In the Beginning Page 9

  “Nissan asked to be remembered to the organization and is grateful for its help. He hopes in two or three years to be able to come to America. There is a difficulty with his father. Business is bad now in Bobrek, he says, because of competition from Lemberg, and new people want to join the organization. I have informed Max of this and it will be discussed by the membership committee. In Lodz, Yonah Brenner and Levi Bromberg have expanded their textile business successfully, despite the tariff problems and the small Polish market, and next year they will be able to make a substantial contribution to the Free Loan Fund as a mark of gratitude for the help given them by the organization. Levi’s brother hopes to come to America in two years and Yonah’s sister, Tziporah, is going to Eretz Yisroel in November. There are other messages from Lodz, but they are of a private nature and I will communicate them in the course of the day. In Warsaw, Aaron Schnitzer asked me to inform the organization that he is now in diamonds and is eager to be of help to the organization in any way it sees fit. He has also asked me to inform the organization that he now has connections in Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Paris, Tel Aviv, Johannesburg, and Capetown. He expresses his deepest gratitude to the Am Kedoshim Society for the help it rendered him concerning his brother’s problems. He is especially grateful to Meyer.” He paused, looked up from the pad, and said quietly, in Hebrew, “He who understands will understand,” then continued reading from the pad.

  I looked away from him and gazed slowly around at the people seated in the clearing. They were listening intently, hungry for each word he spoke. The food, covered with paper napkins, lay untouched on the blankets. An occasional fly settled on the napkins. My mother listened with her eyes closed, a sad, wistful, longing smile on her thin lips. Alex sat quietly on her lap, apparently awed by the silence of the group, chewing wetly at his Kaiser roll. Wispy clouds sailed lazily below the sun. A flock of small birds raced across the sky in the direction of the zoo.

  Mr. Bader went on speaking in his placid businesslike manner. My father stood beside him, looking somewhat dwarfed by Mr. Bader’s tall sparse form. My father stood with his legs spread slightly apart, his hands clasped behind him. Once in a movie I had seen soldiers stand like that. My father liked to see movies about soldiers. He had once taken my mother and me to a movie and there had been many soldiers running and falling and shells exploding and long charges across broken smoking earth and men firing rifles and machine guns and hand-to-hand fighting with bayonets and rifles in trenches, all in absolute silence save for the piano that gave tinny life to the movement on the huge screen. My mother had come out of the movie looking very pale. She walked leaning heavily on my father’s arm. “I was sure you would be over it,” my father kept saying. “I apologize, Ruth. It was a stupid mistake and I take full blame.” When had that been? I could not remember. My father never took us again to movies about soldiers. He went alone.

  My forehead ached and I felt the first faint chills of the approaching fever. A sudden burst of laughter followed by a heavy stirring sound came from the group. I looked around: faces had turned strangely hard. He had said something just then about Polish anti-Semites. What had it been? I should have listened. It had been something about Poles and drunkenness and a man falling off a wagon. They had all laughed, even my mother; then had come the tense rustling movement, as if everyone there had crossed together from the satisfaction of achievement to the expectation of further menace and challenge. I could not remember when I had last seen my mother laugh. She never laughed. Laughter was as much a stranger to her as sleep was to me. Yet she had laughed. I would have to listen and keep my mind from wandering back and forth through memories. But my head was beginning to hurt badly now. Still I would try hard to listen. What was Mr. Bader saying about Pilsudski? I could barely hear him, his voice was so calm and quiet.

  “Max can tell you more about Marshal Pilsudski than I. He was in Pilsudski’s army killing Russians while I was first getting used to wearing United States Army puttees. But almost everyone I met informed me that life for Jews in Poland under Pilsudski remains very difficult. Max once mentioned to me that Pilsudski was the kind of anti-Semite who did not want the Jews in his army harmed by Poles. That is an accomplishment in Poland. But the peasants are hungry and angry. The crop failure has aggravated the situation. The peasants and townspeople blame the Jews for everything, and Pilsudski does very little to protect the Jews because he does not want to antagonize the Poles. That is the picture, in case some of you here are not entirely up to date. Did you hear that there were ritual murder stories this year in Lublin and Vilna? I see some of you did not. Yes, Jews were accused of killing Christian children and using their blood in the baking of matzos. In Eastern Europe we are still agents of Satan and the Angel of Death.” I glanced quickly at Saul. His eyes were wide behind their shell-rimmed glasses. “Little has changed since you all left. There was a serious anti-Semitic riot in Lemberg recently. You know that. Yes. About Lemberg you all know everything. Fine. In any event, though life is somewhat more stable now than it was a few years back, there is still considerable unemployment, especially in Warsaw, and Jews have not yet recovered from the devastation of the war and the revolution and the epidemic. I need not tell you the details. You all receive letters from your relatives and friends. You know what is happening. Your friends and families are grateful for the help given them by your organization. I am happy to be able to be of service to you and continue to be grateful for the accident that brought me into contact with your founder, Max Lurie. Since everyone here is a board member of the organization, I don’t mind telling in absolute confidence—and I am certain that young Saul Lurie understands what that means. Yes? Good—I don’t mind telling you that the ARA and the State Department are not helping Jews too much and if it were not for the JOAC, Jews would be starving. That is my report. Thank you.”

  Again, the group stirred heavily. There were whispers and nods. Mr. Bader went back to his blanket, hitched up his trousers with a deft motion of his wrists, and sat down.

  My father stood alone in front of the group. He cleared his throat.

  “I thank Mr. Bader for his report. Ten years ago when the Am Kedoshim Society was founded in the forest outside Bobrek, did anyone dream we would be as active and as rich an organization as we are now? God has been good to us. I am sure that David, my dear brother, may he rest in peace, has been a good interceder for us. The forty of us who were there, who had served with Pilsudski for the sake of Poland and had returned to Lemberg and Bobrek and Polish anti-Semites, decided it was time for us to help ourselves. To hell with the Poles and their filthy anti-Semitism. Jews would help Jews. Why should we help a people that wants to kill us? Let the stinking Poles take care of their own problems. You remember I said it would take only a little money from each of us to get ourselves started. I learned that in the trenches from a clever goy whose father was in banking and who used to make money from the watches and wallets he stripped off the dead bodies of the Russians I killed. I am giving this little speech now because I want you all to know that we are not in the business of making money but using money to help our members. I have prepared a full report of our stock transactions over the past few months and you will receive it in the mail soon. At the next meeting of our finance committee I will request the right to sell off stocks as I see fit in order to increase the availability of liquid capital. Our good friend is returning to Europe for a quick trip in three weeks. I want him to go with a lot of our money and to help a lot of our members, both old and new, the new ones our membership committee will accept at its meeting tomorrow night. And, please, I do not need your cheers. I do this because I see it as my job. If we are truly am kedoshim, a nation of holy people, then each of us has a job to do, and he should do it without the silliness of public praise. I have completed my remarks. Let us wash our hands and enjoy our picnic. And I challenge any of the men here to a wrestling match afterward.”

  There was a burst of laughter and loud cheers. People began to rise to
their feet, when my father suddenly clapped his hands sharply together and said, “I forgot something. I am sorry. Forgive me. I asked Dr. Weidman to come and speak to us very briefly about a serious matter that has to do with health.”

  Dr. Weidman, short, pink-faced, red-haired, wearing his pince-nez and smiling cheerfully, talked briefly in Yiddish about the various kinds of paralysis that could result from poliomyelitis; he stated that the usual epidemic would probably break out this year some time in August; he talked of precautions, danger signs, urged everyone to be conscious of the need for cleanliness, to avoid fatigue, and to go to the country for August if that was possible. “Do not let your children become chilled. Do not swim for too long. Do not become overheated and then jump right in for a swim. Try to avoid crowded areas. If there is a sore throat with a high fever, call a doctor immediately.”

  He left behind him an apprehensive silence when he returned to his blanket.

  My father said, “Now we can wash and eat.”

  He joined us on our blanket. “Nu, Ruth. We lived to see it. Ten years. Where is the water bottle?”

  He washed his hands, spilling the water onto the grass. All around us people were washing their hands in similar fashion. He said very quickly the prayer for washing the hands and for bread. He broke a piece off a slice of rye, sniffed it, chewed it, and swallowed.

  “How are you feeling, David?”

  “I’m all right, Papa.”

  “Did you understand what went on here before?”

  “I think so, Papa. I understood a little bit.”

  “It is not a topic for street talk, David. It is like the things we keep only in the family. That you understand?”

  “Yes, Papa.”

  “Good.”

  “Papa?”

  “Yes, David.”

  “What is JOAC?”

  “It stands for Jewish Overseas Aid Committee. J is Jewish. O is overseas. And so on. You understand? It is an organization of American Jews who help Jews in Europe.”

  “What is ARA?”

  “You remember all those letters like that?”

  “I told you, Max,” my mother murmured from behind a smoked meat sandwich.

  “Yes, I know you told me. ARA stands for American Relief Administration. It is an American government organization set up to help very poor people in Europe.”

  “Why does America help Europe?”

  “Because America is a rich country and it feels it has a job to help people who are poor.”

  “The way Jews help Jews?”

  “Yes. But America helps mostly goyim in Poland. The American money is given to Polish organizations, and they give it to goyim. Why don’t you eat your sandwich, David? Meat gives you muscles. Afterward we will play some games, yes?”

  “Yes, Papa.” I could feel he was happy; he never showed happiness on his face, but you felt it when it was there. His movements were slower and gentler and he answered questions patiently rather than brusquely. I did not want to spoil his happiness by telling him I had begun to feel ill. Perhaps I would play anyway despite the pain in my head. But if the pain reached my face I would not be able to play. I would have to be very still then and perhaps even need to be carried home.

  “God makes such coincidences,” Saul said. He was chewing cautiously on a piece of meat, trying to hold his upper lip still. “I just read about the way it happened in Prague.”

  I did not understand what he was saying.

  “Where the Maharal created the Golem. In a city called Prague in Czechoslovakia hundreds of years ago.”

  “What does Maharal mean, Saul?”

  “It’s short for Morenu harav Loew. Our master, Rabbi Loew. Mem is morenu. Hara is from harav, rabbi. You understand?”

  JOAC. ARA. Maharal. How people played with letters and words.

  “He was the Rabbi of Prague. He lived about four hundred years ago. And he was almost a hundred years old when he died.”

  “Really?”

  “Ouch, my lip. I hurt my lip.” He was silent a moment. “Stupid accident,” he said. “The book I read said the goyim in that city kept accusing Jews of killing children and using the blood for matzos. The Maharal made a tall strong man out of clay—a golem—and he would go around and see what the goyim were doing, and if a goy made plans to harm the Jews the Golem would report it to the Maharal, who would tell the police. Sometimes he was invisible.”

  “Really? Was he a giant?”

  “I don’t know if he was a giant. But the book said he was very tall and big and strong.”

  “How did he become invisible?”

  “The Maharal gave him some kind of lucky charm, and whenever he wore it around his neck it would make him invisible.”

  “He made the Golem out of clay?”

  “Near the Moldau River in Prague there are places where you can find clay. The Maharal went down with two people from his synagogue in the middle of the night and made this shape out of clay and said some special prayers and it came to life.”

  “Really? It came to life? And it helped the Jews against the goyim? And it was invisible? That’s a good story, Saul. I like it better than the story about Abraham smashing all those heads.”

  “Isn’t it strange how Mr. Bader heard about the same thing just now in Europe when he was there?”

  “It’s just an accident that you read the book now, Saul.”

  My parents were talking quietly together. Alex had finished his roll and was attacking a slice of rye bread, unperturbed by the talk and laughter and movement around him. Most of the people were speaking Yiddish; some were speaking in a language I did not understand; I heard no English. A man began to sing and the song was quickly picked up by others around us. It was a Yiddish lullaby about a fire burning in a hearth and the house warm and schoolchildren being taught the Hebrew alphabet. They had stopped eating and were all singing together, including Mr. and Mrs. Bader. I noticed that Dr. Weidman was gone.

  The song ended; the eating resumed. My brother became disenchanted with his slice of rye bread and tossed its soggy remnants onto the grass. He got up on his feet, began to explore the blanket, and stepped into a paper plate of sauerkraut. My mother put him on her lap and gave him a bottle of juice. He put the nipple to his lips, let out a gurgle, and sucked greedily.

  One of the men on a nearby blanket called out, “Max, are you going back this year?” He was a dark-haired man in his thirties who came often to our house in the evenings. “You’ve never gone back.”

  “No,” my father said. “I am not crazy.”

  “I may go over,” said the man, lowering his voice.

  “Don’t be a fool, Aaron.”

  “They have no memories for old crimes.”

  “Do what you want. But you are a fool.”

  “I’m considering it.”

  “Better they should come here.”

  “That’s it. That’s where the dog lies buried. They won’t come. My father is like your father. He says his job is to stay there.”

  I saw my father’s face go stiff.

  “What should I do, Max?”

  “Whatever you do,” my father said in a flat, cold voice, “do not go.”

  “You always see the dark side of the world, Max.”

  “Yes. And I am rarely surprised. Who is that? Sonia?”

  A woman’s rich contralto voice had suddenly burst into a lively song. The talk ceased immediately; heads turned. The woman sat near the side of the clearing that was across from the path we had taken through the wood. She was small and slight of build, but her voice filled the clearing and echoed within the silent branches of the trees. She was singing a song in a language I did not understand; it sounded like Polish, the language my parents spoke on occasion when they were alone or with friends or when they did not want me to understand what they were saying. After a moment some of the people began to hum the melody and then sing the words. Soon everyone was singing except me, my brother, and Saul. My mother sang with her eyes closed,
her body swaying slightly from side to side. I saw she had taken my father’s hand in hers. He was singing very quietly, his face wearing a stiff look. I felt like that sometimes when I wanted to cry but for some reason would fight back the tears: all stiff and hard and stonelike in my face and chest and fingers.

  As I watched my father, I saw my brother take the bottle out of his mouth. I thought he was about to toss it on the grass alongside his discarded piece of bread, and I reached out for it. But he put it back into his mouth. Then I looked across his shoulder and along the front of the group and saw Eddie Kulanski standing very still just inside the pine wood near the edge of the clearing. Behind him stood a tall man and woman in their late twenties or early thirties. The man was flaxen-haired and wore a tight polo shirt and tight trousers. The woman had very full breasts and a round face with high cheekbones and long blond hair. They stood behind Eddie Kulanski and looked around the clearing and listened to the song. Some of the men had removed their straw hats and were wearing skullcaps. I saw Eddie Kulanski and his parents standing there and looking at us. I did not know how long they had been standing there. Eddie Kulanski’s father carried a picnic basket and his mother carried a blanket. Eddie Kulanski held a baseball bat, a glove, and a softball. On his head he wore a baseball hat. I felt cold seeing him there suddenly on the edge of the clearing like a ghost in one of Saul’s stories, the ones that were not from the midrash but were just plain stories that no one believed but were exciting to hear. As I sat there staring at them, Eddie Kulanski turned his head slightly and his eyes met mine. His thin pointed face and half-closed eyes remained expressionless and cold. He did not seem surprised to see me; he must have noticed me earlier. There had been no one near the edge of the woods during the speeches. They must have come just a short while ago. What were they thinking as they stood there watching and listening to a group of Jews singing a Polish song? They would talk about it afterward when they left. The Golem might know what they said if he followed them. Invisible, he could follow them and listen to everything they said about Jews. What did goyim say about Jews when they were only among themselves?