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Story Copyright 2004 by Jacob Thomson. All rights reserved. A limited license is hereby granted to post this story on Usenet, on appropriate fiction websites, or to include this story in PERSONAL emails, provided that this notice remains intact, and that a link is provided to http://jacobthomson.com. With the exception of brief quotes in reviews, no other use of this material is permitted without permission in writing from the author.

There were times when I really envied my cousin Mort. He was the wealthy one in the family, living in a big house a couple of miles outside town. People sometimes say that so-and-so lives on an "estate," but in Mort's case it was literally true. His house, which was enormous, sat right in the middle of a 35-acre plot. The land was cleared to a distance of some 500 feet around the house, and carefully manicured and landscaped. The rest was virgin forest, with many trees rising over 100 feet.

None of us ever really understood how Mort managed to keep the place up. The house—well, mansion, really—contained 28 rooms. Mort was the only guy I ever knew who lived in a house with an actual drawing room. He also had a library, a private study, a gun room, both formal and informal dining rooms, living room, parlor, a commercial kitchen, butler's pantry, a TV room with a giant screen set and theatre seating for 20, and an even dozen bedrooms, each with its own private bath.

Naturally, there were servants' quarters. You couldn't keep up a place like that without servants, or so you'd think. And that's where it was odd. When the house was built, back in the late 19th Century, there had been a butler, a cook, two footmen, and five maids to take care of the inside of the house. There was also a full-time gardener to take care of the grounds. A couple of grooms and a coachman, who had their own quarters over the old coach house, had completed the household staff.

That was then. But now Mort had only a single servant, who presumably did everything. He had a maid. She was a small woman, no more than three inches over five feet tall, and utterly perfect. She was slim where she should be slim and curved where she should be curved. Though I never saw her except in her uniform—the traditional black dress, with lace collar and apron—I was sure her figure had to be perfect.

She was also remarkably beautiful, presently wearing her long, black hair gathered at the back of her head. The only odd thing was that she always wore rather long bangs, nearly covering her forehead down to her eyebrows. I saw her hair in a number of styles over the years, but the bangs were a constant.

And she never seemed to get any older. When I first encountered her, during a visit shortly after my 22nd birthday, she appeared to be in her mid twenties. I just turned 53 a few months ago, and when she answered the door to admit me this morning she still looked exactly the same age as when I had first met her some 31 years before.

"You have a picture up in the attic that's getting older, don't you, Yvette?" I commented.

She smiled and beckoned for me to enter, but said nothing. She never did. As Mort explained it, she was like Don Diego's servant, able to hear normally, but for some unexplainable reason unable to speak.

Not that I cared. She was young and beautiful, and I was rapidly turning into an old geezer who appreciated young, beautiful women more and more as the years passed. The sad part was that, as the years went by, they appreciated me less and less. Such is life, I suppose.

Yvette led me into the gun room, indicating a chair by the window. She gestured out the window, and following her pointing finger I could just see Mort stalking along the edge of the forest, a pair of powerful binoculars and a long-lensed camera hanging around his neck. Mort was an avid amateur ornithologist—a bird watcher.

It was one of his hobbies, of which he had many.

His hobbies were his occupation. No one in the family knew exactly how much money Mort had, but it was obvious that he had more than enough. A local real estate agent had just told me that Mort's house and grounds were the object of a developer's attention, and that he had been offered seven million for the place. In the agent's opinion, the offer was a little on the low side, but not by much.

The developer wanted the place for a shopping mall. Mort wasn't interested in selling, and that was where it stood, much to the annoyance of the agent, who stood to make close to half a million dollars in commission if the deal went through.

"Your cousin should probably reconsider," he'd told me. "These guys want the land, and I don't think they're used to people turnng them down. I'm a little concerned for him."

"How long have you known Mort?" I'd asked.

"Maybe 40 years. I sold him that place, way back when I was just getting started in this business."

"Then you know he probably won't sell. He never leaves his estate. Anything he needs, he just has delivered. I think the only way you'll ever get him out of there is when he's dead. Maybe not even then. He's got a private mausoleum behind the house, presuming the county will allow him to use it."

"I know," the agent said, shaking his head. "That's the problem. I get the feeling the guys backing this shopping mall deal are the type who might be inclined to arrange it if he's too stubborn. And the county won't let him be buried there, either. He'd have to subdivide the land and set aside a minimum of ten acres as a cemetery to do it."

This was one reason I was out at Mort's house today. Mort was a stubborn old guy, but he might not know just who he was dealing with. The agent never said, exactly, but there was a strong impression the developer was some sort of Mob front.

Well, for the moment, I was sitting in a very comfortble chair, sometimes looking out the window, and sometimes watching Yvette as she dusted the dead animals. There were heads all over the walls, and several full body mounts scattered around the room, with gun cases in between. The room had always struck me as rather an odd place. We're Jewish, and Jews don't hunt. I don't think it's any particular Jewish repugnance at killing game animals, mind you. It's just that, the way we're taught, if you shoot an animal the meat isn't kosher, so what's the point?

The family who built the house, of course, were gentiles, and had obviously hunted on several continents. When Mort bought the house the furnishings, including the mounted trophies and guns, came with it. The original builder's family had whithered away and died, leaving only a nephew who lived in California and didn't care about the old family place, which he hadn't seen since he was three. Mort made an offer for the estate and the nephew took it.

After a while, Yvette finished her dusting and left the gun room. I continued to look out the window. This room was a favorite of Mort's, but I'd never cared for it. You can recognize that hunting is a part of the natural order, man simply being another predator and every bit as much a part of nature as a wolf or cougar, but that doesn't mean you may not have philosophical objections. I'd never been placed in a position where I had to take a life. At least, nothing higher in the natural order than the random insect. I wasn't sure I could. I doubted that actual hunting was in Mort's nature, either. But he kept the old trophies.

I honestly wondered just how much of the house really reflected Mort's personality, and how much was simply preserved, like a museum, from the original occupants. The library often seemed to me to be the only room where you could really see the current owner. The shelves were crowded with his books, some of them very old.

My cousin was a curious man. He wasn't in the least religious, probably hadn't been inside a synagogue in the last 20 years, yet he was as well versed in Jewish law and tradition as any rabbi. Mort could cite the entire Babylonian Talmud from memory. I've tested him on this, giving him what I was sure were a number of extremely obscure passages. He could not only tell me which volume they were from, but cite the page, column and line, and rattle off every commentary on the citation.

His passion was Cabala. I doubt there was a single book, text, or treatise on the subject, no matter how obscure, he didn't own. But he had no interest at all in what he called "Pop Cabala," the sort of thing being taught to celebrities. He was quite sure it was all just another fad and, in any case, even the deepest popular teachings were, in his estimation, no more than a very superficial treatment.

"They teach this stuff to children," he'd told me. "How deeply can they be delving? You can't teach Cabala, real Cabala, to children. The rules are quite clear on that. Before you may begin to learn in Cabala you must be at least 40-years-old, and have a very thorough knowledge of every aspect of Jewish law and tradition. If you lack those prerequisites, you'll never really be able to learn, and you may very well end up going crazy instead."

Mind you, I've never really understood any of it. Mort claimed that Cabala could explain the workings of the Universe. I was more inclined to look to science. I suppose this is why Mort is a wealthy, eccentric artist and philosopher and I'm a civil engineer.

While I was mulling this over, Mort returned to the house. Coming into the gun room, he greeted me, then walked across the room to one of the gun cabinets, putting his binoculars and camera in a drawer in the lower section.

"I hope you haven't been too bored, David," Mor said. "If I'd known you were coming out here I wouldn't have been wandering about in the woods looking for birds."

"I was okay. Yvette was dusting in here. That was actually sort of entertaining to watch."

"She is a beauty, isn't she?" He smiled.

"That she is. Almost too beautiful. She has to be close to 60, but hardly looks older than her middle twenties."

"She will be 64 in three months," Mort replied. "But I never intended her to age, so she remains young."

This was new. It wasn't the first time I'd noticed that Yvette seemed frozen at about 24, but this was the first time I'd heard Mort say anything implying he might have something to do with her perpetual youthfulness.

"What do you have to do with it?"

"Learn your Cabala, David, and you'll understand."

"What does the Cabala have to do with people not getting older?"

"Nothing at all."

That made about as much sense as most of Mort's cabalistic musings, which was none at all. If the Cabala had nothing to do with people not aging, then why would I understand the phenomenon if I studied it? Ask me why a delicate looking bridge can carry a pair of fully-loaded freight trains at the same time without falling down, or how many cubic yards of concrete are needed for a 200-foot tall dam, and I can give you an answer. A direct answer, not one that seems to rely on circular logic with a huge hole in the circle.

Yvette came back into the gun room, nodding to Mort. "Supper," he said. "You'll stay, won't you, David?"

"Of course."

Yvette was also the cook. One of the best in the world, in my opinion, and I've traveled enough to know. In any case, I'd come out here to talk to Mort about the possible threat from the mall developers. Probably not a subject for the table, but certainly appropriate afterward.

The meal was, as expected, excellent. Chicken, prepared with some sort of herb coating and deep fried. There was a choice of green beans or peas—I took both—and whipped potatoes with real butter. (We don't actually keep kosher in our family, obviously.) A bottle of wine from Mort's extensive cellars completed the meal. For some reason he never serves desserts, so I'd long ago learned not to expect them.

Our stomachs full, we retired to the library to talk. "You know," I said, "Jim Curtis thinks you may be in some danger."

Mort leaned back in his chair. "Jim wants his commission on this place. I have no plans to sell. I like it here."

"He seems to think the people who want to buy your property are Mob types."

"I had them checked out," Mort said. "Jim is correct."

"That doesn't bother you?"

"Not much. Does it bother you?"

"I'd like to keep you around a while longer. How many relatives do we have left?"

Mort got up and walked to a bookcase, pulling a small, leather-bound volume from the shelf. He flipped through the pages, read something, and replaced the book on the shelf before resuming his seat.

"In answer to your question, David, I have exactly one living relative, and that would be you. I'm going to be 88 next year, which means I have already outlived the oldest previously known member of our family by 20 years. We tend to die fairly young, in case you haven't noticed. If these gangsters kill me, well, this estate will be your problem then."

"I don't want it. Not anytime soon, at least."

"Don't worry. I'm in no hurry to pass it on."

Yvette came in just then, a quizzical look on her lovely face. "I think we won't be needing you for the rest of the evening, Yvette," Mort told her.

She nodded and went out, her footsteps retreating toward the back of the house, where the servants' quarters were located. She had quite a spacious apartment for herself back there, having full use of a space originally built to house a complete live-in staff.

"I still think you might want to take some precautions," I said. "This house is pretty isolated, sitting in the middle of all this land with no close neighbors."

"What sort of precautions? Hire bodyguards? They'd just get in the way." He smiled. "Besides, I have Yvette, don't I?"

"What kind of protection can she provide? She's just a woman, and a rather tiny one at that. Do you think she'll charm the bad guys into leaving you alone?"

"She's more capable than you might think. A very tough customer, as we used to say. Perhaps she could charm them with her beauty, but she could also take more direct action."

I shook my head. "You mean, she's some sort of karate expert or something?"

"Nothing of the sort. I'd just say that anyone who tried to take her on might be in for quite a surprise."

I could see I was getting nowhere and, as it was getting dark, I decided to head for home. Mort walked with me to the front door, still reassuring me that he was in no danger. I had a feeling he was wrong, but knew I'd never be able to convince him. He had to come to that conclusion on his own.

I was a quarter mile down the road when a big Lincoln, with out of state plates, passed me going the other direction. I didn't think anything of it at first, until I saw the turn signals come on and the car make a left turn. There were no roads back there, only Mort's long, winding drive.

Mort almost never had visitors, with the exception of me, and some delivery people. It was too late for deliveries and, in any case, I couldn't think of anything you delivered in a Lincoln, other than possibly unwelcome guests. But he clearly had visitors now. Just as clearly, he hadn't been expecting them, or he would certainly have said something.

I turned the car around and drove back to the estate. The Lincoln was parked by the main door. As I was shutting off the engine I heard a single, muffled "crack!" from the house, and there was a flash in the drawing room window. Acting foolish, as people frequently do in that sort of situation, I ran into the house and hurried down the hall.

Mort was standing by the fireplace, still holding the poker in his right hand. He looked at me and smiled weakly. "I told you it would be all right," he said.

It didn't look all right to me. There were three bodies sprawled on the floor, two rather large men, wearing black suits, and Yvette. All three were obviously dead. One man had the front of his head stove in, bearing the imprint of the mantelpiece. The other had a long crease in the back of his skull, which I had no doubt would match the poker in Mort's hand. There were two pistols on the floor near the men.

Yvette lay face down on the parquet floor. There could be no question she was dead, even without turning her over. She was still in her uniform, the skirt hiked up in back, exposing most of her legs. She was gray, and a very unnatural gray at that. Clearly there was no blood flowing through her veins.

"Have you called the police?" I asked.

"In a minute. I need to take care of Yvette first."

"I think she's dead, Mort. You shouldn't move her. The police will want to see this scene exactly the way it is."

Mort smiled and knelt beside the maid, rolling her over onto her back. "She'll be fine," he said.

He brushed back her bangs with his hand. Curiously, the hair had become stiff, so that it stayed where he moved it, standing up from her head. There was a deep crease across her forehead where a bullet had hit her. There was no blood, which I didn't understand. Nor did I understand what appeared to be the Hebrew letters Mem and Sov, seemingly incised into her forehead. It was no wonder she always wore those bangs, I thought, for they would hide the scars.

Mort looked up at me. "Easily fixed," he said.

"Easily fixed?"

"David, you remember how I made my money, don't you?"

"Sure. You're an artist. A painter and a sculptor."

"Well, then, you can see that this is no great problem." With his finger he smoothed the crease in Yvette's forehead. It all came together neatly, more like clay than flesh. "You know what the word meis means, don't you?"

I nodded. The Hebrew letters on her forehead. "It means 'death'," I said.

"Precisely. But if you put an alef in front of it, then it becomes 'emes,' which means 'truth'." He took his PDA from his pocket and took out the stylus. "This should do," he said.

He took the stylus and incised an alef on Yvette's forehead. "Alef, you remember, is not only a letter, it is also the number one. One is the most basic attribute of God, as it declares in the Torah, 'Hear, O Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is One.' And emes, truth, without God in it is no truth at all, but death. But, if we restore God, then it becomes true again, doesn't it?"

Yvette opened her eyes. What I saw, as the lids opened, were not eyes, but only the sculpted images of them in gray clay. But, as I watched, the color returned to her skin and her eyes again took on the appearance of normality. Mort helped her to her feet. "Now," he said, "we will call the police."

I really couldn't help much when the police arrived. I had still be parking my car when the shot was fired. As Mort explained it, when the gangsters broke in to attack him, Yvette had shoved one of them into the mantelpiece, instantly killing him. The other had gone after her, firing one shot and missing, and Mort had grabbed the poker and killed him. The explanation satisfied the detectives, and after a few hours the bodies were taken away. The police asked us to stay out of the drawing room for a while, until they were sure the forensic people had been able to collect any physical evidence, but they left us in no doubt that they considered the whole thing justifiable and that no charges were likely to be filed.

After the police had left, the three of us were sitting in the library. "I don't think we'll have any more trouble, do you?" Mort said.

"Probably not. But you know, you lied to the police."

"Not in any way that would change things."

"You said the second guy fired and missed. He didn't miss. We both know that."

"Of course. But I could hardly tell the detectives that, could I? What would they think? They'd probably lock me up as some sort of nut."

"I'm not sure I really believe any of this myself."

"And there's the problem. You're Jewish, you've heard all the old legends, and you don't believe it. How well do you think I'd fare with a Christian cop? 'Well, officer, he killed my maid, but that was okay, because I sculpted her out of clay myself about 64 years ago, so I knew how to fix her.' I don't think he'd consider it credible." He smiled. "After all, how many cops have even heard of a golem?"