter. The rabbi had given the name of someone who could help, and a location where that man could not possibly be. It was written in Yiddish. Someone wiser than he would explain things. Hopefully.
On his walk back home, he tried not to think of the nonsensical telegraph, and instead reviewed the case. The town’s blacksmith had been robbed the night before. An elderly woman had been as well.
It just so happened that on that night Yankel had been too anxious to sleep. Every profession he had tried had ended in utter failure, and his grandmother, who he had been taking care of, seemed to actually have been taking care of him all this time. He paced in his room, and she was awoken by the creaking of the floorboards. Feeling even more guilty about his failures, for he had just added ‘failure to walk quietly’ to the list, Yankel had decided to pace outside instead.
Nearly everyone in Chelm was poor, or so it seemed. A few still clung to a precious heirloom from better times, but money itself—cold, hard cash—was a rarity. With everyone in a similar situation, town beggar was a vacant position, and as he walked along the business district in Chelm, Yankel thought he’d try it on for size.
He had done fairly well that night, as a man he had met who had also been wandering the street in his restlessness had given him quite a few coins.
When news of the theft finally made its way to Yankel, his first thought was: perhaps I can solve this mystery? His second thought was: perhaps I could be a detective! His third thought was: could I go around solving crimes? And his fourth thought was: How difficult could it be? He didn’t know. He hadn’t tried it yet. Yankel was filled with optimism.
He had been all around the town on the night of the robberies, driven by his lack of a future, and during that time he had seen nothing at all suspicious. He had even stopped by the home of one of the robbery victims earlier that evening while on his new beggar’s beat. It was the old widow whose husband had been a successful grain merchant, the richest person in town. She had given him a fine necklace which he thought maybe he could sell for a good price, or trade for some new shoes.
The blacksmith (who hadn't mentioned it at first, maybe he felt embarrassed he hadn’t punched out the burglar) and the old widow (who mentioned it right away while gathering water the following morning) were in shock, but apart from that, doing well. Yankel went straightaway to visit the man, who seemed unable to provide him with any details. Then he went to visit the woman, and the exact same thing happened.
There must be some trick to it, thought Yankel. What I need is to find an expert and ask him questions. The wisest man I can find. Even Yankel knew wise men were in short supply in Chelm. He had heard of a very wise rabbi in London and decided to send him a telegraph asking for help. “How exactly does one solve crimes?”
So now we are all caught up, yes? Yankel the Beggar decides to become Yankel the Detective. And he is told to seek out Shelach Bayit.
Kiev is a half day's journey by train. Not particularly expensive, except for a man who has nothing. But now, Yankel had some coins. He looked at them, then looked at the cupboard, then looked at the train schedule, then looked at the cupboard again. Then he remembered that Shelach Bayit couldn’t possibly be in Kiev anyway. He wouldn’t be allowed to live in the city. He went to his rabbi for advice.
The rabbi looked carefully at the telegraph. “I have heard of this happening,” he said. “If you are a very important man, you can live anywhere you choose. This must be such a man.”
Yankel hung his head in despair. Asking for help was one thing. Someone important traveling all the way from Kiev to Chelm was quite another. He had intended to visit Kiev himself someday. It would be the journey of a lifetime! The beautiful buildings! The parks along the Dnieper! But he could not afford such a trip. Maybe it would be better if he just gave up his newfound career as a detective and went back to being a beggar before that vacancy was filled by someone else.
***
“Mishka… I will soon be traveling to Chelm.”
Shelach had taken to calling him Mishka (A nickname for Mikhail meant for children. It translates to baby bear.) His brother simply refused to call him Mikhail—his name for over a decade. Switching from his birth name of Mykhalio to Mikhail had been a practical move. Easier to pronounce. Easier to remember. (This was just before name-changing for Jews became illegal.) His star was on the rise in the Russian government, and soon he would become indispensable. Then, for all Shelach’s veiled accusations of turning his back on his heritage to chase success, he would become like Esther, who changed her name from Hadassah to become Queen of Persia but never once forgot her duty to her people. He would work his way into the Duma and abolish The Pale altogether. (The first thing he would eventually do. The second thing, not so much.)
Once Mikhail was making policy, he could influence things for the better. Not by flitting around from school to school, dropping careers like a hot latke, like someone he knew. Wasting his gifts with idleness. No, not exactly idleness. Shelach traveled a great deal during his short-lived academic pursuits, and in spite of the not-so-subtle prodding, he had no moral dilemma with making the most of Mikhail’s diplomatic connections in order to obtain a special permit to live in the great city of Kiev, instead of being banished to the backwaters of the Empire.
Mikhail accepted the new nickname with limited grace. His little brother could call him whatever he liked. It made no difference; he would always be the more mature sibling. And to act as if it was bothersome would only serve to encourage him. And thinking it over, maybe he should make a bigger deal out of it, even if keeping the peace was in his nature just as much as disturbing it was in Shelach’s. A bit more conflict might just be what Shelach needed to leave Mikhail’s comfy apartment and strike out on his own. The dear boy was wise beyond his years, but lacked ambition.
“Why would you want to go to Chelm? Why would anyone want to go to Chelm? Who summoned you? I would think no one in Chelm capable of writing anything aside from their own name.”
“I’ve not been summoned yet. I have received a telegraph from Dr. Hermann Adler.”
Mikhail waited. His brother did like to be dramatic, and sometimes Mikhail prefered to simply say nothing, knowing that Shelach would find the silence maddening.
“The Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth. In London,” Shelach continued, raising his eyebrows and leaning forward.
Mikhail poured some tea into the glass within his ornate silver holder and waited.
“He told me a man named Yankel from Chelm might be requesting my services.”
Ah. There it was. No. He would wait just a bit longer. He held back a few choice words about a visit to the Paylishe Yidn in favor of continued silence. That’s an insult, by the way. I’d use English, but I can’t. (Just suffice to know that Galitzianers and Litvaks have conflict over more than just how to season their gefilte fish.)
“As a consulting detective,” Shelach concluded.
Mikhail dropped a sugar cube in his tea, held a second one in place between his teeth, and began to drink. This little hobby of Shelach’s was turning into something after all. A few dignitaries had used him to track down a stolen jewel or two and now someone in England with a direct line to the Crown had heard of him.
“Congratulations,” he said.
“Thank you.”
“Will you wait for this telegraph then?”
Shelach was silent for some time. “Hmm. How far is it to Chelm?” he finally asked, trying to sound casual.
“I see all your studying has little bearing upon your knowledge of geography. Between 200 and 300 miles.”
Shelach frowned. Both he and Mikhail knew there was little chance of this Yankel making it into Kiev for a “consultation”, but there was also very little chance of his extending an actual invitation to Shelach. The telegraph would probably never come. The problem would never reach him, like ripe berries snatched up by the birds before the harvest. No. More like those berries rotting on the ground uneaten. No one in his right mind would send a telegraph to a stranger in anticipation of him making such a journey. And less than no one would take it upon himself to go fetch the person. But you and I know something that both Shelach and Mikhail did not. Yankel was not in his right mind. Yankel, remember, was a fool.
***
How Yankel found Shelach in a city as big as Kiev, I don't know. I think he went to the tallest building, for that was surely where the important people would live. It was a good plan for a fool. Of course the tallest building in the city was the Lavra Bell Tower, which measured 316 feet—if you included the cross on top. Perhaps he broke down at the base of the church and wept at his situation, hundreds of miles from home and lost. And perhaps one of the street urchins Shelach occasionally employed to get information, street urchins who gathered in places visitors would frequent in order to beg them for spare change—places like the tallest bell tower in what would eventually become Ukraine-Rus, then The Ukraine, and finally just regular old Ukraine—saw him weeping and asked what was wrong. And perhaps he said, “I am looking for Shelach Bayit and cannot find him.” Or perhaps not. As I said, I don’t know.
How he paid for the trip, that I do know. He sold the necklace.
He couldn’t just sell it at the shop on the corner. What woman would want to wear a necklace the whole village saw someone else wearing in shul every week? No one would tell the new owner how the blue jewels really brought out the color of their eyes, or that the golden scrollwork was delicate, yet imposing. “That looks just like the grain merchant’s widow’s necklace!” they’d say. And what would you say to that? Even a fool knows that much. So he sold it to The Man By The River.
The Man By The River has no name, so the police will never track him down. He comes and he goes, wandering from town to town, collecting things people don’t want to keep. The Man By The River doesn’t ask questions.
So The Man By The River gave Yankel some coins for the necklace. Nowhere near what it was worth, of course. And Yankel bought a ticket from Chelm to Kiev.
***
When they met at last, Yankel had given a brief account of the victims and their losses, and Shelach wasted no time in asking questions.
“Tell me all you saw on the night of the robberies. Start from when you decided to go out for a walk.” He touched his fingertips together and perched them beneath his chin.
“I got up and couldn’t go back to sleep.”
“What caused you to wake up? Was there a noise?”
“No. Not that I remember. I just was worried.”
“About what?”
“About how I have no profession. No way to care for my grandmother. She’s all I have left. So I thought, since I was awake anyway, I’d go for a walk.” Yankel paused. “No. No, first I started pacing around my bedroom trying to think of what I should do. The … the floorboards were creaking, and that woke her up.”
“Has that woken her up in the past?”
“I don’t usually pace quite so much. I don’t think so.”
“And so you decided to go out.”
“Yes.”
“What time was it?”
“I … I didn’t check. Late. It was very quiet.”
“Did you bundle up? It must be as cold there as it is in Kiev. Were you wearing your night clothes?”
“Yes, I changed into my street clothes and put on the warmest socks I could find and my leather boots. I took my long wool coat and my scarf and wrapped it around my head and then across my face to keep out the wind. Then I put on my gloves.”
“And did you carry anything with you?”
Yankel paused. “I think I took my satchel with me out of habit. I usually take it with me when I run errands.” So many questions, thought Yankel. I could never think of this many questions. I don't think I would make a good detective after all.
“Where did you go?”
“Down the main street that cuts through the town.”
“Describe the route.”
“I … don’t remember.” His eyes grew watery and he sniffed. The pressure was a bit much for poor Yankel.
Shelach softened his voice. “It’s fine, Yankel. Let’s try it this way. Close your eyes and imagine you are closing your front door and headed outside. Picture it in your mind. Can you do that?”
Yankel nodded, eyes scrunched shut.
“Good. Good. So you shut the door and turn to face the street. Which way do you go?”
“To the right.”
“Good. And what stores do you pass? Can you see the lights on in any of the windows?”
“The grocers is closed and it’s dark. Next is the tailor and the same thing. The restaurant is open. Late at night it’s more like a bar. It’s loud. Then there’s a store I don’t know. I think it’s a ladies shop? Hats. They sell fancy hats. Then there’s a newspaper stand and some people are stacking boxes next to it.”
“The morning edition out of Katerynosláv. Well, that establishes the time for us.” Did it? Yankel supposed that was a good thing.
“And that’s when I saw the man,” added Yankel.
“What man?”
“The man who gave me the coins. I was walking and I decided maybe I would try to beg for money. I hadn’t done that yet. Maybe I'd be good at it?”
“So you saw a man.”
“Yes. And … well no. I didn’t see him. I bumped into him. Not very hard, but he almost fell over.”
Shelach leaned forward. The motion stretched his frame, making his body seem even more lean than it already was. “Pray continue. Where did you put the coins?”
“In my satchel. They were already in a small cloth bag.”
“And then?”
“Then I decided I would give this whole beggar thing a try again tomorrow, so I went back home.”
Shelach grinned as if he knew something Yankel didn’t. Yankel relaxed. That was more in keeping with the world as he knew it. “Did you go back the same way you came?” Shelach asked.
“No, there was a cart in the way. I think it was the same one that brought the newspapers. And there was horse poop in the street, so I went to the other side. I passed the widow’s house.”
“The one who reported the robbery?”
“Yes. And the light was on. The only place still lit up on the whole street except for the restaurant. So I thought I’d check in on her.”
“And she gave you her necklace?”
“Yes. And then I went home.” It didn’t occur to Yankel he had never mentioned being given a necklace as tzedakah (that means an act of charity).
“Do you, by any chance, remember what you said to the good lady? Or to the man in the street?”
“Well, not really. I was trying out my new beggar speech.”
“Try to remember some of it, if you can.”
Yankel paused and wrinkled his brow. He hadn’t thought this hard in a long time. Maybe ever. “The man tripped on the curb. And he asked me for some help so I ran over to steady him. Then he asked me what I wanted and I said, ‘What is there I don’t want? I am in want of everything!’ But really I didn’t feel like a person should expect to get anything just for helping someone in the street! He gave me a bag of coins anyway. Then he remembered his children were home alone and hurried off. It went well, I think. A lot easier than this detective job of yours. I can’t see how someone could solve such a puzzle.”
“And yet, I have.”
“You have? But you haven’t even been to the scene of the crime!” Yankel cleared his throat and tried to sound stately. “You are indeed the most brilliant of men!”
“And can you not recall so much as a single word of the exchange between you and the widow?”
“I’m sorry. I don’t remember any of it.”
“Yankel, allow me to recreate the scene at the widow’s house.” He spread his hands wide as if opening a curtain to characters onstage. “You see her light is on and you go inside. The widow is still wearing the same dress from the evening service. She is awake, perhaps reading a novel. You ask her…”
“I asked her where her lovely necklace was, yes! I think she must have just removed it. She took it from the table and gave it to me, and then she asked me to leave. She must have been tired after all.”
“Yes. So she said something like, ‘Please go?’, am I correct?”
“Something like that, yes. And I said I was sorry for disturbing her, and I left.”
“Friend Yankel, you had robbed two people on that night. Do you think they would recognize your voice? Would they know it was you?”
“What? No! I—”
“Don’t fret. If you have the necklace and the coins we can still make it right. Do you have them under your floorboard?”
“How did you know about the floorboard?” One should never purposely disclose one’s best hiding place. Not even to a detective.
“I suppose I owe you an explanation before you assign to me some sort of mystical power. You seemed reluctant to discuss the loose boards, and it would be an ideal spot to conceal the coins and the necklace for a little while, as you were still working out a way to explain your new career as a beggar to your grandmother.”
Shelach needn’t have bothered. Yankel was far too amazed to be superstitious. “I still have the coins,” he explained. “I was going to give them to her when she went to the market on Tuesday.”
“And the necklace?”
“I sold it. To The Man By The River. He frightened me, Reb Bayit. I should not want to go back alone.”
“Then you shall not. That man is likely a wanted thief with many crimes against him. But we shall go. Only to seek the return of the necklace. I am no policeman.”
“Nor am I. Yet. Though a beggar does not seem to me like a good profession any longer. I’ve no wish to steal, even by accident.”
“No indeed. We may need some help. We shall see what kind we get, im yirtzeh Hashem.” (Oh, that means G_d willing. Sorry about that.)
So they left on the train together, from Kiev back to Chelm. With Yankel sleeping, and occasionally praying, for he had had a difficult day indeed. And with Shelach Bayit quietly making notes in his journal of cases, then ordering snacks for them both, and then reading a pocket version containing sections of Mishneh Torah followed by the newspaper he’d gotten during a brief stop at Ternopil. They passed a troop encampment, and he peered through the window with great interest.
“Do soldiers come through town often?” Shelach asked.
“They camp nearby. Sometimes we offer them some food. The rabbi says a man who is given may be less likely to take. Many from our own village have been taken away by the army to fill the empty space when a rich man pays to spare his sons. They call them the snatchers.”
Shelach Bayit was silent.
“Reb Bayit?”
“Yes?”
“I still don’t understand. Why did they think they had to give these things to me? That’s not what I meant by it.”
“The restaurant, as you mentioned, had switched mostly to liquor by then, and it was the only business open, except for the newsstand. They stock their morning edition around 4 a.m. That is when your man likely staggered out of the bar, quite drunk. He tripped over the curb because he was unsteady, but when he bumped into you on the deserted street he already was convinced you were trying to rob him. That’s why he called out for help. Not because he thought he was about to fall over.”
“Oh. I was trying to help him.”
“I have no doubt you were,” Shelach said. “And let’s think about the words here, which I know you cannot recall precisely. Might we employ some which might fit, as an example?”
He nodded.
“He saw you coming, and he didn’t ask you for help, he called out for it. He expected you to rob him. And he said something like this: ‘What do you want?’”
For those brief seconds, Shelach had sounded exactly like the man in the street.
“Yes.”
“He was afraid. He thought if he could give you what you wanted you would spare his life. And you then said, ‘Give me everything’, or at least that’s what he made of your words. You say he suddenly remembered he had left his children alone and hurried home. I believe it to be more likely he said he had five children at home, or something similar, not because he suddenly remembered this, but because he was, again, hoping you’d spare his life, as he was a father.”
“I…” He didn’t know what to say next.
“Yankel, I know you didn’t mean to rob the man, but … you certainly did.”
“Should I find him and apologize? I need to explain.”
“We should find him, yes. And you should return the money. But as for an apology…”
Yankel was in tears. He was a simple man, but he had a good heart.
“Maimonides says that when an apology will cause more harm, it should not be given. Think about it like this: The man believes he had been robbed. And he was, by his view. You cannot change his experience. All that you could possibly achieve would be to convince him it was not what you meant to do, but it is still what you did. Do you see what I mean? An apology should never be for the one making it. It is not about you feeling better. It is always about the person you hurt. It is for them.”
“I will give him the money back! I have it!”
“And as for the widow…”
Yankel looked ill. He could not even imagine terror the widow must have felt when he had asked her where the necklace was! Shelach, being wise, guided him to a path forward.
“We need to get that necklace. The Man By The River. Do you know where to find him?”
“I think so.”
***
The soldier watched the train as it lumbered toward the setting sun, its steady thrum somehow comforting.
He pictured himself climbing into an open car as it slowed at a junction, seating himself behind a crate of whatever it was they were transporting, and going to sleep. That was the thing he wanted most. A home was too much to wish for. As was a proper bed. But he’d take a quiet corner to rest, alone. Maybe even tend to the wound on his shoulder, find a cleaner section of dressing and rebandage it. He had gone along peacefully with the men who came to his village in hopes of sparing his mother any trouble, but she hadn’t lasted long without him. With her death, he had no one left—his older brother having gone before him, and his father before his brother, leaving nothing but a pocket watch behind.
He had no friends here, no family, yet to go back to what was once his home before he was conscripted seemed pointless. If he were to leave…if…he would need to create a life for himself outside of the army. And his mind was far from settled on that point. Being a civilian had little appeal. Well, to be honest, for Ivan everything seemed to have little appeal. Some soldiers may have claimed the war had brought them good things, but he had received nothing but misfortune and disaster. He had not chosen this life. But he could choose to leave it. One way or another.
He had seen far too much since he was forced to join the regiment. Things he’d give anything to unsee. But the worst of it was how little distress it had caused his fellow soldiers, who should have been true comrades-in-arms. Ivan was convinced if he stayed he would risk losing his soul.
He inhaled, “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God.” He exhaled, “Have mercy on me, a sinner.” He repeated it twice more as he reached into his pocket for a woolen thread with a hundred knots in groups of ten.
“O heavenly King, Paraclete, Spirit of Truth, who art present everywhere and dost permeate all things, Treasury of blessings and giver of life, come and take up Thy dwelling within us. Purify us from every stain and save our souls, O gracious Lord.”
He looked once more at the train, then ran alongside it and, struggling against the pain, pulled himself into a vacant car.
***
When he finally disembarked, Ivan was surprised to see a man approach him on the platform. Was he about to be arrested? No. This was no public official. He wore a short jacket in keeping with the more Germanic of the two dress codes permitted for Jewish males; his white shirt stood out starkly against the darker clothing, neat and trim, topped by a low hat with a very wide brim. The fabric was of high quality, in complete contrast to the ragged child mere steps behind him who wore a long black coat, a fur-trimmed hat, and had his trousers stuck into his tattered boots. They were all a bit too big for him, giving the impression that he was wearing his father’s clothing. As they drew closer, however, Ivan could see that he had misread the situation entirely, for the man was actually closer to a boy—twenty at most—and the ragged child was the older of the two.
“You are from Astrakhan, I perceive,” the young man said in perfect Russian.
“How on earth did you know that?”
He smiled. “Oh, in good time, in good time. First, we have a thief to rob and no weapons with which to do so. Will you help us?” The young man extended his hand and Ivan could see a thin, black leather strap encircling it. He didn’t know what it was exactly, but he’d seen men wearing them before, back home. He wondered if this was some sort of test and shook it without hesitation.
Shelach explained the situation as quickly as possible, with Yankel looking blankly between the two of them, for he spoke Russian about as well as he read German. Not at all.
Soon, Ivan nodded. “I should still like to know how you—”
“Oh, it is quite simple. You have not stared overly-long at my appearance, nor at my friend Yankel’s.”
This was the only word Yankel had understood so far, and he smiled so that the soldier would think he was of a friendly disposition. He trusted Shelach to take care of everything else.
“That means you have seen people of our faith,” Shelach continued. “A large and unrestricted community or one inside The Pale, then. Or perhaps one recently released from it. There are few cities left that are both large and unrestricted. But why should you stay inside The Pale unless you are something other than Russian Orthodox? The visible edge of your chotki, in the style of Eastern Rite Catholics, confirms that you are.”
Ivan straightened his posture at this, as if to challenge any negative comment which might follow.
“It makes no difference to me. Clearly, I am also not Russian Orthodox.” He made a broad gesture down his body and drew back his coat and shirt sleeve to reveal the rest of his tefillin shel yad before quickly and methodically restoring it to its original state. “You are in a Russian uniform with a Russian surname sewn upon it, and though I do rather hate guessing, I would dare to presume the I is for Ivan.”
“It is.”
“This means your parents wanted to give you a Christian name which would not hamper your success. So, Russia proper. And although a location in Russia with a thriving Catholic community leads me initially to Moscow and St. Petersburg by virtue of sheer numbers, they would not have such a visible Jewish population. The obvious choice is Astrakhan and the congregation of the Church of the Assumption of the Holy Virgin Mary, established well over a hundred years ago. Do you follow my chain of logic?”
Who was this man? “Perfectly.”
“Such thoughtful parents were looking forward to your success. They had ambitions. Therefore, it is perhaps not too far of a leap to presume they had undergone some hardships, or they would have bought you out of conscription. Forgive me, but, I fear they are no longer alive. Your father most likely succumbing first, leaving your mother in poverty.”
Ivan looked down, but it was clear Shelach had deduced this correctly.
“That you have traveled west instead of east upon your…”, here Shelach hesitated, “your decision to leave the service … indicates she is also no longer among the living.”
Ivan nodded.
“As for all the rest which naturally follows such a determination, we can discuss it after we return the stolen items. My name is Shelach Bayit. If you help us, I will buy you a train ticket from Chelm to whatever city you wish as payment for your services. Your old battalion will not be able to trace your journey.”
Ivan stared and hoped he did not look as dumbstruck as he felt.
“Rest assured, our task is not only a service worthy of payment, it is the right thing to do.” Here Shelach turned to Yankel. “He will help us,” he said in Yiddish.
***
They waited. Once darkness had engulfed the countryside, Yankel pointed out the path to the river, and Ivan removed his service revolver from its holster. They crept down together with Ivan in front, Shelach close behind, and Yankel in the rear, twisting his cap, fretting. Shelach had replaced his usual hat with a kliyapove hitl and pulled the fur-lined flaps down to keep his ears warm. It might be a long night.
“Do you think he’s sold it already? What if he moved on to the next town? Should we try to get the police to … no, of course not. But, if he—”
Eventually, Shelach turned around and placed his hand over his own mouth to indicate silence, though if it was because they were nearing the camp or if it was because he was growing tired of all the kvetching, who can tell?
They had no reason to worry. Not only was the master thief and fence still there, he was holding the necklace up to the light of a small lamp, perhaps judging its value and considering removing the stones to sell separately.
Shelach rested his hand lightly on Ivan’s good shoulder. “We just want the necklace back,” he whispered. “We are not here to play at being agents of the law.”
The Man By The River put the necklace down and peered into the darkness which surrounded him. Perhaps he heard a snapping branch, or perhaps he had that sixth sense so many people have when they are doing evil things. He reached into his jacket pocket. “Who's out there?” He hesitated just long enough, wondering if it was another thief bringing him more ill-gotten goods under the cover of darkness, for Ivan to send a bullet whizzing past his head to lodge into the tree behind him.
“We only want the necklace,” said Shelach. “It is stolen property and needs to be returned to its owner. Place it on the ground and walk away and no harm shall come to you and you may keep the rest of your horde.”
The man hesitated for the briefest moment, then turned and ran off into the darkness, leaving it amongst a small cache of treasure. True to their word, our heroes took only the necklace and left.
Shelach, by means which are best left unspoken, made sure the necklace would be found by the old widow in the morning upon her kitchen table, and the money by its rightful owner as well. And if they could have read it, both crime victims would have found a short note in Yiddish expressing remorse for the theft.
Yankel thanked them both for their help and Shelach wished him luck on finding his true calling. He stood there for a moment, unsure what to say before Shelach told him there was no need to say anything, really, and he was certain that Yankel would find him again if he needed him. Yankel nodded. “It was a very beautiful church,” he said, and turned back toward his home.
“Well, then,” he said to Ivan.
“Yes. I suppose I should head back to…” his voice trailed into nothingness. “It’s been—”
“There are 613 distinct rules I must follow, but I expect you to follow exactly none of them.”
Ivan wrinkled his brow. “613…?”
“Oh, it’s no burden to me. I think I rather thrive under the structure of it. Even my resting time is prescribed.”
“I see, but—”
“Yes, you may see, but you do not understand. Allow me to explain the relevance. I need to leave the influence of my family, and you need a safe haven. I have my eye on a suite in Bucha Street which would suit us down to the ground. I do keep my kitchen kashrut, so you’d likely follow those rules by default. I wouldn’t burden anyone but myself with the task of preparing meals correctly, so my admittedly limited number of household servants believe me to be a very picky gourmet chef.” He chuckled lightly. “It’s almost true. I did study cooking for a time. There are separate utensils—one set for dairy, one set for meat. Because of the need for me to obtain those meats from selected sources, I will supply both room and board. You don’t mind the occasional lack of bread, I hope? On certain holidays.”
“A modified holiday diet is not new to me. I eat fish at the end of the week throughout Lent myself,” Ivan replied.
“That’s good enough. I generally have many lit candles about, and occasionally do davening … a sort of rocking motion during prayer sessions. Would that annoy you?”
“By no means.”
“Let me see—what are my other shortcomings? Sometimes I will not eat anything for days. And every Friday continuing through Saturday I will not move a muscle from one evening to the next, save to read. I do occasionally play the violin during this time, though I am technically forbidden from doing so. I will take it up with Hashem eventually. I have an excellent argument worked up in favor of it.” He grinned. “And what have you to confess now? It’s just as well for two fellows to know the worst of one another before they begin to live together.”
Ivan laughed. “I intend to keep my service revolver,” he said, “and I object to rows because my nerves are shaken. I’ve been known to attend services at all hours, and I am extremely lazy.”
“So long as you do not include violin-playing in your category of rows.”
“It depends on the player. A well-played violin is a treat for Saint Cecelia herself. A badly-played one—”
“Oh, that’s all right, I think we may consider the thing as settled. We can discuss the particulars on the train to Kiev. What say you?”
Recipient:
acorn_squash Author:
iwantthatcoat Verse:ACD Canon
Characters/Pairings: Sherlock Holmes&John Watson, Mycroft Holmes
Rating: Gen
Warnings: Period and Location-Typical Antisemitism, War References
Summary: It is said that an angel was carrying foolish souls back to heaven for repair. It is also said that an angel was given instructions from G_d to evenly distribute the fools of the world over the Earth. Which one was it? Feh! Do I look that old to you that I should know? Anyway, the point is, the angel’s sack tore open while they were flying over a town called Chelm, and all the fools spilled out. And there they stayed.
An Ashkenazi Sherlock Holmes tale…
You’ve started this story expecting a mystery, no? And why shouldn’t you? That’s what Holmestice is all about. The Mods look at the offers and at the requests and they hope, with some work and some luck, that they will match up well—just like any good shadchanit does. But I forget myself. You probably don’t know what a shadchanit is, and to spare you the hassle of googling every other sentence, I promise to stick to English, im yirtzeh Hashem. (Okay, that didn’t count. Starting … now.)
Anyway, once the matches are made and posted and we all start reading, we are right to expect a story with some meat on its bones—a puzzle worthy of being solved by the great detective, Sherlock Holmes. Or, maybe Gregory House. Or maybe Shirley Holmes, if you are so inclined. But I bet you weren’t expecting Shelach Bayit. No. That is as unexpected as the Spanish Inquisition (which, in fact, wasn’t unexpected at all, being that they always issued an Edict of Grace a month before they burned you at the stake). But here you are. About to read a Shelach Bayit story. The first one ever written. And as you’ve already put in the effort to read nearly two full paragraphs, surely you can try just one more to see if you like this sort of thing. Or maybe you’ve already had enough and want to stop here. That’s fine. I won’t judge.
Shelach Bayit: the wisest of the wise throughout The Pale and far beyond. Maybe you’ve heard the story of the Athenian and His One-Eyed Slave? No? Well, an Athenian was returning home from Jerusalem and bought a slave to assist him in his travels. The seller had assured him that even though he lacked an eye, he more than made up for it with his remarkable cleverness. A sort of Columbo of the Ancient World, if you will. So, as soon as they left the city, the slave advised his master to hurry and join up with the party ahead of them. No travelers could be seen along the sparsely-vegitated stretch of desert, so the Athenian asked his slave to tell him more about this supposed group of travellers. The slave provided him with a detailed description: the party included a one-eyed female camel, pregnant with twins, who was bearing a pack filled with wine on one side and a pack filled with vinegar on the other. They were less than four miles out.
The Athenian, shocked by the level of detail, asked how he had arrived at these conclusions. The lowly Jewish slave replied, “That the animal is one-eyed you can see from the way it grazed from only one side of the road. The imprint of the twins in her belly is visible here, where she has crouched on the ground. The liquid cargo has dripped, the wine absorbing into the sand while the vinegar still bubbles on the surface. And everyone knows that camel tracks are no longer discernible beyond a distance of four miles.”
Shelach Bayit makes that guy look like an idiot.
For one, Shelach Bayit could probably have found camel tracks at least six miles off, though to be fair he had the aid of a hand lens while the best the slave could have done at that time was to use a curved emerald, like the Emperor Nero did to watch gladiator fights … and let’s face it—if he had a giant emerald lying around, he probably wouldn’t have been a slave. And for two, he would have found a way to have obtained his freedom before the trip even started. How? I don’t know. I’m not Shelach Bayit. I don’t know how he would have managed it, but I do know he would have. You can’t expect me to just make up stories like that.
But I can tell them.
And this one happens right at the start of it all, while he was still young and not yet famous. Even before he … Well, I’ll just start already, shall I?
Now you may have heard of Chelm, but if not, I will tell you plain and simple; it is a village of fools. To find the dimmest of them would be a difficult task indeed, for it was a place where every dunderhead and shlemiel in the Russian Empire was inexplicably drawn. The village idiot, if they even saw value in such a term, was, in a moment of surprising perspicacity, deemed to be the oldest of them, for that person had been an idiot for the longest time. If he had instead been determined by merit, Yankel was, perhaps, the worst of a bad lot. And so it was that Yankel, just before he had become a rabbi and married the beautiful Rivkah (a tale for another day) and just after he had become a thief, had tried his luck at becoming a detective.
That went just as well as one might expect, by which I mean not well at all. Upon hitting an unsolvable case (his first one, in fact) he walked a full day to Katerynosláv to send a telegraph to a well-known rabbi in England, asking for help.
Rav Hermann Adler was known far and wide both for his tireless effort to help Jews who had managed to leave places like Chelm adjust to London’s East End and for his friendly meetings with other faith leaders, discouraging antisemitism. It was said that during a lunch with British Catholic Cardinal Herbert Vaughan, the cardinal asked the rabbi, "Now, Dr. Adler, when may I have the pleasure of helping you to some ham?" The rabbi had responded, "Most certainly. At Your Eminence's wedding." Such a man … such a man could solve any problem.
Yankel was a fool, yes, but he wasn’t stupid. He knew Rav Adler was unlikely to travel to their little village from so far away for a trifling matter of petty theft. And while Dr. Adler spoke so eloquently on the struggles of their people in Britain, he was said to have had little experience or patience with the turmoil and tribulations of life in Eastern Europe, and thought it a noisy, untidy sort of piety.
Yankel was nervous. Perhaps there was some truth to this. Certainly Chelm was nothing like Minsk, for example, with its fancy theatres and its library and its paved streets. In fact the whole of Galicia, what would now be Eastern Poland and Western Ukraine, of which Chelm was only a small part, didn’t have what one might call a stellar reputation. The Litvaks to the north thought Galitzianers were irrational and uneducated and they, in turn, thought the Litvaks were as soulless as a toaster and not half as warm.
Dr. Adler and his father before him had seen Jewish freedom steadily expand in England to include the ability to engage in retail trade inside the capitol, join fully in the legal profession, and hold civil and military office. Such equality was still a dream for the people of Chelm. Their equivalent of “holding military office” was conscription into the Russian army at the age of 12 instead of 18 like the Russians. It was believed that by preventing Bar Mitzvah and contact with their parents during the teen years, the young men would be “Russofied.” An advisor to the czar had suggested that one third of the Jews should be starved, one third driven from the country, and one third baptized. Forbidden to own their own property, or even to settle on rented parcels of the rich agricultural land outside of their clusters of small towns, land where the wheat grew strong and tall, Chelm was nothing but hungry tailors, bakers, peddlers, and small store owners. Would a great man such as this ever journey inside the Pale of Settlement? No. But perhaps … perhaps he might offer Yankel some advice.
***
Now where was I?
Oh, yes, Yankel had walked a full day to Katerynosláv.
He walked up to the counter of the telegraph office with three messages, one scrawled in Yiddish which he had dictated to his rabbi (as Yankel, and indeed most of Chelm’s residents, could write no more than a few words at best), one in Polish written with the assistance of the local tax collector, and one in German aided by the fishmonger. No one spoke English. It would cost three times as much to send, but he didn’t know which language the good rabbi could read, and it simply did not occur to him that the Chief Rabbi of the British Empire, Commander of the Royal Victorian Order, might have better access to a translator than Yankel himself.
Yankel took a seat on the hard, wooden bench at the telegraph office and waited for the old woman in front of him, bundled against the coming onslaught of winter, to finish collecting a parcel.
He approached the counter and pushed the three notes forward with tattered gloves. The telegraph operator spoke to him in Yiddish. “You wish to send these to Dr. Hermann Adler, London, England?”
“Yes.”
The operator looked at Yankel again, then shrugged and began his work.
Yankel paid the fee and sat down once more on the bench in hopes of a quick response. He did not have long to wait. The man gestured for Yankel to come to the counter and handed him the reply.
“THE MAN YOU WANT IS SHELACH BAYIT STOP IF YOUR CASE IS OF INTEREST HE WILL WAIVE HIS FEE STOP IF IT IS NOT NO PRICE CAN ENTICE HIM STOP HE IS IN KIEV”
Yankel looked puzzled, for two reasons. The first was he had no idea what the telegraph actually said. The second was, given what he did recognize—a name and the city of Kiev, and the words “man”, “want”, and “price”—it simply made no sense. Or rather, the words made sense separately, but not together. Shelach Bayit was a Hebrew name. Of this he was certain. Kiev was outside of the boundaries of Jewish settlement. Of this he was also certain. The rest was probably just filler, thanking him for thinking of him but he was a very busy man and couldn’t possibly help with his little problem and so on, but that didn’t matter. The rabbi had given the name of someone who could help, and a location where that man could not possibly be. It was written in Yiddish. Someone wiser than he would explain things. Hopefully.
On his walk back home, he tried not to think of the nonsensical telegraph, and instead reviewed the case. The town’s blacksmith had been robbed the night before. An elderly woman had been as well.
It just so happened that on that night Yankel had been too anxious to sleep. Every profession he had tried had ended in utter failure, and his grandmother, who he had been taking care of, seemed to actually have been taking care of him all this time. He paced in his room, and she was awoken by the creaking of the floorboards. Feeling even more guilty about his failures, for he had just added ‘failure to walk quietly’ to the list, Yankel had decided to pace outside instead.
Nearly everyone in Chelm was poor, or so it seemed. A few still clung to a precious heirloom from better times, but money itself—cold, hard cash—was a rarity. With everyone in a similar situation, town beggar was a vacant position, and as he walked along the business district in Chelm, Yankel thought he’d try it on for size.
He had done fairly well that night, as a man he had met who had also been wandering the street in his restlessness had given him quite a few coins.
When news of the theft finally made its way to Yankel, his first thought was: perhaps I can solve this mystery? His second thought was: perhaps I could be a detective! His third thought was: could I go around solving crimes? And his fourth thought was: How difficult could it be? He didn’t know. He hadn’t tried it yet. Yankel was filled with optimism.
He had been all around the town on the night of the robberies, driven by his lack of a future, and during that time he had seen nothing at all suspicious. He had even stopped by the home of one of the robbery victims earlier that evening while on his new beggar’s beat. It was the old widow whose husband had been a successful grain merchant, the richest person in town. She had given him a fine necklace which he thought maybe he could sell for a good price, or trade for some new shoes.
The blacksmith (who hadn't mentioned it at first, maybe he felt embarrassed he hadn’t punched out the burglar) and the old widow (who mentioned it right away while gathering water the following morning) were in shock, but apart from that, doing well. Yankel went straightaway to visit the man, who seemed unable to provide him with any details. Then he went to visit the woman, and the exact same thing happened.
There must be some trick to it, thought Yankel. What I need is to find an expert and ask him questions. The wisest man I can find. Even Yankel knew wise men were in short supply in Chelm. He had heard of a very wise rabbi in London and decided to send him a telegraph asking for help. “How exactly does one solve crimes?”
So now we are all caught up, yes? Yankel the Beggar decides to become Yankel the Detective. And he is told to seek out Shelach Bayit.
Kiev is a half day's journey by train. Not particularly expensive, except for a man who has nothing. But now, Yankel had some coins. He looked at them, then looked at the cupboard, then looked at the train schedule, then looked at the cupboard again. Then he remembered that Shelach Bayit couldn’t possibly be in Kiev anyway. He wouldn’t be allowed to live in the city. He went to his rabbi for advice.
The rabbi looked carefully at the telegraph. “I have heard of this happening,” he said. “If you are a very important man, you can live anywhere you choose. This must be such a man.”
Yankel hung his head in despair. Asking for help was one thing. Someone important traveling all the way from Kiev to Chelm was quite another. He had intended to visit Kiev himself someday. It would be the journey of a lifetime! The beautiful buildings! The parks along the Dnieper! But he could not afford such a trip. Maybe it would be better if he just gave up his newfound career as a detective and went back to being a beggar before that vacancy was filled by someone else.
***
“Mishka… I will soon be traveling to Chelm.”
Shelach had taken to calling him Mishka (A nickname for Mikhail meant for children. It translates to baby bear.) His brother simply refused to call him Mikhail—his name for over a decade. Switching from his birth name of Mykhalio to Mikhail had been a practical move. Easier to pronounce. Easier to remember. (This was just before name-changing for Jews became illegal.) His star was on the rise in the Russian government, and soon he would become indispensable. Then, for all Shelach’s veiled accusations of turning his back on his heritage to chase success, he would become like Esther, who changed her name from Hadassah to become Queen of Persia but never once forgot her duty to her people. He would work his way into the Duma and abolish The Pale altogether. (The first thing he would eventually do. The second thing, not so much.)
Once Mikhail was making policy, he could influence things for the better. Not by flitting around from school to school, dropping careers like a hot latke, like someone he knew. Wasting his gifts with idleness. No, not exactly idleness. Shelach traveled a great deal during his short-lived academic pursuits, and in spite of the not-so-subtle prodding, he had no moral dilemma with making the most of Mikhail’s diplomatic connections in order to obtain a special permit to live in the great city of Kiev, instead of being banished to the backwaters of the Empire.
Mikhail accepted the new nickname with limited grace. His little brother could call him whatever he liked. It made no difference; he would always be the more mature sibling. And to act as if it was bothersome would only serve to encourage him. And thinking it over, maybe he should make a bigger deal out of it, even if keeping the peace was in his nature just as much as disturbing it was in Shelach’s. A bit more conflict might just be what Shelach needed to leave Mikhail’s comfy apartment and strike out on his own. The dear boy was wise beyond his years, but lacked ambition.
“Why would you want to go to Chelm? Why would anyone want to go to Chelm? Who summoned you? I would think no one in Chelm capable of writing anything aside from their own name.”
“I’ve not been summoned yet. I have received a telegraph from Dr. Hermann Adler.”
Mikhail waited. His brother did like to be dramatic, and sometimes Mikhail prefered to simply say nothing, knowing that Shelach would find the silence maddening.
“The Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth. In London,” Shelach continued, raising his eyebrows and leaning forward.
Mikhail poured some tea into the glass within his ornate silver holder and waited.
“He told me a man named Yankel from Chelm might be requesting my services.”
Ah. There it was. No. He would wait just a bit longer. He held back a few choice words about a visit to the Paylishe Yidn in favor of continued silence. That’s an insult, by the way. I’d use English, but I can’t. (Just suffice to know that Galitzianers and Litvaks have conflict over more than just how to season their gefilte fish.)
“As a consulting detective,” Shelach concluded.
Mikhail dropped a sugar cube in his tea, held a second one in place between his teeth, and began to drink. This little hobby of Shelach’s was turning into something after all. A few dignitaries had used him to track down a stolen jewel or two and now someone in England with a direct line to the Crown had heard of him.
“Congratulations,” he said.
“Thank you.”
“Will you wait for this telegraph then?”
Shelach was silent for some time. “Hmm. How far is it to Chelm?” he finally asked, trying to sound casual.
“I see all your studying has little bearing upon your knowledge of geography. Between 200 and 300 miles.”
Shelach frowned. Both he and Mikhail knew there was little chance of this Yankel making it into Kiev for a “consultation”, but there was also very little chance of his extending an actual invitation to Shelach. The telegraph would probably never come. The problem would never reach him, like ripe berries snatched up by the birds before the harvest. No. More like those berries rotting on the ground uneaten. No one in his right mind would send a telegraph to a stranger in anticipation of him making such a journey. And less than no one would take it upon himself to go fetch the person. But you and I know something that both Shelach and Mikhail did not. Yankel was not in his right mind. Yankel, remember, was a fool.
***
How Yankel found Shelach in a city as big as Kiev, I don't know. I think he went to the tallest building, for that was surely where the important people would live. It was a good plan for a fool. Of course the tallest building in the city was the Lavra Bell Tower, which measured 316 feet—if you included the cross on top. Perhaps he broke down at the base of the church and wept at his situation, hundreds of miles from home and lost. And perhaps one of the street urchins Shelach occasionally employed to get information, street urchins who gathered in places visitors would frequent in order to beg them for spare change—places like the tallest bell tower in what would eventually become Ukraine-Rus, then The Ukraine, and finally just regular old Ukraine—saw him weeping and asked what was wrong. And perhaps he said, “I am looking for Shelach Bayit and cannot find him.” Or perhaps not. As I said, I don’t know.
How he paid for the trip, that I do know. He sold the necklace.
He couldn’t just sell it at the shop on the corner. What woman would want to wear a necklace the whole village saw someone else wearing in shul every week? No one would tell the new owner how the blue jewels really brought out the color of their eyes, or that the golden scrollwork was delicate, yet imposing. “That looks just like the grain merchant’s widow’s necklace!” they’d say. And what would you say to that? Even a fool knows that much. So he sold it to The Man By The River.
The Man By The River has no name, so the police will never track him down. He comes and he goes, wandering from town to town, collecting things people don’t want to keep. The Man By The River doesn’t ask questions.
So The Man By The River gave Yankel some coins for the necklace. Nowhere near what it was worth, of course. And Yankel bought a ticket from Chelm to Kiev.
***
When they met at last, Yankel had given a brief account of the victims and their losses, and Shelach wasted no time in asking questions.
“Tell me all you saw on the night of the robberies. Start from when you decided to go out for a walk.” He touched his fingertips together and perched them beneath his chin.
“I got up and couldn’t go back to sleep.”
“What caused you to wake up? Was there a noise?”
“No. Not that I remember. I just was worried.”
“About what?”
“About how I have no profession. No way to care for my grandmother. She’s all I have left. So I thought, since I was awake anyway, I’d go for a walk.” Yankel paused. “No. No, first I started pacing around my bedroom trying to think of what I should do. The … the floorboards were creaking, and that woke her up.”
“Has that woken her up in the past?”
“I don’t usually pace quite so much. I don’t think so.”
“And so you decided to go out.”
“Yes.”
“What time was it?”
“I … I didn’t check. Late. It was very quiet.”
“Did you bundle up? It must be as cold there as it is in Kiev. Were you wearing your night clothes?”
“Yes, I changed into my street clothes and put on the warmest socks I could find and my leather boots. I took my long wool coat and my scarf and wrapped it around my head and then across my face to keep out the wind. Then I put on my gloves.”
“And did you carry anything with you?”
Yankel paused. “I think I took my satchel with me out of habit. I usually take it with me when I run errands.” So many questions, thought Yankel. I could never think of this many questions. I don't think I would make a good detective after all.
“Where did you go?”
“Down the main street that cuts through the town.”
“Describe the route.”
“I … don’t remember.” His eyes grew watery and he sniffed. The pressure was a bit much for poor Yankel.
Shelach softened his voice. “It’s fine, Yankel. Let’s try it this way. Close your eyes and imagine you are closing your front door and headed outside. Picture it in your mind. Can you do that?”
Yankel nodded, eyes scrunched shut.
“Good. Good. So you shut the door and turn to face the street. Which way do you go?”
“To the right.”
“Good. And what stores do you pass? Can you see the lights on in any of the windows?”
“The grocers is closed and it’s dark. Next is the tailor and the same thing. The restaurant is open. Late at night it’s more like a bar. It’s loud. Then there’s a store I don’t know. I think it’s a ladies shop? Hats. They sell fancy hats. Then there’s a newspaper stand and some people are stacking boxes next to it.”
“The morning edition out of Katerynosláv. Well, that establishes the time for us.” Did it? Yankel supposed that was a good thing.
“And that’s when I saw the man,” added Yankel.
“What man?”
“The man who gave me the coins. I was walking and I decided maybe I would try to beg for money. I hadn’t done that yet. Maybe I'd be good at it?”
“So you saw a man.”
“Yes. And … well no. I didn’t see him. I bumped into him. Not very hard, but he almost fell over.”
Shelach leaned forward. The motion stretched his frame, making his body seem even more lean than it already was. “Pray continue. Where did you put the coins?”
“In my satchel. They were already in a small cloth bag.”
“And then?”
“Then I decided I would give this whole beggar thing a try again tomorrow, so I went back home.”
Shelach grinned as if he knew something Yankel didn’t. Yankel relaxed. That was more in keeping with the world as he knew it. “Did you go back the same way you came?” Shelach asked.
“No, there was a cart in the way. I think it was the same one that brought the newspapers. And there was horse poop in the street, so I went to the other side. I passed the widow’s house.”
“The one who reported the robbery?”
“Yes. And the light was on. The only place still lit up on the whole street except for the restaurant. So I thought I’d check in on her.”
“And she gave you her necklace?”
“Yes. And then I went home.” It didn’t occur to Yankel he had never mentioned being given a necklace as tzedakah (that means an act of charity).
“Do you, by any chance, remember what you said to the good lady? Or to the man in the street?”
“Well, not really. I was trying out my new beggar speech.”
“Try to remember some of it, if you can.”
Yankel paused and wrinkled his brow. He hadn’t thought this hard in a long time. Maybe ever. “The man tripped on the curb. And he asked me for some help so I ran over to steady him. Then he asked me what I wanted and I said, ‘What is there I don’t want? I am in want of everything!’ But really I didn’t feel like a person should expect to get anything just for helping someone in the street! He gave me a bag of coins anyway. Then he remembered his children were home alone and hurried off. It went well, I think. A lot easier than this detective job of yours. I can’t see how someone could solve such a puzzle.”
“And yet, I have.”
“You have? But you haven’t even been to the scene of the crime!” Yankel cleared his throat and tried to sound stately. “You are indeed the most brilliant of men!”
“And can you not recall so much as a single word of the exchange between you and the widow?”
“I’m sorry. I don’t remember any of it.”
“Yankel, allow me to recreate the scene at the widow’s house.” He spread his hands wide as if opening a curtain to characters onstage. “You see her light is on and you go inside. The widow is still wearing the same dress from the evening service. She is awake, perhaps reading a novel. You ask her…”
“I asked her where her lovely necklace was, yes! I think she must have just removed it. She took it from the table and gave it to me, and then she asked me to leave. She must have been tired after all.”
“Yes. So she said something like, ‘Please go?’, am I correct?”
“Something like that, yes. And I said I was sorry for disturbing her, and I left.”
“Friend Yankel, you had robbed two people on that night. Do you think they would recognize your voice? Would they know it was you?”
“What? No! I—”
“Don’t fret. If you have the necklace and the coins we can still make it right. Do you have them under your floorboard?”
“How did you know about the floorboard?” One should never purposely disclose one’s best hiding place. Not even to a detective.
“I suppose I owe you an explanation before you assign to me some sort of mystical power. You seemed reluctant to discuss the loose boards, and it would be an ideal spot to conceal the coins and the necklace for a little while, as you were still working out a way to explain your new career as a beggar to your grandmother.”
Shelach needn’t have bothered. Yankel was far too amazed to be superstitious. “I still have the coins,” he explained. “I was going to give them to her when she went to the market on Tuesday.”
“And the necklace?”
“I sold it. To The Man By The River. He frightened me, Reb Bayit. I should not want to go back alone.”
“Then you shall not. That man is likely a wanted thief with many crimes against him. But we shall go. Only to seek the return of the necklace. I am no policeman.”
“Nor am I. Yet. Though a beggar does not seem to me like a good profession any longer. I’ve no wish to steal, even by accident.”
“No indeed. We may need some help. We shall see what kind we get, im yirtzeh Hashem.” (Oh, that means G_d willing. Sorry about that.)
So they left on the train together, from Kiev back to Chelm. With Yankel sleeping, and occasionally praying, for he had had a difficult day indeed. And with Shelach Bayit quietly making notes in his journal of cases, then ordering snacks for them both, and then reading a pocket version containing sections of Mishneh Torah followed by the newspaper he’d gotten during a brief stop at Ternopil. They passed a troop encampment, and he peered through the window with great interest.
“Do soldiers come through town often?” Shelach asked.
“They camp nearby. Sometimes we offer them some food. The rabbi says a man who is given may be less likely to take. Many from our own village have been taken away by the army to fill the empty space when a rich man pays to spare his sons. They call them the snatchers.”
Shelach Bayit was silent.
“Reb Bayit?”
“Yes?”
“I still don’t understand. Why did they think they had to give these things to me? That’s not what I meant by it.”
“The restaurant, as you mentioned, had switched mostly to liquor by then, and it was the only business open, except for the newsstand. They stock their morning edition around 4 a.m. That is when your man likely staggered out of the bar, quite drunk. He tripped over the curb because he was unsteady, but when he bumped into you on the deserted street he already was convinced you were trying to rob him. That’s why he called out for help. Not because he thought he was about to fall over.”
“Oh. I was trying to help him.”
“I have no doubt you were,” Shelach said. “And let’s think about the words here, which I know you cannot recall precisely. Might we employ some which might fit, as an example?”
He nodded.
“He saw you coming, and he didn’t ask you for help, he called out for it. He expected you to rob him. And he said something like this: ‘What do you want?’”
For those brief seconds, Shelach had sounded exactly like the man in the street.
“Yes.”
“He was afraid. He thought if he could give you what you wanted you would spare his life. And you then said, ‘Give me everything’, or at least that’s what he made of your words. You say he suddenly remembered he had left his children alone and hurried home. I believe it to be more likely he said he had five children at home, or something similar, not because he suddenly remembered this, but because he was, again, hoping you’d spare his life, as he was a father.”
“I…” He didn’t know what to say next.
“Yankel, I know you didn’t mean to rob the man, but … you certainly did.”
“Should I find him and apologize? I need to explain.”
“We should find him, yes. And you should return the money. But as for an apology…”
Yankel was in tears. He was a simple man, but he had a good heart.
“Maimonides says that when an apology will cause more harm, it should not be given. Think about it like this: The man believes he had been robbed. And he was, by his view. You cannot change his experience. All that you could possibly achieve would be to convince him it was not what you meant to do, but it is still what you did. Do you see what I mean? An apology should never be for the one making it. It is not about you feeling better. It is always about the person you hurt. It is for them.”
“I will give him the money back! I have it!”
“And as for the widow…”
Yankel looked ill. He could not even imagine terror the widow must have felt when he had asked her where the necklace was! Shelach, being wise, guided him to a path forward.
“We need to get that necklace. The Man By The River. Do you know where to find him?”
“I think so.”
***
The soldier watched the train as it lumbered toward the setting sun, its steady thrum somehow comforting.
He pictured himself climbing into an open car as it slowed at a junction, seating himself behind a crate of whatever it was they were transporting, and going to sleep. That was the thing he wanted most. A home was too much to wish for. As was a proper bed. But he’d take a quiet corner to rest, alone. Maybe even tend to the wound on his shoulder, find a cleaner section of dressing and rebandage it. He had gone along peacefully with the men who came to his village in hopes of sparing his mother any trouble, but she hadn’t lasted long without him. With her death, he had no one left—his older brother having gone before him, and his father before his brother, leaving nothing but a pocket watch behind.
He had no friends here, no family, yet to go back to what was once his home before he was conscripted seemed pointless. If he were to leave…if…he would need to create a life for himself outside of the army. And his mind was far from settled on that point. Being a civilian had little appeal. Well, to be honest, for Ivan everything seemed to have little appeal. Some soldiers may have claimed the war had brought them good things, but he had received nothing but misfortune and disaster. He had not chosen this life. But he could choose to leave it. One way or another.
He had seen far too much since he was forced to join the regiment. Things he’d give anything to unsee. But the worst of it was how little distress it had caused his fellow soldiers, who should have been true comrades-in-arms. Ivan was convinced if he stayed he would risk losing his soul.
He inhaled, “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God.” He exhaled, “Have mercy on me, a sinner.” He repeated it twice more as he reached into his pocket for a woolen thread with a hundred knots in groups of ten.
“O heavenly King, Paraclete, Spirit of Truth, who art present everywhere and dost permeate all things, Treasury of blessings and giver of life, come and take up Thy dwelling within us. Purify us from every stain and save our souls, O gracious Lord.”
He looked once more at the train, then ran alongside it and, struggling against the pain, pulled himself into a vacant car.
***
When he finally disembarked, Ivan was surprised to see a man approach him on the platform. Was he about to be arrested? No. This was no public official. He wore a short jacket in keeping with the more Germanic of the two dress codes permitted for Jewish males; his white shirt stood out starkly against the darker clothing, neat and trim, topped by a low hat with a very wide brim. The fabric was of high quality, in complete contrast to the ragged child mere steps behind him who wore a long black coat, a fur-trimmed hat, and had his trousers stuck into his tattered boots. They were all a bit too big for him, giving the impression that he was wearing his father’s clothing. As they drew closer, however, Ivan could see that he had misread the situation entirely, for the man was actually closer to a boy—twenty at most—and the ragged child was the older of the two.
“You are from Astrakhan, I perceive,” the young man said in perfect Russian.
“How on earth did you know that?”
He smiled. “Oh, in good time, in good time. First, we have a thief to rob and no weapons with which to do so. Will you help us?” The young man extended his hand and Ivan could see a thin, black leather strap encircling it. He didn’t know what it was exactly, but he’d seen men wearing them before, back home. He wondered if this was some sort of test and shook it without hesitation.
Shelach explained the situation as quickly as possible, with Yankel looking blankly between the two of them, for he spoke Russian about as well as he read German. Not at all.
Soon, Ivan nodded. “I should still like to know how you—”
“Oh, it is quite simple. You have not stared overly-long at my appearance, nor at my friend Yankel’s.”
This was the only word Yankel had understood so far, and he smiled so that the soldier would think he was of a friendly disposition. He trusted Shelach to take care of everything else.
“That means you have seen people of our faith,” Shelach continued. “A large and unrestricted community or one inside The Pale, then. Or perhaps one recently released from it. There are few cities left that are both large and unrestricted. But why should you stay inside The Pale unless you are something other than Russian Orthodox? The visible edge of your chotki, in the style of Eastern Rite Catholics, confirms that you are.”
Ivan straightened his posture at this, as if to challenge any negative comment which might follow.
“It makes no difference to me. Clearly, I am also not Russian Orthodox.” He made a broad gesture down his body and drew back his coat and shirt sleeve to reveal the rest of his tefillin shel yad before quickly and methodically restoring it to its original state. “You are in a Russian uniform with a Russian surname sewn upon it, and though I do rather hate guessing, I would dare to presume the I is for Ivan.”
“It is.”
“This means your parents wanted to give you a Christian name which would not hamper your success. So, Russia proper. And although a location in Russia with a thriving Catholic community leads me initially to Moscow and St. Petersburg by virtue of sheer numbers, they would not have such a visible Jewish population. The obvious choice is Astrakhan and the congregation of the Church of the Assumption of the Holy Virgin Mary, established well over a hundred years ago. Do you follow my chain of logic?”
Who was this man? “Perfectly.”
“Such thoughtful parents were looking forward to your success. They had ambitions. Therefore, it is perhaps not too far of a leap to presume they had undergone some hardships, or they would have bought you out of conscription. Forgive me, but, I fear they are no longer alive. Your father most likely succumbing first, leaving your mother in poverty.”
Ivan looked down, but it was clear Shelach had deduced this correctly.
“That you have traveled west instead of east upon your…”, here Shelach hesitated, “your decision to leave the service … indicates she is also no longer among the living.”
Ivan nodded.
“As for all the rest which naturally follows such a determination, we can discuss it after we return the stolen items. My name is Shelach Bayit. If you help us, I will buy you a train ticket from Chelm to whatever city you wish as payment for your services. Your old battalion will not be able to trace your journey.”
Ivan stared and hoped he did not look as dumbstruck as he felt.
“Rest assured, our task is not only a service worthy of payment, it is the right thing to do.” Here Shelach turned to Yankel. “He will help us,” he said in Yiddish.
***
They waited. Once darkness had engulfed the countryside, Yankel pointed out the path to the river, and Ivan removed his service revolver from its holster. They crept down together with Ivan in front, Shelach close behind, and Yankel in the rear, twisting his cap, fretting. Shelach had replaced his usual hat with a kliyapove hitl and pulled the fur-lined flaps down to keep his ears warm. It might be a long night.
“Do you think he’s sold it already? What if he moved on to the next town? Should we try to get the police to … no, of course not. But, if he—”
Eventually, Shelach turned around and placed his hand over his own mouth to indicate silence, though if it was because they were nearing the camp or if it was because he was growing tired of all the kvetching, who can tell?
They had no reason to worry. Not only was the master thief and fence still there, he was holding the necklace up to the light of a small lamp, perhaps judging its value and considering removing the stones to sell separately.
Shelach rested his hand lightly on Ivan’s good shoulder. “We just want the necklace back,” he whispered. “We are not here to play at being agents of the law.”
The Man By The River put the necklace down and peered into the darkness which surrounded him. Perhaps he heard a snapping branch, or perhaps he had that sixth sense so many people have when they are doing evil things. He reached into his jacket pocket. “Who's out there?” He hesitated just long enough, wondering if it was another thief bringing him more ill-gotten goods under the cover of darkness, for Ivan to send a bullet whizzing past his head to lodge into the tree behind him.
“We only want the necklace,” said Shelach. “It is stolen property and needs to be returned to its owner. Place it on the ground and walk away and no harm shall come to you and you may keep the rest of your horde.”
The man hesitated for the briefest moment, then turned and ran off into the darkness, leaving it amongst a small cache of treasure. True to their word, our heroes took only the necklace and left.
Shelach, by means which are best left unspoken, made sure the necklace would be found by the old widow in the morning upon her kitchen table, and the money by its rightful owner as well. And if they could have read it, both crime victims would have found a short note in Yiddish expressing remorse for the theft.
Yankel thanked them both for their help and Shelach wished him luck on finding his true calling. He stood there for a moment, unsure what to say before Shelach told him there was no need to say anything, really, and he was certain that Yankel would find him again if he needed him. Yankel nodded. “It was a very beautiful church,” he said, and turned back toward his home.
“Well, then,” he said to Ivan.
“Yes. I suppose I should head back to…” his voice trailed into nothingness. “It’s been—”
“There are 613 distinct rules I must follow, but I expect you to follow exactly none of them.”
Ivan wrinkled his brow. “613…?”
“Oh, it’s no burden to me. I think I rather thrive under the structure of it. Even my resting time is prescribed.”
“I see, but—”
“Yes, you may see, but you do not understand. Allow me to explain the relevance. I need to leave the influence of my family, and you need a safe haven. I have my eye on a suite in Bucha Street which would suit us down to the ground. I do keep my kitchen kashrut, so you’d likely follow those rules by default. I wouldn’t burden anyone but myself with the task of preparing meals correctly, so my admittedly limited number of household servants believe me to be a very picky gourmet chef.” He chuckled lightly. “It’s almost true. I did study cooking for a time. There are separate utensils—one set for dairy, one set for meat. Because of the need for me to obtain those meats from selected sources, I will supply both room and board. You don’t mind the occasional lack of bread, I hope? On certain holidays.”
“A modified holiday diet is not new to me. I eat fish at the end of the week throughout Lent myself,” Ivan replied.
“That’s good enough. I generally have many lit candles about, and occasionally do davening … a sort of rocking motion during prayer sessions. Would that annoy you?”
“By no means.”
“Let me see—what are my other shortcomings? Sometimes I will not eat anything for days. And every Friday continuing through Saturday I will not move a muscle from one evening to the next, save to read. I do occasionally play the violin during this time, though I am technically forbidden from doing so. I will take it up with Hashem eventually. I have an excellent argument worked up in favor of it.” He grinned. “And what have you to confess now? It’s just as well for two fellows to know the worst of one another before they begin to live together.”
Ivan laughed. “I intend to keep my service revolver,” he said, “and I object to rows because my nerves are shaken. I’ve been known to attend services at all hours, and I am extremely lazy.”
“So long as you do not include violin-playing in your category of rows.”
“It depends on the player. A well-played violin is a treat for Saint Cecelia herself. A badly-played one—”
“Oh, that’s all right, I think we may consider the thing as settled. We can discuss the particulars on the train to Kiev. What say you?”
