Until that night when she could stand it no longer. She rose screaming from the pallet at her husband's side, the letter from her brother Bernard, in America, still fresh in her mind. "Are we to live like rabbits in a trap, waiting for the Cossacks to come?" she cried. "Is it into this dark world that my husband expects I should bring forth a child? Even Jehovah could not plant his seed in a cellar."
"Hush!" Chaim's voice was a harsh whisper. "The name of the Lord shall not be taken in vain. Pray that He does not turn His face from us."
She laughed bitterly. "Already He has forsaken us. He, too, is fleeing before the Cossacks."
"Quiet, woman!" Chaim's voice was an outraged roar.
She looked at the other pallets in the damp cellar. In the dim light, she could barely see the pale, frightened faces of her parents. Just then there was a thunder of horse's hoofs outside the house and the sound of a gun butt against the locked door.
Quickly, her father was on his feet. "Quick, kinder," he whispered. "The storm cellar door at the back of the house. Through the fields, they won't see you leaving that way."
Chaim reached for Esther's hand and pulled her to the storm door. Suddenly, he stopped, aware that her parents were not following them. "Come," he whispered. "Hurry! There is no time."
Her father stood quietly in the dark, his arm around his wife's shoulder. "We are not going," he said. "Better someone be here for them to find or they will begin searching the fields."
The din over their heads grew louder as the gun butts began to break through the door. Chaim walked back to her father. "Then we all stay and face them," he said calmly, picking a heavy stave up from the floor. "They will learn a Jew does not die so easily."
"Go," her father said quietly. "We gave our daughter in marriage. It is her safety that should be your first concern, not ours. Your bravery is nothing but stupidity. How else have Jews survived these thousand years except by running?"
"But— " Chaim protested.
"Go," the old man hissed. "Go quickly. We are old, our lives are finished. You are young, your children should have their chance."
A few months later, they were in America. But it was to be almost twenty years before the Lord God Jehovah relented and let her have a child.
Last, she prayed for her brother Bernard, who was a macher now and had a business in a faraway place called California, where it was summer all year round. She prayed that he was safe and well and that he wasn't troubled by the Indians, like she saw in the movies when she used the pass he'd sent her.
Her prayers finished, she went back into the kitchen. The soup was bubbling on the stove, its rich, heavy chicken aroma almost visible in the air. She picked up a spoon and bent over the pot. Carefully she skimmed the heavy fat globules from the surface and put them in a jar. Later, when the fat was cold and had congealed, it could be spread on bread or mixed with chopped dry meats to give them flavor. While she was bent like this over the stove, she heard the front door open.
From the footsteps, she knew who it was. "That you, Duvidele?"
"Yes, Mama."
Her task finished, she put down the spoon and turned around slowly. As always, her heart leaped with pride as she saw her son, so straight and tall, standing there.
"Papa went to shul," David said. "He'll be home at seven o'clock."
She smiled at him. "Good," she said. "So wash your hands and clean up. Supper is ready."
3
When David turned the horse into the little alley that led to the back of Shocky's garage, Needlenose came hurrying up. "Is that you, David?"
"Who did yuh think it would be?" David retorted sarcastically.
"Geez, we didn't know whether you'd show up or not. It's almost ten o'clock."
"I couldn't sneak out until my old man went to sleep," David said, stopping the wagon at the side of the garage.
A moment later, Shocky came out, his bald head shining in the dim light. He was of medium height, with a heavy barrel chest and long tapering arms that reached almost to his knees. "You took long enough gettin' here," he grumbled.
"I’m here, ain't I?"
Shocky didn't answer. He turned to Needlenose. "Start loading the cans," he said. "He can help you."
David climbed down from the wagon and followed Shocky into the garage. The long row of metal cans gleamed dully in the light from the single electric bulb hanging high in the ceiling. David stopped and whistled. "There must be forty cans there."
"So he can count," Shocky said.
"That's four hundred pounds. I don't think Old Bessie can haul that much."
Shocky looked at him. "You hauled that much last time."
"No, I didn't," David said. "It was only thirty cans. And even then, there were times I thought Old Bessie was goin' to croak on me. Suppose she did? There I’d be with a dead horse and two hundred gallons of alky in the wagon. It's bad enough if my old man ever finds out."
"Just this once," Shocky said. "I promised Gennuario."
"Why don't you use one of your trucks?"
"I can't do that," Shocky replied. "That's just what the Feds are lookin' for. They won't be lookin' for a junk wagon."
"The most I’ll take is twenty-five cans."
Shocky stared at him. "I’ll make it twenty bucks this one time,'' he said. "You got me in a bind."
David was silent. Twenty dollars was more than his father netted in a whole week, sometimes. And that was going out with the wagon six days a week. Rain or shine, summer heat or bitter winter cold, every day except Saturday, which his father spent in shul.
"Twenty-five bucks," Shocky said.
"O.K. I'll take a chance."
"Start loadin', then." Shocky picked up a can with each of his long arms.
David sat alone on the wagon seat as Old Bessie slowly plodded her way uptown. He pulled up at a corner to let a truck go by. A policeman slowly sauntered over. "What're ye doin' out tonight, Davy?"
Furtively David cast a look at the back of the wagon. The cans of alcohol lay hidden under the tarpaulin, covered with rags. "I heard they're payin' a good price for rag over at the mill," he answered. "I thought I'd clean out the wagon."
"Where's your father?"
"It's Friday night."
"Oh," the policeman answered. He looked up at David shrewdly. "Does he know ye're out?"
David shook his head silently.
The policeman laughed. "You kids are all alike."
"I better get goin' before the old man misses me," David said. He clucked to the horse and Old Bessie began to move. The policeman called after him and David stopped and looked back.
"Tell your father to keep an eye peeled for some clothes for a nine-year-old boy," he called. "My Michael is outgrowin' the last already."
"I will, Mr. Doyle," David said and flicked the reins lightly. Shocky and Needlenose were already there when David pulled up against the loading platform. Gennuario stood on the platform watching as they began to unload.
The detectives appeared suddenly out of the darkness with drawn guns. "O.K., hold it!"
David froze, a can of alcohol still in his arms. For a moment, he thought of dropping the can and running but Old Bessie and the wagon were still there. How would he explain that to his father?
"Put the can down, boy," one of the detectives said.
Slowly David put down the can and turned to face them. "O.K., against the wall."
"Yuh shouldn't 'a' tried it, Joe," a detective said to Gennuario when he arrived.
Gennuario smiled. David looked at him. He didn't seem in the least disturbed by what had happened. "Come inside, Lieutenant," he said easily. "We can straighten this out, I'm sure."
The lieutenant followed Gennuario into the building and it seemed to David that they were gone forever. But ten minutes later, they came out, both smiling.
"All right, you guys," the lieutenant said. "It seems we made a big mistake. Mr. Gennuario explained everything. Let's go." As quickly as they had come, the detectives disappeared
. David stood staring after them with an open mouth.
* * *
Needlenose sat silently on the wagon beside David as they turned into the stable. "I tol' yuh everything was fixed," he said when they came out in the street.
David looked at him. Fixed or not, this was as close as he wanted. Even the twenty-five dollars in his pocket wasn't worth it. "I'm through," he said to Needlenose. "No more."
Needlenose laughed. "Yuh scared?"
"Damn right I’m scared. There must be an easier way to make a living."
"If yuh find one," Needlenose said, "let me know". He laughed. "Shocky's got a couple or Chinee girls over at his flat. He says we can screw 'em tonight if we want."
David didn't answer.
"Sing Loo will be there," Needlenose said. "You know, the pretty little one, the dancer who shaves her pussy."
David hesitated, feeling the quick surge of excitement leap through him.
* * *
It was one o'clock by the big clock in the window of Goldfarb's Delicatessen when he turned the corner of his street. A police car was parked in front of the door. There was a group of people surging around, peering curiously into the hallway.
A sudden fear ran through David. Something had gone wrong. The police had come to arrest him. For a moment, he felt like running in the opposite direction. But a compulsion drew him toward the house. "What happened?" he asked a man standing on the edge of the crowd.
"I dunno," the man answered. He peered at him curiously. "I heard one of the cops say somebody was dying up there."
Suddenly, frantically, David pushed his way through the crowd into the house. As he ran up the staircase toward the apartment on the third floor, he heard the scream.
His mother was standing in the doorway, struggling in the arms of two policemen. "Chaim, Chaim!"
David felt his heart constrict. "Mama," he called. "What happened?"
His mother looked at him with unseeing eyes. "A doctor I call for, policemen I get," she said, then turned her face down the hallway toward the toilets. "Chaim, Chaim!" She screamed again.
David turned and followed her gaze. The door to one of the toilets stood open. His father sat there on the seat, leaning crazily against the wall, his eyes and mouth open, moisture trickling down into his gray beard.
"Chaim!" his mother screamed accusingly. "It was gas you told me you got. You didn't tell me you were coming out here to die."
4
"So it is my fault his father dies before he can finish school?" Uncle Bernie said angrily. "Let him get a job and go nights if he wants to go so bad."
David sat on the edge of his chair and looked at his mother. He didn't speak. "It's not charity I'm asking, Bernie," she said. "David wants a job. That's all I'm asking you for."
Norman turned and looked down at his nephew suspiciously. "Maybe a job you'd like in my company as a vice-president, hah?"
David got to his feet angrily. "I’m going out, Ma," he said. "Everything they said about him is true."
"Say about me?" his uncle shouted. "What do they say about me?"
David looked at him. "Down at the shul when I went to say Yiskor for Papa, they told me about you. They said you didn't come to the funeral because you were afraid somebody might ask you for a few pennies."
"From California I should come in one day?" Norman shouted. "Wings I ain't got."
He started for the door. "Wait a minute, David," his mother said quietly. She turned to her brother. "When you needed five hundred dollars before the war for your business, who did you get it from?"
She waited a moment before answering herself. "From your poor schnorrer of a brother-in-law, Chaim, the junkman. He gave you the money and you gave him a piece of paper. The piece of paper I still got but did we ever see the money?"
"Paper?" Bernie said. "What paper?"
"I still got it," she said. "In the box Chaim put it in that night, the night he gave you the money."
"Let me see." Bernie's eyes followed her as she left the room. He was beginning to remember now. It was a certificate promising his brother-in-law five per cent of the Norman Company stock when he bought out the old Diamond Film Company. He had forgotten all about it. But a smart lawyer could make it worth a lot of money.
His sister came back into the room and handed him a sheet of paper. It was faded and yellow but the date on it was still bright and clear. September 7, 1912. That was fourteen years ago. How time had flown.
He looked at his sister. "It's against my policy to hire relatives," he said. "It looks bad for the business."
"So who's to know he's your nephew?" Esther said. "Besides, who will do more for you than your own flesh and blood?"
He stared at her for a moment, then got to his feet. "All right. I’ll do it. It's against my better judgment but maybe you're right. Blood is thicker than water. Over on Forty-third Street, near the river, we got a warehouse. They'll put him to work."
"Thank you, Uncle Bernie," David said gratefully.
"Mind you, not one word about being my nephew. One word I hear and you're finished."
"I won't say anything, Uncle Bernie."
Norman started for the door. But before he went out, he turned, the paper in his hand. He folded it and put it into his pocket. "This I'm taking with me," he said to his sister. "When I get back to my office, they'll send you a check for the five hundred dollars with interest for the fourteen years. At three per cent."
A worried look came over his sister's face. "Are you sure you can afford it, Bernie?" she asked quickly. "There is no hurry. We'll manage if David is working."
"Afford it, shmafford it," Norman said magnanimously. "Let nobody say that Bernie Norman doesn't keep his word."
* * *
It was a dirty gray factory building down near the Hudson River, which had fallen into disuse and been converted into lofts. There were two large freight elevators in the back and three small passenger elevators near the front entrance, scarcely large enough to handle the crowd of workers that surged in at eight o'clock each morning and out at six o'clock each night.
The building was shared by five tenants. The ground floor housed an automobile-parts company; the second, a commercial cosmetic manufacturer; the third, the pressing plant for a small record company; the fourth, the factory of the Henri France Company, the world's largest manufacturer of popular-priced contraceptives and prophylactics. The fifth and sixth floors belonged to Norman Pictures.
David arrived early. He got off the elevator on the sixth floor and walked slowly down the wide aisle between rows of steel and wooden shelves. At the end, near the back windows, were several desks, placed back to back.
"Hello," David called. "Anybody here?" His voice echoed eerily through the cavernous empty floor. There was a clock over one of the desks. It said seven thirty.
The freight-elevator door clanged open and a white-haired man stuck his head out and peered down the aisle at David. "I thought I heard somebody calling," he said.
David walked up to him. "I'm supposed to see the foreman about a job."
"Oh, are you the one?"
David was confused. "What d'yuh mean?"
"The new boy," the elevator operator replied. "Old man Norman's nephew."
David didn't answer. He was too surprised. The elevator operator got ready to swing shut the doors. "Nobody's here yet. They don't get in till eight o'clock."
The steel doors closed and the elevator moved creakingly down out of sight. David turned from the elevator thoughtfully. Uncle Bernie had told him not to say anything. He hadn't. But they already knew. He wondered if his uncle knew that they knew. He started back toward the desks.
He stopped suddenly in front of a large poster. The lettering was in bright red — Vilma Banky and Rod LaRocque. The picture portrayed Miss Banky lying on a sofa, her dress well up above her knees. Behind her stood Mr. LaRoque, darkly handsome in the current Valentino fashion, staring down at her with a look of smoldering passion.
David s
tudied the poster. A final touch had been added by someone in the warehouse. A milky-white condom hung by a thumbtack from the front of the male star's trousers. Next to it, in neat black lettering, were the words: Compliments of Henri France.
David grinned and began to walk up the aisle. He looked into the steel bins. Posters, lobby cards, displays were stacked there, each representing a different motion picture. David looked them over. It was amazing how much each looked like the next one. Apparently, the only thing the artist did was to change the names of the players and the title of the picture.
He heard the passenger elevator stop, then the sound of footsteps echoed down the aisle. He turned and waited.
A tall, thin man with sandy-red hair and a worried look on his face turned the corner near the packing tables. He stopped and looked at David silently.
"I'm David Woolf. I'm supposed to see the foreman about a job here."
"I'm the foreman," the man said. He turned away and walked over to one of the desks. "My name is Wagner. Jack Wagner."
David held out his hand. "I’m pleased to meet you, Mr. Wagner."
The man looked at the outstretched hand. His handshake was soft and indecisive. "You're Norman's nephew," he said accusingly.
Suddenly, David realized the man was nervous, more nervous even than he was himself. He wondered why. It didn't make sense that the man should be upset because of his relationship to Uncle Bernie. But he wasn't going to talk about it, even though it seemed everyone knew.
"Nobody is supposed to know that but me," Wagner said. "Sit down here." He pointed to a chair near the desk, then took out a sheet of paper and pushed it over to David. "Fill out this personnel application. Where it asks for the name of any relatives working for the company, leave that one blank."
"Yes, sir."
JC1 The Carpetbaggers Page 44