by Jan Cherubin
Before shul, I walked up to the farm to help Moti Goldberg and Artie Shack do whatever chores were on the list for the day. I came inside the barn hoping to thaw out and shoot the breeze, but the barn was hardly warmer than the outdoors, and the senior boys had already finished their barn detail, gotten up even earlier than I did that day, and had ridden off in the wagon somewhere. I was left to muck out the stalls, and so I did, and then started to trudge back by myself for shul and breakfast. A thin layer of ice as delicate as lace coated the frozen mud furrows and crunched pleasantly under my feet. I dug my hands into my pockets. I’d lost my gloves a few weeks ago and I couldn’t find my hat. The tops of my ears were raw. Across the fields, the Home loomed, its brick edifice dark against the pale blue light of dawn. The institution always looked haunted from a distance. I could imagine an all-American father driving the family Ford around a curve on Tuckahoe Road, the grim building coming into view, and the kids in the backseat shrieking in horror.
I turned my collar up and hunched my shoulders against the cold. The moon was still visible in the pale sky, and next to it, a bright planet. As I made my way across the field, yellow lights flicked on in the building. The kids in Companies D and E were getting up. Soon windows on every floor were ablaze. I stopped in the middle of the field and stared. A confusion of feeling stirred my heart. A few times over the years, I threatened to run away, but I knew there was nowhere to go. I knew deep down that the island I wanted to run away to, the place where I would be accepted, and where I’d have nothing to hide, was here. The Home was the island unto itself where my companions and I ate the fruit off the trees. My eyes stung. I shivered and jammed my fists deeper into my pockets and I walked toward the warmth and light.
Back from the barn and the frozen fields, down in the freezing synagogue we mumbled prayers. We were men now, the rabbis told us bar mitzvah boys. We had responsibilities, said Louis Longbeard, a man who did nothing but pray all day, while we swept the floors he trod and flicked the chickens he ate or sold on the black market, our bellies empty. We hitched up the horses and plowed the fields in summer and the snow from the roads in winter. We shoveled chicken shit from the coops and horseshit from the barn and ashes from the furnace and we didn’t mind because it was honest work and not prayer that gave our lives meaning. We drove the horse and wagon to bakeries from Bronxville to Tarrytown picking up three-day-old bread and stale donuts. We mended fences, rebuilt car engines, planted potatoes, peeled potatoes, collected eggs, flicked chickens, did I say flicked chickens already? Well, we flicked a helluva a lot of chickens, drowned cats, repaired radios—we were men all right. And then we were beaten for staring at a supervisor the wrong way. Little kids whacked on the back of the head, carted off to Nurse Flanagan passed out during standing detention, bleeding from their noses, from their ears.
We grumbled all year in the newspaper office, and wrote our editorials, which were censored. We complained to Flanny, to the porters, to Eddie the night watchman, to the kitchen staff. Forget Miss Beaufort, she did nothing for us. Sometimes we complained to visiting dentists when they asked why our permanent teeth were loose or missing, although we never complained to the Ladies Auxiliary of White Plains; those compassionate women would close down the place, and then, like we always said, where would we go? The talk was big, but the truth was most of us could barely stand to leave the grounds for the ninth grade, so tormented were we by the snobs at Roosevelt High School, we came rushing back each afternoon to the safety of the orphanage.
I grumbled mainly to Carl Grimm. He valued my opinion. Besides being the Home’s second chef, Mr. Grimm was a true friend and mentor. He listened to classical music and appreciated abstract art. He was generous, inviting us into the cottage he shared with Charlie the porter and Hymie the handyman, offering snacks, sharing books that were banned, dispensing advice about girls. In the thirties, we destitute and neglected orphans were naturally budding socialists, hungry for news of the world. Mr. Grimm was willing to talk about the food riots, about union men and scabs, the workers storming the Ford plant at River Rouge, and the Harlan County coal strikes.
Later in the newspaper office, Pussy Friedman said, “They’re criminals, those coal miners.” Pussy was a pious boy. He gave the Hebrew speech at the Hotel Astor.
“You’re against the striking miners?” said Skelly Schwartz.
“The miners strike,” said Pussy, “and babies freeze to death.”
“Nobody’s freezing to death,” said Skelly. “It’s summer.”
“They wait until winter to strike! They plan it that way. It’s criminal,” said Pussy.
“Tell it to the bosses, for God’s sake,” Moti Goldberg said.
A lot of the guys were stirred up, and most everyone who worked on the Oracle newspaper had an opinion.
“Shee-at, I just got an idea,” said Oscar Finerman.
“Uh-oh. Finerman has an idea,” said Pussy.
“No, this one is good,” Oscar said.
Finerman pitched for the varsity baseball team at Roosevelt, which as I said, was outside of the orphanage gates and a regular Yonkers public high school, but instead of the Roosevelt uniform, Finerman always wore his Home jersey with the Star of David emblazoned on the front and “Hebrew National Orphan Home” stitched on the back. He was proud of it. Meanwhile, it turned out Oscar, along with being a natural athlete, was a natural-born leader. He called a meeting in the barn.
“It’s like this,” said Oscar. “You juniors are always saying, if the seniors are such hot shit why do we let the supervisors push us around.”
“Well, why do you?” said Chick.
“Never mind. It’s time to put up or shut up.”
“Hear, hear!”
“That’s right! Put up or shut up!”
“What the hell does that mean?” said Harry. He was the last to climb the ladder through the hatch and into the hayloft.
“What’s the squirt doing here?” said Moti.
“He’s a fighter,” I said. “You want him on your team.”
“All right,” said Oscar. “Lookit. We have a plan, me and Moti.”
Moti Goldberg played in the outfield for Saunders Technical High.
“Yeah, yeah. So what’s the plan?”
“We can’t tell you,” said Moti.
“Stick it up your ass,” said Stanley Hirsch.
“Fellas, fellas. It’s for your own protection,” Oscar said. “I can’t sniff out all the rats. Just show up here tomorrow after lunch.”
When the meeting ended, Oscar stopped some of the older juniors at the barn door, including Chick, Jesse, and me, and whispered our orders. Then we wandered over to the cottages on our way to B. A. Beach. It was hot and we were dying to get into the shady woods, wade in the cool brook, but we were riled up and hungry so we knocked on the door.
“Hey, Mr. Grimm,” said Chick.
“What’s on your mind, boys?”
“Nuttin,” said Chick.
“Hungry?”
“Always,” I said.
Mr. Grimm rummaged around in his kitchenette and brought out some bread and cheese. I loved the cozy clutter of the cottage.
“Tell us again about the Bolsheviks storming the Winter Palace,” said Jesse.
“I got into a little trouble over that, my friends,” said Mr. Grimm. “Accused of stirring you fellas up.” He removed a newspaper from the couch so we could sit down.
“Comrades, you mean.” I said.
Mr. Grimm laughed. “Look, fellas. Comrades. The religious zealots who run this joint won’t tolerate a socialist and nonbeliever on the premises.”
“Plenty of us Homeboys are non-believers,” I said.
“Wait a minute,” said Mr. Grimm. “You boys just had your bar mitzvahs.” He sliced the bread on a cutting board and brought it over with a slab of smelly cheese and a knife.
“So what?” I said. “It was a nice ritual. But that’s all it was.” I took a slice of the bread along with a hunk of cheese and s
o did Chick and Jesse. The bread was soft and fresh. We watched each other eat with pleasure, while making sure no one got more than his share.
“It was real nice,” said Chick. “You were there, weren’t you, Mr. Grimm? At the Hotel Astor?”
“I couldn’t afford it. Fifty dollars a plate.”
“Fifty coconuts for a piece of chicken and a baked apple?” Chick said. “Suckers.”
“Wasn’t a baked apple, Chick,” said Mr. Grimm. “I’m told the swells got Baked Alaska.“
“Look Carl, we want your honest opinion,” Jesse said. He reached for another slice of bread then pulled back.
“Go ahead,” Mr. Grimm said. “Bread, cheese, and my opinion are always free of charge.”
“All right then. What do you think of armed rebellion?” Jesse said.
“Ah, the Bolsheviks again,” said Mr. Grimm. “Maybe we should keep the conversation to girls.”
“Girls are good, too,” I said. The three of us snickered. The last time we were over, Mr. Grimm told us some things we could do with women once we got them. He said it seriously, not like the seniors who bragged and smirked and you couldn’t believe a word they said, it was all jokes and lies. Carl told us the truth, but sometimes even Mr. Grimm we didn’t believe. He told us our wives might do to us what some of the boys did to each other. Put it in their mouths. We laughed ourselves silly. This was too good to be true. We’d heard it, but we were sure it was only whores. “Sometimes you might do the same for her,” Mr. Grimm said. Chick punched him on the arm. “Don’t tease us.” We snorted with laughter. “If you want to be a good lover,” he said. He showed us a book he was reading that he held in his hands like a precious jewel: Lady Chatterly’s Lover by D. H. Lawrence, banned in America. Mr. Grimm had a bootlegged copy. He read us a passage with the most hilarious sentence: “If a woman shits and pisses, I’m glad. I wouldn’t want a woman who couldn’t shit or piss.” We howled and repeated the line whenever we got the chance. Pity the poor Homeboy who said he had a girlfriend. “And does she shit, this girlfriend of yours? How about pissing? She do that too?” Chick slapped his knee.
“Lookit, we’re not here to talk about girls,” said Jesse. “You can answer one question, can’t you, Carl?”
“Whose armed rebellion are you talking about?” said Mr. Grimm.
“Ours,” said Chick. “We can’t stand it anymore—the beatings, the cruel punishments for sneezing or laughing. We gotta do something.”
“I watch them,” I said. I had a wad of bread in my cheek, and some soft cheese was stuck to the roof of my mouth, so I chewed and swallowed before I went on. “I watch the little kids sometimes, and it breaks my heart.”
“What little kids?”
“The kids in Company E,” I said, and wiped my mouth with a napkin. “The little guys. The freshmen.”
“What do you mean you watch them?” said Mr. Grimm.
“I go downstairs and stand in the doorway. I’m not doing anything creepy. I swear. They’re so little and cute. I can’t believe I was that little when I came here. They need their mamas. But God forbid they don’t make their beds just right, if the blanket has a wrinkle . . .”
“Whack! on the back of the head,” said Chick, smacking the air in front of him.
“What about you?” Mr. Grimm said. “You get beaten, too.”
“It’s different for us older kids. We’re strong. It’s the little ones I’m worried about.”
“They’re not your problem, Clyde. Worry about yourself. Stick it out. Keep your noses clean. You’ll be out of here before you know it.”
“Four more years of this?” I said. “Are you kidding me?”
“Can you imagine this place without discipline?” Mr. Grimm said. He balanced his cigarette on the edge of a saucer and went to the icebox to get us some milk. “Complete chaos.”
“Standing detention is not discipline,” I said. “It’s torture.”
“You’re going to fight back, is that the idea?” he said.
“We want change. We want action.” I said.
“Don’t tell me anymore,” said Mr. Grimm. “I’ll be forced to report you.”
“Who us?” said Chick. “We didn’t say nuttin.”
For the next twenty-four hours I thought of nothing but how Chick and I, as ranking members of the farm gang, were supposed to leave lunch early, hitch up the horses and start harvesting the potato field in a hurry. Now that we were older, we had the freedom to come and go as we pleased, more or less. No more marching. We had to be present in class, synagogue, Hebrew school, for chores and at meals, but how we got there was our own business. One of the more annoying monitors stopped us anyway, on the way out of the dining room, and asked where the heck we thought we were going, so we told the truth. Out to the farm to bring in the harvest.
Scores of boys got their orders and trudged up the hill after us. None of this aroused suspicion as it was mid-July and the potato plants were well over two feet tall, their purple and white flowers withering, a sure sign the tubers were ready to be dug up. Chick and I harnessed Playboy and hitched up the potato lifter, a wacky-looking contraption with long spikes that raked through the soil like fingernails and brought the tubers to the surface. All the boys had to do was follow along behind us and fill their gunnysacks with as many potatoes as they could carry, careful not to get their arms lopped off by the rotating prongs. I gave Playboy a pat. “Now you can tell your foals you were at the revolution,” I said. After Chick and I were done with our part, we gave a hand to Oscar and Moti, who had a team digging a trench. Most of us were stripped to our waists covered in a slick sheen of sweat. Chick’s freckled skin burned, so he kept his shirt on, which by this point was soaked through and plastered to his body. It was satisfying work. Every shovelful of dirt seemed like progress, a way to somewhere we hadn’t been able to get to before. Pretty soon we had a fifteen-foot-long trench about three-feet deep on the edge of the potato field bordering the service road. We worked steadily until the sun was low in the sky and the heat let up a little. As the last of the bulging sacks was lowered into the trench, the supper bell rang. Normally when the bell rang, we ran like hell for our supper. Now we strained against the urge.
“STAY PUT!” Oscar commanded. “Do not go down to the dining hall! Man your positions! Jump! Get down in the trench.”
We crouched, hidden but still able to see. I kept my eyes on the horizon. The bell rang again and again. I’d never heard that before. The supervisors had to be mystified. Why were so many boys missing from supper? A few more extra clangs, then silence. Nervous laughter down the line. Shut up! Shut up!
We stayed in the trench. Nothing. My heart pounded in fear and excitement and then died down from waiting, until three heads bobbed over the crest of the hill about a hundred yards away. They were coming to us, just like Oscar said they would. Gasps up and down the line. My heart started pounding again, but no longer out of fear, only excitement. My hand twitched. Now they were so close we could see who they were. From left to right, muscle-bound Bull Pushkin, the bastard; in the middle, a silhouette of Humpty Dumpty that had to be Piggy Rosenthal, the lying cocksucker; and on the right, the towering shell-shocked Colonel in his ridiculous uniform.
“Come on. Suppertime! Suppertime!!” Piggy shouted. He waved his arms beckoning, calling us in.
“Boys! Boys! Let’s go!” called Mr. Pushkin.
But there were no boys, not a soul. The three supervisors slowed and stopped and all three shielded their eyes with their hands and scanned the fields, and then their hands dropped to their sides.
“Where is everybody?” said Bull Pushkin.
Piggy Rosenthal blew his whistle furiously at the empty landscape. I fell on my ass laughing in the muddy trench. We were all cracking up, silently of course, well-practiced at that. What a sight those assholes were, waving their arms, scratching their heads. They were quite possibly shitting their pants. Let it be them this time! I got back on my knees and peered out between blades of
grass. The supervisors started walking again, fast approaching. They were about fifteen feet away.
“Ready! Aim! FIRE! Oscar shouted.
A barrage of potatoes flew machine-gun style, rat-a-tat-tat! The supervisors threw up their elbows protectively and backed away, but they were getting hit plenty, some in the head. I threw as hard as I could while still taking aim. One after another, digging into the burlap sack at my feet, leaning back, but not too far, as there wasn’t room to stretch, I shifted my weight from my right foot to my left, feeling the easy weight of a potato in my hand and the strength in my arm as I lobbed it. I got Piggy on the thigh. Dipped into the sack and lobbed another and bull’s-eye, and another and another. I didn’t hear Oscar at first.
“Hold your fire! CEASE FIRE!”
My fingers went limp and I let a potato plop to the bottom of the trench. A fourth figure strode up the hill. There was a collective intake of breath. Superintendent Henry Laudenbacher himself, the big man, boss of the bosses, wielding a megaphone.
“Boys! Boys! Please. Why are you doing this?” His voice echoed.
No one moved or said anything, but we didn’t duck like cowards either. Then Oscar climbed out of the trench.
“We’re on strike!” he called over no-man’s land.
Mr. Laudenbacher lowered the megaphone to his side. “Why?” he called back.
“The supervisors are cruel to us. We’re not coming in until our grievances are addressed and our demands met.”
“All right,” said Laudenbacher. “All right. I’ll meet with you. You and I will talk this out. Bring a boy from each company.”
How sweet to watch the three supervisors file into the infirmary for ice bags from Flanny. At 8 p.m. as promised, Mr. Laudenbacher met with Oscar and his chosen representatives. A bunch of us were loitering outside the office door trying to eavesdrop when Miss Beaufort came by.