by Robert Mayer
This day he would be of little assistance, however. When Meyer showed him the glittering Russian sword and explained the reason for his visit, Buderus admired it but handed it back. The Crown Prince was closeted in his apartments, Buderus said, and had left word that he was not to be disturbed. As he held Meyer’s gaze, the thought passed between them that Wilhelm was entertaining a mistress — perhaps more than one. But no word was spoken on the subject. Instead, Buderus came around from behind his desk. “Are you riding back to Frankfurt?” he asked. “I have business there, and we could ride together if that is agreeable.” Meyer replied that he would be honored by the company.
So it was that a short time later the two men on horseback were ambling down a road bisecting fields of pungent hay when their path was blocked by an officer of the Crown Prince’s army. He was dressed in a deep blue coat, hat and breeches, a sword at his side, a musket in his hand. Buderus did not speak, merely wheeled his mount so the soldier could see Wilhelm’s coat of arms embossed in red on the yellow saddle cloth. The officer stepped aside and let them pass.
“What was that encounter?” Meyer inquired.
Up ahead they could see a high-sided wagon, and a small cluster of blue-clad soldiers. “I suspect they’re recruiting,” Buderus said.
“Recruiting?”
“A regiment to lease to King George of England, Wilhelm’s cousin. To help put down the uprising in America.”
“I’d heard that his father the Landgrave often hired out troops at Hesse-Kassel. I didn’t know that Wilhelm also did it.”
“King George was having difficulty finding cannon fodder, to speak bluntly. Russia and Sweden turned him down. When the Crown Prince heard this, he quickly made an offer. At an advantageous price to himself. George had little recourse but to accept. The contract is being prepared as we speak.”
They stopped beside the knot of soldiers in the road. Two young soldiers were walking to a small farm house. Two dogs began to bark, and ran at them from behind the red-painted house. The soldiers lowered their muskets, their bayonets fixed, and pointed them at the approaching dogs. The animals slowed their run, set their tails to wagging. From the house a peasant farmer emerged, wiping his hands on a cloth, as if he had been interrupted at lunch.
Meyer could not hear what was being said. The farmer began shaking his head. The soldiers began pushing him toward the house.
“It appears that he does not want to go,” Meyer noted.
“They usually don’t. But he has no choice. The Crown Prince owns him, body and soul.”
A woman wearing an apron over her yellow dress came out of the house, two small children running to keep up. She spoke to her husband, looked at the soldiers, and began to wail. Her husband grabbed her and put a hand over her mouth, and hugged her, and knelt and hugged the children. He spoke to her, to them, quietly Then he turned and went into the house. In a short time he emerged carrying a sack. He stood beside his family and stared at the waiting wagon.
“Underwear and one change of clothes,” Buderus said. “The regiment will provide a uniform.”
The man hugged his wife and children again. Then, head held high, he walked between the soldiers to the road, and climbed into the empty wagon, which was surrounded by four more soldiers. The prisoner, Meyer thought — then he corrected himself — the recruit — appeared to be about Meyer’s age.
“How long will he be gone from them?”
“As long as the fighting lasts. Assuming that he survives.”
The wagon rolled off, pulled by two Clydesdales, surrounded by the four guards. The two recruiting officers walked beside it. A Kapitäin rode on horseback in the rear. In front of the farmhouse, the woman was pressing a large red handkerchief to her face. Even from a distance, Meyer could see her shoulders heaving. The two children, a boy and a girl, were waving their Papa goodbye.
“If I may ask,” Meyer said, “how much does King George pay for these men?”
“Seventy-six gulden per year for each recruit. Another seventy-six for each man killed. Three wounded equals one killed. A simple formula.”
“The money goes to the public treasury? With perhaps a stipend for the widows?”
“The money goes to Wilhelm.”
Meyer absorbed this information silently. It was hardly his place to protest. But a question popped from his mouth regardless. “Why do the peasants not rebel?”
Buderus gave him a sidelong glance as they rode. “Why do the Jews not rebel?”
“Unlike the peasants, we are greatly outnumbered. There is a matter of the walls. And to date, although we are confined, we are not sent off to be killed. I suppose we should be grateful.”
At a crossroads up ahead, the soldiers and the wagon maneuvered to the right, into a narrow dirt lane. Another farm house was not far away. Three more were visible further along.
“Have you seen enough of this?” Buderus asked.
“Perhaps one more, if you’ll indulge me.”
“It’s hardly a state secret.”
They reigned their horses twenty metres behind the guarded wagon as the two recruiters approached the first house. A woman with gray hair came to the door, then watched as they approached her husband, or son, who was at work in a field. The soldiers spoke to him. He appeared to argue, gesticulating with his arms. When one of the soldiers lowered his musket, his bayonet, the man had no choice to but to go with them. After procuring a sack from the house, he hugged the woman briefly, then walked with the soldiers to the wagon. The woman watched, silent, both hands covering her mouth.
“He must be fifty years old,” Meyer whispered.
“The limits are sixteen to sixty. As long as they’re able-bodied.”
Suddenly one of the soldiers shouted, “There’s another one!” They all looked toward the house. Beyond it a younger man on horseback was galloping away across the fields.
“Shall we give chase?” a soldier yelled.
“Let him go,” the Kapitäin said. “We’ll come back for him another time.”
The woman with graying hair was sitting in the dirt, appearing stunned, as she watched them move away. With the two recruits in the wagon, the soldiers strode on toward the next house, perhaps two hundred metres farther along. Buderus turned his horse towards the main road, and Meyer did the same.
“How many will they take?” he asked.
“The contract calls for twenty-five hundred. With the fees, and a number of dead and wounded, the Crown Prince likely will earn two million gulden. That’s a lot of money. It’s not as if the Crown Prince has no feelings. He would not do this for ten kreuzer.”
Meyer, unsure if Buderus was being ironic, managed not to smile.
“Wilhelm’s father, the Landgrave, will send twenty-five thousand men,” Buderus said. “That’s a lot more money.”
They turned the horses onto the road to Frankfurt. The weak sun moved in and out among the clouds. Cows in a field on the left stood dumbly munching.
“That fellow who rode off,” Meyer asked, “what will happen to him?”
“They won’t shoot him for desertion. That would be costly. They’ll make him run a gauntlet. Then they’ll send him off to fight anyway.”
“What if they don’t find him?”
“Oh, they’ll find him. If they don’t, anyone who helped him escape will have to pay the fee. Or supply an able body to take his place.”
When the boy escaped from the recruiters he leaped from the horse, which ran off, and burrowed into a stack of hay far out in a field. Bits of seed tickled his nose; he tried not to sneeze. His dog, a black mutt named Schnell, whimpered beside the hay but did not bark. He heard the army wagon creaking down the road and waited until much time had passed, until the sun was fading. He was hungry. At a neighboring farm, far from the house and barn, he found a field of carrots, and ate. He sent the dog home, fiercely, and in the falling dark set off across the fields in the direction of the city. It would take him much of the night to walk there, he knew, b
ut in Frankfurt he could lose himself.
In recent years the lane had become overcrowded. Jews coming to Frankfurt for work were sent to the Judengasse, but by order of the lane council they could not be admitted. There were no apartments or houses available, they had been divided and redivided as much as was possible. So the newcomers began to sleep against the wall outside the north gate, and soon became a small community of beggars. At first Meyer would hand out coins as he passed, but they would only clamor for more. The Constables ordered him to stop, so the beggars would eventually move on.
The aroma of potato and onion stew greeted Meyer when he arrived home. He placed the sword and scabbard and his pouches of coins on the desk and hurried upstairs. Embracing Guttle, he sat on one of the kitchen chairs so that Schönche and Amschel, bursting in from their room shouting “Papa, Papa,” could crawl over him while he kissed their hair, their cheeks. After the scenes he had witnessed, of fathers being ripped from their homes, he kissed them a few extra times. The baby Salomon was asleep in a small crib in the corner; those tender kisses he would save for later.
“You’re upset,” Guttle said, after he had shooed the children back to their room. “The coins weren’t good?”
He took off his three-cornered hat and his gray wig, ran his hands through his hair. He put on the yarmulke she handed him. “The coins are a treasure. It’s humanity that isn’t good.”
“That sounds serious.” She pulled her skirt around her, sat across from him at the kitchen table as he recounted what he had witnessed. For a moment she closed her eyes, envisioning the scenes, and bit her lower lip. “Is it possible the peasants are treated worse than the Jews?”
“Sometimes,” Meyer said.
“That’s difficult to believe.”
She took his hand and played with his fingers. They sat in silence, in sympathy with those being sent to a foreign war. Their God, she thought, is as harsh as ours.
Hesitant in the face of such imagery, she nonetheless forced herself to speak of other things. “I’ve got a potato stew simmering that might help cheer you up. But I don’t think it will cheer you enough.” She stood and came to his side. “So I’m going to tell you a secret.”
Secrets made Meyer wary; he did not look up at her. “Well, I’m waiting.”
“I’m think I’m carrying a child.”
He looked up then, stared at this lovely, fertile being he had married. His worried face shattered into a grin. He stood, and he hugged her tightly. “Guttle, that’s wonderful!”
She kissed his cheek, his ear. “I thought you would be pleased.”
He placed his hand flat on her belly, to feel the child.
“It’s much too early for that.”
His hand rose to her breast. She eased it away. “It’s much too early for that, also.”
He kissed her forehead. “Perhaps that is Yahweh’s ultimate plan,” he said. “For the good people on earth eventually to outnumber the evil.”
“Or maybe that’s just an excuse for you to have your way with me.”
Meyer swatted her rear. “I didn’t realize we needed an excuse.”
A stranger of striking appearance walked slowly across the arched bridge over the river Main on his way to the Judengasse. As he reached the Fahrtor Arch, he paused to look at the obscene drawing of the Judensau engraved high in the wall. He had been prepared for such a sight, he had seen such things in other places, though none as prominently displayed. He shook his head in sadness. As he stepped under the arch, he asked a tall, thin guard the amount of the toll required to enter the city. Setting down his bag, he handed over the eight kreuzer.
“Jew, what are you selling?” the guard asked. “I might want to buy something.”
“You’ll never want to buy from me,” the stranger replied.
“And why is that? Tell me what you deal in.”
“I deal in reason.”
The puzzled guard cocked his head and squinted, but asked no more questions. The stranger began to walk up the lane, noting with incredulity the narrowness of the houses, less than three metres across; he had not seen their like anywhere. As he passed the fourth house a moneylender seated at an outdoor table rose and intercepted him. “Welcome, stranger,” the man said. He was wearing a long black coat, a black hat, had an untrimmed black beard. “Jacob Marcus here.” Marcus extended a hand, which the visitor shook lightly. “You’ll be wanting to change your money to the local currency. Gulden and kreuzer, good in the Judengasse and all of Frankfurt. I offer the best rates in the lane.”
Assuming that for the brokers to stay in business all rates in this narrow street would be the same — which they were — the stranger emptied his purse of notes and coins from Wiesbaden, where he had spent the past two days, and received gulden and kreuzer in return.
“Tell me — Herr Marcus, is it? — I’ve been riding a coach all day. Is there a place where a stranger can get a glass of tea?”
“Up ahead, not far past the hospital. Brendel’s Café. Best eyeful of tea you could imagine.”
The stranger assumed the man meant glassful, and was eager to be on his way. As he turned to go he heard a familiar intaking of breath, followed by astonished whispers and nervous giggles, as the children caught sight of his hump. Such sounds had trailed him all his life, would trail him, he knew, to the grave.
Brendel’s Café was heralded by a blue and white banner. A good omen for his visit; he had a daughter named Brendel. When he reached it he found a quaint establishment, painted also white and blue, the first discernible attempt at a modern style he had seen within the gate. Three small tables, two chairs at each, stood on the cobbles; five more were arranged in a cozy front room, beside a counter covered with cookies and petite cakes on glass-covered trays. None of the chairs was occupied, the Café appeared deserted as he took a seat inside, as far as he could get from the sewage trench. Here the aromas of brewing coffee and warm chocolate overpowered the putrid smell outside. Barely had he set his traveling bag on the wooden floor when from a lighted doorway appeared one of the most appealing women he had ever seen — a woman not corseted and coifed and painted like the salon ladies of Berlin, but resembling a lovely, freshly scrubbed milkmaid, in a white cotton mob cap from which blonde ringlets peeked, a white apron over her blue peasant dress. An eyeful indeed, as the money changer had said.
When she brought out the glass of hot tea he ordered, she served with it on a small plate an enticing piece of ruggelah. “A free sample for a weary traveler,” she said.
“Does my weariness show?”
“I’m afraid it does.”
He bit into the pastry and chewed the tender crust, the sweet apple filling. “Delicious! You don’t find ruggelah this moist in Berlin. I’ll be wanting a few more. On my reckoning, of course.”
From the counter she brought a small tray with several pieces on it. “You’re a long way from home,” she said.
“I’ve never seen the Rhine Valley. I thought it was time.” He sipped his tea and ate another cake. “Not to be rude,” he said, indicating the vacant room with his hand, “but your business seems slow. I gather the Café is new.”
“People just ate their lunch. Some will come later, when they take a rest from work. It is new, though — eight weeks today. People here aren’t used to coffee houses. We’re forbidden to enter the ones in Frankfurt.”
Sipping his tea, the visitor nodded.
“The lane is small enough so people walk home for tea,” Brendel said. “For most, it’s right upstairs from their shop. But that’s not the same as relaxing in a Café, gossiping with your friends. Maybe having a good argument.”
“Please, sit,” the stranger said, indicating the vacant chair at his table.
Brendel sat, smoothing her dress beneath her. “I was a rag dealer before, but with my boys in heder now, I have time to bake.” She reached for one of the ruggelah on the tray, and bit into it. “How rude,” she said, brushing crumbs from her lips with her fingers. “Sharing
your table, and I haven’t introduced myself. I am Brendel Isaacs.”
“The first part I could have guessed. Moses Mendelssohn.” He offered his hand.
“Oh, my!” Her fingers flew to her mouth like birds to a nest.
“Is something wrong?”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t recognize you.”
“How could you? I’ve never been here before.”
“I mean … you’re a great man. I’ve been babbling on … I didn’t realize … ”
“You’ve been delightful, Frau Isaacs. Thanks to your babbling — and your ruggelah — I don’t feel the least bit weary anymore.”
“I haven’t read your books — I’m sure I wouldn’t understand a word — but my husband — he’s not my husband, really — my friend Yussel Kahn — is a great admirer of yours. Will you be preaching here?”
“I don’t preach, as such. But I do discuss my ideas in public, if I am invited.”
“I’m sure the Chief Rabbi will invite you.”
“Not necessarily. Most Rabbis don’t like my views. They think of me as the enemy.”
“The enemy of what?”
“Judaism.”
“Oh.” Brendel appeared shaken. She wiped her hands on her apron. “Are you?”
“Not in the least.”