The Hours Count

by Jillian Cantor

  “You’re not that old,” I said, though I worried about the tense lines around his eyes, the way his hands shook a little bit as he wrapped my chickens in brown paper.

  He handed the chickens across the counter. “I’m just saying, Mildred. You’re such a nice girl. You’ve always wanted to help everybody else. You do such a good job with your boys.” He said all these things about me as if they were fact, as if everyone knew and believed them, not just him. He patted David on the head. “But if you have to choose between helping your friend and saving yourself, you save yourself, you understand me? You save yourself.”

  “Don’t worry,” I told him, and I knew he wouldn’t hate me if I left with Jake. And that if my mother did, maybe he would help her understand that it was what I had to do. “Really.” I squeezed his hand. “I’ll be fine, okay? And if Dr. Zitlow comes back, you’ll tell him I got his message?”

  He frowned a little, but then he agreed. I put the wrapped chickens into the carriage, and then I grabbed David’s hand and we walked back to Knickerbocker Village.

  BACK ON THE ELEVENTH FLOOR, I knocked on Ethel’s door and this time John answered. He stared at me and then held out his small hands as if Ethel had told him to take the chicken without saying a word to me. I bent down and put the brown package in his hands. “Does your mother need anything else?” I asked.

  “Johnny, shut the door!” I heard Ethel yelling from the kitchen, where I guessed she was cleaning.

  ‘It’s okay,” I said to him just before he did what Ethel asked and shut the door. “Everything is going to be okay.”

  IN MY APARTMENT, I read Jake’s letter again, and I wondered where I could find the evidence he needed. After I laid the boys down for their naps, I searched the kitchen cabinets, not quite sure what I was looking for. I pulled out Ed’s half-empty bottle of vodka, but, behind it, there was another full one. I quietly rifled through his bureau drawers but found only clothes, then looked under couch cushions, between the pages of an old copy of the New York Times on the coffee table. But I found nothing of any consequence. If Ed had anything that might incriminate him, I didn’t think it was in our apartment.

  I stopped searching as I began to hear noises in the hallway, people walking down the hall. The press. They were coming to watch Ethel prepare her chicken. I felt nervous for her and I sat on my couch and lit a cigarette. I closed my eyes as I inhaled and exhaled the smoke, wishing for the moments to pass quickly until Jake sent word again.

  IN THE DAYS that followed, most of what I learned about Julie and Ethel’s situation was from other sources. I heard news in worried telephone calls from my mother and Susan, and I read bits on my own in the paper and watched it on the television. Ethel went to visit Julie in jail the Sunday after he was arrested, which I learned when I got onto the elevator as she was getting off, in tears, her face so red it seemed she had been crying for years.

  “Ethel,” I said, reaching for her arm to embrace her, but she ignored me and walked off the elevator past me.

  Mrs. Greenwald, an older woman who lived down the hall, stepped onto the elevator with me only after Ethel had slammed her apartment door shut. “It’s better we shouldn’t be seen on the elevator with her, eh?” Mrs. Greenwald cocked her eyebrows at me. “I waited to make sure she was gone before I came on.”

  I pressed my lips tightly together, remembering what Mr. Bergman had told me, not wanting to make my own enemy.

  AS AUGUST CAME, I learned that there was going to be a grand jury hearing in Julie’s case. In the nights after I put the children to bed and the apartment was quiet, I watched the television turned down low, and I began drinking what was left of Ed’s vodka. I couldn’t even stand the taste of vodka or the way it burned my throat as it went down, but I enjoyed the warmth I felt immediately after—the feeling, at last, that everything could be okay. Maybe that was why Ed had always drunk so much of it.

  Ed had been gone so long now that I convinced myself it was possible he’d left us for good. If he was never coming back, he would never miss all his vodka I was drinking. But deep down, I knew he wouldn’t have left Henry behind for good no matter what. I hoped and prayed for Julie’s ordeal to be over, for life to go back to normal and for the FBI to forget all about Knickerbocker Village, but I was pretty sure when that happened Ed would mysteriously reappear, and I could not imagine life here as it once was, me and Ed, living in this apartment as husband and wife.

  THE SATURDAY NIGHT before Ethel was called to testify in front of the grand jury, I stayed up late, drinking more vodka than usual, watching a report on television about a bomber plane that had crashed into a neighborhood in California, killing and injuring innocent people. I imagined it would be like the bomb, coming out of the sky out of nowhere. And I shuddered at the idea, and stood up to turn the television off.

  I was dizzy; I’d drunk too much vodka, and I reached out for the top of the television to steady myself. My hand caught on something odd, and, once I’d regained my balance, I ran my hand across the top of the television again. It felt like a small door built into the wooden casing surrounding the television. I turned on the lamp and came back to examine it closer. I tried to pull it open with my fingernail and realized I’d need something stronger, so I grabbed a steak knife from the kitchen and then pried the small door open.

  Inside was an envelope. I opened it and unfolded the paper inside it. It was a sketch: large circular objects that were unfamiliar to me. It appeared to be a giant bull’s-eye, with numbers—calculations—on the left side.

  I held it up to the lamp as if seeing it more clearly would help me understand it better, and I noticed something was written on the back. I turned it over and there, in Ed’s very familiar large block handwriting, were the words For Raymond. For Raymond? My fingers trembled as I traced the letters. I was still unsteady and I had to sit back down on the couch. Was this what Jake was looking for? Was this the evidence that could show Ed was actually the man the FBI wanted?

  I picked up the telephone and quickly dialed the number, that by now, I had memorized. “Tell Dr. Zitlow I found something,” I said when the woman picked up.

  After I hung up, I wondered if I really had. I wondered if this one piece of paper that Ed must’ve hidden in the television could have the ability to change everything.

  TWO DAYS LATER, on Monday morning, August seventh, a Western Union man knocked on my door just after the children awoke. As I stood in the hallway, Henry on my hip, and signed for the telegram, I saw Ethel leave her apartment, her boys in tow. She was in a nice dress I hadn’t seen before—I wondered if it was new just for this occasion—and she wore one of her spectacular hats, like the one I’d seen her in that first morning I’d met her when she was dashing off to the studio to make her recording for John. I knew from the news reports that she was on her way to testify in front of the grand jury in Julie’s case today.

  I thought about waving to Ethel or calling out to wish her good luck, but then I thought I better not, especially with the Western Union man standing at my door. And besides, I was still dressed in my nightclothes and had thrown on only a robe to answer the door. She went into the elevator, and I felt a sense of sadness that we couldn’t even smile at each other in the hall anymore. That I couldn’t even tell her that I was trying to help her.

  I looked down at what I was signing for and remembered the last telegram I’d gotten on the day of Henry’s birth. Ed’s message, which I’d mistaken for Jake’s, and my heart fell at the idea that this was Ed contacting me now as if he intuitively knew about the paper I’d found hidden inside the television on Saturday. But I hadn’t seen or heard from Ed since that morning in Mr. Bergman’s butcher shop, and my new theory was that he’d run off to Mexico, too, just like Mortie Sobell. And besides, I’d carefully left a message specifically for Jake Saturday night. I was fairly certain that, this time, the telegram was from him. It had to be.

  Ba
ck inside my apartment, I put Henry down on the floor and opened it up.

  MEET ME FRIDAY 4 PM.

  DR. ZITLOW

  Friday was only a few days away, and there was so much to do. I would need to pack our things and make sure to say a quiet good-bye to my mother and Bubbe Kasha and Mr. Bergman. And . . . Ethel . . . if she would let me. I hoped her grand jury testimony would go well today and that the jury would have no choice but to let Julie go. How couldn’t they? Even according to the press, there seemed no real evidence to hold him other than David Greenglass’s word.

  And on Friday I would bring Jake what I found Saturday night. I hoped it would be what he needed to put this on Ed, wherever he was, and then they’d have to let Julie go no matter what. Ed would be arrested. Julie and Ethel would be free. And then Jake and I would be together. I held the telegram against my chest and exhaled.

  26

  I woke up on Friday morning feeling lighter than I had in some time. I sat up and smiled, remembering that today was the day my life was going to change. At last. While the children still slept, I walked around the apartment, readying our last-minute things in a suitcase. I thought we wouldn’t need much in our simple, beautiful new life in the mountains, and last night I’d packed only the basics: clothes for the children, a few dresses for myself, bottles and formula for Henry, David’s communication cars, and, of course, the paper I’d found in the television. I felt paranoid just having it in my possession, and all week I’d felt the overwhelming dread that Ed would choose just now to return for it. Last night I’d even taken the time to draw a duplicate sketch and I’d placed it back in the envelope, back inside the secret compartment in the television, just in case Ed were to come back looking.

  Now I stood by the living room window, looking down and watching the tiny men rushing to work on the street below, and I realized this might be the last morning I’d ever have this view. Instead of sadness, I felt relief. I was more than ready to leave Knickerbocker Village, this world in the shadow of the Manhattan Bridge, behind.

  I heard a knock at the door. Another telegram from Jake maybe? I ran to the door. Then I thought, Or from Ed? And I hesitated for a second before turning the knob and opening the door. I was surprised to find Ethel there on the other side, her face as pale as fresh snow.

  “Millie,” she said, “I need a favor.” She was dressed in a crisp, light blue polka-dot dress and she held on to a pair of white gloves in her hands, wringing them together uneasily as she spoke. “I have to go back to testify before the grand jury again today. And I really need you to watch the boys for me.” She looked down at her feet. “I can’t take them back to my mother’s again. There was so much . . . unpleasantness on Monday.”

  “I’m sorry.” I put my hand on her arm. “Of course I’ll watch the boys. It’s just . . . I have an . . . appointment later in the afternoon. At four p.m.” I didn’t say more. I couldn’t tell Ethel here, like this, that I might be leaving her forever, or even that I found something that could possibly implicate Ed, because I didn’t know what was going to happen yet.

  “It shouldn’t take that long,” she said. “I’m pleading the Fifth Amendment to everything they ask, just like the lawyer said.”

  “What does that mean?” I asked.

  “It means, I’m answering nothing,” she said. “It means, this is all a waste of everyone’s time.” She held her hands up in the air and then let them drop back down. “I wouldn’t have anything to tell them even if I did answer.”

  “I know.” I put my hand on her shoulder, and she didn’t push me away. The hallway was empty and we were talking softly, so none of the other neighbors could hear us. “I’ve been following everything in the newspapers. And after this silliness today, they’ll have to let Julie go, right?”

  “I don’t know. It seems they don’t have to do anything, Millie.” She shrugged. “I’ve made an appointment for later today with the Jewish Homemakers. For . . . help with the children . . . should Julie not be coming home anytime soon.”

  “The Jewish Homemakers?” I thought of that odd and frightening woman, Zelda Weiss, whom Ed had called years ago to take David, and I tried to remember if that was the same organization. But Ethel wouldn’t give her children away. It had to be something different.

  “I need help,” Ethel said, sounding apologetic.

  I opened my mouth to offer more help, whatever she needed, but I remembered I might not be here past this afternoon. And even if I were going to be here, Ethel probably wouldn’t let me help more, that today, it seemed, she was here asking only because she had no other option.

  “I can’t take the children with me today,” she said, “and I can’t take them back to my mother’s again, I just can’t.” Tears sprang up in her eyes, and I leaned across the doorway to hug her. I wanted to tell her that everything was going to be fine, to apologize for running away today before her entire ordeal was finished. But I have to go, I wanted to say to her. I have to save myself. And this piece of paper I had to give to Jake could save her and Julie, too. I was going to help her, I reminded myself. But all I said was “Of course. Bring the children over. I’m happy to watch them this morning.”

  “You’re such a good friend, Millie,” she said.

  “I’m so sorry this is happening to you. It is isn’t right . . .”

  She pulled back and wiped away her tears. She stood up a little straighter. “‘A coward dies many times before their death. The valiant never taste of death but once.’” She gave me a half smile. “It’s from Julius Caesar. It was a line in a play that I was in once when I was still just a girl. Oh, isn’t it silly that that’s what’s running through my head now?”

  “No one is going to die,” I told her, and she laughed a little, wiped away the rest of her tears, and then she walked down the hallway to collect her boys.

  A FEW MINUTES LATER, she was back with John and Richie. I ushered them in, and John raced to turn on the television. Ethel looked past me into the apartment, watching them for a moment. “They’ll be fine,” I said. “We’ll have a nice day.”

  She pulled her white gloves on her hands and blew a white-gloved kiss as she backed up toward the elevator. I waved in response. I didn’t say good-bye to her. I thought I would do that when she came back to pick the children up.

  AFTER ETHEL LEFT, Henry began to cry. I went into the bedroom to pick him up and get him his bottle and I found David just sitting up on his mattress, looking out of sorts. “What is it, darling?” I asked him as I jostled Henry a bit to try to calm him down. Then I remembered I’d packed David’s communication cars, and David always reached for them first thing now when he woke up. I walked into the living room to retrieve them from the suitcase.

  “Where are you going?” John had turned around and was peering at me over the back of the couch, his eyes wide with suspicion. Richie still faced the television and watched eagerly, sucking his thumb.

  “Oh,” I said, startled. “Just a little trip with the boys, that’s all.”

  “To Mexico?” John asked. He must’ve overheard Ethel and Julie talking about the possibility of their trip. I didn’t answer him. “I don’t think you should go to Mexico. It might not be very safe there,” he said. “David could get hurt.”

  “You don’t need to worry,” I told him. “We’ll be fine.”

  “Mortie and his family were kidnapped by bandits just like on The Lone Ranger.”

  “Oh, were they?” I murmured. I pulled the cars from the suitcase and brought them back to David in the bedroom. His entire body seemed to ease with relief as he took them out of the box and began lining up the reds to show me he was hungry.

  “They really were,” John said, and I realized he’d followed me back to the bedroom. He sat down on the edge of my bed and stared at me expectantly. He was calmer now that he was seven . . . or maybe now that he’d been in therapy for a little while. He was bigger, to
o. The babyish look seemed all gone from his face, and I could see the beginning of what he might look like as a man. Something like Julie, only with Ethel’s spark thrown in.

  “You don’t need to worry. We’re not going to Mexico,” I told him. “We’re just taking a short trip,” I lied, “that’s all.” As soon as I said it, I felt bad. I imagined John repeating this conversation some time later to Ethel, her frowning and wondering, Why didn’t she tell me? But, for now, I pushed the thought away. “Come on,” I said, “let’s get some breakfast and then we’ll go to the playground.”

  IF I THOUGHT two children were hard to manage on a walk outside, four were nearly impossible. I had John hold on to David while I held on to Richie and pushed the carriage. Just out on the street, I thought about turning around and going back inside, but I wanted to stop in to see Mr. Bergman. Yesterday, I’d taken the boys to see my mother and Bubbe Kasha, but I hadn’t had a chance to visit the butcher shop all week and I couldn’t leave the city without saying good-bye.

  The shop was crowded this Friday morning, as it always was just before the Sabbath. It occurred to me that I would meet Jake at the Biltmore before the Sabbath came tonight and that I wouldn’t need my usual brisket today, that it might be the first time in years, except for when I was in the hospital, that I hadn’t observed Shabbat, except for that last night I’d been at the Biltmore with Jake. I’d kept up the weekly ritual on my own even after Ed had left because it seemed important that something should be the same. Tonight would be the end of that something, I thought. I felt vaguely sad until I remembered it would be the beginning of something, too.