“Not quite. Yitzy’s knowledge of Chumash was photographic—commentaries and all. Yitzy had a photographic memory about everything. But he had also been a ba’al koreh—a reader of the Torah. So he knew Torah—Chumash—comma by comma or rather, trupp by trupp. So along came Bram. At first, they just learned a little, went over a few basics. Yitzy was feeling him out, trying to ascertain Bram’s level…which he thought was pretty high for someone trained outside the system. Then slowly, slowly…I could almost see the wheels turning inside his brain…Bram started trying to put things over on Yitz. You know, showing off what he had learned, coming up with an obscure Jewish source, positive that Yitzy had never heard about it.”

“Wrong approach?”

“Very misguided. Yitzy would listen politely. Then he would quote the source letter perfect, and come back with more than a few of his own sources, gently showing Bram why he was misinformed, flooding him with information the poor guy wasn’t equipped to process. By the end of a month, Yitzy had unwittingly demolished him. Then they got along great. Because then, Bram was ready to learn.”

Decker said, “One couldn’t have expected a Catholic seminary student to know as much Chumash as a yeshiva bocher. It wasn’t Bram’s main text.”

“You’re right. I knew that. Yitzy knew that. Rav Schulman knew that. It just took Bram a little while to catch on. Anyway, they became very good friends. Even Yitzy didn’t realize how good a friend Bram was until he really needed him.”

Indifferently, Decker said, “What happened with Bram’s book?”

“Oh that!” Rina rolled her eyes. “He had a contract for it. Something like Messianic Teachings in the Old Testament, as they call it. Pretty offensive to a person of strong Jewish beliefs.”

“Like Yitzchak?”

“Like me. I read part of it. For me, it was as if he was playing exegesis games with our holy book and using it for his own purposes.”

“But isn’t that what he believes?”

“Absolutely. From Bram’s point of view, he was simply interpreting the Bible the way he had been taught. One thing I should make clear. Even with Yitzchak as his friend, Bram never wavered in his faith. Last time I saw Bram, he was just as strong a Catholic as he is today. But after learning with Yitzy, knowing him personally, knowing how the Catholic Church had persecuted Jews over the centuries, Bram had some misgivings about publishing his work.”

Rina sighed, poured herself a glass of iced tea.

“Somehow the powers in Rome got hold of the unfinished manuscript.”

“Somehow they got hold of it?”