Leah reached out and took her hand. “It doesn’t matter. I know what you meant. Are you worried about it?”

Shaindele looked defiantly into her teacup. “So what?” she said softly as if to herself. “Who cares? I mean, after what happened to my mameh, do I really want to get married? Do I really want to have children? She did everything right, everything people expected from her. So how come all those terrible things happened to her anyway? I mean, how could a kind God let it happen, if there even is a God.”

Leah felt her mouth suddenly go dry. “Of course there is a God, Shaindele!” she said hoarsely, helplessly, shocked.

Shaindele shook her head. “I don’t understand you, Leah. You came from outside. You had everything. Nobody bothered you or told you what to do. You didn’t need a shadchan. You could just meet a boy and it was nobody’s business. Why did you give all that up? Why do you even want to be one of us?”

Leah felt a deep chasm open in her heart. It wasn’t an innocent question. It was a challenge to all she had so painfully and arduously acquired over the past few years, demanding that she relive every fork in the road, every footfall. It was gut-wrenching and a bit mortifying to have to do so under the scrutinizing gaze of this young, troubled girl who had never liked her and always viewed her beliefs and practice with suspicion. It was like being cross-examined by a particularly cynical and unfriendly detective. But it was also, she realized, absolutely crucial to her stepdaughter’s well-being at this delicate point in her life to give her some real answers. She was at a dangerous crossroads, and these were vital questions that she couldn’t ask her father, or her grandmother, or her teachers without arousing hostility, calumny, and misgivings.

“Once, when I was very small, my mother took me to the zoo. I remember being in the snake house. There was this gorgeous snake with different colors and markings, as if some artist had painted its skin. I couldn’t stop staring at it. And I thought, I love the artist who made that beautiful creature. So I guess you could say I started believing in God right then and there. I became religious because I love the world, Shaindele—every animal, every tree, every flower. The sea. The sky. Mountains. It is all too complex, too fantastic, to be just some random accident. There has to be a Creator. And I love that Creator.”

“The goyim also love the Creator. But why did you choose to love HaShem, our HaShem? The One we say took us out of Egypt, gave us the Land of Israel, gave us the Torah and all the laws. Why do you love Him?”