by Philip Roth
“What is it?”
“The other thing is—I’ve got relatives in St. Louis, and they say they’ll give me a whole Passover dinner if I can get down there. God, Sergeant, that’d mean an awful lot to me.”
I stood up. “No passes during basic, Grossbart.”
“But we’re off from now till Monday morning, Sergeant. I could leave the post and no one would even know.”
“I’d know. You’d know.”
“But that’s all. Just the two of us. Last night, I called my aunt, and you should have heard her. ‘Come—come,’ she said. ‘I got gefilte fish, chrain—the works!’ Just a day, Sergeant. I’d take the blame if anything happened.”
“The Captain isn’t here to sign a pass.”
“You could sign.”
“Look, Grossbart—”
“Sergeant, for two months, practically, I’ve been eating trafe till I want to die.”
“I thought you’d made up your mind to live with it. To be minus a little bit of heritage.”
He pointed a finger at me. “You!” he said. “That wasn’t for you to read.”
“I read it. So what?”
“That letter was addressed to a congressman.”
“Grossbart, don’t feed me any baloney. You wanted me to read it.”
“Why are you persecuting me, Sergeant?”
“Are you kidding!”
“I’ve run into this before,” he said, “but never from my own!”
“Get out of here, Grossbart! Get the hell out of my sight!”
He did not move. “Ashamed, that’s what you are,” he said. “So you take it out on the rest of us. They say Hitler himself was half a Jew. Hearing you, I wouldn’t doubt it.”
“What are you trying to do with me, Grossbart?” I asked him. “What are you after? You want me to give you special privileges, to change the food, to find out about your orders, to give you weekend passes.”
“You even talk like a goy!” Grossbart shook his fist. “Is this just a weekend pass I’m asking for? Is a Seder sacred, or not?”
Seder! It suddenly occurred to me that Passover had been celebrated weeks before. I said so.
“That’s right,” he replied. “Who says no? A month ago—and I was in the field eating hash! And now all I ask is a simple favor. A Jewish boy I thought would understand. My aunt’s willing to go out of her way—to make a Seder a month later….” He turned to go, mumbling.
“Come back here!” I called. He stopped and looked at me. “Grossbart, why can’t you be like the rest? Why do you have to stick out like a sore thumb?”
“Because I’m a Jew, Sergeant. I am different. Better, maybe not. But different.”
“This is a war, Grossbart. For the time being be the same.”
“I refuse.”
“What?”
“I refuse. I can’t stop being me, that’s all there is to it.” Tears came to his eyes. “It’s a hard thing to be a Jew. But now I understand what Mickey says—it’s a harder thing to stay one.” He raised a hand sadly toward me. “Look at you.”
“Stop crying!”
“Stop this, stop that, stop the other thing! You stop, Sergeant. Stop closing your heart to your own!” And, wiping his face with his sleeve, he ran out the door. “The least we can do for one another—the least…”
An hour later, looking out of the window, I saw Grossbart headed across the field. He wore a pair of starched khakis and carried a little leather ditty bag. I went out into the heat of the day. It was quiet; not a soul was in sight except, over by the mess hall, four K.P.s sitting around a pan, sloped forward from their waists, gabbing and peeling potatoes in the sun.
“Grossbart!” I called.
He looked toward me and continued walking.
“Grossbart, get over here!”
He turned and came across the field. Finally, he stood before me.
“Where are you going?”I asked.
“St. Louis. I don’t care.”
“You’ll get caught without a pass.”
“So I’ll get caught without a pass.”
“You’ll go to the stockade.”
“I’m in the stockade.” He made an about-face and headed off.
I let him go only a step or two. “Come back here,” I said, and he followed me into the office, where I typed out a pass and signed the Captain’s name, and my own initials after it.
He took the pass and then, a moment later, reached out and grabbed my hand. “Sergeant, you don’t know how much this means to me.”
“O.K.,” I said. “Don’t get in any trouble.”
“I wish I could show you how much this means to me.”
“Don’t do me any favors. Don’t write any more congressmen for citations.”
He smiled. “You’re right. I won’t. But let me do something.”
“Bring me a piece of that gefilte fish. Just get out of here.”
“I will!” he said. “With a slice of carrot and a little horseradish. I won’t forget.”
“AH right. Just show your pass at the gate. And don’t tell anybody.”
“I won’t. It’s a month late, but a good Yom Toy to you.”
“Good Yom Tov, Grossbart,” I said.
“You’re a good Jew, Sergeant. You like to think you have a hard heart, but underneath you’re a fine, decent man. I mean that.”
Those last three words touched me more than any words from Grossbart’s mouth had the right to. “All right, Grossbart,” I said. “Now call me ‘sir,’ and get the hell out of here.”
He ran out the door and was gone. I felt very pleased with myself; it was a great relief to stop fighting Grossbart, and it had cost me nothing. Barrett would never find out, and if he did, I could manage to invent some excuse. For a while, I sat at my desk, comfortable in my decision. Then the screen door flew back and Grossbart burst in again. “Sergeant!” he said. Behind him I saw Fishbein and Halpern, both in starched khakis, both carrying ditty bags like Grossbart’s.
“Sergeant, I caught Mickey and Larry coming out of the movies. I almost missed them.”
“Grossbart—did I say tell no one?” I said.
“But my aunt said I could bring friends. That I should, in fact.”
“I’m the Sergeant, Grossbart—not your aunt!”
Grossbart looked at me in disbelief. He pulled Halpern up by his sleeve. “Mickey, tell the Sergeant what this would mean to you.”
Halpern looked at me and, shrugging, said, “A lot.”
Fishbein stepped forward without prompting. “This would mean a great deal to me and my parents, Sergeant Marx.”
“No!” I shouted.
Grossbart was shaking his head. “Sergeant, I could see you denying me, but how you can deny Mickey, a Yeshiva boy—that’s beyond me.”
“I’m not denying Mickey anything,” I said. “You just pushed a little too hard, Grossbart. You denied him.”
“I’ll give him my pass, then,” Grossbart said. “I’ll give him my aunt’s address and a little note. At least let him go.”
In a second, he had crammed the pass into Halpern’s pants pocket. Halpern looked at me, and so did Fishbein. Grossbart was at the door, pushing it open. “Mickey, bring me a piece of gefilte fish, at least,” he said, and then he was outside again.
The three of us looked at one another, and then I said, “Halpern, hand that pass over.”
He took it from his pocket and gave it to me. Fishbein had now moved to the doorway, where he lingered. He stood there for a moment with his mouth slightly open, and then he pointed to himself. “And me?” he asked.
His utter ridiculousness exhausted me. I slumped down in my seat and felt pulses knocking at the back of my eyes. “Fishbein,” I said, “you understand I’m not trying to deny you anything, don’t you? If it was my Army, I’d serve gefilte fish in the mess hall. I’d sell kugel in the PX, honest to God.”
Halpern smiled.
“You understand, don’t you, Halpern?”
“Yes, Sergeant.”
“And you, Fishbein? I don’t want enemies. I’m just like you—I want to serve my time and go home. I miss the same things you miss.”
“Then, Sergeant,” Fishbein said, “why don’t you come, too?”
“Where?”
“To St. Louis. To Shelly’s aunt. We’ll have a regular Seder. Play hide-the-matzoh.” He gave me a broad, black-toothed smile.
I saw Grossbart again, on the other side of the screen.
“Pst!” He waved a piece of paper. “Mickey, here’s the address. Tell her I couldn’t get away.”
Halpern did not move. He looked at me, and I saw the shrug moving up his arms into his shoulders again. I took the cover off my typewriter and made out passes for him and Fishbein. “Go,” I said. “The three of you.”
I thought Halpern was going to kiss my hand.
That afternoon, in a bar in Joplin, I drank beer and listened with half an ear to the Cardinal game. I tried to look squarely at what I’d become involved in, and began to wonder if perhaps the struggle with Grossbart wasn’t as much my fault as his. What was I that I had to muster generous feelings? Who was I to have been feeling so grudging, so tight-hearted? After all, I wasn’t being asked to move the world. Had I a right, then, or a reason, to clamp down on Grossbart, when that meant clamping down on Halpern, too? And Fishbein—that ugly, agreeable soul? Out of the many recollections of my childhood that had tumbled over me these past few days I heard my grandmother’s voice: “What are you making a tsimmes?” It was what she would ask my mother when, say, I had cut myself while doing something I shouldn’t have done, and her daughter was busy bawling me out I needed a hug and a kiss and my mother would moralize But my grandmother knew—mercy overrides justice. I should have known it, too. Who was Nathan Marx to be such a penny pincher with kindness? Surely I thought the Messiah himself—if He should ever come—won’t niggle over nickels and dimes. God willing, he’ll hug and kiss.
The next day, while I was playing softball over on the parade ground, I decided to ask Bob Wright, who was noncom in charge of Classification and Assignment, where he thought our trainees would be sent when their cycle ended, in two weeks. I asked casually, between innings, and he said, “They’re pushing them all into the Pacific. Shulman cut the orders on your boys the other day.”
The news shocked me, as though I were the father of Halpern, Fishbein, and Grossbart.
That night, I was just sliding into sleep when someone tapped on my door. “Who is it?” I asked.
“Sheldon.”
He opened the door and came in. For a moment, I felt his presence without being able to see him. “How was it?” I asked.
He popped into sight in the near-darkness before me. “Great, Sergeant.” Then he was sitting on the edge of the bed. I sat up.
“How about you?” he asked. “Have a nice weekend?”
“Yes.”
“The others went to sleep.” He took a deep, paternal breath. We sat silent for a while, and a homey feeling invaded my ugly little cubicle; the door was locked, the cat was out, the children were safely in bed.
“Sergeant, can I tell you something? Personal?”
I did not answer, and he seemed to know why. “Not about me. About Mickey. Sergeant, I never felt for anybody like I feel for him. Last night I heard Mickey in the bed next to me. He was crying so, it could have broken your heart. Real sobs.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
“I had to talk to him to stop him. He held my hand, Sergeant—he wouldn’t let it go. He was almost hysterical. He kept saying if he only knew where we were going. Even if he knew it was the Pacific, that would be better than nothing. Just to know.”
Long ago, someone had taught Grossbart the sad rule that only lies can get the truth. Not that I couldn’t believe in the fact of Halpern’s crying; his eyes always seemed red-rimmed. But, fact or not, it became a lie when Grossbart uttered it. He was entirely strategic. But then—it came with the force of indictment—so was I! There are strategies of aggression, but there are strategies of retreat as well. And so, recognizing that I myself had not been without craft and guile, I told him what I knew. “It is the Pacific.”
He let out a small gasp, which was not a lie. “I’ll tell him. I wish it was otherwise.”
“So do I.”
He jumped on my words. “You mean you think you could do something? A change, maybe?”
“No, I couldn’t do a thing.”
“Don’t you know anybody over at C. and A.?”
“Grossbart, there’s nothing I can do,” I said. “If your orders are for the Pacific, then it’s the Pacific.”
“But Mickey—”
“Mickey, you, me—everybody, Grossbart. There’s nothing to be done. Maybe the war’ll end before you go. Pray for a miracle.”
“But—”
“Good night, Grossbart.” I settled back, and was relieved to feel the springs unbend as Grossbart rose to leave. I could see him clearly now; his jaw had dropped, and he looked like a dazed prizefighter. I noticed for the first time a little paper bag in his hand.
“Grossbart.” I smiled. “My gift?”
“Oh, yes, Sergeant. Here—from all of us.” He handed me the bag. “It’s egg roll.”
“Egg roll?” I accepted the bag and felt a damp grease spot on the bottom. I opened it, sure that Grossbart was joking.
“We thought you’d probably like it. You know—Chinese egg roll. We thought you’d probably have a taste for—”
“Your aunt served egg roll?”
“She wasn’t home.”
“Grossbart, she invited you. You told me she invited you and your friends.”
“I know,” he said. “I just reread the letter. Next week.”
I got out of bed and walked to the window. “Grossbart,” I said. But I was not calling to him.
“What?”
“What are you, Grossbart? Honest to God, what are you?”
I think it was the first time I’d asked him a question for which he didn’t have an immediate answer.
“How can you do this to people?” I went on.
“Sergeant, the day away did us all a world of good. Fishbein, you should see him, he loves Chinese food.”
“But the Seder,” I said.
“We took second best, Sergeant.”
Rage came charging at me. I didn’t sidestep. “Grossbart, you’re a liar!” I said. “You’re a schemer and a crook. You’ve got no respect for anything. Nothing at all. Not for me, for the truth—not even for poor Halpern! You use us all—”
“Sergeant, Sergeant, I feel for Mickey. Honest to God, I do. I love Mickey. I try—”
“You try! You feel!” I lurched toward him and grabbed his shirt front. I shook him furiously. “Grossbart, get out! Get out and stay the hell away from me. Because if I see you, I’ll make your life miserable. You understand that?”
“Yes.”
I let him free, and when he walked from the room, I wanted to spit on the floor where he had stood. I couldn’t stop the fury. It engulfed me, owned me, till it seemed I could only rid myself of it with tears or an act of violence. I snatched from the bed the bag Grossbart had given me and, with all my strength, threw it out the window. And the next morning, as the men policed the area around the barracks, I heard a great cry go up from one of the trainees, who had been anticipating only his morning handful of cigarette butts and candy wrappers. “Egg roll!” he shouted. “Holy Christ, Chinese goddam egg roll!”
A week later, when I read the orders that had come down from C. and A., I couldn’t believe my eyes. Every single trainee was to be shipped to Camp Stoneman, California, and from there to the Pacific—every trainee but one. Private Sheldon Grossbart. He was to be sent to Fort Monmouth, New Jersey. I read the mimeographed sheet several times. Dee, Farrell, Fishbein, Fuselli, Fylypowycz, Glinicki, Gromke Gucwa Halpern Hardy, Helebrandt, right down to Anton Zygadlo—all were to be headed West before the month was out. All except G
rossbart. He had pulled a string, and I wasn’t it.
I lifted the phone and called C. and A.
The voice on the other end said smartly, “Corporal Shulman, sir.”
“Let me speak to Sergeant Wright.”
“Who is this calling, sir?”
“Sergeant Marx.”
And, to my surprise, the voice said, “Ohi” Then, “Just a minute, Sergeant.”
Shulman’s “Oh!” stayed with me while I waited for Wright to come to the phone. Why “Ohi”? Who was Shulman? And then, so simply, I knew I’d discovered the string that Grossbart had pulled. In fact, I could hear Grossbart the day he’d discovered Shulman in the PX, or in the bowling alley, or maybe even at services. “Glad to meet you. Where you from? Bronx? Me, too. Do you know So-and-So? And So-and-So? Me, too! You work at C. and A.? Really? Hey, how’s chances of getting East? Could you do something? Change something? Swindle, cheat, lie? We gotta help each other, you know. If the Jews in Germany…”
Bob Wright answered the phone. “How are you, Nate? How’s the pitching arm?”
“Good. Bob, I wonder if you could do me a favor.” I heard clearly my own words, and they so reminded me of Grossbart that I dropped more easily than I could have imagined into what I had planned. “This may sound crazy, Bob, but I got a kid here on orders to Monmouth who wants them changed. He had a brother killed in Europe, and he’s hot to go to the Pacific. Says he’d feel like a coward if he wound up Stateside. I don’t know, Bob—can anything be done? Put somebody else in the Monmouth slot?”
“Who?” he asked cagily.
“Anybody. First guy in the alphabet. I don’t care. The kid just asked if something could be done.”
“What’s his name?”
“Grossbart, Sheldon.” Wright didn’t answer.
“Yeah,” I said. “He’s a Jewish kid, so he thought I could help him out. You know.”
“I guess I can do something,” he finally said. “The Major hasn’t been around here for weeks. Temporary duty to the golf course. I’ll try, Nate, that’s all I can say.”