“Rachel, for God’s sake,” Allan cried.

Rachel stood up and tilted the coffeepot so a small stream of hot coffee hit Sussman’s thigh. He jumped up.

“You’re crazy,” he screamed. “I’ll sue you . . .”

But he backed away from her, up the steps still going backward and into the foyer. She found his coat with one hand, holding the pot with the other. Allan’s eyes were wide with amazement. Sussman turned to Allan helplessly. Allan shook his head and Sussman said in his most soothing tones, “Mrs. Levy. I know how you feel. I swear to you, I’m no racist.” Rachel drew back the pot to throw and he ran out the door, down the path. She stood at the door with the pot raised until he started his car and drove away.

When Allan told Jacob what happened, he laughed and shook his head. Rachel ladled out soup.

“Extra noodles?” she asked. He nodded and they exchanged a look of conspirators while Allan said, “It’s not funny, Jake. Maybe Sussman’s a boor, but that doesn’t mean . . .”

Levy said, “Allan, a man I love deeply and who once loved me was black. . . .”

Roger Hawkins. Rachel spilled some of the soup she was ladling out and mopped up the drops.

“And I’m not going to run away because people of the same color live a block away.”

“What if you live next door? What if they live all around you?” Allan asked.

“What if they do?”

Allan shook his head. “Look, Jake, I don’t mean to sound like this, I swear I don’t. But some of what that guy said made sense.”

“About the property values?”

“Yes.”

What about moral values, she expected Levy to ask. Should my money mean more to me than my conscience? He was one of the few people she’d ever known who could say things like that without sounding pompous. But instead he said quietly, “Allan, I’ve left Poland, Germany, Cyprus, Palestine, and Brooklyn. I’m not going again, and that’s final.”

It wasn’t final then, but by the end of the evening it was. Levy called a meeting and by eight-­thirty Luria, Dworkin, Alldmann, Fineman, and the rest had gathered in Golda’s finished basement. Outside it was snowing again. They could hear the wind off the Sound; branches and limbs creaked and would break and leave windfalls all over the lawns and roads. They couldn’t help contrasting the outside storm with the warmth of the room they sat in. Golda made sandwiches, sturgeon salad on thin sliced rye, with sliced tomatoes and black wrinkled olives. The men drank tea, ate the sandwiches.

It was Walinsky who came to the point. “So—we pack and move and have to start over someplace else, or we stay and lose money. Some choice,” he said bitterly.