Her letter sat on my desk for three days, sealed in a small square violet envelope with a 42-cent stamp of a sunflower. I couldn't bring myself to open it. Without even looking at the return address, I knew it was hers. I knew by her handwriting, which is the scrawl of a child, all in caps except for the vowels.
I haven't seen my blind sister in over three years. I'm calling her my blind sister, but she isn't really blind; she plays blind, with her dark glasses and her stick, and sometimes a dog, to put you off your guard, to play with your affections, to see you better. She's always involved in some horrible mess or another. Wherever she goes she makes trouble, and it's always her older brother who ends up picking up the pieces. I have bailed her out of jail; I have paid off her credit card debts, her loan shark debts, her student loans; I have paid her rent, paid her bills, cleaned her apartment, put her old cat to sleep. But I decided, three years ago, that enough was enough; she was twenty-six years old and should take control of her own life.
She was offended, and wouldn't talk to me for almost a year. Then out of nowhere she called, in the middle of the night, asking for ten thousand dollars, urgently. I told her I would give her the money if she told me what she needed it for. She said that was none of my business. I said it was my money and therefore certainly my business. She said I owed her that money. She said all the money I had, everything I owned, was rightfully hers. She said I had killed our parents (they died in a car accident) and she was going to tell the cops. She said I had made her blind; she said I had darkened her very soul. I said, "So you're still playing blind?" She said she never played at anything. She said, "Are you going to give me the money or not?" I said no. She said she would never talk to me again, and she hung up.
So you can see why I didn't want to open that envelope. As always with my little sister, I sensed a trap. But after three days I yielded. Her letter:
DeaR LouiS,
i KNoW i'Ve BeeN MeaN To You SoMeTiMeS aND i DoN'T BLaMe You FoR CuTTiNG Me ouT oF YouR LiFe. i DoN'T NeeD aNy MoNey. THaT'S NoT WHy i'M WRiTiNG. i aM WRiTiNG To SaY GooDBye. You WiLL NeVeR See Me aGaiN LouiS aND You WiLL NeVeR HeaR FRoM Me aGaiN, i PRoMiSe. i JuST WaNT You To Do Me oNe LaST FaVoR. PLeaSe CoNTaCT THe PeoPLe oN THiS LiST. TeLL THeM You aRe My BRoTHeR aND i aM DeaD. TeLL THeM i aM SoRRy i HuRT THeM iF i DiD. TeLL THeM i NeVeR MeaNT To HuRT aNyBoDy. i'M SoRRy LOUIS i CaN'T SaY MoRe. PLeaSe tRuST Me. DoN'T CaLL THe PoLiCe.
LoVe, YouR BaBy SiSTeR
P.S. DoN'T You LoVe SuNFLoWeRS? LooK aT THe STaMP.
The list was written on three Post-It notes, in a tiny handwriting, in red ink, and included twelve names (only first names), with phone numbers and addresses. I had no idea who these people were. They could be anybody. Their names were suspiciously generic: Bill, Bob, Dan, Ray, Roy, etc.
I put the letter and the list back in the violet envelope and tore it all to shreds. There was no way this was not a prank.
I went to the kitchen. I opened the cupboard, took out my vintage crystal soup bowl, opened the icebox, and helped myself to three big scoops of strawberry ice cream. Ice cream soothes my nerves. I leaned against the counter and slowly consumed my three scoops, and thought of all the work I had ahead of me. I set the bowl on top of the fridge, pulled out my BlackBerry, and consulted my calendar. I had three or four appointments; I had five important e-mails to reply to; I had an expenditure report to revise.
I called my sister, and was greeted by a recording: We are sorry. The number you have dialed has been disconnected. Please check the number and try again. I checked the number, tried again--and as I dialed, I reached for my ice cream bowl, but I missed it, that is to say, I hit it, I knocked it over and it fell to the floor and (strange, very strange) it did not break. I got the same message: We are sorry, etc.
I booked the next flight to New York. I arrived in LaGuardia at a quarter past five and took a cab to 242 East 9th Street. I was about to ring the bell, but an old lady and her dog came out and let me in. She smiled. She said, "Good evening, George." She tugged her dog down the stoop, a nervous rodent-like dog.
I ran up to the third floor. I knocked on my sister's door, apartment 3D. There was no answer. I knocked again. It occurred to me that she might have moved out, that I was knocking on someone else's door. I knocked again and called her name. I knocked again, I called her name again. I did this for two or three minutes, till I convinced myself that she didn't live there anymore and I was knocking on some stranger's door, who wasn't home. But then I convinced myself that she was in there, my sister, that is, and she was dead. She was dead, my sister was dead, behind the door, rotting. I knocked again, stronger this time. I said, "Open up. It's Louis." But then I thought: if she is dead and decomposing, wouldn't it stink? It didn't stink. I was relieved. She wasn't home. But where was she?
I knocked on the door opposite hers, 3F. There was no answer. I knocked on the door next to it, 3E, no answer. I knocked on the door at the end of the hall, 3A, no answer. I was getting annoyed. Would I have to knock on every door in the building?
But then the lady and dog who had opened the street-door for me came out of the elevator.
I introduced myself, and asked her if she knew my sister.
She said, "You're not George?"
I said, "I'm Louis and I'm looking for my sister."
She said, "Hello, Louis. I'm Eva. I've been living in this building since nineteen fifty-three. This is Duke, my dog. I'm a Virgo. What are you?"
The dog sniffed me nervously and released an asthmatic little yelp, like a rat trying to bark.
I said I was a Virgo too. I asked her again if she knew my sister.
"Yes," she said, "of course. Hilda is one of the sweetest girls..."
That is not my sister's name. I corrected her.
"Oh?" she said.
"Do you know her?" I said.
"I remember, yes," she said. "I've been living in this building since nineteen hundred and fifty-three."
I said, "She still lives here, right?"
"Where?" she said. Her rat was sniffing my feet.
"Apartment 3D," I said.
"Hm," she said. "What does your sister look like?" And she studied my face, to extrapolate a resemblance.
Have you ever seen Pickpocket? My sister looks exactly, uncannily, like the girl in that movie, Jeanne. O Jeanne, says the pickpocket at the end, behind bars, kissing her forehead, what a strange and winding road I've had to take to get to you! I said, "Light brown hair, straight, not very long, with bangs, and usually collected in a pony tail; five-foot-five; slim; in her twenties; wears old, odd clothes; they say she is remarkably beautiful."
"The blind girl!" she cried. "Oh dear."
"Yes," I said.
"Oh dear," she said.
"Does she still live here?" I said. "What happened?"
The lady winced. "Come, Duke, come," she said. Duke was busy sniffing my shoes. She scuttled away, dragging Duke behind her, and locked herself in her apartment.
I went out and sat on the stoop. I pulled out her list (I'd spent the entire flight patching it and the letter back together) and decided to call every single phone number in it. I started with Dan, who lived a few blocks away. I walked the two blocks, to 7th Street, and dialed the number.
A male voice: "Hello?"
Louis: "Dan?"
Male voice: "Yes."
"My name is Louis Marcus," I said.
A brief pause. "Who?" he said.
I told him whose brother I was.
"Ah," he said.
"I need to see you," I said. "It's an emergency."
"What?" he said. "What happened?"
"Let me in," I said.
"I'm not home," he said.
"You are home," I said (it was a 212 number; what was the guy thinking?), "and I'm downstairs."
"What happened?" he said.
"Open up," I said.
"I don't know you," he said. "Who are you?"
I told him again who I was.
"I don't have to talk to you," he said. "I'm busy." He hung up.
I called again.
"Leave me alone," he said. "What do you want?"
"It's an emergency," I said. "I need your help."
He said, "Call 911 if it's an emergency."
"I'm not calling 911," I said.
There was a pause. Then he said, "I'm calling the police."
"You don't want to call the police," I said.
He paused again, then said, "Why not?"
"You're implicated, Dan," I said. If there's one thing I'm really good at, it's bluffing.
"Implicated in what?" he said.
"You're implicated," I repeated.
He hung up, and a few seconds later the door clicked and I opened it. I walked up to the fifth floor.
The door was ajar and before I got a chance to knock I was asked to come in and lock the door behind me.
I walked into a little stuffy living room. It smelled distinctly of peanut butter, with a trace of pot. There were books and papers and journals everywhere, on bookcases, on the floor, on the windowsill. A student, I concluded. The windows were shuttered. The walls were blank. On the desk, apart from more books and papers, a laptop was open to a paused game of Space Invaders.
Then I saw an ultra-Orthodox Jew, a skinny man in a black gabardine, with a black skullcap and earlocks and a thick, long beard. Standing between the kitchen and the living room, with a glass of orange juice in one hand, he had been observing me as I studied his apartment.
"Take a seat," he said.
"Are you Dan?" I said. I did not take a seat.
"I'm Dan," he said.
He sat down on his recliner, pulled the handle and reclined. I looked at him and he looked at me. He was playing with his left earlock.
There were several things that I found suspicious: 1. What was an ultra-Orthodox Jew doing in the East Village, playing Space Invaders, smoking pot? 2. Where were the prayer books, the religious paraphernalia, the wife, the kids? 3. Would an ultra-Orthodox Jew be involved with my sister, who (as far as I know) is not Jewish?
I said, "How do you know my sister?"
He said, "We were involved."
"How were you involved?" I said.
He let go of his earlock and stroked his beard. He made a wistful face. "We were in love," he said.
Typical. My blind sister lives to toy with men's affections. I said, "My sister's not Jewish."
"I know," he said.
I said, gravely, "My sister's dead."
He sat up. "What?" he squeaked. "How?"
"And you're implicated," I said.
"What?" he said. "How?"
"You tell me," I said.
"Tell you what?" he said. "I don't know anything."
"When's the last time you saw her?" I said.
"A year at least," he said. "She stopped talking to me." His voice was cracking.
What a girl. I was beginning to think he was in no way implicated. "You're implicated," I said.
"What do you mean?" he said. "No I'm not."
"Don't lie to me, Dan," I said. "I know what you do. Just tell me what you know and I won't make trouble for you."
"What do I know?" he said.
"Don't play innocent, Dan," I said. "You think I don't know?"
"What?" he said. "Know what?"
I said, "I know more than you think I know, Dan."
He said, "What do you want from me?" He burst into tears.
I let him cry it out for a minute, then said, "When's the last time you heard from her?"
"I told you, a year," he said.
"Tell me the truth," I said.
"I'm telling you the truth," he said.
"How long were you together?" I said.
"Not long," he said, looking down, as if he had done something wrong. Then he looked up and asked, "How did she die?"
"You tell me," I said.
"What?" he cried.
"Don't play innocent, Dan," I said.
"What do you want?" he said.
"Are you going to help me?" I said.
"What do you want?" he said.
"Just tell me what you know," I said.
"I told you all I know," he said.
"Help me," I said.
"What do you want from me?" he said.
"I know you're implicated," I said.
He shook his head. "I may be implicated in lots of things," he said, "but they have nothing to do with your sister. How did she die?"
"I don't know," I said. "I don't even know if she's actually dead." Then I noticed, on the bookcase behind him, a strange little something, something that looked oddly familiar. I drew closer and studied it. It was a crystal figurine, red and brown, an ostrich. I had seen this thing before. I picked it up. I carried it in the palm of my hand to the other end of the room.
The Jew panicked. He said, "Put it back, please. It's very fragile."
I said, "What is this? This was my sister's, wasn't it?"
He said, "Please, just put it back where you found it."
I walked back to the bookcase, to put it back in its place, and tripped on an extension cord, and fell, and the crystal ostrich flew out of my hand and hit the wall and shattered.
The Jew was in shock.
I said, "I'm sorry, I'm really sorry. I tripped." I took the patched-up violet envelope out of my pocket and handed it to him. I had to shove it in his face, to make him snap out of it.
He read the letter and gave it back to me.
I said, "I'm sorry, again, about the ostrich."
Then for at least five minutes he didn't say anything and neither did I. It was getting very uncomfortable. I though he might need a Valium.
But then he said, cool as a cucumber, "Where's that list she mentions?"
I showed him the list.
He studied it. His face became grave.
"Do you know these people?" I said.
He gave me back the list without a word.
"Who are they?" I said.
Dan was shaking his head, smiling wretchedly. He said, "You have no fucking idea what you're getting yourself into, my friend."
"Why?" I said. "Who are these people?"
He continued to shake his head and smile like a broken man.
"Who are these people?" I demanded, and noticed, just then, between the seat and the arm of his recliner, the butt of a revolver.
