She was rubbing her hands together to maintain the warmth when she entered Moskowitz’s office to take out his old newspapers. He was still in, later than usual, dressed in his travel suit. He stood in front of his open vault, rummaging through its contents and depositing selected documents into a small trunk at his feet.

Batya turned to leave just as Freda entered with a cup of coffee. “I’ll come back later,” Batya murmured. Outside the office, she halted and pressed her ear to the wall to eavesdrop. Right by her face, hanging along the side of a painting, she noticed a key. Probably to Moskowitz’s door. In a houseful of illiterate prostitutes, he rarely locked it.

“How long will you be in Rio?” she heard Freda ask her brother.

“A week.” Moskowitz took a noisy sip of coffee, something he forbade Batya to do in public. “Important members of Zwi Migdal will be coming from all over to vote.”

“God will bless you, you should be elected president.”

“Pedro won’t relinquish his throne so easily. If I don’t get all the pledged votes, next year is only a year away.” He chuckled at his own joke. “Pedro hates that I’m the treasurer; I have more say than he does as president. He must go through me for every expense, so who’s in charge?”

“Even as a little boy our Yitzik was a math professor.” Freda laughed. “There’s no situation you can’t handle.”

He chuckled again, and Batya walked away. She wouldn’t get the newspapers for a whole week; she’d miss reading about Alfred Dreyfus’s fate.

An hour later, feeling gloomy, she looked down from her window at the rainwater flowing along the street. A covered carriage was parked in front of the house, the horses’ heads lowered under the heavy rain. From the commotion that reached Batya from inside the house, she figured that a horde of girls was gathering in the vestibule for a big sendoff.

She descended the back stairs, intending to get herself a cup of hot coffee and then, after Moskowitz had left, join the sisters in the pavilion, since few customers would be around in this weather.

As she passed the office, her glance caught Moskowitz’s leather briefcase still resting on the chair next to his gray felt hat, a walking stick with a silver handle leaning against it. His wool coat was draped on the second chair, but the trunk with the documents must have been carried out to the carriage; Moskowitz was probably making a last stop at the lavatory before collecting his personal belongings.

Without thinking, Batya entered, unbuckled the briefcase, and looked inside, unsure what she hoped to find.

There was the ledger.

She pulled it out, slid it under her cardigan, and quickly rebuckled the briefcase. She hugged the book to her chest and, heart pounding, slipped through the back corridor up to her room.