The Family Moskat (33 page)

He puts it down under the word "Debts" and he watches over every centime. Oh yes, he has some sort of teaching job that pays him a few francs.

Mamma dearest, now we're back in Berne. We're still living in a hotel, but we're looking for a regular place. I am sending you in this letter a note from the rabbi, certifying our marriage, so that the Moskats will be able to send me the two thousand rubles that were promised to me. I really could have kept on postponing the wedding and kept on collecting the ten rubles a week for months; you will remember that according to the agreement I had eighteen months to get married in. But I didn't want to take advantage of that. I'm sure that if they have any pride they won't want to see me the loser financially, and will make it up to me in the way of a gift. If your late husband were alive he would certainly have been lavish with his gifts. You -209-must remember that we're both students and we have no chance to earn any money. I kiss you many times and offer a sincere
Mazeltov
for you as well as for us, because I know that this is as much your joy as it is ours. Asa Heshel sent a telegram to his mother, but he hasn't received an answer yet. From what he tells me about his family it's quite clear that they're a bunch of religious primitives.

Their way of life is just as though they were still in the Middle Ages. Even Asa Heshel himself is a mixture of backwardness and modernity. That's why it's often so hard to understand him.

Please write me how everything is with you, and whether they've already made over to you the house that my late stepfather left to you. I am very eager to hear about every detail. Has Hadassah been married already? Did you go to the wedding? What does the family say about my marriage? Please write me everything. Asa Heshel promises to write you a separate letter. In the meanwhile he sends his heartfelt regards. I kiss you many times. From me, your daughter who hopes to see you soon in peace and in joy--

Adele Bannet

FROM HADASSAH'S DIARY

July 3
.--He has married Adele. In Switzerland.

July 4
.--A sleepless night. An awful suspicion kept on torturing me: he must have written to me, and Mamma concealed his letters. I lay awake until daylight burning with anger. I kept on seeing pictures of myself fighting with Mamma and tearing the letters out of her hands.

In the evening
.--Why don't we have the kind of religion where a Jewish girl can go into a synagogue and kneel in prayer before God? I've been reading the Psalms, translated into Polish. Once I remember seeing my grandmother weeping over her prayerbook, and I laughed at her. God forgive me. Now I myself stain the pages with my tears. Please, Father in heaven, give me back my faith. I want to die--but not before Mamma. I am afraid to imagine her walking after the corpse of her only daughter. I have caused her so much suffering already.

The middle of the night
.--God created everything, the heavens -210-and the earth and

the stars. And all according to His will. What a great comfort this is. If God wants us to suffer, then we must suffer with thankfulness.

(I must never forget this!!!)

July 5
.--A wedding announcement has come, printed in He-brew and German. Shifra brought it in to me. I suppose Adele had it printed especially to send here to Warsaw. So that she could gloat over all of us. It's so childish and so disgusting. They are in Berne.

I'm sure that he's unhappy, but not like I am.

July 6
.--There must be some sort of devils racing around in my brain. I fight with all my strength not to hate poor Mamma. I love her, but somehow I can't abide her presence. Please, God, do not take away from me the last object of my love. My Uncle Abram doesn't want to have anything more to do with me. It seems to me that everybody rejoices over my misfortune. But that can't be true.

They are making so many dresses and clothes for me that it's really terrible. They've engaged seamstresses, and they are in the living-room sewing all sorts of shirts and underwear, all trimmed with lace. It's so old-fashioned and unpleasant, just as though we're all stuck somewhere in the Middle Ages. They're making me a fur coat. I'm so happy that Klonya is in Miedzeshin. I'm more ashamed to face her than anyone else. They've taken my measurements for a matron's wig. I tried it on and in the mirror I hardly recognized myself. With all of the tragedy, I really wanted to burst out laughing. Well, I'll wear it, just as though it were my cross.

Dawn
.--I slept for six solid hours. I dreamed that I was at the cemetery on the Gensha. There was a slanting plank of wood there, and dead children were sliding down it. One little girl had a ribbon in her blond hair and a scar on her forehead. I can see her now. If everything comes from God, what is the sense of dreams like this? The wedding is to take place at grandfather's old flat, not at a hall. They're already printing the invitations. It's my own fault.

I've willingly bent my shoulders to receive the yoke. And I know there is more suffering waiting for me.

I received a letter from my bridegroom. He has such a round handwriting, and there's a little curlicue at the end of each word.

The letter was in a mixture of three languages, Yiddish, Polish, and Russian. It's quite evident he copied it out of one of those books that print sample letters of all kinds.

July 8
.--I was sitting on one of the benches in the Saxon Gardens, and a wild thought came to me--to write a letter to
him
.

-211-I know his

address in Switzerland. I knew that I wouldn't really dare to send it, but just the same I went into a shop and bought a sheet of paper and an envelope. I wrote the word "
Mazeltov
" in Yiddish, and then I tore the sheet into pieces and threw them away. It's all so foolish.

And all the time I cried so much that people stared at me.

July 9
.--Yesterday I met my Uncle Abram in the street. When he saw me he made a movement as though to turn away, but instead he took off his hat, bowed, and hurried on. I never believed that my Uncle Abram would ever lift his hat to me and then go on his way, like a stranger. Apart from the fact that he doesn't like my husband-to-be, my marriage is a personal calamity to him. What it means is that Koppel has won out over him. How strange it is that in our family everything is complicated by strife and personal ambition. Papa is in Otwotsk; he doesn't even write to me. After Grandfather died I could have had my way in everything; that is the truth. I could even have got Papa to agree to my going away to Switzerland. But I was too broken. I am plunging into the abyss of my own free will. I really don't understand it. It's as though I were committing suicide.

In the evening
.--It's so difficult for me to imagine him with Adele.

It's simple enough, but my mind can't grasp it. I know for sure that he's thinking of me day and night. It can't be otherwise. Our beings have a sort of electrical affinity for each other. Thank God I don't feel any hatred toward Adele. (This very second I
did
feel a twinge of hatred; she has such a hypocritical nature. Dear God, protect me!) The only thing I'm afraid of is that I might go out of my mind. There's a sort of childish terror that seems to hold me enchained. I can't describe it. For some reason I've developed a frantic fear of dirt of any kind; I'm always washing myself. And every few minutes I imagine that I have to go to the bathroom. It's all so unpleasant. Stepha brought me a volume of Forel to read. I read it once before, but this time it all seemed so loathsome. Why is everything in the world profaned?

Later
.--There's something I must do and I don't know what it is.

I'm envious of the nuns that I see walking on the street; they all seem so at peace. If not for my mother, I would become one of them. I have a strange premonition that my marriage to Fishel will not take place. Something will happen. Either I'll die, or I'll run away at the last moment. My mother gave me half of -212-her jewels. It suddenly occurs to me that I could sell them all and run off to America. People have done things like that before. But what's the sense of such thoughts? All hope has gone forever.

Morning
.--I've completely forgotten the date. All I know is that in about two weeks I'll have to stand under the wedding canopy.

They've just brought the wedding dress. I tried it on, and when I looked in the mirror I saw to my astonishment that I'm still good-looking. The dressmakers kept on exclaiming how beautifully the dress fits. It has a lot of folds and a long train. For a moment I felt better, and I thought to myself that things weren't so terrible after all. I am young, and good-looking, and I'm not poor. I could see how the others envied me, and that made me more cheerful for a while.

Monday
.--This Saturday my bridegroom will be "called up" for a reading at the prayerhouse. Mamma called Papa on the telephone at Otwotsk. He promised he would come back right away. The wedding will be on Friday, and on Saturday night there'll be a reception. Mamma is doing all the work. Day and night she's busy cooking and baking. She worries about everything, and that aggravates her gall-bladder condition. How can I help her, when I just can't stand being near her? And while I am suffering so much,
he
is somewhere in a pension in the Alps with Adele.

Shifra brings me all the news. All the things I didn't even dare to hope for myself. I am sure that she doesn't even love him. How she must rejoice over my misfortune!

The middle of the night
.--How easy it would be to put an end to everything. I found a piece of cord and made a noose in it.

There's a hook on the wall, and I have a stool. Everything that is needed to be rid of all my troubles. But something holds me back. I suppose it's sympathy for Mamma. I know, too, that God doesn't want us to run away from His punishment. And deep in-side me there's still a hope that everything is not yet lost.

Tuesday
.--Dear diary, dear friend, it's almost three weeks since I've written in your pages. She who writes now is not the Hadassah you knew before. I am sitting at a writing-desk, a matron's wig on my head, and my own face is as strange to me as my soul.

I have gone through all of it: the ritual bath, the wedding ceremony, and all the rest. I will confide no more of my secrets to you, my diary. You are pure; I am unclean. You are honorable; I am false. I hardly have the courage to turn your pages. I will hide you away, together with a few other mementos that are -213-precious to me.

Even my name is changed now. Now I am Hadassah Kutner. And that name is just as meaningless as everything else that's happened to me. Adieu, my diary. Forgive me.

3

Letter from Rosa Frumetl to Adele
To my precious and devoted daughter Adele Bannet
: I open this letter by informing you that my health, thank God, is good; and may God grant that I may hear the same from you always and forever, amen. Second, I again wish you a heartfelt
Mazeltov
, and many joys and long years of satisfaction and all good things; may your marriage be an omen of peace and prosperity and may the years cover you with health and honor.

For who else is left to me in all the world save you, my daughter?

True, it would have been well if I might have had the merit of leading my only child to the canopy, but probably in God's eyes I am not worthy of so great a blessing. When your telegram came to me I shed tears of gratitude and rejoicing. If only your sainted father could have lived to see this day. May he be an intermediary and a pleader for mercy before the divine throne for you and your husband and for all of us, amen. I am sure that his spirit hovered over your wedding canopy and that he prayed to God that you may have blessings and benedictions and know no more of sadness, and that your husband may treasure you with honor.

For it is true that he has acquired a rare jewel, such as one might search for all over the world, intelligent and beautiful and--may no evil befall you!--with all virtues. And I pray to God that you may be an exemplary wife; undoubtedly it is so decreed by Heaven, for everything is determined in heaven even before we are born. And I must tell you further that when I saw Asa Heshel for the first time at Nyunie's house, I felt a strange pang in my heart, which seemed to be telling me that he was the one who was to be your destined husband. And now it is as though he were my own child. I cannot tell you of my eagerness to meet his mother and his grandmother, and his grandfather, the rabbi of Tereshpol Minor. May God be thanked, my daughter, for you have acquired a husband of noble birth, as is fitting for your own distinguished lineage, and you may hold your head high. The foolishness of his youth is long forgotten, and if the end is good, then all is good.

-214-I must write

you further that your good news has rejoiced everyone and that everyone has come forward to wish you everything that is best, even Dacha, though--the truth must be said--she did so not with an open heart. The two thousand rubles have already been placed in your name in the bank. About the ten rubles' weekly allowance there have been many words. The matter would have been well arranged except that that scoundrel Koppel interfered, and Leah, too, let herself be heard. You are aware, my daughter, of all the gossip that has been whispered concerning these two--and now I can see that they were true words. One hand washes the other. I gave them warning that if no fair settlement were arrived at I would sum-mon them to an arbitration. Nor is the matter of the building left to me by your late stepfather yet settled. It would seem that they are anxious to drag the affair out until I weary of it.

But I may tell you, my daughter, that this I will not permit. The truth is that they are overflowing with riches; they do not know themselves the limits of their wealth. Many people are saying that that abandoned villain Koppel has looted the family from head to toe. In spite of that he has become the real head of the family affairs and he is the one who holds the reins; especially since the others are, unfortunately, thick-skulled. How often did I warn your stepfather! But now it is all too late. In the meanwhile I was required to move from the large apartment and was given a flat of two rooms on the Tvarda. Joel moved into the large flat. I could, of course, have made difficulties, but I did not want to enter into any quarrels with them, for they are, may I be forgiven the words, a coarse lot.