Things Could Be Worse

by Lily Brett

  When Mr Bensky had built this oversized bathroom, he’d had high hopes of being able to shave in peace. Eventually, in despair, he’d removed his Remington electric razor with four different cutting blade selections and automatic overseas conversions to the small cupboard in the toilet next to the bathroom, and there he found his peace.

  Mr Bensky spent two hours a day in the toilet, between 7 a.m. and 8 a.m., and again from 9 p.m. to 10 p.m. The seemingly endless stream of volcanic farts erupting from him in there was a source of excruciating embarrassment for Lola, whose bedroom was across the hallway. If she had a girlfriend staying overnight, Lola set the alarm clock for six-thirty. At five to seven she nonchalantly turned her transistor on to full volume. Johnny O’Keefe screaming ‘Shout’ at the top of his lungs on 3UZ was barely a match for Mr Bensky’s early-morning evacuation.

  Touching up her eyelashes, already lengthened and strengthened by Fabulash, Mrs Bensky reminded herself that it was their turn to pay for the pictures this Saturday. She looked up the phone number of the Rivoli and rang straight away, because it wasn’t always easy to get seventeen seats on a Saturday night.

  The gang, as Lola called them – the Benskys, the Smalls, the Ganzes, the Zelmans and the Pekelmans – were joined by the Feiglins, the Glicks, the Blatmans and poor divorced Mr Berman for their regular Saturday-night excursion to the pictures.

  They’d seen almost every film shown in Melbourne since 1952. Mrs Bensky thought of herself as the intellectual of the group. She liked Wild Strawberries and Last Year At Marienbad, while others enjoyed The Pink Panther and My Fair Lady.

  At interval, Mr Bensky liked to be the one to buy the snacks. He could get as much as he needed, and it was dizzyingly satisfying for him to buy scorched almonds for seventeen people. Seventeen people could eat a lot of scorched almonds. Mr Bensky liked to make sure that nobody missed out.

  Sometimes after the film they went to a supper dance at the Top Hat cabaret. Mr Ganz, with his lean figure and cornflower-blue eyes, was unanimously recognised as the most handsome man in the group. He danced with Mrs Bensky. The knowledge that they made a stunning couple swept them through the quickstep with even greater grace.

  Mrs Zelman danced with Mr Bensky, who could be relied upon to have a few leftover scorched almonds in his jacket pocket. They ate them with a furtive happiness while they foxtrotted in the far corner of the dance floor. Mrs Ganz and Mr Zelman often danced the cha-cha and the rumba together. They both liked the livelier dances.

  Mrs Glick and Mrs Small and Mrs Blatman and Mrs Feiglin and Mrs Bensky took it in turns to dance with Mr Berman. In the last few years Mr Berman had become even more nervous and distant. He hadn’t gone out with a woman since his disastrous affair with Mrs McKenzie ended in 1962.

  Their affair had thrown the entire group into turmoil. The group had all made sure their children had grown up understanding that it was essential to have a Jewish partner. Now, here was one of their close friends infatuated with a shikse, holding her hand in Carlisle Street and grinning like a fifteen-year-old. Mrs Glick and Mrs Feiglin decided that she was after his money. They visited Mrs McKenzie privately. They offered her five hundred pounds to stop seeing Mr Berman. Mrs McKenzie offered the women tea and biscuits. Ten days later she was gone. She had moved to Moe to be closer to her mother, a broken Mr Berman told the group.

  The phone rang. Mrs Bensky, who was just about to put the final coat of Imbi’s Mellow Mauve on her nails, shook her head in annoyance. It was probably Mr Bensky calling from Myers to say that there was no white Tissus Michel material left. She should have bought it when she saw it there last week, she admonished herself. She knew she looked good in white, and could wear it without any worry about its fattening effect.

  She answered the phone. It was Mrs Ganz. Mrs Bensky cradled the phone on her shoulder with her upper arm. She swung her nails to and fro to catch the dry breeze of the air-conditioning. ‘Renia darling, I don’t think we will go to the pictures tomorrow, darling. Moishe has a terrible cold. I asked him to go to the doctor because I’m sure he has got a virus, but you know Moishe, stubborn like an ox. Me, myself, I’ve got a sore throat already. So, Renia darling, make it fifteen tickets.’

  Mrs Bensky nurtured a not-so-secret dislike of Mrs Ganz. Mrs Bensky knew that Mrs Ganz thought of herself as highly intelligent and very beautiful. Mrs Bensky reassured herself that anyone could see that Mrs Ganz was no beauty. The fact that the Ganzes’ Champs Elysees Blouses had one hundred and seventy-eight retail outlets around Australia did not mean that Mrs Ganz was intelligent. Mrs Bensky bit her lip, thinking about the many very stupid people she knew who were good at business.

  Mrs Bensky toasted herself a slice of black rye bread. It was so black it could have passed for pumpernickel. Mrs Bensky liked peace and quiet when she ate. She was comforted by the warm density of the thick toast.

  When Mr and Mrs Bensky arrived in Australia, Mr Bensky had wanted to abbreviate their name to Benn, but Mrs Bensky liked the name Bensky. She didn’t want to change it. Many people had changed their names when they came to Australia. The Silberbergs, the Rotkleins, the Mokruschkis, the Pirkoskis and the Minofskis had become the Silvers, the Rotes, the Moors, the Pikes and the Mints. They now sounded like a gathering of good Presbyterians.

  As Renia Kindler of Lodz, and then Renia Bensky, Mrs Bensky had been the most beautiful girl in the town, some said in the whole of Poland. Her red-brown hair was waist-length and flowed behind her like a dark curtain, framing her high pink cheekbones and intense eyes. Even though she was from one of the poorer families in Lodz, with no dowry to speak of, she was constantly pursued by admirers.

  She was also very clever. In later years Mrs Bensky never tired of telling her two daughters: ‘I gave maths tuitions’, which she always pronounced ‘choosons’, ‘to pay for my schooling, from when I was eight. I was always very good at mathematics. I was the only Jewish girl to finish high school in Lodz and be offered a place at university.’

  As Mrs Bensky was about to begin her first year of medicine at the University of Vienna, the war broke out. Six years later Mrs Bensky graduated from Auschwitz.

  Mr Bensky was a good husband. He had always been grateful to Mrs Bensky for marrying him. His family were displeased by the marriage, for they were property owners and timber merchants, and one of the wealthiest Jewish families in Lodz. Mr Bensky still felt upset when he remembered the hysteria he’d caused in his family when he had married Mrs Bensky. All that fuss and all that heartache, and all for nothing, because soon they were all in concentration camp and equally poor.

  To give Mrs Bensky a break, Mr Bensky took Lina and Lola out on Saturday afternoons. When the girls were smaller they would go to the zoo. Mr Bensky enjoyed those afternoons. He would sit in the small park next to the bandstand and read the latest Perry Mason thriller. Lina and Lola would wave to him from the top of the elephant, which walked round and round the track circling the park. Lina and Lola liked to buy ten tickets each. That way they stayed on the elephant for exactly an hour. This suited Mr Bensky. When the hour was up, the three of them walked to the kiosk and bought six Eskimo Pies. Then they strolled around, looking at the animals. When she was older, Lola looked back on those afternoons as the nicest part of her childhood.

  If there was a new show on at the Tivoli, Mr Bensky took the girls there on Saturday afternoons. They saw acts from all over the world. Sexy dancers and all sorts of singers, acrobats and jugglers, exotic striptease artists, a blonde underwater stripper, comedians and performing dogs, magicians and evil-looking hypnotists.

  Hundreds of semi-nude, beautiful showgirls decorated the stage. The showgirls wore high heels and high-cut fishnet tights. On their heads they balanced spectacular soaring head-dresses made from hundreds of brightly coloured feathers and sequins. By law the showgirls had to stand perfectly still. They were not allowed to move at all. From their front-row seats, Mr Bensky and the girls had a very good view.

  The comedians were Mr Bensky’s
favourites. He laughed at their jokes so heartily that other people in the theatre stood up to see who was laughing like that. Sometimes he laughed so hard that his shirt buttons popped and tears ran down his face. Sometimes Lola worried that he would burst with happiness. At interval they always shared a packet of Jaffas, a packet of Fantales and a packet of Columbines.

  Mr Bensky applauded each act vigorously and was the first to leap onto the stage if a juggler, hypnotist, comedian or magician asked for volunteers from the audience.

  Now, Mrs Bensky was starting to feel edgy. A faint headache hovered at the back of her head. Mr Bensky should have been home by now. She’d told him that the photographer was due at two o’clock.

  She parted the plush gold velvet curtains in the family room. Outside it was sunny. Mrs Bensky was pleased. Later on she could lie out on the grass for half an hour or so.

  Mrs Bensky had a deep golden tan all year round. She saw her suntan as public evidence of her energy, vitality and youthful spirit.

  When Mrs Bensky lay in the sun, she could think about her daughters without anxiety. In the sun she could forget about Lola’s weight and not worry about whether Lina would ever find a boyfriend. Sometimes a ray of pleasure crept through Mrs Bensky’s thoughts about her daughters; at least neither of her children had ever had an abortion or experimented with drugs.

  Mrs Bensky liked to sunbathe in solitude. At home this was easy, for Mr Bensky loathed the sun. Even on his summer holidays he spent his time indoors reading Raymond Chandler. Lina had very pale skin, which blistered if she crossed Collins Street in the sun, and Lola was too embarrassed to put her flesh, olive though it was, into a bathing suit.

  There was a loud knock at the front door. ‘Renia, Renia darling, it’s Josl.’ Mrs Bensky switched off the indoor and outdoor burglar alarms and Mr Bensky unlocked the mortice lock and Lockwood deadlock. He was beaming. ‘Darling, I went to Buckleys and I went to Georges and I had no luck. And then I had a very good idea, I went to Yanek at the top of Bourke Street and Yanek had two and a half yards of white Tissus Michel.’

  Mrs Bensky looked at him. ‘Josl, you know I need three yards for a dress.’ Mr Bensky lost his beam.

  Mrs Bensky had prepared Mr Bensky’s lunch: four slices of Pariser sausage, a tomato quartered, two radishes, a spring onion, some lettuce and three Vita-Weat biscuits. On their bed she had laid out Mr Bensky’s new white shirt, a finely striped maroon and gold tie, and Mr Bensky’s best suit, which was grey with cream flecks. Mr Bensky ate and got dressed.

  At exactly two o’clock Michael Beets, the most successful and talented Jewish photographer in Melbourne, arrived with his assistant.

  Every year Michael Beets photographed the Bensky family. Mrs Bensky chose the photograph she liked best and ordered a twenty-by-thirty-inch copy, which she put into an ornate gilt-edged frame and displayed with great pride in the lounge-room.

  ‘Good afternoon, Mrs Bensky. You look wonderful. You’re getting younger every day. It’s true, you look more beautiful every year. It’s a pleasure to see you.’

  ‘Oh, Mr Beets, I look terrible. I’ve got a headache and I’ve had sinus trouble for three weeks. I’ve taken Amoxil and Abbocillin and Moxacin and nothing helps. Look at how my nose is swollen.’

  Lina and Lola arrived separately, at the same time. Mr Bensky kissed Lina hello. Lina had a habit of averting her head when she was kissed, so that the kisser came in contact with a mouthful of hair and the back of her head.

  Lola picked up the book that Lina had bought her parents as a gift. It was inscribed: ‘To the best Mum and Dad in the world.’ Lola felt nauseous with disgust.

  ‘Lola darling,’ her mother was saying. Lola looked up, still feeling sick. ‘Maybe you’d like to put on a little bit of mascara?’ Mrs Bensky trilled.

  ‘No thanks, Mum.’ Lola walked away, smoothing down her dress, which had bat-wing sleeves, was gathered at the yoke and was made out of satiny, black crushed velvet. The dress flowed past Lola’s hips, the part of Lola that Lola tried to hide, against all odds.

  ‘OK, OK, OK, everybody,’ Mr Beets called as he shepherded them into the dining room. The dining room was low-ceilinged and rectangular. The bottom panels of the windows, which overlooked the garden, were made of opaque blue glass, a style that was fashionable in Caulfield and East St Kilda in the 1960s. Lola called it Jewish-Chinese architecture.

  The Bensky family stood in a row. Mr Bensky patted a block of Small’s Energy chocolate in his pocket. Lina blinked rapidly, her face twisted with tension. Lola arranged herself so that she stood between but slightly behind Mr and Mrs Bensky, a position that she hoped would cut her hips down a bit. Mrs Bensky glowed. Her eyes were luminous. A soft expression of serenity lit her face. Everything was ready. One, two, three, click. They smiled for the camera.

  What Do You Know About Friends?

  In Renia Bensky’s world, people were pigs. ‘Don’t be a greedy pig,’ she would say when Lola reached for another potato. Renia’s neighbour, Mrs Spratt, was ‘a dirty pig’. Her favourite grandchild was ‘a little piggy’, her cousin Adek ‘a big pig’.

  Josl chauffeured his two daughters around every Saturday morning. To the city, to the dressmaker, to the hairdresser. On the way home he liked to stop and buy himself a double chocolate gelato. ‘What a pig!’ Renia said when they arrived home.

  When Renia talked about Josl’s father, who had died in the ghetto, she said, ‘such a pig’. Sometimes she would say a bit more, although the past, their lives before they came to Australia, was definitely out of bounds, their own private territory. Sometimes a small sliver of detail would slip out. ‘Such a pig he was. In the ghetto he cried because he was so hungry. Children were dead in the streets and he was crying because he was hungry.’

  Until she was twenty Lola had never seen a pig. When she saw her first pigs, she was fascinated by how unselfconscious they were. They snorted their way through their food, big and pink and bulky. They weren’t holding their stomachs flat or sucking in their cheeks. They weren’t expecting judgements. They seemed quite happy to be pigs. If people weren’t pigs, then they were idiots. Even when she was quite small Lola knew that Mrs Bensky was an authority on pigs and idiots. ‘Such an idiot!’ Mrs Bensky would shout. ‘Such an idiot is that Mrs Berman. An idiot, an i-d-i-o-t. She thinks she speaks a perfect English. In the butcher I heard her say, “Cut me in half please.” Such a perfect English!’

  Mrs Berman had been Mrs Bensky’s friend. Until Mrs Berman left Mr Berman and Mrs Bensky could no longer be friends with her, the two women had baked cakes in Mrs Bensky’s kitchen on Saturday afternoons. Mrs Berman made her honeycake and rugelachs and Mrs Bensky baked her lakech. Working in the kitchen together, they looked like good friends.

  ‘Friends,’ Mrs Bensky said to Lola. ‘What do you know about friends? Friends, pheh! You can trust only your family.’

  And what did Lola know? She had watched the Benskys and their friends, their ‘company’, as they called themselves. The company went to the pictures together every Saturday night and then to supper afterwards. On Sunday evenings they played cards. If there was a good show on, sometimes they went out during the week. They celebrated each other’s birthdays, anniversaries, barmitzvahs, engagements and weddings, and were present at the operations, illnesses and funerals.

  Lola thought that the company were family. She called them Uncle and Aunty and believed that they would always care about her. What did Lola know?

  Mrs Bensky hated Mrs Ganz. She was irritated by the way that Mrs Ganz kept inviting her to fashion parades, card afternoons and charity luncheons. Couldn’t Mrs Ganz see that she was very busy? Every day Mrs Bensky had to wash six sheets, four pillow cases, three eiderdown covers and seven towels. She had to scrub and polish the floors, and vacuum the carpets. And on top of this she had to cook and to wash up. She was not the kind of woman who had time to go to a fashion parade. Why couldn’t Mrs Ganz understand this?

  Mrs Bensky thought that Mrs Ganz had always be
en spoilt. In the ghetto Mrs Ganz’s father had been a Jewish ‘policeman’. Their family had rarely been hungry. In 1943 they were smuggled out of the ghetto and spent the rest of the war hiding in a cellar. Mrs Bensky often chatted to Mrs Pekelman on the phone. She felt that Genia Pekelman had her problems, but above all she had a good heart. Mrs Bensky advised Mrs Pekelman about which clothes suited her best, how to cook a good gulah, where to buy the freshest Murray Perch. She also shared some beauty tips with her, including the fact that if you rinsed your hair with a bit of beer after washing it the waves stayed in much longer. Renia Bensky and Genia Pekelman, both nondrinkers, often trailed an alcoholic air around with them.

  Lola learnt about friendship from listening to the two women on the phone. Last week Mrs Bensky had said in an affectionate tone, ‘Genia darling, I bumped into Yetta Kauffman in the city. Such an ugly face that woman has got. You think you are ugly, Genia darling? Next to Yetta Kauffman you are a big beauty.’

  This may have seemed harsh to an outsider, but Lola knew that it was affectionate and well-intentioned. In this company one of the friendliest and most enthusiastic responses to anything was: ‘What, what, you are crazy or something?’

  Things cooled off between Renia Bensky and Genia Pekelman when Genia took up dancing lessons. She was forty-seven. At thirteen, Genia had been a promising young dancer. She had won a ballet scholarship to study in Paris. She was counting the days to her fourteenth birthday, waiting to leave for Paris, when the Germans arrived in Warsaw.

  Now, Mrs Pekelman was learning Indian dance. She went to dancing classes twice a week. She was taught by Madame Sanrit. Mrs Pekelman wore leotards under her sari and practised at home every afternoon. She loved to dance and danced at every opportunity.

  If a group of women were having a charity luncheon, Mrs Pekelman asked if she could dance at the lunch. When Mrs Pekelman learnt that Mrs Small was taking a group of voluntary Jewish Welfare kitchen helpers on a tour of the Victorian National Gallery, she begged her to bring the group to her home, where she would dance for them.