Mount Terminus (34 page)

Roya had remained in the rose garden, and when Bloom returned she sat kneeling beside the hole he had dug. With the twine he had wound around his waist, he lowered Adora into the grave just as the thinnest line of magenta began to line the top of Mount Terminus. When he had finished shoveling the earth over Adora's body, Roya took him by the hand. Bloom wanted to do nothing more than to bathe and sleep, but Roya pulled him in the direction of the trailhead. Please, Bloom said, later we can walk, after I've slept. But Roya wouldn't let go. She dragged him along, up to Mount Terminus's peak, and there she pointed out into the valley in the direction of the sunrise.

Yes, said Bloom. It is beautiful and glorious, but I want nothing more than to sleep. Roya stepped behind Bloom, thrust her arms out on either side of his head, and focused his attention on the sun casting its light on the silver line running at a declining grade along the edge of the northern range. She held him there as the sun continued to rise, and there he began to see the taut thread shimmer.

Yes, I know. Bloom turned back to Roya. She lifted her finger and waved it across the panorama of the basin. She was trying to tell him something. She was in a panic to show him. What is it? he asked. I don't understand. She now took Bloom by the hand again and dragged him back down the trail, and when they reached its bottom, she guided him to the service entrance, and once there, pulled him up to the top of the tower. There she set his eye against his telescope, and there Bloom watched sheets of dust licking across the land, dust originating from large swaths of earth on which the orange and lemon trees had been cut away. In their place were parked trucks and piles of lumber. When her face turned back to his, Bloom said again, Yes, I know. It's beginning.

Roya shook her head in anger. She pointed an accusatory finger at Bloom. She thrust it at him. Eyes wide and feverish. Lips tight.

No, said Bloom. Not me. Simon.

She thrust her finger at him again.

No. You're wrong. As he was about to ask what had gotten into her, she turned away from him and ran downstairs.

*   *   *

From atop his tower Bloom witnessed in the months ahead the basin teem with men in the thousands. They dug and poured foundations into the shape of a grid, and across the grid they dug trenches into which they laid pipe, and alongside the trenches they dug holes in which they erected power and telephone poles, and to complete the reticulation, they began running, parallel to the trenches and the high tension wires, a system of interconnected roadways. Every now and then, Simon met him at the edge of the promontory, where they stood together in an awkward silence, and they looked across the panorama, and his brother appeared to Bloom to be growing brighter with light, stronger and more powerful, larger than life. On these occasions, Bloom wondered if what he witnessed was evidence of Simon's better nature shining forth. Or was it the dybbuk strengthening his pride?

The dust generated from below swelled into the air. It blocked Bloom's view of the sea. Ballooned into a red-and-orange holocaust. For months on end the vista that had brought his mother and father to Mount Terminus, the vista to which his father longed to return, the vista onto which Bloom first looked when he arrived here, was no more, and every day now he felt as if a small part of him was dying, and when the news arrived about Isabella, he couldn't help but perceive the horrible image spread across the landscape of the shore as a harbinger.

*   *   *

The small packet arrived a little over a year after Isabella had departed. Five weeks before the anniversary of his father's death. Five weeks before the Day of Atonement. Twenty-five days before the start of the Days of Awe. The only letters Bloom had ever received from anyone at his home address were from Isabella, and so, when at lunchtime he saw the packet sitting beside his place setting at the table, his spirit was immeasurably uplifted, but an instant later he saw in what condition the paper was in—it was dirty and frayed at its corners, the area under the postage appeared singed—he sat down and stared at it, looked at it with apprehension. He lifted it and felt its weight. It was thicker and heavier than he thought it would be. Its surface felt gritty. He brought it to his nose, and took in its scent. Gunpowder. It smelled of something incendiary and something else, something noxious, like the smells he associated with the chemical baths of the darkroom. And once again he looked at the singe under the postage, and stood up and walked out to the courtyard, and he walked into the cottage where Isabella had slept, and he smelled the sheets and tried to sense her scent. He lay down on the bed and carefully fitted a finger into the fray of the corner. He knew as he had known with his father. He knew the foreboding he felt was meaningful. He pulled apart the paper's seam and out onto his chest fell the images he had drawn for her during those months they corresponded. The chrysanthemums. Elijah. Cupid and Psyche. He arranged them on the bed and then looked into the packet, where he found a single slip of paper. He pulled it out, his fingers forceps extracting a foreign substance from a body, and he laid out the message next to his drawings.

My dear Joseph,

I've carried this letter and its contents everywhere as a way to keep you close to me. If you're reading this, my love, the news isn't good. If you're reading this, the sad truth of it is I'm no longer with you.

Just know this: you are my love.

I've had no other.

Here, in this madness, I've thought of our friendship, your tenderness, more than ever. I'm often sitting quietly by your side in the gardens. I am there now. So, please, don't be afraid for me.

If I have met my end, I have only one wish. I only ask you not to be angry with me for having been reckless. So many of the people you've loved have departed this world, and I know you may not be able to forgive me for doing the same, but I beg you, Joseph, to think of me fondly from time to time, with love and affection always …

Yours,
Isabella.

*   *   *

It wasn't possible.

Did God find it amusing to take everyone away from him in this manner? What more was there to do than laugh at this cosmic injustice? And so Bloom laughed and laughed. He lay in the cottage and laughed until he could laugh no more, and then he lay there paralyzed until he was discovered by Gus, who pried open his fist and read his letter. The big man gathered all the papers together and carefully fit them back into their package, and he said to Bloom, Let's go.

Gus lifted Bloom in his arms and carried him into the villa, to his bed, and he sent for Meralda, who on this occasion could find no words to comfort Bloom. On this occasion, Roya's touch would not comfort him. Simon's Panglossian positivism, his bromides and platitudes, wouldn't comfort him. Nothing would comfort Bloom. Silence and solitude would not comfort Bloom. He remained in bed. Didn't speak. Didn't think. Didn't see. He disappeared into sleep, into a dark sleep without dreams. For weeks he was like this. For a month he was like this. At which point, Gottlieb said, Enough!

Enough! he cried out. He walked into Bloom's room, climbed on top of him, and smacked him across the face. When he didn't react, Gottlieb slapped him harder. When Bloom didn't react, Gottlieb walked to Bloom's washbasin, placed it beside his bed, and said, Fine! You no longer want to live? Fine! And he took Bloom by the scruff of his neck and submerged his face in the water, and he held him there until Bloom began to struggle. Gottlieb lifted his head. Are you prepared to live? Bloom said nothing, and so Gottlieb submerged his face again. And again Bloom began to struggle, this time with greater spirit. What will it be? Life or death? Gottlieb this time didn't relent. He kept Bloom's face submerged. Well? Bloom began to breathe water, to cough, and finally he threw Gottlieb off him, sending the dwarfish man back against the wall.

Bloom's eyes were now open and, when he turned to see where Gottlieb had gone, he saw the man reaching for his throat. His little hands grabbed hold, and once again Bloom found himself in Gottlieb's clutches. Are you ready to live yet? Gottlieb released one hand from his throat and punched Bloom square in the cheek. We-e-e-e-ll? Bloom threw Gottlieb off a second time and started back to his bed. Gottlieb now jumped on his back and forced Bloom to the floor so he was lying on his chest. He pinned Bloom down at the back of his neck, pulled at the hair on the top of his head, and stuck two of his fingers into Bloom's nose and pulled. The pain Bloom felt was extraordinary. You're going to pull my nose off! Bloom screamed.

Aha! screamed Gottlieb. It speaks! He pulled harder and, with the hand pulling Bloom's hair, he boxed his ear. How do you like that? And he did it again.

Goddammit! Bloom bellowed.

It speaks again! Gottlieb leaped off Bloom's back now. He was on his feet. Get up! he insisted. Fight me!

No!

Get up! I'm only just getting started.

No!

Have it your way. Gottlieb pulled his leg back and kicked Bloom right between the legs. Bloom clutched ahold of himself down there, raising his ass into the air. The breath had been knocked out of him. Get up! screamed Gottlieb. Or so help me God, I'm going to kill you! Bloom rose to his knees, too slowly for Gottlieb's taste, and so Gottlieb once again boxed Bloom on the ears, both of them.

Enough! screamed Bloom, who was now holding his groin and an ear.

No! Gottlieb screamed back. Get up! And fight! You piece of shit
faygala
!

Bloom now rose to his feet and turned around to find Gottlieb approaching again, only this time Bloom cocked back his fist and landed a punch directly on the point of Gottlieb's chin, landing the little man on his back. Twitching. Twitching. Then nothing. Unmoving. He'd knocked him out cold? He tried to rouse him, but couldn't. He slapped his face, but nothing. Meralda! Bloom cried out. Gus! He ran out onto the landing and called for them again. Help! he cried. He walked back into his room, and there was Gottlieb sitting up on Bloom's bed.

So, he said, there is someone you care about other than yourself.

You little bastard! Bloom said with clenched teeth. He approached Gottlieb again and punched him so hard this time, he did, indeed, knock him out. His small body flipped back off the bed, and he was out, facedown, for quite some time.

*   *   *

The bruised and battered men limped along the trails later that afternoon. They walked in silence until they reached Mount Terminus's summit. They continued in silence as they watched the dust rise up from the basin. And then Gottlieb spoke. Work, he said. Let us work.

I don't know if I can, said Bloom.

What's so difficult? Tell me a story, and we go from there.

I'm only able to think of her. I need to know what happened.

It will become clear in time.

In time, yes, I know, in time. I'm cursed by the passage of time.

Pitiful. She believed in something. She followed that belief to a dangerous place. Like her mother and her father, like her adopted father, she lived pursuing her ideals. Do you really think she would want you to give up your reason for being on this Earth? Do you really believe she would want you to sacrifice what life and talent remains within you for the sake of her memory?

No. But I don't understand. Why, Gottlieb, why have I been made to feel this way over and over again? I can't see the point.

I
will
put you out of your misery now, Rosenbloom. I meant it before. I mean it now. If your wish is to be dead, I will kill you.

I don't think I can bear the thought of your face being the last I would see on this Earth.

Then live your life and tell me a good story. Tell me a story you told to Isabella.

Bloom recalled the final day he and Isabella spent together. And without revealing from where the story was derived, he told Gottlieb over the course of the afternoon the story of Miranda and Fernando, of Adora and Manuel Salazar, and the telling of the story gave him pleasure.

It's an epic! said Gottlieb when Bloom reached the conclusion. I can see its enormity.

Bloom turned away from the unpleasant sight of the basin and turned his attention to the farms and ranches that had begun to spread throughout the valley.

What do you say, Rosenbloom? Do we work?

For her. For her, I'll make one final picture.

What is this nonsense? One final picture? You are made for pictures. Your soul was born for pictures.

I'll make one final picture for Isabella.

And then?

And then you can kill me, said Bloom.

It's a deal! said Gottlieb. What's the title?

The Death of Paradise
.

Gottlieb thought it over. He threw a rock down the rocky slope toward the valley. He then threw another. But before we make this picture, before I have the pleasure of killing you, you must understand what it is to be set apart from this place.

Why?

Because you're a grown man, Rosenbloom. Because you need to see something of the world. As it was time for you to have your heart ripped out of your chest to make
Death, Forlorn
, it's time for you to take a journey.

I don't want to go anywhere, Gottlieb.

Well, you are going. You'll go and then you'll return. But you must go.

Why must I go?

To understand Fernando's rage, you must go. To understand Miranda's desire to return home, you must go. To know what Manuel Salazar saw on his journey to Mount Terminus, you must go, and discover for yourself what it means to be in motion. I hereby send you into exile.

No.

Yes. If need be, I'll have you forcibly removed.

*   *   *

You must go, said Simon after having eaten dinner at his house. They sat on the white settee facing the white window frames and looked out onto the disturbed stretch of land leading to the sea. Gottlieb is right. It's time you saw something of the world. All on your own.