Read The Ministry of Special Cases Online
Authors: Nathan Englander
The Ministry of Special Cases (44 page)
Kaddish craned his neck, looking with her. Again he pointed. “Come,” he said. “Come see.”
Lillian did not move and Kaddish did not try to lead her. The only noise was the broken exhalation as she let out, in a thousand steps, her breath.
“A mother knows,” Lillian said. “A mother knows her own son and when he is near. I’ve no idea what you’ve got out there, Kaddish, but I’ll swear on my life that they’re not Pato’s bones. If they’re another man’s, God help you. Take them and do what you need to set yourself right.”
Kaddish nodded. Kaddish understood.
He backed away from his wife, keeping his eyes on her as long as he could, and then the door closed in front of him. Kaddish picked up the sack from where he’d left it and started down those stairs, two bodies descending. He didn’t bother with the hallway light. He knew every step.
This was indeed the best time for the cemetery, and the plot next to his mother’s belonged to One-Eye. There was a lovely stone on it and Kaddish had already chipped away the name. A chisel works both ways, he figured. He could add another just the same. As for the bones, there’d be plenty of space alongside One-Eye’s. The old man always was a good sport. Kaddish was sure he wouldn’t mind.
In the house, Lillian stood with her back to the door. She let out a long slow wail and, for the first time in a long time, she let herself cry. She cried about Kaddish and the bones, about the fortune she’d never muster, and about the priest’s call she knew would never come. When she was done, she wiped her face on her sleeve and made her way to the chair by the window. She sat down and settled in. She set her gaze on the corner Pato would come around. And as she did every night, Lillian thought, He will turn.
The author gratefully acknowledges the support of the Bard Fiction Prize, the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, and the Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers at the New York Public Library. Over the years, there were many people whose kindness and wisdom were invaluable to the completion of this book. A sincere thank you to all of them; and to Jordan Pavlin and Nicole Aragi, thank you for your ceaseless dedication. The following sources proved helpful during the writing of the novel:
Nunca Más
, The Report of the Argentine National Commission on the Disappeared;
A Lexicon of Terror
by Marguerite Feitlowitz;
The Flight
by Horacio Verbitsky;
The Disappeared and the Mothers of the Plaza
by John Simpson and Jana Bennett;
Circle of Love Over Death
by Matilde Mellibovsky;
Prostitution and Prejudice
by Edward J. Bristow;
Sex and Danger in Buenos Aires
by Donna J. Guy;
Making the Body Beautiful
by Sander L. Gilman;
Seven Nights
by Jorge Luis Borges; the article “The Gray Zone” from
The New Yorker
, by Seymour M. Hersh; and the testimony of survivors and relatives of
desaparecidos
at the Foreign Ministry in Jerusalem in March 2001.
FIRST VINTAGE INTERNATIONAL EDITION, APRIL 2008
Copyright © 2007 by Nathan Englander
All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Vintage Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto.
Vintage is a registered trademark and Vintage International and colophon are trademarks of Random House, Inc.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
The Library of Congress has cataloged the Knopf edition as follows:
Englander, Nathan.
p. cm.
1. Disappeared persons—Argentina—Fiction. 2. Missing children—
Fiction. 3. Human rights—Argentina—Fiction. 4. Argentina—
History—1955-1983—Fiction. 5. Jews—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3555.N424M56 2007 2006048731
813′.54—dc22
eISBN: 978-0-307-56978-3
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