The Day of Atonement Read Free Page A

the tears began to flow fast and hard. Her eyes were red, and her lips trembled. “Please, Sebastião. You must do what I say. You can’t know how I want to hold on to you, but if you don’t leave they will hurt you. They will make you scream, and they will make us listen to it,until we give them every name they want. Do you understand? They will use you to destroy us, and nothing you say will stop them. We could tell them everything we know, but they don’t care about what is true. They will hurt you to make us bend to their will. I know you want to help us, but the only thing you can do is be safe and free. That is how you will help me and your father.”
    I was crying openly now. Under any other circumstances, I would have been furious with myself for weeping, but now I didn’t care. “But I won’t see you again,” I said. “I won’t even have the chance to say goodbye to Papa.”
    “I cannot say what will happen. I pray to the saints we will find each other.” She crossed herself, and then stood and looked at the Englishman. “Take him.”
    “No, Mama,” I said, but I knew the words were empty. She had made it so I could not stay. She had made it clear that to do anything but get on the barge would be a betrayal of both her and my father. To be loyal to my family, I must abandon them to the Inquisition.
    I threw my arms around my mother and felt hers around me. I took in her familiar scent, and for the briefest of moments I felt safe with her. I forgot, for that second, that the future was fixed and immutable. I allowed myself to believe that things might somehow go back to how they were before.
    Then the Englishman put his hand on my shoulder. “If we are to go, we must go now,” he said.
    My mother pushed me away, firmly but with such warmth I felt my heart breaking anew. “I love you, my sweet boy,” she said. “We both love you. Be well, and don’t forget us.”
    “No,” I whispered. “Not yet.”
    She was already turning away, losing herself in the crowd. I moved to run after her, but the Englishman grabbed my arm hard.
    “I know you want to,” he said, lowering himself to speak directly to me. “You’d be a wretch if you didn’t want to, but you cannot go after her. You must honor their wishes. Getting you to safety is theonly power they have over the Inquisition. It is all they have left, and it will be all they will have to sustain them in the months ahead. If you love them, you will not take away that shred of comfort.”
    I looked up at Mr. Settwell and saw that he too was weeping. Then I reached into my pocket and felt something. It was Gabriela’s blue scarf. I ran my fingers around and over it and I closed my eyes. I would never see her again either.
    I could never say what happened in the minutes afterward. Did I later will myself to forget the moment when I chose to abandon my parents? Did I expunge from my memory the decision to escape rather than stay with Gabriela? I don’t know why I can’t recall those moments, but I am grateful that it is so.
    London, 1755
    It was a cold night in a rainy winter. The streets were full of melting snow and horse shit. The thief had fled through the alley, and I ran after him because that was what I did. I was a thief taker, and I was acting in accordance with my duties.
    That was what I told myself: but the man in question was not really a thief. He had, however, tried to take something from me. No, that wasn’t quite true either.
    He had flirted with a woman I was courting. Yes. That was certainly correct. He had tried to steal from me the woman I loved.
    But again—that wasn’t right. I did
not
love Leonora, however deserving she might be. I had been courting her because my patron, Mr. Weaver, thought it would be good for me to seek a wife. He thought a kind woman would prove a calming influence. It was not turning out to be the case. Mr. Weaver was rarely mistaken, but this time, he had erred significantly.
    I shook off my hesitation