‘I’m not proposing you should do a Communist play,’ Dora interrupted her. ‘How could you? No one knows any more where Stalinism ends and Fascism – or whatever you choose to call it – begins. Still, it remains a fact that the masses suffer and their suffering grows steadily worse. If the Nazis attack Poland, it’s the poor who will be the victims. The rich will all flee abroad. If you can show a bank book with a hundred thousand dollars and if you travel strictly for pleasure, then the whole world is open to you. They’ll even let you into Palestine if you can show one thousand pounds sterling. Is that true or not, Aaron?’
‘A novel or a play that said all this wouldn’t change anything,’ I said. ‘The masses already know that’s how things are. Besides, you said before the very opposite of what you’re saying now.’
‘I didn’t say the opposite. I have my doubts, but the masses remain dear to me. They should be taught how to resist this exploitation.’
‘Dora, you speak of the masses as if they were innocent lambs and only a few villains are responsible for the human tragedy. Actually, a large part of the masses themselves want to kill, plunder, rape, and do what Hitler, Stalin, and tyrants like them have always done. Chmielnitsky’s Cossacks weren’t capitalists, neither were Petlura’s murderers. Petlura himself was a pauper right up to the time Schwartzbard did him in. He starved in Paris.’
‘Who sent a hundred thousand soldiers to die at Verdun? Wilhelm and Foch.’
‘Wilhelm and Foch couldn’t have sent them unless a big enough percentage had been willing to go. The ugly truth is that a great number of men – young men in particular – have a passion to kill. They only need a pretext or a cause. One time, it’s for religion; another, it may be for Fascism or to defend democracy. Their urge to kill is so great it surpasses their fear of being killed. This is a truth forbidden to utter, but true nonetheless. Those Nazis ready to kill and die for Hitler would under other circumstances be as ready to do the same for Stalin. There hasn’t been a foolish ambition or an insanity for which people weren’t ready to die. If the Jews were to become independent, you could start a war between the Litvaks and the Galicianers.’
‘If that is true, then there is no hope.’
‘Who says there is?’
‘A hypocrite!’ Betty said after Dora had gone. ‘I’ve seen her ilk in Russia. They put on leather jackets, hung revolvers at their hips, and became Chekaists. Now they’re being liquidated. They richly deserve it. Tsutsik, come kiss me. For the last time.’
Twelve
1
In the afternoon more snow began to fall. A dusky murkiness showed through the windowpanes. The sky loomed low, gray, neither cloudy nor clear but looking as if, through some change in creation, the world had acquired another climate. Where was it written that the Ice Age couldn’t suddenly come back? What was to prevent the earth’s tearing loose from the gravitational force of the sun and straying from the Milky Way in the direction of some other galaxy? After Dora and Betty left, it grew quiet in the apartment. The telephone didn’t ring, nor did Tekla come to straighten up and take away the tray. I lay down in my clothes on the unmade bed and closed my eyes.
Around seven-thirty I’d have to take a droshky, a sleigh, or a cab and go to the boardinghouse on Gnoyna Street where my mother and Moishe were waiting for me. Mother was undoubtedly sitting on a chair or on the bed, waiting absorbed in The Duty of the Hearts, which she had brought with her. My marriage to Shosha had robbed her of the last hope of returning to Warsaw. Moishe was probably in the studyhouse browsing through books there. He hadn’t uttered a word against Shosha, but his eyes laughed momentarily when he first heard her name. The boys in the cheder where he went used to mimic Shosha. I was sure he was thinking that those who strayed from the path of righteousness also strayed when it came to worldly matters. Well, and what about Feitelzohn, Celia, and Haiml? Even Teibele had reacted with a hint of contempt when she heard I would be marrying her sister. I had already determined never to take Shosha to the Writers’ Club. They would ridicule her – and me.
Evening fell abruptly. My room grew dark. The sky had acquired a violet tinge. I got up from my bed and stood at the window. The passersby were not walking but struggling against the blizzard; occasionally they danced with the whirlwind. Vast piles of snow transformed the street into valleys and hills. What are the sparrows doing now? I wondered. According to Spinoza, the frost, the birds, and I were all modes of the same substance. But one mode whistled, whined, and drove a cold wave from the North Pole; a second hid in a hole in a wall, shivering and starving; a third was getting ready to marry Shosha.
It wasn’t yet seven when I went outside to find a droshky. I had put on my good suit and a fresh shirt. Haiml and Celia had reserved a room in a hotel for us in Otwock, where we would spend a week. This was to be their wedding gift and our honeymoon, and I had packed a satchel with manuscripts, some clothing, and a toothbrush. I did it all with the feeling that it was never my decision but that some unknown power had decided for me. The illusion of free choice had vanished from within me. Perhaps this is the way all people marry? Perhaps this is how men steal, murder, go to war, commit suicide? Something in me laughed. The fatalists are right after all. I’ll never blame anyone for anything. I waited in front of the gate for fifteen minutes, but all the sleighs and taxis that passed were taken. Nor were any of the trolleys with their frosted-over windows heading in the direction of Gnoyna. I started off on foot, carrying the satchel, and the snow sprayed my face at an angle. My eyelids became swollen. The snow-covered street lights cast trails of fog. I stumbled along in the wintry chaos with the uncertainty of a blind man. Even though I wore rubbers, my feet were soon wet. I passed Solna and Electoralna Streets, and from Zimna came out on Gnoyna. How would I take Mother and Moishe through such a storm to Panska? She could barely take a step in normal weather. I glanced at my wristwatch, but I couldn’t read the numbers on the dial.
I climbed the three flights of wet and slippery stairs that led up to the boardinghouse. Mother sat in the living room in a velvet dress, a silk kerchief over her head, her face pointed and white. I could see in her eyes both a pious acquiescence in God’s verdicts and a tinge of worldly irony. Moishe had already put on his rabbinical fur-lined coat with the mangy collar and his broad-brimmed hat. There were other men and women in the place, guests who had spent the night there, possibly stranded in Warsaw by the snowstorm. They apparently knew who was expected and guessed the circumstances, for when I came in a tumult broke out and a clapping of hands.
Someone exclaimed, ‘Mazel tov, the groom is here!’
A whirl of steam covered my face and for a moment I saw nothing and heard only a mixture of male and female laughter.
A youth – he may have been an employee of the house – volunteered to go downstairs and help us get a sleigh or droshky. Mother wasn’t able to climb in, and I had to lift her and place her in her seat. Moishe didn’t forget to be suspicious that the seat cover was of forbidden cloth, and he spread his handkerchief over it for a partition. The droshky had already started off when I realized I didn’t have my satchel. I began to shout to the driver to stop. At that moment the youth – Mother designated him an angel from heaven – raced up and threw it in beside me. I wanted to reward him, but I had no change. I yelled my thanks and the wind blew my words away. The droshky’s canopy was up; it was dark inside. I heard Moishe say, ‘Well, thank the Almighty you came. It was getting late and we were afraid something had happened. You know how Mother worries.’
‘I couldn’t get a droshky. I had to walk the whole way.’
‘God forbid you didn’t catch a cold,’ Mother said. ‘Ask Bashele to give you an aspirin.’
‘It all comes from heaven, it’s all from heaven,’ Moishe said. ‘In everything man does there are obstacles so that he can discern the hand of Providence. If everything were to go smoothly, man would say, “My power and the might of mine hands hath gotten me this wealth.” When evildoers achieve success, they be
lieve it to be due to their own ability, but not always is the path of evil successful. That Hitler – may his name be blotted out – will be dealt his punishment, nor will Stalin, that wicked monster, have his way either.’
‘Until they receive their deserved punishment, who knows how many innocent people will perish,’ Mother said.
‘Eh? Accounts are kept in heaven. Rabbi Sholom Belzer once said, “Not a pinch of snuff is ignored in the Celestial Council of Justice!” He who knows the truth relies completely on God.’
The droshky dragged along, rocking. From time to time the horse stopped, turned his head, and glanced back, seemingly wondering why people should drive in weather like this. The driver said in Yiddish, ‘On a night like this, a droshky is no good and a sleigh is worthless, too. On a night like this, it’s good to sit by the stove and eat broth with noodles.’
‘You’ll have to give him a few groschen more,’ Mother whispered.
‘Yes, Mama, I will.’
When we got to the rabbi’s, everyone was waiting: Shosha, Bashele, Zelig, Teibele, Feitelzohn, Haiml, Celia. They greeted me with smiles, winks. Celia’s eyes seemed to ask, Are you really so blind? Or do you see something the others can never see? Maybe they had suspected I would change my mind at the last minute. Mother’s old-fashioned clothes brought a condescending expression from the rebbitzen, a stout woman in a black curled wig; she had a broad face and a huge bosom. There was not a trace of feminine well-wishing in her stern gaze. Counting the rabbi and his son – a swarthy youth with hardly any earlocks and the stiff collar of a half Hasid, half dandy – there were seven males present, and the rabbi sent his son out to collar three men from the courtyard or the street to complete the quorum.
Shosha had on a new dress. Her hair done in a pompadour and her high-heeled shoes made her look taller. When we came in, she stretched out her arms and made a gesture as if to run up to us, but Bashele indicated to her that she should stand still. Bashele had brought a bottle of wine, a bottle of whiskey, and a bag of cookies. The rabbi, a tall, erect man with a pointed black beard, didn’t appear pious like my father or Moishe, but a worldly person, all business. There was a telephone in his apartment. Mother and Moishe looked at each other, surprised. It never occurred to Father to install a gadget like this in his house.
Since Zelig had already deposited a thousand zlotys with a lawyer to be paid to Bashele after the divorce, the former husband and wife avoided each other. Zelig paced to and fro in a black suit, a stiff collar, and a tie with a pearl stickpin. His shoes squeaked. He was smoking a cigar. He was already properly drunk, as befitted a member of the burial society. He called Mother ‘mechutayneste’ (in-law), and reminded her of the time when we had been neighbors. Feitelzohn was having a conversation with Moishe, displaying his knowledge of the Gemara and the Midrash. I heard Moishe say to him, ‘You are a scholar, but erudition demands practice.’
‘For that you need what I lack – faith,’ Feitelzohn replied.
‘Sometimes the faith comes later.’
Feitelzohn had already met Shosha at Celia’s. He had praised her childish beauty to me, said that she reminded him of an English girl friend of his of olden times, even spoke of having Shosha take part in some future soul expedition of his, together with me. He added, ‘Tsutsik, in my eyes she has a million times more charm than that American actress – what is her name? If you would have married her, I would have considered it a degradation.’
The rabbi sat down to fill out the marriage contract. He wiped the point of his pen on his skullcap. When he asked if the bride was a virgin, Zelig replied, ‘Certified.’
The rabbi’s son came back with three men dressed in padded jackets, heavy boots, fur caps. One wore a rope tied across his loins. They didn’t want to wait for refreshments until after the ceremony and immediately poured themselves glasses of whiskey. Their faces, raw from the cold outside, blackened and wrinkled from age and hard work, expressed disdain for all the hopes of the young. Their moist eyes behind bushy brows were saying, Just wait a few years and you will know what we know. From behind the stove the rabbi’s son brought a canopy and four poles. The rabbi quickly read the ketubbah, the marriage contract written in Aramaic. He swallowed words. I promised Shosha two hundred gulden in the event I divorced her, and the same sum of money from my heirs should she be widowed.
I hadn’t bought a wedding ring. Bashele told me that no jeweler would be able to supply a ring to fit Shosha’s index finger, which was as slender as a child’s. Bashele now gave me the ring that Zelig had given her over thirty years ago. I would use it just for that occasion. She burst into tears when the rabbi began to chant the holy words. Teibele wiped a tear from her left eye with a corner of her handkerchief. Shosha moved her lips several times, as if about to ask or to say something, but each time Bashele shook her head in warning.
I noticed that my mother was barely able to stand. From time to time she wavered and took hold of Moishe’s shoulder. Moishe swayed as if he were mumbling a prayer.
Haiml and Celia had planned a reception for us at a restaurant, but it had to be canceled. Mother and Moishe let it be known that they didn’t trust the big-city restaurants to be strictly kosher. Besides, the last train to Otwock, where a room stood ready for Shosha and me, departed too early to leave enough time for a reception. Bashele had packed a supper for us to eat on the train. Mother and Moishe intended to go back to Old Stykov the first thing the next morning. Haiml and Celia would take them to the station. When Shosha and I returned from Otwock, we would move in with the Chentshiners.
I knew that all who were present at the ceremony – perhaps even Bashele and Shosha herself deep down where a vestige of sane judgment always remains – felt that I was committing a terrible folly, but the general mood was a kind of jubilant solemnity. Feitelzohn, who was wont to make jokes even at funerals to show how consistent he was in his cynicism, conducted himself almost paternally. He squeezed my hand and wished me good luck. He bent down and gallantly kissed Shosha on her little hand. Haiml and Celia both cried.
Zelig said, ‘Getting married and dying are two things you can’t avoid.’ And he handed me a stack of banknotes wrapped in tissue paper.
Mother wasn’t crying. I hugged and kissed her, but she didn’t kiss me back. She said, ‘Since you went ahead and did it, it was obviously ordained.’
2
The train was scheduled to leave at twenty to twelve, but at midnight it still hadn’t moved. The car in which we were seated was empty. The tiny gas lamp blinded more than it illuminated. Bashele and Teibele, who escorted us to the train, had gone home. It was nearly as cold in the car as outside, and I put on the two sweaters I had packed in my satchel. Shosha had brought along a fur collar and a muff that may have come from before the war and had undoubtedly belonged to her mother. The collar had a fox head with two glass eyes. Shosha pressed against me and her body vibrated, like that of some small animal.
Had we made a mistake and boarded an empty train that was scheduled to stand all night in the station? I wanted to take a look in the other cars, but Shosha clung to me and said she wouldn’t be left alone. Eventually we heard a whistle and the train began to glide hesitantly over the slippery rails.
Shosha opened the bag Bashele had given us and we ate a cold meal. Everything she did took a long time: untying the bag, deciding which portion was meant for her and which for me. She seemed to waver at every bite. I had promised Haiml and Celia, those generous benefactors of ours, that when we lived with them Shosha would help out with the housekeeping chores, since Celia’s Marianna had gone off to be married, but Shosha’s indecision each time she had to make the pettiest choice convinced me that she would be of little use. She picked up a slice of sour pickle and it fell from her fingers. She took a crumb of a roll, then put it down again. Her slim fingers had almost no nails and I could not make out whether she had bitten them off or whether they had stopped growing. She began to chew and somehow forgot that she had food in her mouth.
We rode past the Praga cemetery, a city of headstones enveloped in snowy shrouds, and Shosha said, ‘Here lies Yppe.’
‘Yes, I know.’
‘Oh, Arele, I’m afraid!’
‘Afraid of what?’ I asked.
Shosha didn’t answer and I assumed she had forgotten what I had asked. Then she said, ‘The train may get lost.’
‘How? A train runs on tracks.’
Shosha thought this over.
‘Arele, I won’t be able to have children. The doctor once said I’m too narrow. You know where.’
‘I don’t want children. You are my child.’
‘Arele, are you my husband already?’
‘Yes, Shoshele.’
‘And I’m really your wife?’
‘According to the law.’
‘Arele, I’m afraid.’
‘What are you afraid of now?’
‘Oh, I don’t know. Of God. Of Hitler.’
‘So far, Hitler is in Germany, not here. As to God …’
‘Arele, I forgot to bring along my little pillow.’
‘We’ll be back in a week and you’ll have your pillow again.’
‘Without my pillow I won’t be able to fall asleep.’
‘You’ll sleep. We’ll lie in one bed.’
‘Oh, Arele, I’m going to cry.’ She burst out in a clamor, like a little girl. I put my arms around her. She trembled and I felt the beating of her heart. I counted her ribs through her dress.
The conductor came in to punch the tickets. He asked, ‘Why is she crying?’
‘Oh, she forgot to bring along her pillow.’
‘Your daughter, eh?’
‘No. Yes.’
‘Don’t cry, little girl. You’ll get another pillow.’ He threw her a kiss and left.
In the midst of crying, Shosha began to laugh. ‘He thought you’re my daddy?’
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