“So what was he doing in the job?” Ritchie asked.

“Well, at the start he didn’t really know it would involve taking a human life. I mean, he knew but I guess he blocked that part out. He needed the job so. He had just arrived here from San Antonio, Texas, to attend Rabbi Tomasi’s Torah studies class. Rabbi Tomasi also came from San Antonio. I believe he knows Nathan’s parents.”

“Was Nathan studying for the rabbinate?” Grelich asked.

“I beg your pardon?”

“Did he want to become a rabbi?”

“I would prefer he answer that himself,” Rachel said. “It is a little personal. And anyhow, I don’t really know. I think he had been planning to, but was having second thoughts. He came to one of our meetings, you know, and asked our pastor some questions.”

“Meetings?” Grelich asked.

“At the International Circle of Christian Friendship of Fort Wayne, Indiana, which has a branch here on 173rd Street.”

“What sort of questions did he ask?” Ritchie asked.

“They had to do with the proper relations between God and man in our secular age. Obviously, our pastor didn’t approve of murder.”

“Suicide is not exactly murder,” Grelich said.

“Murder of the self is still murder,” Rachel said. “And it’s still a sin, even if Mr. Nietzsche did approve of it.”

“How did Nietzsche get into this?” Grelich asked.

“Nathan was always quoting him. And Camus.”

“Aha!” Grelich said. “He must have been quoting the Camus who says that whether or not to suicide is the only real question.”

“That must have been the one,” Rachel said.

“And he talked about an old Greek. Sissy-something?”

“Sisyphus?” Grelich guessed.

“This Nathan sounds like a man after my own heart,” Grelich said.