“The navi Hoshea. Can you imagine, Mama. He had a body, he lived and walked these hills, and here he rests”

The soup kitchen is no longer a haven.

Ever since she gathered the children together, clapping her hands and asking a sweet, round-faced boy to strike a pot with a ladle until they all quieted down. Ever since she had led them all outdoors, up the hill toward the wool factory and explained that…

Leonora closes her eyes. How, exactly, did she explain it? As a game? An obligation? A threat? She sifts through her memory, but does not find it.

She only knows that when she sits down to eat now, the children do not continue their games around her, tossing pebbles and stacking cups into towers and stepping up and down on the benches to the intricate rhythms that sound in their heads. They watch her when they think she is not looking. Even when she focuses on the stew in her bowl, she feels their gaze.

She squeezes her eyes closed.

It was an error.

Ines would tell her to forgive herself.

But she has always felt that forgiveness is for the weak. For those who cannot help it, from whom we cannot expect better — to them we extend a little more credit in our heart’s account. As Papa would say, it flouts the rules of business. Only extend credit to those proven trustworthy.

Repair, that is what she believes in.

And if there is no repair, better to guard your memory of the crime. Let it hover near the back of your mind, not far enough that it can be forgotten, but also not allowing it to take up too much space, for a person must live, even if he does not sleep. For otherwise, when the scaly, triangular head of the viper rears up, tongue darting, malevolence oozing from its dark eyes, how will you recognize it?

The children. Their sudden distrust. It is of her own making.

She stands, suddenly, and leaves the soup kitchen. Outside, she sees Amram, an ink stain on his cheek, a harried look in his eyes. She wonders if it is business or home that worries him.

He dips his head in a sign of respect. “Honorable Mama.”

“Amram.”