Positive? Positive is good, positive is—positive.

No, she said, positive in the House of Holy Healing is negative—it is lethal, a virus, plague. They are all terminal.

Rebbie-ji, my brother, made his final darshan on the night of the fire. He was curled up in a corner of his wheelchair, pitifully frail, skeletal, swaddled in blankets and shawls pulled over his head like the angel of death to conceal as much as possible the purple blotches that had erupted on his skin. Buki ben Yogli, slumping over the handlebars of the chair, had pushed him out of his private quarters into the great communal ward packed with his followers, among them also the wounded warriors, survivors and heroes of the anti-Semitic riot at the Kali temple with bandaged heads, arms in slings, on crutches, some also in wheelchairs like their master himself. Women also came out that night, sensing the weight of the occasion, willingly taking their places behind the partition, desiring to pay homage to the holy man their guru who had endured such agonies on their behalf and whom they sensed was now being recalled from this mortal travail to enter a phase of concealment in advance of coming out of the closet as the one we all await. A special alcove completely enclosed was set aside for me due to the impurity I now was carrying in a bag attached to the outside of my body, instead of hidden internally packed away in my bowels like everyone else. Manika and the devadasis, and every other outcast untouchable disease carrier, were also invited to join me in my quarantined isolation booth.

The electrical power had failed again, and the entire ward was illuminated with flickering lights from the memorial candles set out that we always bought in bulk. The weight of parting pressed down on everyone assembled there that night, yet Rebbie-ji, my brother, when he spoke briefly, as if for himself alone, in a voice so quietly intimate but nevertheless audible aimed at our most vital inner cells, alluded to nothing about farewell. He chose to talk about Shakti and Shekhina. Where do they reside, these two essential cosmic female energy forces, these two goddesses, the Hindu Shakti and the Jewish Shekhina? That was the question he was asking. He had searched for them everywhere—he had sought them but he could not find them.