Trinity Church. He had gone a stop too far. He was now in the Syrian Quarter, signs in Arabic all around him. From Liberty Street down to Battery Park, everything here west of Broadway was in Arabic script. He walked past tables with men playing chess and smoking water pipes, handcarts with exotic fruit. It smelled of coffee and cardamom. LITTLE SYRIA. SON OF THE SHEIKH, SYRIAN COOKING. He would bring Lauren here, assuming she was still interested in him. “Why should she be interested in you at all? What can you offer her, you good-for-nothing?” Arthur had been ribbing him. “Yeah, the FBI must have sent her after me,” he’d answered.

He stepped inside a Syrian church, maybe just because he read its name, Saint Joseph’s Maronite Church. A silence enveloped him, as if he’d plunged his head underwater. He said a prayer. He prayed for Carl, prayed that Carl really wouldn’t be sent to the front.

He unfolded the letter and learned that Carl had bought a house. Not incentivized:

The deplorable has become common practice around here—no, the proper, normal way. Edith doesn’t much care for the house, it’s old and it’s got some things wrong with it, but you can’t have everything—a clean conscience and luxury. At least not in these times!

A photo was enclosed. The family in the park. It was an older photo: Carl, posing proudly with one foot forward, showing off the family. Thick wool coats and fur collars, snow in the background.

He crossed himself and stepped back outside. The cool, fruity air of the water pipes drifted through the street. He crossed Liberty Street and soon reached Cortland Street, Radio Row. The radio components glittered in the heat. A whole street crammed with replacement parts; the technology was developing at such a rapid pace that the stores kept having to make room for the newest items. Steel and aluminum casings, speakers, and tubes were piled up on the sidewalks. A crowd of buyers threaded its way among it all, browsing. A few were gathered in little groups—experts talking shop. In the sun it smelled of burnt rubber, lubricating oil, and metal. Music drifted out of the shops, jazz mixing with classical. It lent rhythm to the shimmering metal. He saw old Radiolas and old Stromberg Treasure Chests with beautifully crafted wooden casings. They once went for three hundred dollars; now they were practically giving them away, but without any guarantee that they would work.

He felt the wooden surface of a Philco Midget, an obsolete model from 1931 that was shaped like a cathedral. “You got a car?” He jumped. “We install radios. Make an appointment.” The man was dressed like a mechanic. He handed him a business card. Cars were parked on the curb, the doors wide open. Curious passersby stopped to take a look.