Israel Book Shop presents Chapter 23 of a new online serial novel, The Black Sheep, by Esther Rapaport. Check back for a new chapter every week.  Click here for previous chapters.

Copyright © Israel Bookshop Publications. 

Mission number one had been crowned with success.

Ariella watched as the taxi carrying Sarah Reiness drove off into the distance. An older man, wearing a small yarmulke, approached briskly from the other side of the sidewalk, and pushed open the gate. He was holding a faded tallis and tefillin bag, and he pulled a key ring out of his pocket, as he called over his shoulder, “The carpentry shop is closed now. It will open later this morning.”

Carpentry shop?

Interesting rabbi Osher had found himself—a carpenter-rabbi!

Ariella observed from afar as the man opened the iron door on the ground floor and switched on the light. A bitter taste filled her mouth. If this was Osher’s rabbi, she would need to think hard about what to do and how. It was a bit strange, because the speech therapist, who had just left the house a few minutes before her husband came back from davening, had given a totally different impression.

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Israel Book Shop presents Chapter 22 of a new online serial novel, The Black Sheep, by Esther Rapaport. Check back for a new chapter every week.  Click here for previous chapters.

Copyright © Israel Bookshop Publications. 

“They caught the fox.” Reb Elazar shared the news with his two students when he arrived to arrange their discharge from the hospital.

“Nice,” Shlomo said, as he sighed and touched his swollen cheek.

“Was it Gadi who caught him?” Osher asked, and then whispered to himself, “Shlomo.”

“No, he saw the fox early this morning and told my brother-in-law, who right away called the Health Ministry office in their district. It took them two hours to come, but the fox was feeling very at home and didn’t seem inclined to run away.”

“So what now?”

“They will put the fox in quarantine and take tests. If, in a few days—I’m not sure how long it takes—they find out that the fox is healthy, then you won’t need to continue treatment.”

“Thrilling,” Shlomo muttered.

“He wanted to catch it, you know,” Osher said, as he handed Reb Elazar his phone. “But I told him not to do it himself. Ooohh, I’m so dizzy.” He quickly sat down on the bed again, and the Rav watched in alarm as Osher’s face drained of its natural color.

“Are you alright?” he asked.

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Israel Book Shop presents Chapter 21 of a new online serial novel, The Black Sheep, by Esther Rapaport. Check back for a new chapter every week.  Click here for previous chapters.

Copyright © Israel Bookshop Publications. 

“What do you mean, someone was here?” Sarah stopped and looked back. “You think it was one of the boys?”

“No, it wasn’t one of the boys.” He stood in the same place, his gaze narrowing as he looked up the stairs. “Wait a minute.”

“You think someone broke into the house? Then I won’t let you go up yourself!”

“It’s fine. We can assume that the intruder—if he broke in—did not sit and wait for us to come back.” He walked past his wife and went up the stairs. For a long moment, he studied the door from top to bottom, and then pulled his key out of his pocket. “Everything is fine,” he called down to Sarah. “You can come up now. No one was in the house.”

“So where were they?” she asked as she looked around. “In the yard? Do you think someone wanted something from the carpentry shop?” She ascended the stairs as he went down to get the suitcase he’d left in the middle of the yard.

“That’s what I want to check,” he said ambiguously.

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Israel Book Shop presents Chapter 20 of a new online serial novel, The Black Sheep, by Esther Rapaport. Check back for a new chapter every week.  Click here for previous chapters.

Copyright © Israel Bookshop Publications. 

“Foxes?” Instinctively, Ariella glanced out the window she was standing near.

“Osher called us.” Before Ariella could exult at the news, her mother continued, “And so did Reiness, this rabbi of his. He spoke to Abba from the hospital. Apparently Osher was bitten by a fox.”

“Bitten by a fox? In Acco? But this is a built-up city. Where exactly is he wandering that he met foxes?”

“I don’t know.” Her mother sounded very distraught. “Osher didn’t say much. Reiness let Abba speak to one of the doctors in the emergency room there; they went to the hospital to get treatment for rabies…”

“To get what?” Ariella’s voice rose.

“Treatment for rabies.”

“It was…” She closed her eyes for a minute. “The fox had rabies?”

“It’s not clear, so in such a case, to be on the safe side, they treat the person as if the animal was infected.”

“What’s the treatment?”

“Local treatment of the bite wound, but most importantly, a vaccine against rabies. If indeed, the fox was infected, the shots neutralize the virus before it can erupt in the body, because if it does erupt, chas v’shalom, there’s nothing to do anymore.”

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