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We stayed with the rabbi for another day and night. Paul said that, although he didn’t know much about being Jewish, he did know that it was important to keep the dead company for a while and that this was called ‘sitting shiva.’ Having made the mistake of not doing this for my father, of leaving him in that alley, I saw that he was right. Besides that, it was the feast day of Saint Agnes, and that needed observing too.
The rabbi had meant it that he was ready to die. Out back of the synagogue, up on two sawhorses and covered with snow, was the coffin he’d made himself. We brought it into the temple, lined it with his ratty wool blanket and some of the straw he’d used for his bed, and then, with six of us lifting, laid him gently into it. Contrary to what’s usually said about dead bo
