The moon caught me. She gazed down with a luminescent eye, serving as my reluctant witness as I held the sari over the fetid waters of the East River. My breath spewed forth in foggy plumes, despite the residual heat of the afternoon sun. I could feel the shadows fast approaching, their wispy limbs seeking to snatch the sari from my panicked grasp.
“I’m sorry, Anjuli,” I whispered, my arms seized by a tremor. “I cannot go on like this.”
If Anjuli were there, I doubt she would have let me make it as far as I did. I peered over the railing, hearing a dull cacophony of blaring automobile horns and horseshoes. A few catcalls. Voices shouting at me to move along. A long moment passed between me and the garment I held. My eyes traced sorrowfully over intricate beading and the careful placement of gold thread. I imagined skilled hands wielding tiny needles and old women clucking to themselves as they stitched.
Wedding saris were family affairs. Everyone got involved in the creation of such a splendid garment. Anjuli herself would have chosen the color of the fabric and matching threads. She would have sat in on weaving sessions and stood impatiently as her many aunts and cousins helped create a sari worthy of a princess. I could hear her now, giggling over her bridegroom.
“What will you do with him?” an old woman’s voice cackled. “What can you do with an Englishman?”
“Pet him!” Anjuli giggled. “He’s so handsome!”
Her grandmother shook her head reprovingly. “You have much to learn about men, child. They are not cats who will nest in your lap. They have sharp claws that need sheathing.”
“Michael will do as I say,” Anjuli boasted. “He wants to please me.”
Her grandmother sighed. “And what of you? Will you seek to please?”
Anjuli twirled about, the silk rustling about her bare feet.
“He must please me,” she decided, pursing her perfect lips. “I shall be very difficult if he does not.”
Her grandmother’s voice faded, along with Anjuli’s, and I was left once again hovering over the East River. The sari was suddenly too heavy for me to bear, and I let it fall, my fingers brushing beads and embroidered flowers. It whooshed through the air until I heard a faint plop! And then it was gone.
I squinted in the dark, barely making out foamy ripples in the glassy surface of the water. Tugboats bobbed past, none the wiser over my misdeed as they patrolled the river for suicide victims and the misplaced pedestrian. Backing away on trembling limbs, I filled my lungs with muggy air and fled at the first sight of a police officer making his rounds.
* * *
The clock struck three, urging me to turn over on the narrow bed. I finally located the flat. Tucked neatly within a new line of row houses, Jon’s flat had been harder to get into than West Point. I had to wait for a gentleman to leave before sneaking past the entrance. Once inside, I ducked my head and followed his instructions. I let myself in, too numb to do much, but sit on the floor and weep.
Now, as I lay on an unfamiliar pillow, the full implications of my actions weighed heavily on me. I cowered in the dark, waiting for vengeful spirits to do to me what I had done to the sari. I wondered how long it would take to reach the bottom. Perhaps there was no bottom. Perhaps it would keep floating with the current. Floating in some perpetual state of insomnolence until it found another victim.
“There are worse things,” I mumbled to the ceiling, knowing there would be hell to pay. My thoughts turned toward Jon. Had he escaped? Had he been caught? What about Mr. Perez? What had frightened him so badly that he sought a cleansing and tried to open the trunk? “It’s my fault,” I said finally, my eyelids drooping from exhaustion.
Anjuli had been wrong to entrust me with her sari.
I thought about apologizing one last time, but knew my empty words were no solace for such an irrevocable loss.
I closed my eyes and slept.
When I opened them again, a sliver of sunlight shot through Jon’s curtains, momentarily blinding me. I thought it was a fitting punishment as I curled into a fetal position, afraid to move lest someone might hear me. I wasn’t hungry. And I had no need for the toilet. So, I stayed where I was, lying on freshly laundered sheets with the just the barest hints of shaving soap and bay rum aftershave lulling me into a troubled slumber where images of Anjuli drowning snatched what peace I found within my dreams.
Time passed as it usually does, and night fell. I sat listening to Jon’s neighbors return from work. I heard the grumbling of men who hated pushing pencils all day. I heard stockbrokers, teachers, and salesgirls who’d had enough of hawking perfume to persnickety society matrons on Park Avenue.
One of Jon’s neighbors was a heavy-set man.
I surmised this by the sound of his feet above me. He must have worn boots or some sort of sturdy shoe because whenever he moved about, it sounded as though he would fall through the ceiling.
Another neighbor liked to cook, and the flat soon filled with the savory aroma of fried steak. Food would have been nice. But I erred on the side of caution. I didn’t know Jon’s schedule. His neighbors might be used to him returning at a certain time. Maybe he cooked as well. If I moved about, they might get suspicious. Best to lie in the dark and starve than lie in a dank prison cell waiting for bread and gruel.
I slept again.
Somehow, ridding myself of the sari also rid me of the shadows.
I should have felt relieved.
And I was. But the feeling I had just committed the gravest of atrocities pricked at me until I sat up and drew the blankets over me. I huddled in the corner of the bed, terrified my actions would set off the apocalypse.
Curses were beyond my simple ability to grasp the laws of the universe. Who knew how the sari ended up cursed in the first place? Macha used to tell me people could hex anything. Inanimate objects, articles of clothing, jewelry, even the Jews had the dybbuk. It took quite a lot of preparation and effort to place a curse. The idea it would scurry into the night like a mouse after finding a piece of cheese left in a mousetrap was probably asking too much.
But like Joshua used to say, I’d cross that bridge once I got there.
* * *
I was being shaken awake and my eyes flew open to find the owner of the flat gazing down, looking as if he’d just returned from the jungles of Burma. “Anne!” he whispered, giving me another shake. “Where is it? Where is the sari?”
Rubbing sleep from my eyes, I drew the blanket over my chest. It was a full minute before I could form words I knew he wouldn’t like. “It’s gone,” I said finally, my tongue feeling as though it wore a feathered overcoat. “I got rid of it.”
He paled.
“What do you mean you ‘got rid of it’?” he demanded through a swollen jaw. He had several cuts and scratches on his face, particularly a nasty one above his right eye. He flung what he was holding aside and sat on the bed. “What have you done?”
“You know what,” I said, my voice oddly calm. “I told you what I wanted to do. So, I did it.”
His left eye twitched.
“Tell me you didn’t,” he muttered, gripping the blanket at my feet. “Tell me it’s under the bed.”
I shook my head slowly.
“Dammit!” he exploded, leaping to his feet. He paced back and forth for a few minutes before whirling about and snatching me by the shoulders. He gave me a violent shake. “You were supposed to hold on to it! Do you realize what you’ve done?”
“Let go of me!” I hissed, slapping his hands away. “I had every right to get rid of that… that…”
“Watch your tongue, madam!”
“I’ll do no such thing!” I snapped, pushing past him to end up on the floor. I crawled on all fours until I reached the kitchen, where I sought refuge on the braided rug near the sink, figuring the colorful strips of fabric would hide any stain, including blood. “You don’t know what it’s been like!”
He ran a trembling hand through his unruly locks, and I could sense he was struggling to maintain control. “Colonel Havelock entrusted me to return that sari, Miss Gibson. I thought we agreed you would wait until we had a replacement.”
“You’d think so.” I worried a nail until it bled. Wincing, I shook out my hand. “I just wanted this whole thing over with! Is that so difficult to understand?”
“You think just because you flung it—” He eyed me closely. “Where did you dispose of it?”
“I threw it over the bridge.”
“Oh, that’s just wonderful! The currents probably washed it all the way to the Atlantic!”
“The East River doesn’t drain into the Atlantic.”
“Never mind that!” He pulled out a chair and sat, looking utterly defeated. “He’ll never forgive me,” he kept repeating to himself. “He’ll never forgive me.”
“What are you going on about?” I sat down, pushing the Lazy Susan around. “Who’s never going to forgive you?”
Jon glanced up with tragic eyes.
“My grandfather.”
