A Kind of Woman

by Helen Burko

  He wrote this after they had left Otvotsk and found, with great difficulty, a temporary apartment in one of the hotels in Warsaw. He hadn’t changed his plans. When they arrived in America, he would take Rachel straight to a hotel, and they would stay there until he was able to introduce her to his parents and friends.

  When the ship passed the famous Statue of Liberty and entered the enormous New York harbor, Jacob couldn’t control his excitement. He pressed the silent Rachel to him and announced, “We’ve arrived! America!”

  “Is there really so much freedom in America?” she asked.

  “Of course!” he replied proudly. “You’ll see that here we don’t have a totalitarian form of government. No dictators rule here, just the wishes of the people. Here a person, as you will see, feels free, and he fights for his liberty and is ready to die for it.”

  Rachel heard how Jacob praised his country but remained silent. A feeling of security had enveloped her as they sailed and had endured all the journey, but she couldn’t free herself from her yearnings. She repressed them in her heart, as she had done before, and waited for the day she could celebrate her true moment of happiness.

  After a few hoots, the ship reached the dock. Some of the passengers were ready to disembark, holding suitcases in their hands, waiting beside the gangway in their desire not to waste a minute.

  Jacob and Rachel didn’t hurry, especially Jacob, who was fearful—of what he didn’t know. He couldn’t begin to understand all the jumble of emotions he was experiencing, and now, when the ship anchored and the loudspeakers announced that the passengers should prepare to disembark, an inexplicable feeling of indifference came over him.

  The ship stopped finally, and the passengers began to climb down the gangway. The city of New York cast a spell with its million flashing neon signs—hinting, promising, winking, and blinding. The city received the incoming crowd with noise and confusion and a medley of colors and lights.

  In a few moments, the pandemonium swept away Jacob’s reflections and Rachel’s recollections. She looked with awe at the skyscrapers, the variety of cars, the crowds of people, the policemen…

  “From now on, Mrs. Barder,” he told her, “we will only speak English. We’re home!”

  He stopped a taxi and, as they got in, called out, “Plaza Hotel!”

  Nothing had changed in the six years he had been away, and yet he had this sensation of being in a new world. How different everything looked to him after the destruction of Europe. Here everything was full of life! He felt as if his chest was expanding and all his veins pulsing. Soon he would take Rachel to one of the most famous hotels and secure the best suite for her. Then he would go to his parents in Brooklyn, and what joy that would be!

  The cab stopped in front of the impressive building, and they entered the hotel. The bellboy took them up to their room and said that he was at their service.

  “God in heaven! How splendid it is! Like magic! I’ve forgotten how marvelous everything can be under normal conditions! After all that has happened to me, I find it difficult to believe I really have the right to be here, that this is real!”

  Jacob smiled. Rachel’s happiness made him feel good.

  “So, my dear, rest up. No more ruins! We’ll start a new life! After we eat dinner, I’ll jump over to my parents. Tonight you’ll have to sleep alone, but after a few days, we’ll start a normal life. I mean we’ll go to nightclubs, cinemas, theaters, bars… I’ll show you the country. There’s a lot to see. My God, isn’t all this a dream? It’s years since I saw a play. Six years that massacre continued… Six years! What a pity. Those were six years of my life!”

  “Yes, yes.” she murmured, busy with her own thoughts.

  “I’ll take care of our finances,” he continued enthusiastically. “As I told you, I have a sum of money in one of the banks and it has probably increased with all the interest. After that I’ll go to my home…my own home and my office. They’re both probably mildewed after all these years and waiting for me to restore them. I’ll arrange it all, and then I’ll introduce you to my family and my friends. I’ll do that gradually, so as not to startle them, but remember, please, what we decided. They must not know that we are already married. I’ll introduce you as the homeless daughter of a refugee I met by chance on the ship.”

  “Okay.” She laughed.

  “I hope you’ll be happy with me.” He hugged her. “And that I’ll find comfort and a good friend in you. Here in America, when you become accustomed to our way of life, you’ll forget your bitter past.”

  At eight o’clock that evening, he took his leave and went to Brooklyn. He hadn’t even phoned his parents that he had arrived. With trembling hands, he pressed the bell, and his heart beat faster as he heard his mother call out, “Just a minute!”

  “Hello, Mom!” he said as she opened the door.

  “Jacob! Jakeile! Oh, my son…my dearest son!”

  Mother and son fell in each other’s arms, and for a few minutes, couldn’t say a word.

  “Where’s Dad?” he asked, but his mother, tears flowing down her cheeks, couldn’t answer immediately.

  “He’s in the city, arranging some business. He’ll probably be back soon. Oh, my son, how good it is to see you! Why didn’t you tell us when your ship was due? Oh, my son…my son!”

  “I didn’t want to make you anxious.” He grinned. “How’s Pop? How’s my friend Eddie Adler? How are Doris’s parents? How’s everyone?”

  Marie wiped her tears, but fresh ones appeared and filled the black eyes that were so like his. His question about Doris’s parents brought more tears to her eyes that mixed with the tears of happiness.

  “Don’t cry, Mom!” He tried to sound matter of fact. “After that war, that lunacy that gripped our poor world, I never expected to see you again.”

  He began to wander around the house, and his mother followed him and continued to wipe her tears away.

  “How different all this looks after all those years.”

  He began to examine all the photographs that were arranged all around. He picked up one that showed him as a youth and burst out laughing.

  “This is from when I was sixteen, right? How mischievous I look here! How much has happened since then! I have become old!” He turned to his mother and cupped her face with his hands.

  “You’ve hardly changed, Mom! There’s no one like you! You’ve kept your looks, and Pop probably loves you more than ever!”

  When he saw the faint smile blossoming on her lips, he knew he had attained his goal and alleviated her sadness. To tell the truth, he had noticed the gray hairs at her temples, but she was still the elegant woman she had always been.

  The house was polished and shining. It was Thursday, the day before the Sabbath night, and everything had been made ready for the day of rest. Even though the house was always clean, she always gave it a special cleaning on Thursday.

  When Lillian was alive, they had all come to visit the grandparents and the house was turned upside-down with childish pranks, but now, nothing disturbed the order of the house.

  After a while, his father returned, and their meeting was no less dramatic. They kissed and hugged and cried.

  “God was with you, Jacob! What a terrible war!”

  “How’s business, Dad?”

  “Who’s interested in business when all the world is burning? My heart wasn’t in it. The tranquility we enjoyed here was like sitting on top of a volcano. Millions were slaughtered! A bedlam of insanity was loose in the world!”

  “You’re saying exactly what I have felt, Dad. There’s a lot to be said on the subject, but not now.”

  “You’re right, Son, you’re right! Not now.” He wiped the tears from his eyes. “We have to call the Levines, because although Doris and Lillian didn’t make it, we have to let them know you arrived. They’ll come to see you and get regards.”

  Sam Barder realized immediately that his words “get regards” were out of place because “regards” were only
received from the living. When he saw that his wife and son didn’t feel his words were strange he added, “So what do you think?” He turned to his wife. “Should we call them? They’ll be hurt if we don’t. After all, Jacob is still, technically, their son-in-law, and nobody is to blame for what happened.”

  “You’re right, Dad!” Jacob said decisively, but to himself he said that even technically he was no longer their son-in-law. Who knew who his new in-laws were?

  “When I tell them all that happened to me, perhaps they’ll understand. Call them up, Mom, and tell them I’m here. We can’t avoid it. I want to see them and tell them what happened.”

  His mother called the Levines. In spite of what happened to Doris and Lillian, they were surprised and happy to hear that Jacob had returned.

  “Yes, yes, we’re coming right over,” Mrs. Levine shouted into the telephone. “My God, Jacob’s here? We’ll be right there! Welcome home!”

  The meeting between the Levines and Jacob was heartwarming. Mrs. Levine had dressed modestly and elegantly, which reminded Jacob so much of Doris. She kissed Jacob.

  Oscar and Evelin Levine harbored no anger in their hearts because Jacob had survived while their only daughter and grandchild had not. It hurt them badly, but they loved Jacob maybe as much as they had loved their daughter and grandchild, and they were happy that at least he survived that hell.

  “Who could have imagined… Who could have dreamed that a war was about to begin?” said Mr. Levine with restrained sorrow. “If I had only known about it, I would never have allowed you to go to Europe for a pleasure trip. But when fate wills an accident on a person, there’s no way out!”

  Marie also called a few friends of Jacob’s, among them Eddie Adler, his friend since childhood and a successful lawyer. He came with his wife, Leonora, black-haired and elegant, and their daughter, Judy. They all gathered around the table, and Jacob, sitting at the head, related his adventures. They all sat there, spellbound.

  “If I hadn’t heard it from your lips, I wouldn’t have believed it.” Eddie said. He resembled Jacob in appearance as though they were related.

  “It’s difficult even for me to believe what I went through!” Jacob smiled bitterly. “When I reached the New York harbor, I asked myself, ‘Have I really come home? Did I really live through hunger and thirst in the camps? Did I really jump from the window of a speeding train? Am I really alive after all around me were lost?’”

  Everyone was impressed and awed and claimed him to be a hero. He told how he had been arrested and sent to Siberia, how he escaped from the camps, and what happened to him until he succeeded in returning to a ruined Europe. The silence was so thick you could almost hear their hearts beating. No one touched the tea and cake Marie had served them.

  Until late that night, Jacob sat and talked, and they were all sure that many more nights could still be filled with the story of his experiences.

  “Enough for now, Jacob. You’re probably tired, and your friends also have to go to work tomorrow. You have to rest!”

  “Don’t worry, Mom.” Jacob smiled. “I feel so healthy! Man is made of steel!”

  “You’ve remained the same courageous Jacob you always were!” Eddie gave him a friendly tap on his shoulder. “Now you’ll reopen your office, but I don’t think you’ll want to defend criminals anymore, not after all the crimes you’ve experienced.”

  “I don’t know,” said Jacob pensively. “I haven’t changed my opinion that criminals need special attention, that something’s wrong with a world full of crime. On the contrary, my convictions are stronger than ever.”

  Everyone listened to Jacob and believed he was entitled to express his views and judge matters from personal, practical experience and not from a theoretical viewpoint like Eddie, who, because of a crippled foot, had not served in the war.

  As the guests left, they congratulated the Barders and wished them great happiness now that their son had returned.

  The Levines were sad as they left because they knew this evening marked the end of their connection with the Barders. They envied them because the light of their life had not been extinguished. Jacob would, in time, remarry. He was such a handsome man and a successful lawyer that any woman would want him. Their dear only child was gone.

  Jacob’s mother couldn’t keep her eyes off her son. It was as though she had given birth to him all over again or that he returned to her from the land of the dead. When the rumors of the Nazi atrocities reached her ears, she never expected to see Jacob sitting next to her as healthy and as well as ever. Wasn’t this sheer happiness? She couldn’t stop kissing him.

  “My son, my dear son,” she exclaimed over and over.

  “Stop all the kissing! Enough! You’re turning him into a child again!” joked Sam.

  “That’s all right, Dad.” Jacob laughed. “The war has made me too old…too mature.”

  Jacob asked about his office and his apartment. His mother had been taking care of them for him. He gave her the keys and she guarded them as though they were a guarantee her son would come back to claim them. His mother went to her bedroom and returned with a jeweled box and brought it to him as if it were something sacred. Tears flooded her eyes as she handed it to him.

  “You see, my son, I guarded it as one would a lucky charm.”

  “You can’t imagine how she watched over the apartment.” Sam smiled wryly. “Every week she would go and clean your apartment as if she expected you to come home the very next day.”

  “How could you keep hoping after such a horrible war?”

  “I don’t know why, but I believed you were alive,” his mother said. “We heard about what the Nazis were doing, but we didn’t believe their barbarity would go so far. It’s impossible for a human mind to comprehend.”

  “Yes,” agreed Jacob. “Every man thinks that only he will survive, that death is in store for someone else. If we didn’t think so, we would die immediately.”

  Sam wanted to comment on this, but Marie stopped him. “Not now, Sam. It’s late, and Jacob is tired. We’ll have plenty of time to talk yet.”

  “I’m not tired, Mom.” He thought of Rachel sleeping alone in the hotel. “Okay, Dad, we’ll go to sleep now. You have to get up early tomorrow.”

  “I’m not tired at all, Son, but I’ll sleep well now. We used to lie awake for hours talking about you.”

  Jacob put the key to the apartment in his pocket and rose from the table.

  *****

  Jacob didn’t awaken until ten o’clock the next morning. Sam was not in the house, and Marie tiptoed into the room a few times to feast her eyes on her son and make sure it wasn’t all just a dream. She hadn’t slept all night from sheer happiness.

  “Good morning, Mom,” Jacob greeted her when he woke.

  “Good morning, my son! A very good morning to you, my dear. Mom…” She smiled. “How long it’s been since I heard that word. You really went through an ordeal, my son!”

  “Oh, how I used to long for the sun. I was sent to a place where the sun never shines all winter long.”

  “Forget all that, my son.”

  “It isn’t easy to forget, Mom.”

  As he dressed and ate, Jacob related more about his life in places where the bears lived, his heavy labor in the tundra, and much more.

  His mother listened now with a gaping mouth as one would to a thousand and one tales. She didn’t cry anymore but was happy that all was in the past and that she was listening to her son tell about it. How many days and nights she had dreamed of this. It seemed to her that she could go on listening to him forever.

  But forever is a relative term, because although Jacob wanted to make his mother happy, he knew Rachel was waiting for him, and every moment away from her was like forever to him.

  He wanted to know how she had slept and how she felt there without him. He was glad the first stormy chapter was over and he hadn’t brought Rachel. Everything was going according to plan. Rachel would stay a little longer at the hot
el. He would visit the Levines again and talk to them and comfort them. He’d tell them more details about his arrest and how he had suffered. He wanted, in this way, to quiet his conscience, because he felt guilty before them even though, God knows, he was innocent. He knew the guilty ones were those who had brought this tragedy upon millions of people.

  After breakfast, he told his happy mother, “I’m going to my apartment, Mom. I may stay there awhile. I don’t know if I’ll be home for lunch. I’ll eat someplace on the way. On the ship, I met a lovely girl among the refugees, and I promised to visit her. Maybe I’ll eat lunch together with her.”

  “A refugee?” She looked at her son.

  “Yes, Mom, a displaced person. That’s a new term that’s been added to the lexicon after the war. You won’t find it in any dictionary yet. It means a person whose identity and home have been destroyed.”

  “Oh, my son, I’m glad you’re interested in this young woman. We’ve founded many committees and organizations to help the survivors. I belong to one of them.”

  “Not with committees and righteous organizations are we going to save humanity!” he said grimly.

  “You’re right, my son, but we all do what we can to help. I only wish people weren’t so tightfisted.”

  Jacob felt this short conversation with his good and kind mother had brought him a step nearer to working out his plan. He was surprised she hadn’t asked him to bring the refugee to the house, but then he understood she saw his interest in the woman only as an altruistic endeavor—or maybe she was pretending she didn’t see it any other way.

  “Go ahead, my son. I wish you success in your new life!” she told him as he went out the door.

  “Thanks, Mom!”

  As he kissed his mother good-bye, he couldn’t help but reflect on why a mother’s kiss was so different from a lover’s kiss or a wife’s kiss.

  *****

  “Hello, Rachel!” Jacob greeted his wife in English and kissed her.

  “Hello!” Rachel also greeted him in English with a laugh. She had just awakened and was standing before the mirror and combing her hair. As usual, she was lovely and calm, although to tell the truth, she had tossed and turned for hours before she fell asleep. What thoughts had passed through her mind as she deliberated on her new life! What plans she had conceived for her future and her eventual return to the homeland that she yearned for more from day to day!