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are too busy to take trips.”
    “All my life I traveled. I am still traveling…. You must make them, then. They have to get married. You have to help them find husbands.”
    Catherine snorted with startled laughter. “Match them up! Like Yentl in Fiddler? ” She closed her eyes and shook her head. “Dream or ghost, go away now! I’m a sick woman. I can’t have this! Carlotta!”
    “You’re afraid they won’t listen to you. That you have no power over them.”
    Catherine felt her heart freeze. She wrung her hands.
    “They will go. And at least one of them will find a husband, a good one. You will persuade them. You will hold your gold above their heads. Gold is a great persuader, I’ve always found.”
    “You don’t understand. It’s not like that. No one listens to parents or grandparents anymore. It’s too late.” She shrugged. “Their characters are set. A trip won’t solve anything. At best they’ll sightsee, buy some trinkets, and sip champagne with my money.”
    “A shroud has no pockets, Rivka.”
    A chill went up her spine, the chill of the nightmare-spinner alone and helpless, smothered by night.
    “It’s too late to visit me. Visit them . Convince them .”
    “Send them to me.”
    “Where is that? Where shall they look for you?”
    “In the book, of course. My book. I wrote it for them.”
    “We looked for it. Rare-book dealers, collectors. It’s never turned up. I’ve got only a few pages.”
    “They’ll find it.”
    “You don’t understand! They have jobs, apartments. Money won’t be enough. They won’t go off just because I tell them. They don’t care about me.”
    “Then you must hold your death above their heads. Use their pity, their greed. Tell them you are dying, tell them about your will.”
    Catherine was shocked. “That isn’t fair! It’s emotional blackmail! It would be appealing to their worst instincts…!”
    “It is all of that, and more.” She nodded. “Do it.”
    She hesitated. “And if I don’t?”
    The woman shrugged. “Have you ever heard the thud of a large tree in the forest when it dies? It’s a terrible, blasphemous noise, like the crack of a small child’s skull hitting the hard pavement, or the slam of a body thrown against a wall. Everyone who hears such a sound, be they living or dead, can never forget it, or forgive.”
    “ No! It isn’t fair! You haven’t told me enough! What should I convince them to do? Where should I send them? What should I tell them?!” She felt a rising hysteria.
    “Missus, missus. Are you all right, all right, missus?” Carlotta shook her. “You sleep so long. You moan. I think you not feel good.”
    Catherine blinked, looking around the empty room. “I slept?” She let out a deep sigh. Her back was sticky with sweat, almost clinging to the chair. She wiped her forehead, trying to calm down. “You probably thought I was drunk.”
    Carlotta—who, seeing the open bottle, had wondered exactly that—blushed furiously. “ No! Señora. S’not true!”
    “It’s all right. I’m sorry. I’m just a bit cranky. I’ll go to bed now.”
    “I help you.”
    “Oh, don’t fuss! I don’t need any help to get up.” She waved her away in exasperation. Not yet, anyway, she thought grimly, pushing herself out of the chair.
    There was a wineglass on its side under the coffee table. It must have rolled out of her hand as she slept, she thought, bending to retrieve it. A tiny thread was stuck to its side. When she removed it, it glinted in the firelight like gold.

3
    Handwritten manuscript, author unknown. Constantinople, circa 1574 (?). Microfiche. Guenzburg Library, Moscow.
     
    I will begin with the dream that has always been for me the true beginning of my adult life. It is not even my own dream, but my mother Esther’s, whispered to me in the cellar of our beautiful family mansion in Lisbon, on the eve of my twelfth birthday; whispered with the strangest and most glorious pride and the deepest of sorrow