Burning Twilight: A Novella by Kenneth J. Wishnia

Author:Kenneth J. Wishnia [Wishnia, Kenneth J.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Mystery & Detective, General, Historical
ISBN: 9780062321138
Google: rfowAAAAQBAJ
Amazon: B00E7RX67Q
Barnesnoble: B00E7RX67Q
Goodreads: 18269363
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2013-10-29T04:00:00+00:00

The man who went by the name of Reb Schildsberg had lived in a large town house near the corner of Zydowska and Kramarska Streets, the informal borderline between the Jewish and Chris­tian quarters, only a few steps from the main square. But the sun was low in the sky and the fog was already rolling in, and the thought of what they might do to Kassy after nightfall made me quicken my pace toward the southwestern part of the old city.

And nobody tried to stop me and ask what I was doing.

Despite the urgency of my mission, it was still a relief to leave Germany behind and be able to move about freely without having to wear that cursed Jew badge on my chest like a bright yellow target. I had almost forgotten what it felt like to breathe the air of freedom.

Or at least partial freedom. Because life in Poznan was no paradise for the dark-­eyed ­People of the Book. For the past seven decades the city fathers had issued one anti-­Jewish decree after another, imposing strict limits on commercial and residential expansion in order to control the size of the city’s Jewish population. And while there was no wall around the ghetto, as there was in other places, that just made it easier for the Chris­tian mobs to attack us, prompting a number of royal proclamations that made the city council directly responsible for our safety, which did help a bit, God save King Sigismund III.

But a ­couple of years ago a suspicious fire had torn through Jew Street, killing more than a dozen ­people and reducing an untold number of sacred Torah scrolls to ashes. The wealthiest merchant in Prague, Mordecai Meisel, had lent the Jews of Poznan ten thousand gildn to help them recover from the disaster, but the facades of many fine houses still showed the scars, like black claw marks left by some ravening creature emerging from the depths, its talons coated with pitch.

The tenements gave way to the vast Market Square, dominated by the enormous Ratusz, the town hall rebuilt in the Italian style after the fire of 1536. It dwarfed the humble Rózany Targ, the rose market, the only spot of color on this gray day. But I found the old weighing house far more interesting than the opulent Ratusz. With its street level Romanesque archways and high peaked roof, it resembled the Old-­New Shul in Prague where Rabbi Loew had delivered some of his most incendiary sermons.

I crossed Water Street, which ran east to the famous Water Gate down by the river, and turned the opposite way, heading west toward Wall Street.

As the main square receded, the streets narrowed, drawing their seductive arms around me and nearly blocking out the sky. The houses grew thin and crooked, and the alleys between them ran wet with offal. Men stood in dark doorways offering to sell everything a man’s heart desires at remarkably low cost. But somehow I chose not to purchase

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