Page 55 of The Immortalists

Fifteen years ago, Klara’s memorial took place at the San Francisco Columbarium. Raj planned to have her body sent to the Gold family plot in Queens, but Gertie initially forbade it. When Daniel confronted his mother, she cited the Jewish law that prohibits those who commit suicide from being buried within six feet of other Jewish dead, as though only the strictest adherence could protect the Golds who remained. Daniel raged at Gertie until she cowered; he could have hit her. He had never felt capable of such a thing before.

Daniel and Mira had just moved to Kingston. Mira had secured an assistant professorship at SUNY New Paltz in art history and Jewish studies, Daniel an overnight position at the hospital. His job would begin in one month, his wedding would take place in six, and he had never felt more incapacitated. Simon’s death had been shattering enough; how was it possible to lose Klara, too? How could the family sustain it? After the memorial, Daniel stumbled into an Irish pub on Geary, lay his head on the bar, and wept. He was scarcely aware of how he looked, or what he was saying—Oh God, oh God; everyone’s dying—until someone responded.

“Yes,” said the man on the next barstool. “But that never makes it any easier.”

Daniel looked up. The man was roughly his age, with strawberry blond hair and thick sideburns. His eyes—a queer color, more gold than brown—were threaded with red. A scruff of stubble extended from his cheeks to the bottom of his neck.

He raised his Guinness. “Eddie O’Donoghue.”

“Daniel Gold.”

Eddie nodded. “I saw you at the service. I investigated your sister’s passing.” He reached into the pocket of his black pants and pulled out an FBI ID. Special Agent, it read, beside an unintelligible signature.

“Oh,” Daniel managed. “Thank you.”

Was that what one said, under the circumstances? Daniel was glad, very glad, that Klara’s death was being investigated—he had his own suspicions—but he was alarmed that the feds were involved.

“If you don’t mind my asking,” he said, “why did the FBI take the case? Why not the local police?”

Eddie put his ID away and looked at Daniel. Despite the bloodshot eyes and the scruff, he looked like a boy. “I was in love with her.”

Daniel nearly choked on his own saliva. “What?”

“I was in love with her,” repeated Eddie.

“With—my sister? She was unfaithful to Raj?”

“No, no. I doubt she knew him back then. Anyway, it wasn’t returned.”

The bartender appeared. “Get you boys anything?”

“I’ll have another. And so will he. On me.” Eddie nodded at Daniel’s glass of bourbon, a bourbon Daniel only just realized he’d been drinking.

“Thank you,” said Daniel. When the bartender left, he turned to Eddie. “How did you meet her?”

“I was on duty in San Francisco. Your mother called us—she said your brother was a runaway, and she asked us to pick him up. This was, what, a dozen years ago? He couldn’t have been older than sixteen. I roughed him up; I shouldn’t have. I don’t think your sister ever forgave me. Even so, she woke me up. When I saw her outside the station, with her hair blowing back and those boots on, I thought she was the most gorgeous woman I’d ever seen. Not just because she was beautiful, but because she was powerful. So I remembered her.”

Eddie finished his beer, wiped the froth off his mouth.

“Couple years later I came across a flier with her face on it,” he said, “and I started to go see her perform. The first time must have been early ’83; I’d had a god-awful day, bunch of junkies killed each other in the Tenderloin, and when I sat down to watch her I felt—transported. One night, I told her so. How she’d helped me. How her show had made me different. It took months to work up the courage. But she wanted nothing to do with me.”

The bartender returned with their drinks. Daniel gulped. He had no idea how to respond to Eddie’s revelations, which were intimate enough to make him uncomfortable. All the same, they numbed his despair: as long as Eddie talked, his sister was suspended in the room.

“I’ll be honest with you,” Eddie said. “I was not in good shape. My dad had just passed, and I was drinking too much. I knew I had to get out of San Francisco, so I applied for the bureau. Straight out of Quantico, they had me in Vegas working on mortgage fraud. When I passed the Mirage and saw Klara’s face on the sign, I just about thought I’d gone crazy. Next day, I see her in the parking lot at Vons. I’m driving an Oldsmobile, and she’s on the curb with a baby.”

“Ruby.”

“That her name? Cute kid, even when she was screaming. Your sister ran; I must’ve scared her. I didn’t mean to. Soon as I saw her, I wanted to talk to her. So I decided I’d go to her opening. I’d stay afterward, I figured, and make sure we were clear. No hard feelings. Nothing for her to be nervous about.”

They stared straight ahead. It was the gift of parallel bar seating, Daniel thought: that you could have a conversation without ever looking the other person in the eye.

“Night before, I couldn’t sleep. I get to the Mirage early. I’m pacing outside the theater when I see the three of them come in, Klara and her man and the baby,” said Eddie. “She’s arguing with the guy—I can see it from a mile away. When he goes into the theater, she takes the baby in the elevator. The elevators are glass, so I get in the one beside her: keep my head down, watch to see where she gets off. She dropped the baby at a day care on seventeen before she rode up to forty-five. She didn’t seem to know where she was going until a maid came out of the penthouse suite. When the maid left, Klara slipped in.”

Daniel was grateful for the dimness of the bar and the liquor, grateful that there were places one could go at one in the afternoon for darkness. The beard he’d just started to grow was salty with tears.

“Friday night,” Eddie said, “and everyone was out. I’d never heard Vegas so quiet. And here’s what you learn, being a cop: peaceful is nice, so’s quiet, but if it goes on too long it’s not peace and quiet. I ran down the hall and I knocked on the door. ‘Ma’am,’ I shout. ‘Miss Gold.’ But there’s no answer. So I got a key from the front desk and I went back up.” He drank until his beer was finished. “I shouldn’t say any more.”

“It’s all right,” said Daniel. He had already lost her. What he heard now would make little difference.