The Brothers Ashkenazi

by I. J. Singer

  And there was nothing he could do about it. He knew how bullheaded his father could be, and he knew that he would get nowhere with him. Still, he kept his eyes and ears open.

  At every opportunity he questioned everyone close to his father’s affairs. His sisters, who still lived at their father’s home with their husbands and who had little to do with their time, were eager to tell Simha Meir about every visitor to the house, every conversation held there. They mentioned Huntze’s recent visit to their father as if this were just another bit of insignificant gossip. Simha Meir perked up immediately.

  “Huntze?” he repeated. “Huntze personally came to ask Father’s advice?”

  He shut his mind to the rest of their chatter, seized upon the one significant fact, and turned it over in his head. He couldn’t have cared less how much the barony would cost the firm. He also knew how devoted Huntze was to his father, even though others offered fortunes to replace him as his sales representative. But Huntze was old, and his days were numbered. It would be foolish to stake one’s future on the whims of an old man who was liable to go at any time, leaving heirs with modern, progressive ideas. Simha Meir knew that it made more sense to hitch one’s wagon to those to whom the future belonged. His father failed to grasp this. He tied his destiny to that of an old dodderer whose own end was near. He didn’t even bother to shine up to the heirs but did everything possible to antagonize them. Just now, for instance, he had advised Huntze against the barony that the sons wanted so desperately.

  Simha Meir chortled to himself. No, his father wouldn’t fit into the New Lodz. So long as Old Man Huntze lived, he would hang on, but Huntze couldn’t live forever. And his heirs would have nothing to do with such an old-fashioned representative and would replace him with a more modern, more worldly individual. There would be thousands of applicants for the job. But it would be a great folly to allow a stranger to fall into the ready-made gravy pot which rightfully belonged to the Ashkenazi family. Had his father understood this, he would have personally invited him, Simha Meir, into the business and groomed him for the position since he, the father, was already a man along in years himself. He had no need to work so hard. He no longer had the strength or the aptitude for this. But his father was obstinate, and he did everything possible to keep his son out of the business. Therefore, it fell upon him, Simha Meir, to seek some way to keep the job that was rightfully his from going to a stranger. True, this wasn’t possible now, but one had to plan ahead. It would be politic to cultivate the heirs, the Huntze brothers, and thus lay a foundation for later.

  Simha Meir racked his brain for some way to approach the brothers, to become their confidential agent just as his father was to their father. But this wasn’t easy. They were seldom home. They had nothing to do with the business. And what could possibly draw them to a young Hasid whom they had seen around the plant but who, to them, looked like the hundreds of other Jews that congregated there?

  Maybe he, Simha Meir, could do something to help them get the barony they wanted so desperately, although only God knew why they did. For several nights he lay awake, his brain churning. He actually talked to himself, and didn’t even notice, in his self-absorption, when Dinele awoke and watched him. His gray, darting eyes saw nothing but the warehouses jammed with goods, customers by the droves, coffers full of money, and, more than anything, the red-brick walls of factories abuzz with work and chimneys looming—a forest of chimneys belching smoke into the skies.…

  The next morning he sat down at the table, and choosing with care German words he still recalled from the correspondence primers, he composed a letter to the Huntze brothers in which he proposed to lend them cash without limit for as extended a period of time as they elected and at a rate of interest they themselves determined.

  Employing the fanciest German script appended with all kinds of spirals and curlicues, he wrote the letter again and again, then signed the final version with his name and with that of his father, the sales representative of the Huntze firm.

  The letter hadn’t come easy to Simha Meir. For all its handsome and generous offer, he had to make it patently clear to the thickheaded gentiles that they would be doing him a favor by accepting since he could think of no safer place to invest his money than with the esteemed gentlemen. He might have found someone to help him with the grammar and phrasing, but he was loath to let anyone else in on such a confidential matter. In cards and in business it was better not to have anyone looking over your shoulder.

  For the next twenty-four hours he waited in a state of fevered anticipation for a reply from the palace. His impatience and anxiety made him squirm. He felt hemmed in inside the factory, in the small cafés, at home. He kept glancing at the gold watch that had been his wedding present, and every ring of the doorbell brought him to his feet.

  Finally, when Melchior came in his forest green hunting costume to deliver a brief note to him, he grew so rattled that he tipped the huge German a whole ruble without even knowing the contents of the letter.

  It contained a few brief words. It lacked any salutation and preamble, and curtly, as if it were a telegram, it bade the recipient present himself the following day at the palace at four. There was no signature, only a scrawled initial.

  Simha Meir read and reread the note. Having digested it to his satisfaction, he picked up a mirror and looked at his beard with distaste. At first he tried to get it to lie flat against the collar so that it appeared less blatant and less Jewish. Failing this, he picked up a scissors and committed his first outright desecration against Jewish custom. The first snip alarmed him, and his hand trembled as if he were cutting into his flesh. But when no lightning came to strike him down, he went on. In order to get it just so, he had to keep on snipping. Next, he lopped off the earlocks until no trace remained of them.

  He polished his boots carefully and pulled out his trouser legs, which had been tucked inside, allowing them to hang outside so that it looked as if he were wearing European oxfords, not boots. He tugged at his trousers to press the long-established wrinkles out of them and to form a crease.

  Next, he went unobserved to a side street, stole into a haberdashery, and bought a stiff collar and a black tie that resembled a swallow in flight. It took plenty of effort before he managed to affix the collar and tie, which seemed reluctant to adapt to his Hasidic neck. He drew on his shortest swallowtail gabardine, which he seldom wore since it was too small for him. Under it he had donned a red velvet vest. He let the heavy gold watch chain dangle across his belly, dropped a silver cigar case into his pocket, and picked up a slim black walking stick with a silver knob.

  He hailed a closed droshky to avoid being spotted and ordered himself driven to the Huntze palace. “Keep the canopy up!” he told the driver when the man tried to lower it.

  Lodz seethed in the late-afternoon rush. People jostled each other on the sidewalks. Teamsters spewed deadly oaths and swung whips, trying to push through the dense traffic. Keening women shuffled in a funeral cortege. But Simha Meir saw and heard nothing.

  “If you get me there in a hurry, there’s a nice tip in it for you,” he said, prodding the driver’s blue-clad shoulder with his cane. “Make it snappy!”

  Twenty-Three

  THE YOUNG HUNTZES weren’t yet presentable when Simha Meir called at the palace door precisely on the dot of four.

  “Wait here!” the lackey ordered, rather than asked, looking down his nose at the stripling, who long before had snatched off his hat and now stood gazing about with darting eyes.

  They had been out all night carousing, the young Huntzes, and they were sleepy now, queasy and hung-over. Their heads felt light, but nowhere as light as their wallets after the hours of heavy gambling.

  Things couldn’t have gone worse for them. It started with the fiasco at the Renaissance.

  For the past few weeks the cabaret Renaissance had been featuring a Hungarian dancer who had taken Lodz by storm. Night after night the place filled with merchants, manufacturers, off
icers, government officials, plant superintendents, traveling salesmen, even ordinary clerks, whooping and whistling each time she stepped out on the floor.

  From her very first night she was assailed with presents, bouquets, and invitations from Lodz playboys, vying to outdo one another. She accepted the gifts and flowers, but not the propositions. She was even more adamant about barring the young rakes and old roués from her tiny dressing room. An elderly lady with eyes and diamonds flashing kept stern watch at the door and politely but firmly kept everyone out.

  In a hodgepodge of Hungarian, German, and Russian she demanded that her daughter’s privacy be respected. “No, no, it’s out of the question, gentlemen!” she insisted, hands held out to block the onslaught. “My daughter is resting, and no one can go in.”

  If some of the more rash among them still refused to back off, she summoned a swarthy, sickly young man who was always dressed as if on his way to a wedding. Bowing low and speaking in the same polyglot jargon as she, he said in a low but sinister tone, “Messieurs, my wife begs your indulgence, but she is exhausted and soon she must do another show. Please.…”

  Something about his presence made the men retreat, but the momentary frustration served only to ignite their lust and competitive spirit. Lodz wasn’t used to such behavior. Lodz knew that with money you could buy anything.

  Once the small fish had failed with their puny offerings, the sharks of Lodz moved in. These were sons of the wealthiest industrialists, to whom diamonds and pearls were like trash.

  The dancer kept their gems, but the attached calling cards ended up in the wastebasket. Following her final performance of the night, she dressed very modestly and headed straight for her hotel on Piotrkow Street, the old lady on one arm, the sickly young man on the other.

  “Nothing doing.… Not a chance in the world,” the cabaret owner told the ardent suitors when they tried to slip him a bribe to gain some advantage with the dancer. “She doesn’t take a step without her mother and husband. There isn’t a thing I wouldn’t do for my guests, but this is out of the question.”

  “I can’t help you, gentlemen, much as I’d like to,” the hotel manager in the green frock coat reiterated, spreading his hands in tragic dismay. “They’ve given strict orders not to be disturbed. The moment they come in, they retire. I must say, for actors, they live very, very simply.”

  Lodz was a town without secrets. Everyone knew down to the last kopeck the price of every gift offered the dancer and the exact measure of her rebuff. In their rage and frustration, the competitors turned on each other. Men neglected their homes and businesses to spend night after night at the Renaissance, indulging their fantasies and planning new stratagems to break down the dancer’s resistance.

  “A saint,” the Germans raved. “A nun.…”

  “A rebbetzin,” the Jews half jested.

  Inevitably legends sprang up about the young woman. The gentiles claimed she was a Hungarian countess who had eloped with the sickly young man after her father, the count, had renounced him. The old lady was really the young man’s mother, who called her daughter-in-law “daughter” to allay suspicions.

  The Jews came up with another tale. The girl was a Galician rabbi’s daughter who had fled home on account of her Hungarian lover.

  Others had a more cynical explanation. This was merely a gang of con artists setting up the suckers to fleece them out of their last ruble.

  Its equanimity shattered, its assurance threatened, Lodz smoldered. Its women felt insulted and betrayed. They couldn’t go to the cabaret—respectable women didn’t even show their faces in cafés—so they strolled the sidewalks of Piotrkow Street for hours, hoping for a glimpse of the source of the men’s infatuation.

  Ultimately news of the dancer reached the young Huntzes at the palace. It was brought there by the Swiss chemist in their father’s plant, who revealed that the girl had taken him into her confidence since he spoke French and she wanted to practice the language.

  When they heard of the sensation created by the lady and of her intransigence, the Huntzes’ florid faces turned even more scarlet. “What crap! No wonder she won’t give in. Sending boys to do a man’s job.…”

  They hadn’t the slightest intention of pitting themselves against the young bloods of Lodz—it was beneath them to rub shoulders with tradesmen, drummers, and junior clerks. They took over the cabaret for the night and gave strict orders that no one be admitted except a select group of invited guests, including some high-ranking Russian officers, several picked industrialists’ sons and members of the local Polish gentry, and the French-speaking chemist.

  Each Huntze, unbeknownst to his brothers, arranged for a handsome gift of expensive jewelry and an intimate supper in a private dining room.

  It started out as a gay, festive evening. The owner personally stationed himself at the front door and kept everyone out. Handsomely attired waiters served the fanciest dishes and finest wines. The dancer was at her most seductive. She writhed like a sinuous snake, cast alluring glances, teased and flirted with every curve of her shapely body.

  She even made an exception this time and joined the brothers for a glass of wine at their table. But everything suddenly turned very ugly for the young Huntzes.

  Like true Germans who abjure diplomacy for direct action, they began to discuss in coarsest terms how they would succeed where all Lodz had failed.

  “A hundred rubles for the first kiss,” a Huntze offered.

  “Two hundred!” bid a second.

  “Three hundred!” shouted a third.

  The dancer smiled. Her frail, dapper husband sat beside her, brooding silently.

  “Look here, little one,” a Huntze said, flashing a diamond ring. “All you got to do to earn this is be a nice little girl.…”

  “I got you beat!” his brother said, shouldering him aside to display an emerald nestling against a black velvet background.

  “That’s all junk next to mine!” the third Huntze said, and without even awaiting a response, he slipped a string of pearls around the dancer’s neck, letting his hairy paw dangle across her bosom as he did so.

  The sickly young man stood up. “Monsieur, mind your manners.”

  “And a hundred rubles thrown in!” the inflamed German added.

  “Monsieur, I demand an apology this instant!” the young man said with unblinking eyes.

  “If that’s not enough, make it two hundred—five hundred!” And he pawed the woman with a drunken leer.

  The young man seemed to stretch to twice his height as he slapped the smirking German so hard the glasses on the table toppled.

  The Huntze brothers sat stunned. No one had ever dared raise a hand to them. And now this—a cabaret floozy’s pimp?

  A moment or so later they leaped to their feet to stamp the fellow into the ground, but he was already gone, along with the two women.

  First, the affronted Huntze smashed every glass on the table. Next, he shattered the biggest mirror in the place with a bottle. Finally, he doused the proprietor’s dazzling shirtfront with the nearest glass of wine. He then flung a roll of bills at his feet and snarled, “You’ll never catch me in this cathouse again!”

  To break the mood, the officers invited the brothers to walk them to their camp on the outskirts of town. Once there, they drank heavily for a time, then broke out the cards.

  “Unlucky at love, lucky at cards,” the officers joked.

  The Huntzes recklessly bet thousands after thousands, but they couldn’t seem to win a pot.

  Incensed, besotted, they didn’t get home until dawn. Still wearing their tails and starched linen, they dropped where they stood and fell asleep right there on the floor. They first awakened late in the afternoon—stiff, crabby, covered with vomit. They beat, cursed, and abused the servants who tried to undress them. They recalled the slap and brooded over the fact that by now all Lodz was enjoying their humiliation. Besides, they had lost many thousands of rubles in markers that would have to be redeemed i
n cash since the officers were to be transferred, and not to pay a gambling debt promptly was for gentlemen unthinkable. Getting the funds together, however, was another matter altogether. Their father wasn’t one to let go of money so easily. Besides, they had been feuding with him for months already as a result of his obstinate refusal to lay out even a pfennig for the barony they so eagerly yearned for.

  It was at this time that Simha Meir showed up at the palace—flushed, awed by all the opulence around him, anxious, yet full of confidence in his own future and that of Lodz.

  When the spectacularly liveried servant first informed them about the little Jew waiting on the front stairs, the Huntzes couldn’t even recall making an appointment for this hour. “Jew? What Jew? Throw the swine the hell out!” they roared.

  But the man, whom Simha Meir had had the foresight to bribe, gently reminded his masters that this was the same Jew they, the young gentlemen, had personally invited. Only then did the Huntzes recall the letter, and they ordered that the Jew be brought to them.

  Simha Meir followed the lackey gingerly through room after room, gazing nervously at the huge wolfhound which trotted behind him, all the while sniffing with obvious mistrust at a gabardine which, although cut down, still wasn’t short enough for him.

  “Good day, esteemed gentlemen,” Simha Meir said, bowing low to the three naked individuals who received him in the bathroom, where they were trying to sober up by having the servants pour cold water over their heads.

  No one responded to his greeting.

  Simha Meir gazed with apprehension and embarrassment at the gross, bloated bodies of the three gentiles, who apparently lacked all shame, and he shifted the brim of his hat between his fingers. He didn’t know what one did about hats in such company. Finally, the brothers stood up and let the servants wrap them in large bath towels, glaring all the time at the youth in the gabardine.