Free An Accidental Murder: An Avram Cohen Mystery by Robert Rosenberg

sweat.
    “A realpotz,” she emphasized. “You think the book was your mistake? You’re wrong. The book wasn’t the mistake.
    That wasn’t your vanity. Your vanity is your attitude. All high and mighty. You’re a martyr looking for a cause.”
    He knew she was right. But he didn’t know what to do about it. He hoped she would hand down a sentence. Not a punishment or fine, but a discipline of some sort that would define his direction, free him from the ambivalence that so plagued him.
    All his life, things had been clear to him. In childhood, as in all happy childhoods, everything was clear. On the run, in the camp, survival was clear. Afterward, hunting the killers was clear until it disgusted him. And even in the midst of a case, even when the only clarity was the faint sparkle of light reflecting through the fog, his questions never brought him up against the sense of paralysis that he felt crawling into his soul with the money he had inherited.
    Writing the book liberated him. But the attention that came with the book’s publication brought back the paralysis, the fear—yes, he admitted to her, he wasn’t afraid of the bomb or the bomber. He was afraid of the way he had become part of a spectacle. So much of his survival depended on his privacy, and more, on his ability to be anonymous. Even in the streets of Jerusalem, where he knew many faces and many more knew him, he could make himself almost invisible in a crowd.
    Yes, he was barrel-chested, but if he was ever seen in shorts in public it would reveal somewhat spindly legs. Of average height, his black hair had gone white over a very long period, with the last dark strands disappearing only in the last year. His skin was only dark on his face, forearm and hands, as well as a small triangle of chest where his top shirt button was usually unbuttoned. Over the years the hair in that triangle had thickened against the sun, turning into a little white forest where Ahuva’s fingers now played, teasing him.
    “You know what you ought to do?” she said to him suddenly, turning in her seat, holding his face with two hands, looking into his eyes.
    “Please, tell me,” he said. In the fading light, her red hair seemed to darken to a deeper shade, framing an oval face that was beginning to wrinkle. The difference in age had never been an issue between them their first ten years, in which secrecy ruled the relationship. The last seven, it was only a matter for gossips. But lately, she was drawing his attention to the years, the wrinkles, even asking if he thought a face-lift might one day be in order for her. The question had made him laugh. He had only discovered during that island vacation that she had been using coloring to control the whitening of her hair and keep it honey red.
    “Please, tell me, what should I do?” he asked again in exasperation.
    “No,” she decided sadly, “you’ll laugh.”
    “No, I promise I won’t.”
    “Get a new wardrobe. Indulge yourself.” He did have to stifle a laugh.
    She hit him on the chest. “I’m serious. Get a new wardrobe and a new car, pay the extra money, whatever it takes to fix up that house—if that’s what you really want to do. Build the computer system you want. Open a school or a restaurant, or any of those other ideas that you know you’ll never do. Or move in with me.”
    He grinned again.
    “No, you’re right, maybe that’s not such a good idea. I understand, you want to keep your privacy. Keep it. Spend what it takes and keep it. But stop blaming yourself. Start enjoying yourself.” “I am enjoying myself,” he said truthfully, “with you.
    And right now I’m going to enjoy myself even more by basting that roast in the oven,” he added, standing up.
    “The mushrooms this year are fantastic.”
    “You’re not taking me seriously,” she protested, reaching for him.
    But he stepped out of reach and curled a finger at her, humming tunelessly the Aranjuez, trying to be romantic.
    “Oh, but