Bess and Frima

by Alice Rosenthal

  She couldn’t recall who was responsible for this ditty, but it was Vinny’s favorite union song, not least because it wasn’t all that easy to sing, and Beth invariably blew it. It had become their intimate joke on those occasions when they made love with Beth in the saddle, so to speak, like tonight. And it was particularly fitting for the next few days, for Beth would drive a horse and wagon in the streets of East Harlem for a scrap metal drive. Old Paint! She gave a snort of laughter. The first time she had driven a horse and wagon for one of these events, the horse was called Jack.

  Frima hadn’t even known the horse’s name, but she had burst out laughing at the thought of Beth, a comically physical coward if there ever was one, driving a horse.

  “Nice, Frima, very nice! I come to you petrified—you, supposedly my dear friend—and you think it’s funny. And you are the only person of my acquaintance who knows anything about horses.”

  “Farm horses, not city horses, I’m afraid. Isn’t there a fruit and vegetable wagon that comes around your neighborhood? You could consult with the driver.”

  “Are you finished?”

  “Bethie, I’m only trying to jolly you along, a little. There won’t be much traffic, will there?”

  “I don’t think so. They close off the streets for a while, like a block party.”

  “Will there be other people on the wagon with you?”

  “I think they don’t want too much weight on it. They need room for the stuff they’re collecting, but Vinny will be there, walking next to it. And someone will lead the horse,” she added, in a small voice.

  “And your job?”

  “Well, I’ll hold the reins and wave and call out, ‘Support the war effort!’ You know, stuff like that.”

  “And look fetching and attract all the men on the street, you poor thing!”

  “I wish you could be there with me, but I guess you couldn’t bring the baby.”

  “Right. Your mother, to say nothing of your brother, would have apoplexy. And I need them around, you see, because I too am supporting the war effort. I’m taking a course with the Red Cross—first aid, and so on. I pray I never have need for any of these skills, but I want to do this. Jack and your mama are both very proud of me, to say nothing of my own mama, and that’s nice. Lena doesn’t seem to care, one way or the other. So far, so good, my dear. Now wear something that shows off your charms, knock ’em dead, and ask Vinny to send me a snapshot.”

  The new cart horse was named Sea Biscuit, God help us. But this second time in the driver’s seat, Beth felt like a pro. She sat in her bright red beret and scarf (wonderful how red showed off her vivid coloring), looking “dishy,” as Vinny said, while he hopped around snapping pictures. Too bad they couldn’t show color. Later she sat with him at a table with a few of their friends at his favorite Italian place on Thompson Street, toasting the successful drive and waiting for their spaghetti with white clam sauce. Beth had loved this from the first time she tasted it. With Vinny beside her, she could probably even learn to like oysters.

  This restaurant reminded her of the one in the country where she’d had her first date with him. No live music and no steaks, certainly, in wartime, but the warm, easy atmosphere was the same. She felt as gleeful and proud as in those carefree summer days before the war. Beth tried to scold herself about her ease, her happiness, when half the world was dying. She was conscientious about blackouts and rationing, and she saved scrap metal, rubber bands, meat fat. She obeyed all the restrictions of the home front without complaint. But she remained buoyant, confident of her safety, optimistic. She was not born to this attitude, she told herself. A lack of angst was alien in her family. But in truth she had not experienced any personal loss. Her brother, now serving as an army medic at the Bronx VA, would very likely do his part for the war effort bomb-free and close to his family. Her guy had so far spent months training on Staten Island and had shipped out to the Caribbean and to the West Coast. Warm waters, close to home. He was back on duty in a few days. Maybe he would ship out to the North Atlantic, but she could not worry about this as she had in the past. They were a lucky couple, they’d constructed a good life for themselves: this was his, this was hers, this they shared. Beth clinked her glass against Vinny’s. “Oh, we are a lucky girl and boy—here’s to us!”

  —

  Beth had walked home from work this Saturday afternoon, a long but leisurely stroll in the fresh chill air. She had the stretch of weekend before her, with no obligations except to herself. Vinny was now back on duty, this time indeed somewhere in the North Atlantic. Sometimes fear about this plucked at her sleeve, but not today. All this time to herself! She kicked off her shoes and sank into an easy chair staring at the wall. If it were stripped clean of shelves, mirrors, and her own two soft watercolors hanging there, what a canvas that wall would make. She could paint something huge. Like “Guernica.” Now that was a crazy thought. Whenever she got over to the Modern, she would stare at the painting, unable to move away from it. She and everyone else. Sometimes she resented Picasso for his power to make her confront the horror, the pity of that bombing. Well, she certainly was no Picasso, nor did she want to imitate him. What would she do with a canvas as big as a wall? She had no ambitions to be a muralist—she didn’t want to do a big stolid monument that was determined to lecture or shout at you forever. Still, wouldn’t it be nice if there were such a thing as a completely erasable wall. She could throw colors on it any way she saw them—clashing, smashing colors, textures, light and shadow—pow! Then she could erase it before anyone saw it. Coward! She scolded herself. Could you see Picasso or Rivera or that strange Frida Kahlo doing any such thing? No! They’d confront the world with their truths—or even their delusions.

  So what had happened to her carefree afternoon of creating art for art’s sake? That child-in-a-candy-shop sense of letting her pencil or paint brush roam free? She couldn’t be free here, for some reason. She should have gone up to the Art Students League to be in the comfort of others in shared space. She couldn’t work here with that sketch tucked away in the closet. Jesus! She was absolutely astounded by her own thought. That portrait of Vinny that she had started with such elation the summer she had met him. She had never finished it, hadn’t thought of it for months. She couldn’t finish it, she knew that now. She didn’t know how to complete it—she didn’t want to—but she couldn’t just dump it. The phone rang, and she grabbed the receiver. It was her friend, Jeanette, who was married to one of Vinny’s maritime buddies. Did Beth want to catch a flick tonight? They could grab a bite before the show.

  “Good idea. (Oh, yes!) Nothing about the war, I hope.”

  “No closer to it than Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney.”

  “Wonderful.” A dose of Hollywood’s sugar-coated optimism, buoyant and resilient as rubber—just what she needed to sustain her. That and maybe a toasted cheese sandwich at Nedicks before the movie.

  She came down to earth, flat on her butt, only a couple of days later, when the doorbell rang and she heard the low voices, the shuffle of footsteps outside. The real war had come home to her. She knew before they spoke what the two sober seamen had come to tell her. Vinny’s Liberty Ship had been sunk by the Nazis. There were no survivors. He was gone. Beth looked at the men numbly, barely reacting to their words. Who were they? They looked familiar. Friends of Vinny? Had she met them before? She didn’t know. She didn’t know anything.

  “Are you all right? Do you have someone to stay with you? Do you want us to call someone?”

  “No, no. But please sit down.” These guys were seamen, less formal than the army or navy would have been. Ordinary men with New York accents in work clothes.

  “You know, we’re here to help. You’re not alone. Vinny wanted . . . we want . . . to take care of you, if we can. We don’t have military benefits for you. Merchant Marines don’t get them, but Vinny contributed to a fund, a less formal arrangement. But we can talk about that later, of course.”

  “Yes. Thank you.”<
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  Murmansk! A name, a place she hadn’t known existed before the war in the North Atlantic. Now it was a name she would never forget. So cold! How awful that her sunny, warm-blooded man should die unclaimed in those freezing waters. He didn’t deserve it. Oh, God, poor Vinny. Words she believed but couldn’t feel. She couldn’t cry. She slept fitfully, wandered around the apartment, finally got around to informing friends who weren’t serving with him and wouldn’t know of his death. Some of them cried, but she couldn’t. She heard Frima choking back tears when Beth called her—she’d had a real soft spot for Vinny. Hannah Erlichman cried for both of them, Beth and Vinny. Even Jack was sympathetic: “I’m truly sorry for your loss. Can we do anything to help?” He sounded awkward but quite genuine. She would have to thank him some day, but not now. Now all she could feel was a depressed numbness, and words beating in her mind: this is what you deserve. She didn’t know why she deserved this. She didn’t know anything.

  Life went on. She went to work, which was a relief; it seemed so normal. She had an occasional meal with a friend, went to the movies, leaving her seat during newsreels of the war at sea. She visited with Frima and her little niece, but she felt almost nothing. And she could neither cry nor paint. How long this went on, she couldn’t say, but gradually her mind took up a new refrain:

  Full fathom five thy father lies

  Of his bones are coral made

  Those are pearls that were his eyes

  The Tempest—she remembered it from high school. Beautiful words, they were. But surely Shakespeare didn’t mean for them to sound like an advertising jingle with an underlying tinge of mockery and reproach. And he couldn’t have meant these lines to be repeated ad nauseam. They seemed to slip into her consciousness at every opportunity when her mind was not focused on something else. It was driving her mad. Was she going mad? Maybe she should see someone about this. Like a psychiatrist? A psychoanalyst? She almost laughed out loud. On her salary? Certainly she wouldn’t dream of using the small stipend Vinny left her for any such purpose. He would have hated the very idea. So bourgeois—so antithetical to solidarity and common cause. Beth didn’t agree, actually. She found the little she knew about Freud and his followers intriguing. It must be a streak of bourgeois individualism coming out in her. But if she was going to analyze her way out of this jingle madness, she would have to do it herself.

  Vinny’s fate was wrapped up in Shakespeare’s words; nobody needed to tell her that. Coral and pearls, now. Didn’t they come from warm tropical seas? From vacation paradises? Not the unrelenting cold of Murmansk. Well, Vinny was—had been—her vacation paradise, for a while at least. Coral bones? Now that was easy. He had been red to the bone. She was suddenly impatient, irritated with herself. What was she doing? Break the code and you win? As if the mysteries of pain were some kind of parlor game? Beth knew she was in great pain. If only she could cry or scream or throw things, she might feel some relief. But she couldn’t. She remained numb and depressed with those damn words beating in her head.

  How long this lasted, she couldn’t say, but quite suddenly there was silence. It sort of sneaked up on her. She found she was free of this misery, as if chains had broken or a fog had lifted without her volition. She entered the Minetta Street apartment with a renewed eagerness and sense of purpose, quickly shed her work clothes for an old pair of paint-stained dungarees, and sat down at the table with charcoal and a sketch pad. She needed to paint. Shakespeare could paint with words. She couldn’t—didn’t want to. She had to have oils and water-colors, brushes. Unbelievably strange how the greatest word conjuror in the English language had been shouting at her: “Paint, paint! Here it is, I’m practically giving you the image. Paint, you fool—it’s the way you mourn and celebrate!”

  This would be her most important work so far. This painting of Vinny. She thought momentarily of the sketch hidden in the closet. Should she throw it out? No need. It didn’t disturb her now. She hadn’t been able to finish it because she didn’t really know what man she was trying to portray. Perhaps she would finish it some day, but no urgency about that. Her real need now was to create the Vinny she would always think of when she thought of his end. It was the sea change she was after. This man, a warm-blooded Mediterranean—she would not let him disintegrate in those frigid waters. A beautiful sea change he would undergo; no bloated or frozen flesh, but there would most certainly be coral bones—a whole skeleton of coral, like finely wrought chain. She already knew the name of this creation: “Those are pearls that were his eyes.” Sea-washed hazel pearls.

  She had been sitting in the same position for hours. It was after two in the morning, and she was covered with charcoal. She hadn’t eaten anything, but a shower was what she needed now. A shower and sleep. She ran the shower long and hot, soothing the stiffness in her shoulders. Suddenly she began to cry, huge hiccupping sobs that brought her a blessed release before she was conscious of thought.

  Full fathom five, thy father lies . . . Shakespeare had to hit her over the head with this before she could see. Vinny was her emotional father. Her lover, yes, but she had cleaved to him, rushed into living with him because he could guide her, love her, keep her safe. So unlike her own father, who never could. That heavy weight of guilt she’d felt since his death; would Dr. Freud call this an Oedipal thing? That’s what the parlor “Freudians” would call it. She didn’t know, and she didn’t care. The weight had lifted now, and she could feel her grief.

  She dozed off, then woke fitfully to more tears. She was stabbed by a certainty: she hadn’t loved Vinny enough or properly—that’s what made her weep now. He needed a woman who would be his wife and a mother to his children, as well as a companion, and she couldn’t do it. She wasn’t a real partner, just a girl who needed him to prop her up. Oh, Vinny, I am so sorry I couldn’t be more for you. I truly am. Forgive me! Without sense or reason, she began to believe he did. Bethie, will you forget about all this screwball remorse—we had a great time didn’t we? That’s what he would say. It was his farewell gift to her. After all, Vinny was not a guy to hold a grudge.

  It was late in the morning when she woke again. She got up immediately, refreshed but starving. She bolted down toast, a piece of cheese, black coffee. Thank God it was the weekend and she could work on the portrait all day. This painting, now. It would not be easy. It might be a struggle to get it right. One thing she was certain of: the coral Vinny would be content and at ease. No agony there, no fear or loneliness. She would put him in a relaxed, lounging position, maybe glass in hand, shooting the breeze with his buddies. Discussing Marx? She didn’t think so. Much more likely gassing about the women and food they missed. She didn’t know how she would portray the other seamen yet. She’d have to experiment, see how things developed. She only knew the eyes were Vinny’s alone—that he was at peace. As was she.

  CHAPTER 21

  The white greasy margarine, looking exactly like lard or Crisco, sat on the table in its squeezable transparent bag waiting for Frima’s attention. Embedded in its surface was the familiar small orange capsule. For an instant and at just the right angle it was a vision of sunrise over Arctic snows before it reverted to mundane artificial food coloring. You squeezed out the orange goop and mixed it with the white fat to emulate the rich yellow of summer butter. The government, in its wisdom, did not want anyone to confuse margarine with real butter, which was rationed of course, so they left the task of transforming this white mass to the patriotic American housewife. The country girl in Frima knew and sympathized with the dairy farmers who benefited from this decision, but she also knew what fresh summer butter looked and tasted like, and she glared at this blob balefully. Three-year-old Lena, in contrast, was entranced. “I want to do it, Mommy. Let me!” To Lena it was magic to see the orange coloring oozing through the white as she squeezed the bag. Better than any sandbox. Of course, her small hands wouldn’t be able to finish the job; they would quickly tire, and soon enough Lena’s interest turned in another direction. Michael in
the playground, she reported, had a whole closet full of bubble gum, and he would only let his best friend have some. All the big kids who were already in kindergarten or first grade wanted to be his best friend. “I’m too little,” Lena informed her without rancor.

  So bubble gum was a casualty of war. Frima doubted that her daughter knew what it was, actually. If it were available, she would keep Lena away from it as long as possible. She didn’t look forward to cutting it out of her child’s tresses or scraping it off furniture. Bubble gum gone; margarine a new plaything. So this was war to an American three-year-old. On impulse she picked up a week-old news magazine that Jack hadn’t gotten around to finishing. It was opened to a picture of a string of advancing Japanese tanks.

  “Do you know what this is, lovie?” She pointed to a tank.

  “Yes, it’s a Jap.”

  “A person?”

  “Don’t be silly, Mommy! That’s not a person.”

  “Is it an animal—like an elephant?”

  “No. . . .”

  “Can you squeeze it—like this?” Frima picked up the package of margarine.

  “No, it’s too hard.”

  “Well, what does a Jap do?”

  “Bad things. Let me make the yellow again, Mommy.” Lena was clearly tired of silly questions.

  And why shouldn’t she be? A lucky child, thank God! A lucky Jewish child! No fear of any bad things; no one lost. Nor had she, Frima, had any close losses, except for Vinny. He was gone and she had wept for him, but he wasn’t her personal sorrow. He was Beth’s. Frima had been puzzled by Beth’s response to his death. It was unlike anything Frima would have expected from her volatile sister-in-law. Beth had been quiet and numbed, and after a month or so she became immersed in her painting, her job, her political activities. “I still expect to hear his key in the door or to see him around the corner in another room. I miss him, but it isn’t the hurt it was,” she told Frima.