“I think it helps her to get out of the house,” he remarked to Sarah.

And so their family life continued quietly, through the winter and into the spring. As the weather grew warmer, Naomi was able to walk a little longer. One day, she told him, she had crossed over to the Left Bank and visited the lovely Church of Saint-Séverin. With the warmer weather, her mood also seemed to lighten. Perhaps she had gotten over her shock of the previous year.

“The time is approaching,” Jacob said to his wife one day, “when we may have to start thinking about a husband for her. As long,” he added uncertainly, “as she isn’t going to start airing her views on the pope to any prospective husband.”

The visit from the rabbi came in the middle of June. He arrived at Jacob’s house a little before noon. Naomi was out with her little brother.

The rabbi had put on weight in the last few years. He sat down heavily on the bench in Jacob’s counting house.

“What can I do for you?” Jacob asked warily.

“What can you do for me?” The rabbi stared at him. “What can you not do for me?” He sighed, and shook his head. “You do not know why I have come to your house?”

“I do not.”

“The wise man does not know.” He nodded. “I am a fool!” he burst out suddenly. And then, very quietly: “But I know.”

Jacob waited.

“Your daughter, Naomi, goes walking by herself quite often,” the rabbi continued.

“Yes. What of it?”

“Where does she walk?”

“It depends. Sometimes to Notre Dame, or some other church.”

“And what does she do when she gets there?”

“Lights a candle. It is the custom. What is this to you?”

“Because your daughter does not walk to Notre Dame. She walks to other places.”

“Where does she walk?”

“She can walk to Aquitaine for all I care! But she is walking with my son Aaron. That is why I am here.”

Aaron. Her childhood friend. A stocky boy, some years older than Naomi. Nothing special. Jacob hadn’t given him a thought in years.

So Naomi’s outburst had caused her to start seeing her Jewish childhood friends again. He could understand her doing so, but it was not wise, especially to be seen in the streets with the rabbi’s son. It could give rise to misinterpretation. He wondered what other Jews she might have seen, and what she might have said to them.

“I did not know this. I will tell her she should not meet him anymore.” He almost reached out his hand to touch the rabbi’s arm, but decided not to, instead giving him what he hoped was a conciliatory smile. “I am sure Aaron is a good young man. But in our situation …” He shrugged sadly. “Their old friendship is no longer wise.”

“You have not understood,” said the rabbi. “They want to get married.”

“Married?”