The Entertainer and the Dybbuk Read Free Page A

said the dancer, checking her makeup in a compact mirror.
    Freddie froze as he felt a puff of air rise from his windpipe. “What’s the matter, fräulein? Can’t you read anything but German?”
    The dybbuk! Consuelo threw an icy glare at Freddie across the small table. “Are you trying to be funny?”
    â€œFunny, no—insulting, yes,” replied the dybbuk, crowding out Freddie’s own voice.“Senorita, you’re as Spanish as sauerkraut. The way you dance reminds me of German soldiers goose-stepping.”
    Her face went pale. She stood up, tipping over a glass flower vase. She peered at The Great Freddie with a blaze of contempt. “Are all Americans pigs?” she muttered, and walked out.
    Freddie sizzled. He clenched his jaws but managed to speak. “Dybbuk! I’m going to break your Jewish neck, if you have one!”
    â€œI was doing you a favor,” the dybbuk replied. “I can smell a German a mile off. She can’t hide from me.”
    â€œYou’re loco!”
    â€œShe’s Nazi rotten. That show-off fox furaround her neck, biting its own tail. A Spanish lady? No. I saw used clothing like that all over Germany. Stolen. Stripped off the backs of Jewish women pushed alive into the gas chambers. One look at your dancer and I broke into a sweat. She’s trying to pass for a Spanish somebody with no blood on her hands.”
    The Great Freddie ignored the glances from a nearby diner, who must have thought he was mumbling to himself. “What if you’re wrong?”
    â€œWhat if I’m right? That fräulein can’t fool me. She’s given me so many Nazi salutes she still sleeps with her arm in the air.”
    Freddie gave his fingers a loud snap. “I’mthrough fighting the war. Stop hanging around me! Stop possessing me! Stop talking from my lips! Vanish!”
    â€œYou’ll feel better in the morning.”
    â€œWanna bet?” Freddie replied. He left a tip on the table and walked out. Bristling, he glanced back, as if he might have left the dybbuk sitting there. Not that cheeky kid. No such luck.

CHAPTER 5
    A t the crack of dawn, Freddie sat through a candlelit mass in a small church a block from his hotel. As soon as the service ended, he stopped the little priest before the holy man could disappear into the shadows.
    â€œFather,” said the ventriloquist. “Can you perform an exorcism?”
    â€œYou know someone possessed?”
    â€œAnd how. It’s me.”
    â€œYou may be imagining it,” said the priest.
    â€œI’m not imagining anything.”
    â€œThere is a young priest in Lyon who is talented at plucking out demons by the scruff of the neck. A contribution to the church would be a blessing.”
    â€œI could pay something now and the rest later,” said Freddie. “I have big show dates coming up in Paris.”
    The priest folded his arms patiently. “Perhaps it would be enough to mark the sanctified cross on your forehead with holy oil. Tell me about this demon of yours.”
    â€œIt’s a dybbuk.”
    The priest’s arms dropped. “A dybbuk! A Jewish spirit?”
    â€œThat’s what he says.”
    The priest broke into a crusty scowl. “My son, are you making a joke? This is a Catholic church. We don’t do Jews.” And then he smiled. “Go find yourself a rabbi, and Jesus be with you!”
    A moment later, Freddie was out on the street, not knowing which way to turn. Were there any Jews left alive in Marseille after the slaughter? Some of the French, defeated by the Germans, had collaborated with the Nazis. They had rounded up their Jewish countrymen and packed them into cattle cars for the death camps.
    Freddie stepped in and out of a few shops, asking if anyone could steer him to a synagogue. A butcher peered at him through watery blue eyes and said, “You don’t look Jewish.”
    â€œYou don’t look