The Family Moskat (54 page)

"No, Papa. Not in the middle of the night."

Nyunie woke the maid. They made Hadassah tea with rasp-berry juice and a coddled egg. They gave her rock candy. But Hadassah's cough persisted through the night. Dr. Mintz came early. He put his hairy ear against Hadassah's naked back. Nyunie and Fishel waited in the outer room. The doctor came out to them, his forehead creased.

"I'm not pleased with the way she is."

"What should be done?" Fishel asked, his face pale.

"She'll have to go to Otwotsk. To Barabander's sanatorium."

Nyunie scratched at the tuft of his beard. Unbidden ideas came to his mind. Good that Fishel was a rich man; he'd be able to take care of the expenses. And Hadassah's absence from Warsaw at the sanatorium would be propitious to his own plans in relation to Bronya Gritzhendler. To banish these selfish thoughts he hastened to a show of concern. "Tell me, dear doc-tor, it isn't dangerous, is it?"

"It must be stopped in time," Dr. Mintz answered shortly.

He put on his heavy overcoat and plush hat, lit a cigar, and went out, without waiting for his fee. He knew everything about Hadassah. All rumors sooner or later reached him. Fishel followed him onto the stairs and thrust a banknote into his hand. "How long will she have to be there, doctor?"

"Maybe a year--and maybe three," Dr. Mintz answered gravely. "You made a bad bargain, eh?"

"God forbid!"

Fishel followed Dr. Mintz to the street. "A bad bargain," he thought. "What made him think of that? These assimilated Jews think they're the only ones with hearts in their breasts." He gazed after the carriage as it rounded the corner. He plucked at his sidelocks and bit his lips. Hadassah had cheated him, had heaped shame and disgrace on him. But his love for her could not so easily be rooted out. "The poor creature, lost to this world, lost to the next. Yet it might be that she is more precious in the eyes of God than all the pious pretenders. In her own way she is a pure soul. Who knows whose sins she is called on to atone for? Maybe she is the vessel for the spirit of some holy man whose purification it is her lot to accomplish."

As he climbed up the stairs he decided that under no circum--350-stances would he now divorce her. He would support her in honor.

He would make it his task to see that she was healed. With God's help she would get well, and she would get over her foolish notions. He went into the flat and toward Hadassah's room. "How are you feeling?"

"Thank you--"

"Dr. Mintz says you'll have to go to Otwotsk. You need fresh air."

"I need nothing now."

"Don't say that. With God's help you'll be well. I'll watch over you. Thank God, you're not among strangers."

"Why? What good have I done you?" Hadassah regarded him with a puzzled look on her face. Fishel's eyes, behind the shining lenses of his glasses, smiled. His cheeks flushed. "Why should he still care for me?" she wondered. "Who is he, this man I married?

Is this what his study of the Talmud teaches him? But the Talmudists say that a woman is one of the meaner of God's creatures."

Directly after the mourning period Hadassah was taken by train to Otwotsk. Fishel sat in the second-class car with her. Hadassah held a book bound in black velvet, Novalis
Hymns to the Night
.

Dr. Barabander, the owner of the sanatorium in Otwotsk, had already received a report from Dr. Mintz and had prepared a room for the patient. Hadassah was put to bed immediately on her arrival. The room had a door that led out to a veranda. Clumps of snow rested on the pine trees. Icicles hung from the eaves. Birds twittered as though it were summer. The winter sun was setting, and threw purple shadows on the wallpaper. Fishel left. A nurse hung a temperature chart at the head of the bed and put a thermometer in Hadassah's mouth. It was good to be here, away from Warsaw, from the family, from the Gensha cemetery, from Fishel's shop, from Papa. What would Asa Heshel be doing now?

Was he thinking of her? Where was he? In what barracks, what trenches, amidst what dangers?

She fell asleep. Toward the middle of the night she started up.

Frost flowers were engraved on the edges of the window panes.

The moon cleft its way through the clouds. The stars twinkled.

The heavens remained eternally the same. What did they care about the petty sufferings on the tiny planet called Earth? Yet Hadassah voiced a prayer, in Polish. "Dear God! Take the soul of my mother under Your merciful wings. Guard my be--351-loved from hunger and danger, from sickness and death. For it is You who have put this love into my heart."

She waited tensely for a moment, all her senses on edge.

"Mamma! Do you hear me? Answer me!"

Instead of an answer from her dead mother, she heard the thud and rumble of a freight train. The headlights threw a bold shaft of illumination on the pines, which seemed to flee into the distance.

ONE AFTERNOON when Koppel sat smoking a cigarette at his

desk in the Moskat office, the door opened and Fishel entered. He greeted Koppel, wiped his misted eyeglasses with a piece of chamois, and said: "Are you busy now?"

Koppel returned the greeting and asked his visitor to sit down.

Fishel lowered himself to the edge of a chair. "How are affairs going?" he asked.

Koppel puffed a cloud of smoke directly into Fishel's face.

"Which affairs? Mine or yours?"

"The family affairs."

Koppel felt like saying: "What business is it of yours?" Instead he said: "Everything's dead."

"The trouble is that the family has to have food to eat, and clothes to wear. I'm not talking only about my father-in-law. The others, too. Queen Esther is a widow, unfortunately, and she's got to take care of a houseful of children. They're really going hungry."

"That you don't have to tell me."

"Uncle Nathan is a poor man, practically a beggar. Pinnie hasn't got a grosz to his name. Abram doesn't know where his next meal is coming from."

"Tell me something I don't know."

-352—

Something's got to be done." "Go and do it."

"The whole thing's got to be figured out. My grandfather-in-law-God rest his soul--left a sizable fortune."

Koppel overcame his impulse to grab Fishel by the coat collar and heave him down the stairs. "What is it you want? Make it short."

"The thing's got to be examined. Why, for example, hasn't the estate been divided?"

"Do you expect me to give you a report?"

"God forbid! But why should they suffer from want when something might be done? I hear that part of the estate is a piece of property in Vola and that the city wants to construct a garage for tramcars there. If that's the case why should it be postponed? It would be better than nothing."

"I have nothing against it."

"My father-in-law's no businessman. Pinnie is impractical.

Nathan is sick. So far as Pearl is concerned, she has her own means and doesn't care. In fact, there's no one to keep an eye on things."

"Then keep an eye on them yourself."

"How about the books? There's not even any accounting."

"The bookkeeper's blind."

"What kind of excuse is that?"

Koppel lost his temper. "You're not my boss yet. I don't have to give any reports to you."

"I have a document here that says you do."

Fishel carefully took out of his pocket a folded sheet of paper.

Written in a flowery script, in a mixture of Hebrew and Yiddish, it read:

We, the undersigned, give authority to our relative, the scholarly
and wealthy Fishel Kutner, to administer our houses, forests,
yards, lots, granaries, stables, warehouses, and other properties
that we have inherited from our father, the pious Reb Meshulam
Moskat, may his memory be blessed, in Warsaw and in other
localities wherever situated, until the entire estate is divided
among the heirs in accordance with the law. The above-named
Fishel Kutner is to have the right to receive reports from the
overseer, Koppel, and to divide the rents and all other income
arising from the said estate. He shall also have the authority
-353-
to negotiate with
prospective buyers of the property of the said estate, both real and
personal, as though he were himself the owner. The overseer Koppel
is hereby directed to give a complete accounting to Fishel Kutner. The
said Fishel Kutner is hereby empowered to hire and discharge
employees at his discretion. We have agreed to all of this of our own
free well on the night after the Sabbath, on the 27th day of the month
of Kislav in the year 5676 in the City of Warsaw."

The document was signed by six of the Moskat heirs; only Leah's name was missing.

Koppel peered at the paper for a long time. Many of the words he could not make out, because of the ornate handwriting; others, in Hebrew, he did not understand. But the main idea was clear: Fishel was now the boss; Koppel would have to make an accounting to him; if Fishel pleased he could throw him out. And all of this had been done without Leah's knowledge and without her consent. They had got together in a secret conspiracy and pulled the supports away from under him. Koppel's face turned as gray as the paper he clutched between his fingers. "I see," he murmured. "Yes, I understand."

"What I want to know is exactly how matters stand," Fishel said, this time in a firmer tone.

Koppel stood up abruptly, almost overturning the half-filled glass of tea near the edge of the desk. "You can take the whole thing over," he said. "I'm going home. Thirty years is enough."

Fishel shook his head. "God forbid you should think we're driving you out."

"Here are the keys." Koppel opened a drawer of the desk, took out a bunch of keys, and threw them down. He reached for his hat, coat, and umbrella.

Fishel shook his head again. "You're an impulsive man," he said. "You jump at conclusions too suddenly."

"I don't like underhanded tricks."

"Nobody's doing anything to hurt you. It was my idea you should stay here, in your post. I even suggested a raise in your wages."

"I don't need your raise. When the old man died I shouldn't have stayed on one day."

"Just a moment, Reb Koppel. Don't run away. I'm no more than a messenger here."

-354-Koppel did not

answer. He hesitated for a moment, deciding whether or not to say good-by. Finally he went out without a word, closing the door after him more loudly than usual. How strange! For years they had eyed him with suspicion, maneuvered against him, complained about him and slandered him. But never had they been able to budge him from his post. And now this Fishel appears, with a piece of paper, and he's through. Everything, seemingly, comes to an end. He went down the steps slowly. In the courtyard the janitor took off his hat and Koppel acknowledged the gesture with a wry smile. He threw a last glance around the courtyard. He suddenly felt an astonishing sense of lightness, as though his job had always oppressed him. He walked along the Gzhybovska, taking deep breaths of the cold air. "So it seems I'm destined to go to America," he thought. "It's already been decreed in heaven."

He went over to Leah's house, but she was not in the flat. Since it was too early for him to go home, he went over to the Oxenburgs'.

Mrs. Oxenburg was seated on a stool, plucking a chicken. Two provincial servant girls were seated on a bench, shawls over their heads. Mrs. Oxenburg was talking to them about jobs. In the corridor Koppel ran into the older of the Oxenburg daughters, Zilka. She was carrying a large bag of flour. Koppel asked her jestingly where she had stolen the stuff and the girl answered in the same vein. He pinched her breast. In the dining-room Isador Oxenburg was seated at the table laying out a deck of cards. He was mumbling: "Spades. Always spades."

"What's the matter, Isador?' Koppel called. "Don't you greet anybody any more?"

"Oh, it's you, Koppel. Come in, sit down. And I congratulate you."

"What for?"

"Your friend Mrs. Goldsober is getting married to Krupnick."

"Impossible! When? Where?"

"Right here. You'll get an invitation."

Koppel smiled, but somewhere inside him there was a knot of anger. Everything was swinish. If a man could turn his back on all this bitchery and run away to some island . . . He left without saying good-by and went home. Bashele was in the Kitchen trying to sharpen a knife on the iron edge of the stove. She examined the blade.

" Koppel! So early?"

-355-Koppel sat

down on the cot where Yppe slept. "Bashele, I've got to talk something over with you."

"Well?"

"Bashele, our life together is no life."

Bashele dropped the knife. "As long as I'm satisfied, what else do you want?"

"I want a divorce."

"Go away. You're joking."

"No, Bashele, I'm serious."

"Why? I'm a faithful wife to you."

"I want to marry Leah."

Bashele's face paled, but her lips still smiled. "Are you playing some trick? Or what?"

"No, Bashele. It's the truth."

"And what about the children?"

"They'll be taken care of."

Bashele did not stop smiling. "It's just too bad," she said.

"And then you can get married to the coal dealer across the street."

The instant these words were uttered, Bashele broke into a fit of wailing. The tears gushed from her eyes. She clutched her hands to her breast and ran into the other room.

Koppel stretched himself out on the cot, putting his boots on the freshly arranged coverlet. He lay watching the winter dusk descend. His glance fell on the knife. "Maybe cut my throat," he thought. "It wouldn't matter any more." He closed his eyes.

There was an unfamiliar silence that seemed to carry in from the street. A hidden force was driving him away from here, liquidating all his affairs, tearing him away from family, from friends. How could it all have happened? Mrs. Goldsober hadn't even mentioned it to him. He turned toward the wall. He heard Bashele come in, move about, light the lamp, fuss with the pots.