Trunk was in a daze. “I never thought I would eat a salmon. I told myself, all right, it’s something you have to do without.”

“On behalf of his people, the Elder accepts the gift of the Jewish preserve. We shall build a kingdom there to last a thousand years!”

Rabbi Kornischoner, thin, almost, as the pole he was holding, and with hair growing from every spot on his face, then asked a question: “Who will be the king of this place?”

All eyes turned of course to Trumpelman, who bowed, who beamed. But Obergruppenführer Grundtripp was looking at Czerniakow. Czerniakow, of all people!

“That,” said the Other, “remains to be seen. The Elder who rules best here will rule overseas.”

And at those words, Czerniakow, as if accepting a challenge, lifted his hat with both hands.

Grundtripp continued. “Jews! I also have a wedding gift! A gift of my own! President of the Judenrat Trumpelman and his bride are to be exempt from the prohibition on Jewish births. They and they alone are free to have children.”

On the platform, Trumpelman swayed, then straightened. “Rabbis!” he said. “Pray that the Elder fathers a son. A broad-chested boy! That is a Judenrat order!”

The holders of the huppah all talked at once.

“Mister Chairman,” said Rabbi Martini, “you have to put the head of the bed toward the north and the foot part to the south. It is a proven method.”

“Eating cucumber is good. Both green ones and the squirting kind.”

“But there are no cucumbers in this part of Poland.”

With a wave of his hand Trumpelman silenced the rabbis. “Nomberg, read the contract. Read it quickly. The Elder and the Elder’s wife will give birth to a line of kings.”

The Minister of Religious Affairs rushed through the marriage contract. First came the date, the third day of the week, the sixth day of Tishrei, 5701 years since the Creation; then the place, the Jewish State of the Balut, on the western shore of the river Dolna, within the General Government of the Reich; then the bride’s name and the groom’s name and how the latter sought out the former and was accepted, and so forth and so on in the regular way.

When the reading was finished, Trumpelman turned his back on the crowd. Solemnly he grasped the bride by her shoulders and turned her toward himself. It was the moment of final unveiling. Once more he took the lower fringe of the cloth and centimeter by centimeter lifted it upward. A neck showed. A chin. A wide, thin-lipped mouth. At that instant two different people stood at two different spots in the right-hand benches. One was a man and the other—also dressed in white, which was an insult to the bride—a woman. They both began to make their way to the platform. When the man arrived he stopped and thrust his hand into his pocket. Everybody thought he was going to throw raisins or nuts. From another angle the woman rushed to the platform, too.