Sunday the Rabbi Stayed Home

by Harry Kemelman

  No one said anything, but Paff seemed not in the least fazed by their silence, which made his deep rumble sound all the more booming. “All of us, we’ve all kicked in with big hunks of dough to the temple. Am I, are we going to let a bunch of Johnny-come-latelies push us around and tell us they’re taking over and we should go peddle our papers someplace else?”

  “You mean you want to start a new temple, here on the site of this old ark?” said Edelstein, finally managing to put what they all felt into words.

  “I mean I want to use this old ark, as you put it, for the new temple. She’s a hundred and fifty years old, but she’s sound, because that’s how they used to build in those days. Of course, it will cost some money to fix up–”

  “Some money?” said Arons. “It’ll cost a fortune.”

  “So what? I made my money too late to change my habits. My Laura is after me I should have my suits made to order. ‘You’ve got it now; spend it.’ But I can’t. I can’t get interested enough in clothes to bother. When I play poker, I play penny ante, and I notice that I get as much fun out of winning ninety cents as I would if it were ninety dollars. And Irving is just as sore at losing thirty-two cents.”

  “Thirty-seven cents.”

  “Right! Thirty-seven cents. See what I mean? None of us would ever think of gambling more than he could afford to lose, so it doesn’t make any difference if it’s pennies or dollars; we get the same kind of kick out of it. I used to trade my car every three or four years; now I trade every couple of years. Each time I come in to trade, Al Becker tries to get me to switch to a Lincoln. ‘A man like you,’ he says, ‘should drive a big car.’ What am I? A kid? A college boy? I got to ride around showing off in a big car to impress some dizzy little broad? For me, a car is just to get from one place to another, and I’m used to a small car. But the temple–that’s something else. I helped build it. Jake Wasserman started it, but I was right there behind him plunking down hard cash when it was needed. So now when Gorfinkle and his boys steal the place out from under our noses, do we just sit quiet and keep handing over money to them so they can spend it the way they like? What are we, a bunch of lousy Arabs we should steal away in our tents? I say, let’s give them a fight; let’s give them some competition.”

  “But the money–”

  “So what? If I’m not going to use my money for things I don’t care about, and I’m not going to use it for things I do care about, what am I going to use it for?”

  “Just what do you have in mind?” asked Edelstein.

  “They’re asking eighty thousand–”

  “Eighty thousand? For an old ark?”

  “Shore front, Irv, shore front. And there’s a nice piece of land across the street that’s part of the deal. That would make a nice parking lot. Believe me, it’s a good investment even for a businessman.”

  “You mean you want us to buy it outright, just like that, with our own money?”

  “Us and a few others I got in mind. We form a corporation and buy the place. Then we sell it to the new temple organization–at cost–and take back notes for our money. In the meantime it’s a tax deduction. When the temple organization raises the money, they pay us off, and not only are we in the clear, but we’ve done a fine thing.” He lowered his voice confidentially. “I’ll tell you, I was thinking of it originally as a business deal.”

  “You mean you were planning to put up another bowling alley here?”

  “You bet. But not just a bowling alley. I was going to combine it with a restaurant, maybe a dine and dance place, maybe billiards instead of bowling–it’s getting big these days. And then while we were talking last night, I got to thinking what happened the day before, Friday–”

  “You mean Ted’s speech?”

  “Believe me, that was just the climax. All day, from one town to another I got nothing but grief. You know, one of those days. So when we were talking last night, I thought to myself, What do I need another business enterprise for? At my age? Then I began thinking about this place as a temple. Lots of temples nowadays are converted homes–and a lot of them not half so fancy as this, let me tell you. We could set in some beams and pull out most of the interior walls on the first floor. That could be the sanctuary, and it would seat a couple of hundred people easy. We’d have to put in a new heating system and maybe the plumbing. But that’s all. Structurally, it’s sound. And then all the rooms on the second floor and the third floor could be used for a school.”

  “So you’d have an old ramshackle place,” said Kallen, “with a bunch of little bedrooms you’re going to try to make into classrooms and a sanctuary, which, no matter how you arrange it, will still look like a dining room and living room knocked together. Like that place in Salem that started with fifty members, and they’ve still got about fifty members. For the last ten years now they’ve been trying to raise money to build, and they still haven’t been able to.”

  “That’s right, Irv baby, but there’s a difference. Ours would be a shore front property.”

  “So?”

  “Let me show you.” He led them down the path to the beach, talking all the while.

  “So what do people join a temple for? Some, because maybe they want to be big shots, but the great majority, they don’t want to be members of the board of directors. They know it costs money, that the members of the board are always being hit. Most of them just want a place to go for the High Holidays and a place where they can send their kids to a school. But once you get started, that isn’t what keeps a temple going. The High Holidays are only three days in the year. And daily prayers–there isn’t a temple in the entire area that can guarantee ten men for a minyan every single day of the year. As for Friday night services, how many are we drawing now? Fifty? Seventy-five? Now for all those things, our place would be big enough and more than big enough.”

  He stopped abruptly to let them fully take in the water view. “The thing that really pulls in the members are the facilities for the Bar Mitzvahs and the weddings–the parties, in other words. Now you just think of the vestry in our temple, which is all we have for parties. Compare that with what we can offer here in Hillson House.” He led them to the sea wall. “Think of it during the summer when most weddings take place. Think of a patio out in front here with a view of the beach. Now you’re going to have a wedding, and you’re going to spend anywhere from three to ten thousand dollars, and your wife and daughter are determined that things are going to be just right. You may not care–You’re just the guy that foots the bills. But they care. They take a look at the vestry in the basement in the present temple, and then they come down to us. We show them they can have their wedding in a beautiful old mansion facing the ocean, and if the weather is warm, they can hold it outside, out of doors. You know, as a matter of fact, that’s the Orthodox way to have a wedding, outdoors under the stars. Which would get the nod, the old temple or our place? You can bet that they would come to us. And we could afford to be exclusive. We wouldn’t take just anybody. They’d have to petition for membership, and we wouldn’t act on them right away. And if you don’t think that would get them …”

  “And what if the same thing happens again, Meyer?” asked Dr. Edelstein. “What if after a while the new members begin to outnumber us and try to take over?”

  “I’ve thought of that,” said Paff. “And I figure we can prevent it easy enough. We limit the number of members on the board, and then we write into the constitution that the founding members are permanent members. No sweat, believe me. And I’ll tell you something else: I don’t care if we don’t pull so many the first couple of years. I’m a little sick of these shoe clerks and insurance agents and commission salesmen we got running things. That Gorfinkle crowd, they’re a bunch of small-time guys, and I’d just as soon have the temple made up of our kind of people, who you run an affair you don’t have to take them by the throat to squeeze the price of a couple of tickets out of them.”

  “When can we take a look at the place inside?” as
ked Kallen, and Paff knew he had sold them.

  “Now you’re talking,” he said jovially. “Did you see that coach house in the front? That’s part of the property. There’s a son of a bitch of an old Yankee living there who is like a kind of caretaker. He’s got a key.” He led the way to the coach house door and rang the bell. “I’ve got ideas for this place, too,” Paff went on. “How about this for a bride’s dressing room? Maybe connected with the main building by a kind of covered walk. Or maybe better, extra classrooms for the school? Or even a clubhouse with ping pong tables and some gym stuff for the kids?”

  “I guess he isn’t in,” said Arons after they had waited for several minutes.

  “Tell you what,” said Paff, “I’ll get the key from the broker, and we can meet here tomorrow night. How about half past eight?”

  “Okay with me.”

  “Suits me.”

  “Okay by me, too,” said Arons. “But look, Meyer, you had this idea last night, right?”

  “Right.”

  “So tell me, why were you so anxious we shouldn’t say anything at the meeting this morning. Seems to me that if we had put up a fight, we would’ve got a lot of guys–”

  Paff shook his head decisively. “You’ve got it wrong, Kerm. Years ago there was a little grocery store in Chelsea, where my mother, may she rest in peace, used to trade. It was run by two brothers, Moe and Abe Berg. Then they had a fight, and Abe moved out and started another store of his own down the street. But even though the new store was a couple of blocks nearer our house, my mother went right on trading with Moe. And carrying bundles that couple of blocks meant something. When my father, may he rest in peace, asked her why didn’t she trade at the new store, she said, ‘How can I? Everybody will think I’m going there because I think Moe was wrong and Abe was right. And I feel that Moe was right.’ See, this way, we’re not asking people to take sides. We’re not asking them to decide who’s right and who’s wrong, because if they decide against us, they won’t come over to us even if we offer them a better deal for their annual dues.”

  “I’ll go along with that,” said Kallen. “But I think it would help us if we could pull over some of the better respected members of the community. Now if Wasserman and Becker would come over–”

  “Wasserman would never come over,” said the doctor, shaking his head.

  “I think I know what might bring him around,” said Arons suddenly.

  “Yeah?”

  “If we got the rabbi to come over first.”

  They all looked at him and then turned to Paff. “I don’t think the rabbi would come,” said Paff. “And I’m not sure that we want him. He’s pretty independent.”

  “He’s popular with the kids,” said Arons stubbornly. “They like him. And you know how kids are these days. They rule the roost. None of them really want to go to Hebrew school. Who can blame them? So if the rabbi were with us, and the kids liking him, their folks might come over, if only to make sure that the kids go to school.”

  “You’ve got a point,” said Paff. “What bothers me is that I don’t think I could sell him on the idea in the first place.”

  “I’ll bet Wasserman could.”

  “But he wouldn’t,” said Paff. “Remember, you’re trying to use the rabbi to sell Wasserman.”

  “How about Becker?” asked Kallen.

  “I’ll bet he’d go along. And he’d try to sell the rabbi on the idea. Then if we got the rabbi, we could get Wasserman.”

  “Now that’s an idea,” said Paff. “Tell you what, I’ll drop in on Becker tomorrow.” He winked. “It’s getting to be trading time. This time maybe I’ll be interested in a Lincoln.”

  CHAPTER

  FIFTEEN

  Miriam opened the door of the rabbi’s study to say that Mr. Carter had come.

  “Mr. Carter?”

  “Yes, David, the carpenter. He’s come to fix the window cords and put up the screens.”

  Mr. Carter, a big, raw-boned man, stood framed in the doorway, with his heavy kit of carpenter’s tools in one big gnarled hand showing no drag on his broad shoulders, like a businessman carrying a light attaché case. A lock of black hair fell across a slanting forehead; his face had the deep leathery tan of a man who spent much of his time outdoors.

  “I arranged with the missus to come this morning,” he said, “but when I got here, the house was closed and there was nobody home. I don’t have much time today, but I can get started, and I’ll finish up tomorrow or Tuesday.”

  “We were delayed and got back only an hour ago.” The rabbi frowned. “Frankly, Mr. Carter, I don’t like the idea of you working on Sunday, on your Sabbath. It doesn’t look right.”

  “Oh, it’s not my Sabbath, Rabbi, and most of the folks in town know it. So don’t bother about what they might be thinking–”

  “What do you mean? Are you the town atheist?” the rabbi asked with a smile as he led him inside to the windows that needed repair.

  “No, I’m no atheist. I don’t go to church, but I’m no atheist. I keep the Sabbath, but it’s yours I keep, not Sundays.”

  “Seventh-Day Adventist?”

  “No, although I hold with a lot they believe in. I keep the Sabbath because that’s the day the Lord told me to keep.”

  “How do you mean the Lord told you?”

  “Well, it’s hard to explain–I mean just how He told me. You see it wasn’t words, but if you translate it into words, it would be something like, ‘Raphael, after spending six days in making the universe and everything in it, I rested, and that was a good thing. And what is good for Me is good for you, because I made you in My image. I want you to work six days in every week and then rest on the seventh. That’s the right proportion. And one is as important as the other.’”

  The rabbi looked at him doubtfully, wondering if he were pulling his leg, but Carter’s face was open and without guile.

  “And when did this happen?” asked the rabbi carefully, not knowing what sort of person he was dealing with.

  “You mean when did the Lord give me that particular command?”

  “I mean when did He talk to you?”

  The carpenter laughed. “Bless you, Rabbi, it happens right along–real frequent. Sometimes more than at other times. Sometimes almost every day maybe for a week. And then weeks go by, and I don’t hear a thing. The first time I had a lapse like that, I got real worried. I tried to make contact and I prayed. I said, ‘Is there something Your servant has done that offends You?’ And I didn’t get any answer that day, but the very next day, He spoke to me again, and this time He told me not to worry about not hearing from Him–that He wouldn’t be talking to me unless He had something definite He wanted to tell me. And that if I didn’t hear from Him, it meant everything was going along all right. And thinking it over afterward, I had to admit that all that time things had been going along nicely for me–no trouble, no problems, just kind of humdrum, you might say.”

  Carter had already begun, and he continued as he talked. He cleaned all the old putty out of the sash and then scooped a handful of putty from a tin and began to roll it in his hands. He straightened up, and the rabbi was startled to see that although his complexion was swarthy, his eyes were a clear, piercing blue.

  “It was right after I was married. Me and the wife had just got back from our honeymoon to Niagara Falls, and we were visiting around–you know, her folks–aunts, uncles, she showing me off, so to speak–and to my aunts and uncles so’s I could show her off. It was kind of expected in those days. Well, we were visiting her Aunt Dorset and Uncle Abner. That was over by Lynnfield they lived. And there were other people there–cousins and such. And suddenly while we were all sitting in the parlor talking and Aunt Dorset was passing around some fruit, I heard a voice saying, ‘Stand upon thy feet, and I will speak to you.’ So, I got up and heard a voice talking, and it told me the first chapter of Genesis.

  “Now, the point is that in all my life I had never read the Bible, but when I came to that
day at Aunt Dorset’s, I could repeat that first chapter of Genesis almost word for word.”

  “And what did your wife–and the rest of the company say?”

  “They told me that I just stood there and didn’t talk to anyone for some minutes. They thought I was under some kind of spell, maybe like a cataleptic, and I guess there was even some discussion about going for a doctor.”

  “And then?”

  “And then the same thing happened the next day. I was on a job and working when it happened, and I was told another chapter. And I got a chapter or so every single day until I went right through the Pentateuch.”

  “And then?”

  Carter shook his head. “After that I would get messages only when I needed them.” He cut off a length of cord and rain it through the sash weight.

  “How do you mean, when you needed them?”

  He ran the weight up and down a couple of times to see if the pulley was moving freely. “Well, Rabbi, take the time the town voted on fluoridation. I was bothered about that. Myself, I didn’t think it was a good idea. I don’t believe much in chemicals–I mean taking them into your body. But the doctor who was taking care of my wife while she was having our last baby, I got to talking to him about it, and he was all for it. So I had doubts, you might say. Him being a fine man and respected. And then I got a message, and I knew I had been right in the first place.” He swung the window in and then turned around and faced the rabbi. “Look at me, Rabbi. I’m fifty-eight and never been what you might call really sick a day in my life. I’ve got all my teeth, and I don’t wear glasses. That’s because I live right. I don’t eat meat, and I don’t eat candy. I don’t drink tea or coffee or tonic.”

  “Was the injunction against meat one of the instructions you received? That’s not quite the same as the dietary laws in the Pentateuch.”

  “Well, it is and it ain’t, Rabbi. He expects you to use your intelligence.” He snapped the edging of the window in place and screwed it down. “Now it says ‘Thou shalt not kill.’ And it also says that you can’t eat part of a live animal. So that would seem to exclude the eating of flesh. Now I know it also says the kinds of animals you can eat–those with a cloven hoof and that chew the cud, but I figure that’s for the mass of people who haven’t got the strength of their own convictions. It’s a kind of sop–for those who still hankered after the fleshpots of Egypt. Couldn’t get it out of their systems, you might say. So He allowed them to eat certain kinds of animals. But you can see He’d like it better if they didn’t eat any.”