Man of the Hour Read Online Free PDF Page B

Brother and sister hardly looked anything alike, except for the eyes. Most days, Elizabeth looked like a regular could-be-anything New York City girl, if you ignored the head scarf. But Nasser had an unmistakable Old World heaviness, as if he’d just come off the streets of Bethlehem. Even their first names sounded as though they came from opposing cultures.
    “No, nothing else is important.” Nasser loaded his sister’s things back into his briefcase. “I am disappointed. I hoped you would help.”
    Every year, they come and go with the tides, David thought once more. The kids. Young, then not young. Some you save, some you don’t. Like a lifeguard.
    “I’m sorry, Nasser. It’s a free country. I mean, I respect your beliefs and I’ll look out for your sister the way I’d look out for any of my students. But people are entitled to make their own mistakes.”
    “No, I don’t think this is so.” He snapped his briefcase shut and stood.
    David started to offer him his hand, but Nasser was distracted again, looking at the Melville quote over the desk.
    “And this is not right either,” he said, jabbing the placard with his finger. “A man should finish anything he starts.”

3
    “WHAT’S THE MATTER?” Youssef was asking.
    “Nothing.” Nasser shrugged, not meeting his eye. “Why do you ask?”
    “I see you looking very … dog-face.”
    They were leaning against the Plymouth, eating lunch outside the Temple Mount All-Halal Deli on Atlantic Avenue, across the street from a Pentecostal church and a bail bondsman’s office. To people driving by, they looked like a couple of Brooklyn cab drivers brown-bagging it on a hot, sooty afternoon, not warriors planning the next stage of jihad.
    “Are you still worrying about this thing we do at the check store?” Youssef bit into his falafel sandwich.
    “No … well … of course not.”
    For the past few days, Nasser had been haunted by the memory of the robbery. He still kept seeing the woman falling away from life and the child with his tinfoil badge. But he was afraid to show any sign of weakness in front of his mentor.
    “It’s my sister, sheik,” he said, trying to change the subject.
    “What about her?” Youssef looked over. He’d always taken a strong interest in Elizabeth, staring at her in long, admiring silence the two times they’d met.
    “I went to her school today.” Nasser fidgeted. “I am very worried about what goes on there.”
    “Oh?”
    “Yes, this is a very bad place,” said Nasser. “No one is taught any respect for God. The girls dress like whores and the boys talk like hoodlums. As if this is normal. I tell you, sheik, I’m scared to death about how this will affect her.”
    He stopped and stared at the House of Detention down the street. Somehow, the killings the other night and his sister’s well-being had become linked in his mind. A wild uncertainty hovered over him, as if something terrible were about to befall him or someone he loved as retribution.
    “Yes, it’s terrible.” The Great Bear set down his sandwich on a bed of wax paper and took out a twenty-ounce bottle of Diet Coke. “A great judgment awaits them all.”
    The great judgment. The phrase made Nasser’s stomach lurch as he took a wedge of pita bread out of his own bag. “And then they are having the governor come to see them,” he went on. “As if it’s okay with him too. The things that go on.”
    “The governor is coming to this school?” Youssef abruptly straightened up.
    “Yes, next week, I think.” Nasser tore at the bread absently, molding the dough into little balls.
    He felt the Great Bear’s weight shift against the car. A city bus moved by slowly and Nasser watched a damp, half-dressed model on all fours smile invitingly from an underwear ad on its side. She looked as if she’d been recently savaged and was ready for another go.
    “Why does the governor come into the school?” Youssef had become alert and attentive, his eyes