After the initial resistance was worn down the buyers even began to take her to lunch. Lunch? Fine. Dinner was politely declined … she was tired, it was a difficult life for a woman but also so rewarding … look at the people one met … And the commission checks grew and grew.
Until late one afternoon, after having returned to Mr. Hammerstein’s with her case, she felt his warm breath on her face and his thick arms around her waist.
Well, well … it seemed Mr. Leibowitz wasn’t all wrong. Being a woman did have its disadvantages in a man’s world. Or maybe to some its advantages … she may have come from the shtetl but she knew a woman could make more money on her back than she could with commissions. But not her.
She disengaged herself from Mr. Hammerstein, looked at his flushed face, turned away from his uneven breathing. Grinding out the words she said, “You’re a fool, Mr. Hammerstein. You’re low. Don’t think I’m flattered, and don’t for a minute think I’m afraid. I’m just disgusted and angry. Take a look at the pictures of your grandchildren. I’ll wait outside for my check.” She walked out, slamming the door behind her.
Yes, she was offended by Mr. Hammerstein, but far more, she was angry that her growing success with his line was so short-lived. Yes … she could probably get another line, but then what? There were more Mr. Hammersteins out there … she was sure they came in all different sizes and shapes. So Chavala went back to the pawnshop, but said nothing to Moishe about her real reasons
“But you seemed so happy,” Moishe said as he watched Chavala look through the loupe at a small ring they had bought this morning.
“I was, but you can’t set real money that way … and besides, I like being my own boss.” And not being Miss Available, she added to herself.
“To tell the truth, I’m happy you’re back. I never liked the idea of your shlepping around all that jewelry. A woman has to be more careful than a man—”
“You’re right, Moishe … Listen, it’s almost time to close. Pull down the shade and lock the door.”
Chavala obviously had something on her mind. She never closed the store on time, often stayed open for an hour or two beyond closing time.
Sitting in the back room Chavala said, “You know, Moishe, I’ve been thinking…”
When she started a sentence with that opening, and the faraway look in her eyes, Moishe knew for sure Chavala had something coming … “All right, what have you been thinking?”
“That we now must open up a jewelry store.”
“That’s a very good idea, but it seems to me you once said it took an inventory we still don’t have. Besides, we make a living here—”
“I didn’t give up my husband to make a living … I came here to make a great deal of money. I have my reasons …”
Moishe laughed. “I wouldn’t be unhappy if you made a million dollars, but tell me, what do you plan on using for capital?”
“My brains. Plus take some chances. We both have done that before.” Chavala swallowed hard. “I can get stock—”
“Someone will give it to you on consignment?”
“Who? Don’t be foolish, and I wouldn’t ask Mr. Leibowitz. Besides, the insurance alone would be so high we couldn’t afford it.”
“Well, then?”
Chavala folded her arms across her chest and took a deep breath, exhaled. “I found a …a fence … his last name I don’t know and I don’t care. But I spoke to this … landsman, that’s what he’s called, and after a while he agreed to sell to me …”
Moishe just sat and stared.
Chavala hurried on. “Would you believe it, Moishe, he looks like a tzaddik, although I know better, but still you would be surmised how nice he seems—”
Moishe found his voice and all but yelled, “We could go to jail.”
“I know … and I’m not proud to have to do this … or too proud to do it… but it’s the only way, Moishe—”
“Why is it the only way? Where are you running, who’s chasing you?”
“Time, that’s who. I’m over thirty and we have a family in Palestine, and they need help. I’m not going to tell you if you don’t know what bad times they’re having. Listen to me, Moishe, we could be here for twenty years and in twenty years I’ll be over fifty and then it will be too late. You think I’m going to stand by and see my family starving? Right now I have two children with no future, and Chia has to go to college, and what about you? If you found a girl and wanted to get married, how would you support her? It’s not kosher, and I don’t want to do this, but honestly believe I must—”
“I see, you have it all figured out … well, I don’t want any part of it.”
Chavala sighed. Moishe the firebrand … the lover of his people … the idealistic warrior … That was yesterday … She was sorry she had even told him, she should have gone ahead on her own. “That’s up to you, Moishe. It’s my decision and my risk. I’m going to take it.”
He shook his head, got up and paced the floor. “How did you find this … this tzaddik?”
“You ask enough questions, you find answers. Besides, you don’t really want to hear.”
Moishe stopped pacing and looked at his sister. “You mean you would actually try to take this on by yourself …”
“I didn’t have a policeman with me when I shlepped the jewelry. I could have been robbed. What’s the use of talking, Moishe, I’ve made up my mind. It’s the only way I can see open to me … It wouldn’t be forever, only to get a new start.”
Moishe knew he was out of his mind to say yes, but how could he let Chavala deal with the … the underworld by herself? Finally, not finding any alternative, he said, “All right … I’m against it, but—”
“I’m for it? Of course not, but I’ve got to do it.” She laid out the plan. “You’ll take care of the pawnshop and I’ll run the new store.”
Moishe merely nodded.
That evening when they went to pick up the baby Joshua, Chavala held the child tightly. He was, incredibly, almost a year old, and what a beautiful child. Why not? He still was the image of his father … When he held out his arms to her she wondered if she deserved such a blessing. That he even recognized her made her grateful … in all the months she’d been able to spend not more than a few hours a day, in the early morning and evening and Saturdays. Maybe love was time …
Maybe … but she still had feelings of guilt. She thought back to the children’s house in the Galilee when she frantically picked Chia up and ran back to her cubbyhole and waited for Dovid to come … no child of hers was going to be raised without its parents, she’d told herself. Well, times changed, and sometimes you had to make sacrifices. So what was perfect in this life … ?
This morning she was especially happy it was Saturday. All the businesses closed down on the Sabbath. And if they opened it was only after sundown. No one defied tradition on the lower East Side. So today forget the bookkeeping, they were going to have an outing.
“Chia, Moishe, we’re going to have a day in the park,” she announced as though a great event were going to take place. And for them it was.
Chia was thrilled. She never complained, but she missed the close relationships they’d once had. Since her older sister had become so involved in her affairs there were less and less family meals, fewer and fewer chances to talk over her personal life with Chavala who, after all, was really more a mother than a sister. And she badly missed Reuven, never mind how they’d disagreed when he’d been here.
As for Chavala, she’d almost forgotten how lovely it could be to spend a whole day with the family. Dressing the baby, she talked to herself, but at him … “My darling little Joshua, you don’t think for a moment that I don’t love you. I hope not God knows … not to mention some others … I’m not the best mother in the world, but if loving you counts … well, you can count on me. Listen, I’m trying to do the best I can. What can I do? I know I’m missing a lot, so are you, but you have a crazy mother. So while you’re still this young, maybe it won’t ma
tter all that much? What do you think, Joshua?” She smiled at him. He cooed and laughed back. Almost as though he understood.
It was 1922. Chavala found a store she could barely afford on the fringes of Harlem. A start. She bought the least expensive showcases she could find, which she and Chia painted green. She padded the inside of the cases with green felt. When the store was scrubbed clean and refurbished, she wasn’t too unhappy. Park Avenue it wasn’t, but better than the pawnshop it certainly was.
Through Mr. Leibowitz, she found an old jeweler who removed diamonds from their mountings, then melted down the metal. One day, Chavala told herself when she went to pick up her merchandise, she would have a place like his. On Fifth or Park Avenue … Why not? If one had a dream, at least make it a big one.
But she set aside the dreams for another time. Soon her low prices attracted the people … she tried not to look too closely at them … who came by their money she didn’t want to know how. They paid cash, no receipts and no returns. If some Jim Dandy wanted a five-carat stickpin, Chavala spoke to the landsman, and one way or another he made it possible for her to satisfy her customer. The ones she felt the most antagonism toward were the Jewish pimps, prostitutes and gangsters. What the goyim did, she didn’t care so much, but her own … In spite of the money she made from them, Chavala wished they would take their business elsewhere. Their money seemed especially tainted, and she felt it tainted her. At other times she almost welcomed their business as a kind of poetic justice, instructing herself that she was a fine one to put on holier-than-thou airs. Oh yes, she had her good reasons, but maybe they did too … Once she woke up in the middle of the night, startled out of a bad dream. A very bad dream. What would happen if she were found out? What kind of mother was she? What kind of a person would do what she was doing?
No, at least Chavala did not excuse herself, but on the other hand her needs, the demands on her, were becoming more urgent. In June Chia was graduating from high school, and they couldn’t live where they were any longer … what kind of friends would she be able to make? To bring home? Matters in Palestine were more and more pressing … she was sending Raizel more money, more clothing. Her contributions were important, weren’t they? So she went on …
Now Joshua was two. And Chia was about to be a graduate.
On graduation day Moishe and Chavala watched with enormous pride as Chia received her diploma. If there was a time when maybe she was entitled to cry a little, it was now. She had kept her promise, part of her plan had come true … For now, at least, anything she had done against … well, set it aside. For now … she was back in the little hovel south of Odessa and she stepped outside herself for a moment, seeing the sixteen-year-old Chavala cutting the cord, then rushing to the kitchen and dunking the newborn first in warm water, then cold, until she shocked the child into life. I kept my promise, mama. Your little Chia had it better than you and I. You’re sitting here, mama, alongside me…
She was brought out of her reverie when she saw Chia standing in front of her, dressed in the lovely white organdy dress. She had grown into such a fine and beautiful young woman … Yes, whatever she had done, whatever she would have to do was worth it when Chia said, “Oh, Chavala, I don’t know how to thank you.”
“Thank you, Chia, for being you. I wonder how many mothers can say that? Now, darling, I have a little treat for you, today we’re going to celebrate.”
Chavala wasn’t, for a change, going to worry about the cost. Not today. Chia was going to have a memory she could always look back on with special pleasure.
They had lunch at the Plaza Hotel. A grand and imposing place none of them had ever been to. How did Chavala even know about such a place? Moishe asked her.
Simple. When she’d sold to the jewelers, many was the time she had walked into the lobby and looked. And looked. It didn’t cost to look, and besides, a person should know about things. The world didn’t begin and end with Ludlow Street. She even had the chutzpah to have a cup of coffee once at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel. Came in the Park Avenue entrance too, not the Lexington entrance, if you please. Moishe was indeed impressed.
As they sat over their coffee, Chavala looked at her sister and brother. Strange, she thought, Chia had never seemed interested in boys, hadn’t even had a date, so far as she knew. Why did that suddenly come to her as such a surprise? The business consumed her so, she hadn’t even thought much about anything else. Maybe just as well, with the bochers on Delancey Street … When Chia went to college she would meet a nice young man … She looked at Moishe. By now he should already have found a girl. He was over thirty. If not now, when?
“Moishe, you should go to some of the dances at the … Jewish Center?”
Moishe looked at her. “Did you ever take a look at the girls who go to them? Yentas … do me a favor, please don’t worry about my love life.”
“Well, I’m not worried … I just feel that you should think about settling down?”
“I will, when the right time and the right girl come along.”
Chavala gave it up for now. When the three of them walked into the June day she said, “Well, I think I have a surprise for you … we’re moving… Moishe, get a cab.”
Getting into the cab, Chavala gave the driver the address.
“794 Riverside Drive.”
Moishe had to know, “Where are we going?”
“You’ll find out. Just enjoy the scenery and be grateful you have a day off. Remember I gave you a vacation. You should thank Chia, she’s the only one with an education.”
Chia laughed. “With your brains, Chavala, you don’t need an education.”
Chavala shook her head. “Everyone needs an education. There’s a big difference between being a little clever and having knowledge. If I had knowledge I wouldn’t need to be so clever.”
“You’re doing all right without the knowledge,” Moishe said, and for a moment Chavala wasn’t sure if he was being sarcastic or not…
Soon the cab came to the curb, and Chavala forgot all her questions, put aside her uncertainties about herself.
“This is where we’re moving?” Moishe asked, looking up at the lovely building.
“This is it.”
“I can’t believe it.”
“Believe it. Come,” Chavala said, as she led them to the elevator.
On the seventh floor she took out the keys from her purse and unlocked the door to the apartment. Even her heart seemed to miss a beat when she saw it again today.
The foyer separating the dining room from the living room was large and square. Down the hall were three bedrooms and two baths. The kitchen was modern with a new refrigerator and a four-burner gas stove. The sink was porcelain and the drainboard yellow tile. It was beyond words. The three of them stood in the center of the living room and looked out to the bridge and the spectacular view beyond.
“Who would ever have imagined that New York was so beautiful,” Moishe said.
Any city could be beautiful, thought Chavala, if one looked out of the right window. And it took money. Well, Chia was going to Hunter College, and she needed a home where she could bring her friends …
“Well, Chia, what do you think?”
“I love it! Oh, Chavala, I can’t believe we’re going to live here—”
“And why not? Nothing is too good for the Rabinskys. Formerly of Odessa and Palestine.”
Moishe shook his head. Chavala had indeed performed miracles. At this moment, he even forgot what it had taken to perform such miracles.
To Chavala it was no miracle. It was, though, some satisfaction. She’d set her goals, she’d achieved some of them … Dvora had shoes and money for food. Raizel could buy a new sheitel and Lazarus could now go to shul with no outside pressures to interfere with his devotions. One prayer he no longer had to beg God for was to please help him keep a roof over his head and help to feed his increasing family, which had now grown to five children.
“Well,” she said, “let’s go see the furniture.
I hope you approve.”
At Axelrod’s on Third Avenue she had carefully selected a peach-colored brocaded chesterfield with two matching armchairs, occasional tables and lamps, a French-type bedroom set. The dining room furniture was the best Grand Rapids could make. If she was going to spend, it was going to be for good things. A few dollars more or less, she’d learned, didn’t make a person richer or poorer. From scrimping and saving on the food money a person did not get rich. You made money by hard work, invested it with care. That was how it was done. Cheap people, Chavala didn’t like them. To know how and when and for what to spend was what counted.
“So, Chia, you pick out the set you want for your room, and you too, Moishe.”
A week later they moved into the apartment. Joshua would sleep in one twin bed, Chavala the other. But the first night Joshua slept with her. Not so much for him but for her … she needed to hold him. He was two very much going on three, and she was missing precious time with him … He’d become so attached to Mrs. Zuckerman he cried when Chavala hired an Irish girl to take care of him during the day. At Mrs. Zuckerman’s it had become like family….
September was a month of joy, and tears. Chia enrolled in Hunter College, and Chavala received a letter that very Friday that on his way to the Wailing Wall, Lazarus had been killed when a bomb exploded just outside the Jaffa gate.
Chavala immediately closed the store and went to see Moishe at the pawnshop.
No Time for Tears Page 34