Acts of Faith

D
OCTORS
“A superior story … A moving and compelling novel of doctors and their fears—how they confront them or are confounded by them.”
—United Press International

“Segal’s best work to date.”
—
New York Post

“A page-turner all the way.”
—Larry King,
USA Today

T
HE
C
LASS
“First-class entertainment.”
—
Cosmopolitan

“An absorbing page-turner.”
—
Publishers Weekly

“A panoramic saga.”
—
The Philadelphia Inquirer

M
AN
, W
OMAN
,
AND
C
HILD
“A jewel … just about perfect … The instant emotion
Love Story
had.”
—
The Plain Dealer
, Cleveland

“Memorable.”
—
The Pittsburgh Press

O
LIVER
’
S
S
TORY
“Reading
Oliver’s Story
, you’ll forget everything else until you’ve finished the last page. What a rare storyteller.”
—
The Detroit News

“Erich Segal has done it again. Mystery, sexual excitement and antagonism in the right mixture work their spell.”
—
St. Louis Globe

“A very pleasurable and believable sequel to
Love Story
that every reader of the first book and every viewer of the film will enjoy.”
—
Publishers Weekly

L
OVE
S
TORY
“For someone who is in love, or was in love, or hopes to be in love.”
—
St. Louis Post-Dispatch

“Not just a story—
Love Story
is an experience. The reader who responds to this little book will feel less like a reader than an unwritten Segal character, living it all out from the inside.… In this ‘love story’ you are not just an observer.”
—
The Christian Science Monitor

“Funny, touching, and infused with wonder, as all love stories should be.”
—
San Francisco Examiner

PROLOGUE

I
 was baptized in blood. My own blood. This is not a Jewish custom. It is merely a fact of history.

The covenant my people made with God requires that we affirm our allegiance to Him twice each day. And lest any of us forget we are unique, God created gentiles everywhere who constantly remind us.

In my case, the Father of the Universe placed an Irish Catholic neighborhood midway between my school and home. Thus at regular intervals, as I was walking to or from my yeshiva, the Christian Soldiers from St. Gregory’s would catch sight of me and hurl verbal abuse in my direction.

“Kike!”

“Sheenie!”

“Christ-killer!”

I could have run when they were still several dozen yards away. But then I’d have to drop my books—my prayer book, my sacred Bible. And that would have been a desecration.

So I would stand there, book-laden and afraid to move as they swaggered up to me, pointed at my skullcap, and continued their ritual.

“Look at this guy—how come he’s wearin’ a hat and it ain’t even winter?”

“He’s a Hebe. They need their hats to hide their horns!”

I just stood there, helpless, as they encircled me and started shoving.

Then came the punches, raining from all sides, hammering my nose and lips, reverberating in my skull. After all these years, I can still feel the pounding and taste the blood.

With time I learned a few defensive tactics. For example, it is better if the victim in a brawl does not fall down (lean against a wall, if possible). For if you are prostrate, your attacker can employ his feet as well.

Furthermore, big books can serve as shields. Not only does the Talmud hold the most important comments on religious matters—it is large enough to fend off any kick aimed at the groin.

Sometimes I think my mother lived her life waiting behind the front door, for no matter how quietly I stole into the house after one of those encounters, she would be there waiting.

“Danny, my little boy—what’s happened?”

“It’s nothing, Mama. I just fell.”

“And you expect me to believe that? It’s that bunch of Irish cossacks from the church again, huh? Do you know the names of those hooligans?”

“No.”

I lied, of course. I could remember every pimple on the sneering face of Ed McGee, whose father ran the local tavern. I had heard that he was training for the Golden Gloves or something. Maybe he was only using me for practice.

“Tomorrow I’m going to have a talk with their superior mother or whatever she’s called.”

“C’mon, Ma, what can you possibly say?”

“I’ll ask her how they would have treated Christ himself. She could remind those boys that Jesus was a rabbi.”

All right, Mama, I thought to myself, have it your way. They’ll just come at me with baseball bats next time.

I was born a prince—the only son of Rav Moses Luria, monarch in our special kingdom of believers. My family had come to America from Silcz, a small town in Carpathia, which at different times had been a part of Hungary, then Austria, then Czechoslovakia. External rulers changed, yet one thing remained unaltered: Silcz was the home of the
B’nai Simcha
—“Sons of Joy”—and every generation saw a Luria honored by the title, Silczer Rebbe.