“Why not?” Boruch asked.
“Well, if I’m leaving Krimsk because of the goyim, I don’t think I should go some place where I will become one of them. Better I should go to a place where I shall be certain to remain a Jew.”
“Don’t I live like a Jew?”
“Yes, Boruch Levi, but you are different. You said so yourself. I’m not. I’m a simple Krimsk shoemaker,” Froika answered.
“Yes, Froika, I shall do what you want on one condition. You must take your violin with you.” Boruch Levi remembered how Froika’s mother madly believed that her tone-deaf son would bring immense glory to the family by playing the violin in St. Petersburg before the tsar. In real life, Froika’s cacophonous attempts with the instrument had sounded more torturous than the burning cats’ screams that pierced Boruch Levi’s nightmarish dreams.
Froika laughed. “That violin is reason enough to leave. It was so awful. That instrument of torture was the one thing you remembered about me as a child.” But as he spoke, he realized that Boruch Levi wasn’t laughing with him.
“You’re not joking, are you?” he asked Boruch Levi.
“No, I’m not. That’s the one condition: you take the violin.”
Boruch Levi’s square jaw was set. Froika had no doubt that if he wanted the man’s help, he had to take the hideous violin.
“Why?”
“In America you would do very well as I have, and if you wanted to return here, you could, but Palestine is a poor country. If you go there, you will never return.” What Boruch Levi didn’t add was that his decision had something to do with the burning cats. That prophetic dream’s relationship to all of this was unclear, and he wasn’t about to tell Froika about the dream anyway. “That’s the way it is; take it or leave it.”
Froika shook his hand. “I’ll take it. I’ll take the infernal thing to the Holy Land, but if I ever play it, it’s on your conscience and not mine,” he said half seriously.
Boruch nodded judiciously, even pompously. “I’ll send you the money. Whatever you need.”
The next morning he visited his mother’s grave for the last time. The wagon with his luggage waited outside the cemetery to take him to the train at Sufnitz. As he exited through the gate and climbed onto the seat alongside the driver, he felt that in St. Louis he had two irrevocable links to Krimsk. He would remain true to his mother, and that meant his sister Malka was all the more his responsibility. There would never be any escaping that. The other link was the Krimsker Rebbe, that enigmatic holy man.
Now as he sat in his office awaiting his sister, he sensed that today would be an opportunity to keep faith with his mother. It might be difficult, but he welcomed the challenge. How to keep faith with the Krimsker Rebbe was not so obvious, although he had already contacted Reb Zelig and would be praying with the rebbe this evening. Out of old loyalty, of course, he would never let his ex-rabbi remain in jail over the Sabbath. Even if Rabbi Max was a fool, he was a rabbi. For the poor he was a good rabbi, but didn’t the fool understand that God had granted the rich their riches, too?
Boruch Levi looked up to see his sister enter the office.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
MALK A SETTLED HERSELF INTO A CHAIR NEAR HER brother’s desk. His studious inattention to her meant that he was still steaming at the insult that she had delivered before his trip. This gave her such joy that she almost forgot why she had come. Stifling a smile, she put her purse on her lap, all business and propriety. She didn’t want to call attention to the actual insult for fear that he would explode and then she would never get what she wanted, but she knew that she had better acknowledge his moral leadership.
“How is the synagogue?” she asked by way of an oblique apology.
Without looking at her, he emitted a low grunt that suggested that her interest was insincere and that she need not worry about it.
“The family?” she asked.
Again she received the same reply.
“Thank God,” she said. “As Mama, may she rest in peace, used to say, health is everything.”
Boruch Levi turned his unsympathetic scrutiny upon his sister. He couldn’t stand her mentioning their mother. How such a fine, saintly woman could have borne such a vulgar, shameless creature as Malka was one of the more fantastic and less pleasant mysteries of creation.
“Boruch Levi, I am here because I need your help.”
He didn’t say anything, but she could see he was interested. There was nothing he liked better than lording it over everyone else as the great protector.
“I’m worried about my Barasch. He has been acting strangely lately, and I don’t like it.”
“What’s the matter? He hasn’t been running around like a meshuggenner?” Boruch Levi growled.
Malka looked her brother straight in the eye.
“I know that Barasch is not to your liking, brother, but I was no princess and had no choice the way you did with your highborn Golda, a teacher’s daughter no less. I was ugly, ignorant, and poor. I did what Mother told me to do, and after her death I’m still obeying her.”
Boruch Levi turned away to avoid her deprecating and accusing confession. Malka smiled behind his back. When all was said and done, her brother had no instinct for the jugular.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
“I think Matti Sternweiss is the problem,” she said.
“That little bum? That ballplayer?” Boruch Levi said in grandiloquent scorn. He said “ballplayer” with considerably more derision than he said “bum.”
“Yes,” Malka replied, only too pleased to help him focus his anger on a common enemy.
“He’s a nothing,” Boruch Levi said.
“Yes, but as Mama used to say, ‘He’s a nothing, but even a cat can still cross your path and ruin your life.’ Since he became Barasch’s best friend, I have no rest. Barasch is always running off to the bookie.”
“You want me to talk to Barasch or Matti?” he asked.
“Neither. I want you to talk to the bookie.”
He took his feet off the desk and sat up. “The bookie?”
“Yes, and I don’t want Barasch to know anything about it.”
“What did the bookie do? Let me talk to your man; I’ll straighten him out, and I’ll see to it that Matti spends more time in the ballpark,” he stated with authoritarian certainty.
“No, I’ll not embarrass him!” Malka shot back. Her face flushed in anger.
Boruch Levi received his shameless, taunting sister’s hot reaction with sarcastic amusement. That jewel is her pride and joy, after all. Like they say, it’s the right rag for the right tuchis. He laughed, and Malka flushed in embarrassment.
“I don’t want my man shamed. I don’t care what happens.”
“I didn’t know he embarrassed so easily.”
She opened her great purse and took out a man’s handkerchief. Tears flooded her eyes as if she were peeling onions; she wiped them with no sign of emotion.
“There’s a lot you don’t know, Brother. If you want Mama’s grandchildren to grow up with the man she picked to be their father—”
She poked at her eyes with the handkerchief.
Even though he knew the tears were for his benefit, still she was a mother, and she cried for her children. Where the hell would Barasch go anyway, that he could get such service?
“All right, I’ll see what I can do.”
“I want you to take care of it,” she insisted.
“All right, I’ll take care of it.”
Malka stopped crying and put the handkerchief back into her purse. Not one to waste time on pleasantries, she stood up.
“Soon,” she demanded. “I don’t like the betting business. That’s a bottomless pit. If it ruins me, Brother, you know on whose doorstep I’ll turn up, so save us both some trouble.”
Although she had confidence in his loyalty, she could not refrain from offering Boruch Levi a form of motivation dearer to her own heart—financial self-interest.
&n
bsp; Boruch Levi scowled. “If he wants to ruin you, he’ll ruin you. Who’s his bookmaker?”
“He runs a cigar store around the corner from the post office on Eighth Street. Barasch calls him Heinie.”
“A Jew?”
Malka shook her head.
“What about Hebrew lessons for your sons?” he asked.
“Well, my children are not the descendants of scholars,” she taunted with a smile, but her brother’s set jaw suggested to her that for now she had better stay on his good side. “We aren’t too close to a synagogue, and they help in the yard, but they should learn how to make a blessing. That wouldn’t hurt them. What do you suggest?”
“I’ll send Reb Zelig to see you. Just see that they behave. He’s no youngster.”
“Reb Zelig? The Krimsker Rebbe’s sexton?” Malka asked in surprise.
“Yes.”
“I thought Rabbi Max was your rabbi.”
“Things change.”
“You get tired of bailing him out of jail?”
“No, I can’t leave a rabbi in jail over the Sabbath. Not even him. He’s been making the stuff in the synagogue. What kind of business is that?”
A very good business, thought Malka to herself, but she heard that flinty tone in her brother’s voice and held her tongue. Let him focus on her problem, not his.
“Thank you. Have a good Sabbath and give my love to Golda.”
“Good Sabbath,” he answered.
As she left, Malka saw her brother nod, and knew that what she wanted was as good as done. She decided to stop off downtown on the way home to buy Barasch two new shirts. No, maybe three, now that there was no chance that her man would lose them off his back.
Before Malka had arrived, Boruch Levi had been thinking that he would give the chief of police a call to see how his wounded hand was doing. Now he decided to take a ride by headquarters on his way home. Since this bookie Heinie wasn’t a Jew, he had better consult with the chief or with Inspector Doheen. Whoever this Heinie was, he was going to be in for one hell of a surprise. Boruch Levi was sure of that.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
BY THE TIME BORUCH LEVI ARRIVED AT THE CHIEF’S office, the chief, still recuperating from his bullet wound, had gone home for the day. His secretary, however, immediately rang the chief of detectives, Inspector Doheen, and handed Boruch Levi the phone.
“Hello, Inspector Doheen. Is the chief all right?”
“He’s doing fine, but he’s still on the mend. Has to take it easy.”
“Good. Good,” Boruch Levi said.
“Yes, in a week or two he’ll be as good as new. Is everything all right with you, Levi?”
“Everything is all right with me, but I have a family problem that I wanted to talk to the chief about,” Boruch Levi said somewhat uncomfortably.
“Come by my office, and let’s see if I can help,” Doheen said sincerely.
“Thank you, Inspector. I think I will, if you have time.”
“I’ll make time. Don’t you worry about that,” Doheen said respectfully.
Inspector Doheen, chief of detectives and senior intelligence officer of the police force, had always been respectful. The tall, lean, dark, dour Irishman made many of his other more sociable and fraternal senior officers uncomfortable with his morose, distrustful air. They joked among themselves that the chief had picked him precisely because he neither looked nor acted like an Irishman, not even in uniform, so in plainclothes no one would guess that he was a policeman. In fact, they knew very well why he had been chosen. Doheen seemed more loyal to the chief than to the general good, that Hibernian brotherhood known as the Force, which they served loyally in the hope of advancing even higher to the position of chief or even to commissioner. Doheen apparently lacked such vaunting ambition. He did not even drink because it aggravated his dyspepsia, which his peers attributed either to his piety (he attended mass daily) or to his inability to escape his own saturnine presence, which was always enough to give any of them indigestion.
Initially skeptical of Boruch Levi’s affection for his beloved chief, Doheen came to admire the Jew’s loyalty, sobriety (he drank with the best of them but never to excess), desire to serve, and devotion to family and religion, particularly his unstinting and unapologetic observance of his Sabbath. As the years went by, Doheen came to appreciate that Boruch Levi did not want the usual greedy favors. Bailing out his bootlegging rabbi for the Sabbath was a different matter. “I understand, Boruch Levi; the others don’t, but I do. I’m religious myself. We’re all sinners—even the clergy are human beings—and because they fall now and then doesn’t mean they’re not of the cloth and can’t help guide the rest of us unholy sinners. Why, there was only one Jesus. A man has to have respect for the Church, I say.”
Last’s week’s incident demonstrated even more clearly that Boruch Levi’s true reward was the same as Doheen’s own—service to their chief. Prohibition had led to raids on the burgeoning breweries, stills, warehouses, and speakeasies, but not on all of them, of course. The chief’s standard operating procedure permitted small operations to pay off, but the larger, rowdier, more violent and more brazen syndicate operations were not to be tolerated. The chief himself loved the excitement and headlines these raids produced and insisted on participating. Doheen, worrying more about the chief’s safety than his own, permitted Boruch Levi to accompany the chief as an unarmed bodyguard. Doheen had seen Boruch Levi masterfully defend his interests on the levee against some very rough characters. With the junk-man along, he could concentrate on directing the raid and not have the aging chief’s safety as his primary concern.
On last week’s warehouse raid, a lone gunman had holed up behind some beer barrels. Beyond an open space, the police crouched behind large crates. Although cornered, the crook refused to surrender, and in the first exchange of shots he hit the chief in the hand. Boruch Levi, who was by the chief’s side, yelled for everyone to stop firing. Even the gunman obeyed. Boruch Levi called out, “You son of a bitch, you shot the chief. Now that’s enough! You had your fun. Come out of there right now, or I’m coming to get you!”
After waiting a second, the unarmed Boruch Levi vaulted over the crates, sprinted across the open space, dived over the barrels, and pounced upon the gunman before the man knew what had happened. In vengeful fury, Boruch Levi snapped the gunman’s pistol arm as if it were a dry stick and proceeded to pummel him. Doheen heard Boruch Levi’s sudden, heavy blows beating a damaging tattoo on the man’s face, thudding into flesh and bone. By the time Doheen and the others arrived, the unconscious gunman’s face had been smashed into a bloody, bruised pulp and Boruch Levi, fists still clenched, was scowling over him, “You son of a bitch, you shot the chief.”
Inspector Doheen motioned for Boruch Levi to enter, rising from his desk to shake his hand. “Come in, come in,” he said so warmly that the two young detectives who had just arrived to brief him looked at each other in surprise at such an outpouring of affection from the dour inspector. When they saw who it was, they respectfully stood up.
“Gentlemen, will you excuse us for a moment?” the inspector said.
The two smiled at Boruch Levi as they passed him. He merely nodded curtly. Doheen closed the door.
“Boruch Levi, I drove the chief home myself. He had to rest. He’s no youngster.”
Boruch Levi nodded.
“You look a little concerned,” the inspector said sympathetically.
“I have a strange problem with my brother-in-law,” he said uncomfortably.
“Mine’s an alcoholic, damn him, but let’s sit down and see if together we can’t handle yours.”
Boruch Levi told Doheen about Malka’s visit and her insistence that the bookie be spoken to without Barasch’s knowledge. Embarrassed by his sister’s foolishness, he looked up.
“You can’t choose your family, although in your case you couldn’t have done better than your sainted mother. Boruch Levi, don’t let such nonsense bother you. I give you my word that your
brother-in-law won’t be able to lay a bet anywhere in town, and he won’t know why either. I’ll take care of it myself. Right away, too. It’s as good as done. Don’t lose any sleep over it. You just go home and enjoy your Sabbath,” Inspector Doheen said.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
SCRUBBED AND DRESSED IN HIS SABBATH TWEED KNICKER suit, Sammy hurried down the steps and across the lawn to greet his father, Boruch Levi. Although it was still before the Sabbath, Sammy quickly took advantage of the opportunity to wish his father a good Sabbath. When his stern father’s words began with a Sabbath greeting, they tended to be less harsh and demanding.
“Good Sabbath, Sammy. No, don’t go to the synagogue yet. Wait for me. We’ll go together.”
“We’re going together?” Sammy asked in timid surprise.
“Yes,” his father answered. “If you can stay clean, you can wait out here. Otherwise, come inside.”
“I’ll be careful. I’ll stay here.”
“Uh-huh.” His father nodded and effortlessly hurried inside.
Although Sammy couldn’t hear any creaks or groans, much less thumping, he knew that his father was charging up the wooden steps to their second-floor home. Sammy listened with a competitor’s ear. Everyone else except the two of them made some noise on the stairs. They moved differently. Sammy, with the light willowy build and oval face of his mother’s family, had a dancer’s demonstrative grace. His coordination seemed to be related to his lack of weight. His solidly built, square-jawed father, however, suggested power even when he was standing still. When he moved quickly, there was no wasted, showy motion, just an incredible efficiency of force like the steel ball bearing that Sammy liked to roll down the steeply slanting garage roof. The shiny ball flying perfectly straight and fast inspired in Sammy respect and fear, as did his father. At least with the bearing, the boy could touch the reflecting, hard exterior, wondering at its strength and untempered coldness.
Big League Dreams (Small Worlds) Page 8