by S. Y. Agnon
When autumn came and the students went back to school, managing the Workers of Zion Society fell entirely to Getzel. The clubhouse could not run itself: if he was away for a single night the chairs would be thrown all over in the morning and the newspaper would be crumpled on the floor. Yet while Getzel had his hands full, he still found time to visit his hunchbacked sister. The devil they once had raised between them had taken himself elsewhere and left them on peaceable terms.
Getzel never stopped by his sister’s without a pocketful of candies. “All right, all you sweet-tooths,” he would tell his nephews and nieces, “whoever guesses what Uncle Getzel has here gets twice as much.” Though the children racked their brains, Uncle Getzel’s sweets were not easily guessable, for Boruch Meir was always trying out new items in his store. Still, Getzel would be a sport and give all the sweet-tooths twice as much anyway. And while he did not have much of a sweet-tooth himself, having learned from Boruch Meir to control it, he could not teach his sister’s children which sweets to chew and which to suck on without chewing and sucking on them too.
At such times Yona Toyber joined his sons and daughters and sat examining a candy between two fingers while his wife stood radiantly by. Yona, who had been no simpleton when he decided to marry the sister of a man who worked for a large firm, inspected each sweet he ate to make sure it contained no chocolate, which was something he was careful not to touch, having heard that it was suspected by the Rabbi of Berezhany of being made with animal fat. A religious liberal in his attitude toward others, Toyber was quite strict with himself.
Yona Toyber was not a typical matchmaker. He was an abstemious eater and drinker and did not keep stacks of cards with the names of eligible young men and women written on them. Had he done so, he might have realized that it was high time his new brother-in-law was married too. Like any red-blooded youth his age, Getzel had not waited for a matchmaker to court the woman of his dreams. He was too shy, though, to confess that he needed one, not having the courage of Samson in the Bible, who, charmed by a Philistine wench, told his parents, “Now get ye her for me to wife.”
In the end, his spirits low and his pockets empty, Getzel would leave his sister and her sweet-tooths to go home. He had played the candy man again in front of his brother-in-law and what did he have to show for it? Absolutely nothing. Perhaps he should have brought his two other sisters food and medicine instead. He was not exactly proud of the fact that Yossele, the carpenter’s son who ran the buffet at the Society for Zion club, went hungry himself in order to feed Saltshi and Beiltshi.
The world, however, did not revolve around either Getzel or Yossele. Both of them existed to serve Hirshl, one in the store and one at the club. Not that Hirshl was necessarily the center of the universe either. But he came from a well-to-do home, had a home of his own, and was the only one of the three to be married. Moreover, his wife, Mina Ziemlich, had wealthy parents too. True, Hirshl had wanted Blume, but both God in heaven and Tsirl and Yona Toyber on earth had seen to it that he wound up with Mina.
Blume was still not married. Since the day she left his parents Hirshl had seen her only twice, once in the Mazals’ front yard and once in the street with Knabenhut. For all anyone knew about her, she might have entered a nunnery. “Isn’t it strange,” Tsirl once remarked, “that we never see Blume anymore”—and indeed it did seem ungrateful of Blume not to have come to see her cousins even once. As is generally the case when all goes well with one, Hirshl saw nothing wrong with his behavior. If anyone had misbehaved it was Blume, who had not even paid a call on his new baby.
Hirshl was settling down. Even thinking of Blume no longer upset him. Could he be growing up at last? And yet, he reflected, if Mina were to die, perhaps Blume would marry him then. Not, God forbid, that he wished his wife dead. Should he ever be a widower, though, he would have to remarry someone, and who might that be if not Blume? If she did not agree to it out of love, she would surely agree to it out of pity. The thought of himself and his little orphan being left all alone in the world made his own heart well with pity for the two of them.
Hirshl grew fond of the word “orphan.” Sometimes he even called his son by it. The first time that Mina heard him say “my little orphan” to Meshulam a chill ran down her spine. Eventually she grew used to it—or rather, to Hirshl’s saying it, though not to the way it made her feel. Each time she heard her son called an orphan she shuddered. And yet she knew that Hirshl meant no harm. It was simply a word he liked and had grown used to.
Meshulam developed slowly. Every conceivable childhood illness afflicted him. A sickly infant to begin with, he was only made more so by the good intentions of those caring for him, who swaddled him so tightly and in so many clothes that he was always sweating and coming down with colds. The wet nurse was so eager to show her devotion that she gave him the breast whenever Mina, Tsirl, Bertha, or Sophia entered the room, even if it meant waking him from his sleep, while in the presence of Hirshl, Boruch Meir, or Gedalia she stood him on his feet to prove how strong he was, though his body was not ready for it, thus causing him to rupture his colon. Her own diet of coarse food and vodka did not do him any good either, nor did her habit of hanging soporific herbs above his head at night to keep him from crying and making her late for her trysts with her boyfriends.
Soon the doctors began to arrive. Each wrote out a prescription and gave Meshulam medicines. Some of these helped for a while but made him worse in the long run, others cured one complaint while creating several new ones. Bertha and Tsirl brought their women friends too, each an expert on childrearing, whose advice was so contradictory that, if worthless in itself, it at least had the merit of being impossible to carry out. The baby, however, showed no improvement.
Sometimes, seeing so many people fussing in vain over his son, Hirshl would think, If Blume were taking care of him, he would be all right by now. He pictured her on one side of the cradle and himself on the other, with the convalescing child between them. God in heaven knew that he was thinking only of Meshulam, since he was getting on well with Mina and was certainly no philanderer. Yet though, upon rousing himself from these fantasies, he guiltily would confess to having really thought only of himself, a moment later he would rail at his own conscience for being so sanctimonious. Then, frightened, he would bite his lip hard so as not to provoke the Fates.
In the end it was decided to bring the baby to Malikrowik. And while this was done less for Meshulam’s sake than for Mina, who was too exhausted to take care of him any longer, the official reason given was that Meshulam needed fresh warm milk from the cow.
Bertha came for the child in the Ziemlichs’ carriage. She took her seat with him up front beside the wet nurse while Stach smiled at the horses and ran his hand along his whip. As the carriage started out, Mina, who was standing on the doorstep, began to cry. Though Hirshl wanted to embrace her, his concern for his son made his arms feel too weak to reach out.
Chapter thirty-six
The house seemed empty once Meshulam was gone. Though Hirshl smoked one cigarette after another to calm himself, he still felt unsettled. Mina, tired from packing for the baby, went to bed early. Hirshl too lay down. But he could not find a comfortable position. Falling asleep, which had never been easy for him, was sure to be even less so on the first night without his son. After a while he got out of bed.
Mina awoke. “Are you up?” she asked.
“I thought I heard the baby crying,” said Hirshl.
“But he’s in the village,” said Mina.
“I only said I thought it,” Hirshl said.
“That’s because you’re used to it.”
“Yes,” Hirshl said. “We’re creatures of habit.”
Mina did not answer, and Hirshl tried to move softly so as not to keep her awake. She too breathed as quietly as she could while listening to his movements. He grew aware of her and stood still. His heart pounded hotly. He had never felt this way before, as if it were his first time alone in a room with a woman.
Mina’s breathing grew quicker. He too felt short of breath. “Are you awake?” he asked. Although his voice shook, he did not think she noticed it.
“Yes,” said Mina from her bed.
Her eyes were wide open. She was thinking of her son, who had been taken away, and of her husband, who was standing over her. Hirshl was not thinking of his son or of anything. He was conscious only of the breathing woman before him.
The night was still. Not a sound came from the street. The slightest noise seemed much louder than it was. Mina’s blanket moved. Hirshl’s lips met hers. “It’s you, Heinrich,” she said when she could breath again. Hirshl clung to her with all his might and said nothing.
Now that Meshulam was in Malikrowik, Mina and Hirshl’s life was changed. The wet nurse had gone with the baby, and, not having found a maid to replace her, Mina did the housework herself.
Mina was not an especially able housewife. Plenty of women were abler. But when all is well between a man and his wife, whatever she does is good enough for him.
Having work to do around the house put an end to Mina’s boredom. Her pale complexion grew rosier, and a smile appeared on her mouth that had always been shaped like a yawn. Hirshl even liked the first wrinkles that had begun to show behind her ears; he called them her kiss lines and seemed as proud of them as if he had made them himself. Every morning he helped Mina prepare breakfast while interpreting her dreams for her. Dr. Freud in Vienna might have done it better, but not as far as Mina was concerned.
Hirshl enjoyed this time of the morning when he stood helping his wife in the kitchen. Not that Mina needed his help. He simply liked looking at her in her attractive house frock. Had not the milk and bread deliveries always arrived just when he most wanted to hug her, he might have been living in Paradise.
Half yielding to Hirshl’s attentions and half fending them off, Mina would urge him to drink his coffee before it was cold. “You have some of it first,” Hirshl would say. “But why should I drink from your cup,” she would ask, “when I have a cup of my own?” “So that I can drink from your cup,” Hirshl said. He talked like that at every meal.
Sometimes when they were together, Hirshl thought of Blume. Not only did she never love me, he told himself, she never loved anyone at all. The reason she doesn’t marry must be that it might give some man pleasure.
Mina’s eyes shone with a blossom of light such as Hirshl had never seen. When she laid a hand on his shoulder, a pleasant warmth flowed into him from her. He saw that she was fuller. She felt him looking and blushed. He looked again. Could it be that he was right and she simply had not told him yet? Before he could ask, the glow of maternal contentment in her eyes told him everything. God in heaven had helped him to realize by himself.
Yet though Mina kept putting on weight, she had become nimbler. Her hands never rested for a moment. As soon as she was done with the housework, she took up the baby clothes she was knitting. They could not have been for Meshulam, who was already too big for them.
Hirshl, who hardly noticed Mina’s clothes, was even less mindful of a baby’s. The Christmas holidays were at hand and the store was busy. Already the gift packages were being prepared for the wives of the high officials. Not that Getzel and Feyvel could not be trusted with them, but a good merchant kept an eye on his staff.
Gedalia Ziemlich was in Szybusz one day and came to the store. Boruch Meir handed him a sheet of paper and Tsirl nodded toward some cartons. Hirshl was standing near his father-in-law; yet if he did not light up with satisfaction like Gedalia, neither did he look particularly annoyed. He had made, it would seem, his peace with the world, which could not be expected to change because of him. Not that some things did not change anyway. Though Hirshl’s house, for example, had become a gathering place for his friends, it was abandoned by them for Gildenhorn’s the minute Sophia’s husband returned to Szybusz for the Christmas holidays.
Hirshl and Mina did not notice the change, or did not seem to mind it if they did. In any case, Mina was leaving for Malikrowik soon to be with her son. And since the government had begun to crack down on Jewish stores that kept open when the Christian ones were closed, Hirshl had time to go with her.
They traveled together. Meshulam was still behind for his age, but he had done better in the village than in town. Under his grandmother’s care he was beginning to catch up.
Hirshl played with the child and made up all kinds of games for him. And though Hirshl bore not the slightest resemblance to his paternal uncle, after whom Meshulam was named, he did manage to write his son a poem, which he crooned for him thus:
The angels are bringing Meshulam my love
A special present from above.
And whether the gift is a girl or a boy
It will give me and Meshulam great joy.
Truer words were never spoken than Schiller’s when he said that nowhere is there a man who has not written poems in his youth. And while Schiller may not have had a poem like Hirshl’s in mind, it was certainly a sight better than calling one’s own son an orphan.
Hirshl did not play with Meshulam all day. Sometimes, if Stach was in the barnyard attending to the horses or poking the dogs in the ribs, he went outside for a chat with him. The dogs did not mind old Knucklehead. They knew he had his problems and they patiently let him take these out on them—which was more than could be said for Meshulam’s wet nurse, who slapped Stach’s face when he got too familiar with her ribs. Though once she and Stach had been as thick as thieves, her stay in town had accustomed her to finer fare.
Mina spent most of her time with her mother. Bertha was a superb cook, and Mina was eager to learn from her. Now and then, however, she took a break from the kitchen and went for a walk with Hirshl.
Fresh snow fell on the gleaming white village, its smell fresh and gladdening too. Mina’s little ears were a frosty pink. Yet after first feeling frozen they were now warm, and she soon saw that the cold was nothing to be afraid of.
The two of them crunched through the snow, which seemed to sing beneath their feet. Or was it really the snow that they heard? Sitting cross-legged in it and strumming as he sang was a blind musician—and though he could not have been one of Dr. Langsam’s beggars, whom Hirshl had always pictured squatting in the hot summer sun of the doctor’s hometown, his song that was boundlessly sad and sweet seemed to have no beginning and no end. Yet Hirshl and Mina stood perfectly still, as if waiting for him to finish it.
Suddenly Hirshl seized Mina’s arm and said, “Let’s go.”
Had it not sent a shiver down her spine, she might have stopped to wonder at the harshness of his voice.
They had already taken several steps when Hirshl turned back and tossed the musician a coin. Had not the beggar been blind he would have been amazed by the sight of it, for it was bigger than any coin that anyone like him was ever given.
God in heaven knew what made Hirshl so restless. Though sometimes happy and sometimes sad, each mood of his seemed equally extreme. Gradually he settled down again. One day it occurred to him that, though Mina had studied the piano, she had never asked for one on which to play for him. As anyone with as little interest in music as himself might have done, he felt grateful to her for having spared him.
Chapter thirty-seven
Twice a day the train stopped in Szybusz, and each time it brought with it new faces. Though there was not much difference among them apart from the state of their clothes, one man’s being clean and another’s dirty, and their Yiddish pronunciation, one man tsva-ing his tsvays and another tsvay-ing his tsvas, sometimes the train brought a passenger from abroad who dressed and spoke completely differently.
Arnold Ziemlich was not exactly a new face in Szybusz, having already been seen there at his cousin Mina’s wedding. In fact, his business in Szybusz was large and getting larger, which should have come as a surprise to no one who had bothered to count the number of chickens pecking in the town’s garbage. The chickens had no idea what made them keep pecking and laying, but
those who grew them and sold them knew perfectly well that each single egg laid was for Herr Arnold Ziemlich of Germany; while as for Herr Ziemlich, though his customers were no wiser than the chickens, it being entirely possible to eat an egg without knowing what tree it grew on, he was only too aware of what made them keep coming back for more. Besides, if a German were to eat eggs from China his eyes might grow slantwise, while the eyes of the good folk of Szybusz were big and blue.
Arnold Ziemlich had written Boruch Meir that he planned to visit Gedalia in Malikrowik during the Christmas holidays when his business was shut down, and true German that he was, he kept his word.
Gedalia Ziemlich’s house basked in jollity. Boruch Meir and Tsirl came from Szybusz to greet the guest, and Bertha outdid herself in the kitchen and set the table with her best china, including the goose-shaped serving dish that pointed its angry beak at Arnold Ziemlich. It was indeed a mystery how, when Bertha was so pleased with every ladleful of gravy spooned from it, the goose could look as sullen as it did.
Gedalia broke out a few bottles of homemade brandy from his cabinet. In Germany one drank alcohol-flavored water that did little more than wet the lips, but Gedalia’s one-hundred-and-eighty-proof goaded the tongue and greased the vocal chords.
That was only the first glass of it, however. The second and the third had the curious effect of paralyzing the vocal chords completely while rendering one insensible to the fact that no one else was able to speak either.
Well, well, mused Boruch Meir, I’ve always thought my in-law Gedalia was the world’s leading Ziemlich, and here the honor turns out to be Arnold Ziemlich’s instead, since Gedalia’s only daughter is now a Hurvitz, while Germany is full of little Ziemlichs. Someday there won’t be a Ziemlich left in Malikrowik, even though they all came from here, but Germany will have lots of them. Maybe we should even plan a Ziemlich-Hurvitz wedding: my grandson Meshulam can marry one of Arnold Ziemlich’s daughters, or else Mina will give birth to a daughter who can marry one of his sons.