The Japanese Lover(40)

Isaac’s initial impulse was to sweep away all these fetishes that had invaded his room, but love for his wife won out. He could easily overlook them if they prevented Lillian from sliding any further down the slope of fear. He had no other means of comforting her. He was aghast at his own physical collapse, since he had always been strong and healthy, and considered himself indestructible. He was bone-weary, and only his determination allowed him to fulfill the obligations he had imposed on himself. Among them was that of remaining alive so as not to betray his wife.

Alma’s arrival gave him a burst of energy. He had never been one for displays of sentiment, but his poor health had made him vulnerable, and he had to be very careful to avoid the flood of feelings he felt inside from overflowing. It was only Lillian in their most intimate moments who glimpsed this side of her husband’s character. Isaac turned to his son, Nathaniel, for support: he was his best friend, associate, and confidant, but he had never needed to make that explicit, because both of them took it for granted and would have been embarrassed to do so. He treated his daughters, Martha and Sarah, with a benevolent patriarch’s affection, and yet in secret he had confessed to Lillian that he didn’t really like his daughters, because he found them mean-spirited. Although she would never have admitted it, Lillian did not much like them either. Isaac celebrated his grandchildren from a prudent distance. “Let’s wait for them to grow a little, they’re not human beings yet,” he would say jokingly to excuse his behavior, but deep down this was what he really felt. However, he had always had a soft spot for Alma.

When, back in 1939, this niece arrived from Poland to live at Sea Cliff, Isaac was so smitten with her that he later came to feel a guilty pleasure that her parents never appeared, as this gave him the chance to replace them in the little girl’s heart. He did not want to mold her as he did his own children, simply to protect her, and that allowed him the freedom to love her. He left it to Lillian to look after her female needs, and instead had fun challenging her intellectually and sharing with her his passion for botany and geography. It was when he was showing her his gardening books that the idea of creating the Belasco Foundation occurred to him. They spent months going through different possibilities together until the idea took shape, and it was Alma, who by then was thirteen, who thought of creating gardens in the city’s poorest neighborhoods. Isaac admired her and watched fascinated as her mind developed; he understood her loneliness and was moved when she turned to him for company. She would sit beside him, one hand on his knee, to watch television or study gardening books, and the weight and warmth of that hand was a precious gift to him. He in turn would pat her on the head when he passed by and the others were not looking, and would buy her sweets that he left under her pillow.

However, the young woman who returned from Boston, with her geometrical hairstyle, red lips, and confident stride, was a far cry from the timid Alma of the past, the little girl who had slept clutching her cat because she was afraid of sleeping alone. Still, once they had overcome the initial awkwardness, they soon resumed the sensitive relationship they had enjoyed for more than a decade.

“Do you remember the Fukuda family?” Isaac asked his niece a few days after her arrival.

“Of course I do!” Alma replied, startled.

“One of the sons called me yesterday.”

“Ichimei?”

“Yes, he’s the youngest, isn’t he? He asked if he could come to see me; he has something he needs to talk about. They are living in Arizona.”

“Uncle, Ichimei is my friend, and I haven’t seen him since his family was interned. Can I be there when he talks to you, please?”

“He gave me to understand it was a private matter.”

“When is he coming?”

“I’ll let you know.”

A fortnight later, Ichimei appeared at Sea Cliff, dressed in a cheap dark suit and black tie. Alma had been waiting for him with a racing heart, and before he could even ring the bell she opened the door and flung herself into his arms. She was still taller than he was and almost knocked him to the ground. Ichimei, amazed at seeing her and taken aback because public demonstrations of affection were not made among the Japanese, did not know how to respond to such effusiveness. A moist-eyed Alma gave him no time to think about it. She grabbed his hand and dragged him inside, repeating his name over and over, and as soon as they had crossed the threshold she planted a kiss squarely on his mouth. Isaac Belasco was in the library in his favorite armchair, with Ichimei’s cat, Neko, who by now was sixteen years old, sitting on his lap. Shocked at what he was witnessing, he hid behind his newspaper until Alma finally brought Ichimei to him. Then she left them together and closed the door.

Ichimei briefly outlined for Isaac Belasco the fate that had befallen his family: the old man was already aware of most of it, because following the telephone call he had investigated as much as he could about the Fukudas. He not only knew about the deaths of Takao and Charles, how James had been deported, and the poverty the widow and her two children found themselves in, but had done something about it. The only novelty Ichimei provided was Takao’s message regarding the sword.

“I am truly sorry about Takao’s passing, he was my friend and teacher. I’m also sorry about Charles and James. No one has touched the spot where your family katana is buried, Ichimei. You may take it whenever you wish, but it was buried ceremoniously, and I think your father would like it to be dug up with equal solemnity.”