Son of a Smaller Hero

  The night sky was deep black and littered with stars. Slim, resolute buildings loomed tall against the hot sky. Neon twitched. Stragglers loitered on corners. St. Catherine Street, deserted, spun out before him like an unanswered question. The occasional homebound whore or baffled drunk walked past quick and unassured, stripped of funds and paid for rumpusing, without commotion and no longer accompanied. Wanting people, unused, headed unwillingly for the longer and more asking night of their rented rooms. Nobody crowded for streetcars: nobody waited under clocks. The lying day was done for. Theatre marquee lights had gone out. Nightclub neon spluttered, then failed. Only the stars stayed on. That, and the quiet. But the stars were too high and the quiet sought them out rudely.

  Noah, however, knew where he could still get a drink. He went to Gino’s on Dorchester Street. Here the neon, the chromium women and the tinsel men, were all unneeded. Most of the regulars were drunk on arrival. Hope had expired and glamour was defunct. The whores did without ruses and the men drank solemnly without too much talk. Noah strained to adjust his eyes to the smoke-filled room. Stumbling between tables he finally found a vacant stool at the bar. He ordered a whisky, and searched in vain among the many stunned faces for a hint of vitality. He would have liked somebody sympathetic to talk to. Perhaps, he thought, I too will end up looking at my watch. Pretending that I’m waiting for a friend. Or that the stranger I might talk to is the oldest of my friends. Or absorb myself in a job. “I’m a busy man, you know.” He felt the photographs and receipts in his pocket. Nobody will mourn for you, Melech. This is Montreal, and we serve many Gods. We believe in minding our own business and the freedom to agree with us. When we go to heaven one will say, I did not cheat on my income tax, and another, I used to give up my seat on streetcars for old ladies.

  Miriam. Miriam, he thought. Miriam.

  Many pillows were propped up behind her. Leah still pale, but she was also very agitated. “I may live for only a few months.…”

  Noah remained by the window with his back turned to her. He clenched his fists and felt something yield deep inside him. Heart, he thought. But I would have gone, anyway – had I still loved her. His hands slipped into his jacket pockets and recoiled swiftly when they touched the letters and receipts. “Miriam,” Noah called out softly. “Miriam.” Then his hands fell limply back into his pockets again and he crushed the letters viciously. What if I do love her, Noah thought, and have turned against her out of fear?

  “Boyele, you won’t have to take care of me so long. I probably won’t last.…”

  “Please, Maw, don’t talk like that.”

  “Your father left an insurance policy of five thousand …”

  “Please don’t go on. Please.…”

  “We can get a small apartment in Outremont.… We …”

  The broken oars burst free of their locks. The boat itself broke up underneath him. And Noah, who did not call out for help, felt the waters close over him.

  “Yes, Maw. Anything you say.”

  III

  She found Miriam perched on a rock by the stream.

  “Marg,” Miriam said.

  They embraced. Then, their hands still joined, they stood apart in the sun and studied each other like competing dancers. She’s altered, Miriam thought. Marg had used to be a lean woman with a vital face and lots of quickness to her body. The woman who smiled at Miriam under that sun was nervously thin with eyes that made fast calculations and a face that was hardening.

  Miriam was barefooted. Her hair, bleached by the sun, hung in swift tangles round her neck. She squeezed Marg’s hand. “Come on in,” she said. Marg seemed dubious. “Noah’s in Montreal. His father died a few days ago. He …”

  “Yes. I know. They ran a rather vulgar ad in the papers. Apparently his father was something of a …”

  “Noah had nothing to do with that.”

  Marg peeled off her long, white gloves. “I can’t get over how wonderful you look,” she said. “Would you recommend him?”

  Miriam faked a tiny laugh. She poured drinks.

  “I’ve been sent here on a rather delicate mission, darling.” Marg picked a sliver of tobacco off her wide, sensual lips. “You might say that I’m the poor man’s Eden. I …”

  “Theo?”

  Marg moistened her index finger and ran it down her leg. “Damn these nylons.” She looked up and smiled ingenuously. “Don’t anticipate. I’ve planned my little speech.”

  “How is he?”

  “Theo?”

  “Yes.”

  “In a mess. You happy?”

  “I think Noah is leaving me.”

  “Oh dear.”

  I mustn’t break down, Miriam thought. I mustn’t.

  “Do you want to talk?” Marg asked invitingly.

  “I – I behaved rather foolishly last night. We had a bad quarrel just before Noah got the news about his father’s death. I think that my bitching was beginning to bore him. Anyway I drove in to see him last night and made a scene in front of his mother. She’s dreadful, but she’s got a tremendous hold on him and there was a scene and she had a heart attack. She … I don’t know if you understand how strong Jewish family ties …”

  “Remember David Shub?”

  “The boy who sat next to you in English 107?”

  “Yes. We were going to get married, but … We’re the last word in bed, darling, but eventually they all settle down with a dreadfully respectable Jewish girl who cooks them that awful greasy food and turns out a baby a year and is paraded about in mink.”

  “Will you please stop.” Miriam bit her lip. “Noah’s different,” she said.

  “Aren’t they all different?”

  “Did Theo send you here to ask me for a divorce?”

  “No.”

  “Would you like another drink?”

  “Yes, but you’d better get yourself a Kleenex first.”

  “I’m sorry.” Miriam blew her nose. Then she poured more drinks. “How’s John?”

  “John’s John.”

  “Are you happy?”

  “I’m not like you, Miriam. I don’t expect to be happy. I think all men are bastards. I … Were you in love with Chuck?”

  “Yes.”

  “He was laying both of us. You knew that?”

  “Yes.”

  “That’s where we differ, you see. I wasn’t in love with him. I enjoyed him while he was around. You don’t hurt as easily that way.”

  “Perhaps.”

  “Would you like some advice?” Marg asked.

  “Go ahead.”

  “Noah’s ten years younger than us. You’re an adventure to him. He …”

  “He’s …”

  “He’s not different. Damn, I haven’t come here to torment you. I want to help.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Theo’s the same as any other man. Right now he’d be willing to forgive and forget. Etc. But in a month, or two months …”

  “I’m not going back to him.”

  “Miriam, be sensible.”

  “I’m not going … He married me so that he could have someone to blame his failures on. We were never in love. We …”

  “Never in what? Aren’t you being slightly romantic?”

  “I’m in love with Noah, Marg. I don’t care about his family or … I’m going to hang around and fight it. I want him. I’m not …”

  “I’m Theo’s mess.”

  “You.”

  “Oh, don’t look at me like that. He was lonely. I didn’t think he’d take it so seriously.”

  “You’re afraid,” Miriam said.

  “He’s an awfully moral lover. Not to haggle about his other failures in that direction. He’d like to tell John. ‘We can’t go on being friends.’ He’s impossible!”

  Miriam giggled. “I’m sorry,” she said.

  “If you’re not going back to him, if you insist on this Noah of yours, will you at least speak to Theo and ask him not to say anything to John about – about us?”
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  “I’ll phone him tomorrow.”

  “Promise?”

  “Yes.”

  “I still think you should go back to him.”

  “I can’t. It would kill me.”

  Miriam giggled after the car had driven off, but soon after that she felt terribly depressed again. She prepared dinner. She ate her bacon and eggs on the screen porch, not at all sure that she would be able to keep it down. It was almost eight o’clock. A breeze swept down from the hills and twisted in the tall grass, and Miriam put on her sweater. Pink tongues licked at the clouds, and the sun dipped lower, less hot but still brilliant, in the fading sky. The pine-stubbled hills that were sprawled on all sides turned a lusher green. Bloated frogs croaked. A swarm of crows flew past, cawing blackly and intent on some distant field. The shadows on the road grew longer. No dust stirred. Miriam got up and collected the soiled dishes.

  That’s when she saw Noah walking towards her. He was already on the lawn. Miriam trembled. “Noah,” she said.

  He hadn’t heard. Not yet. He waved, but his gesture was without spirit. Immediately Miriam anticipated the worst. But she smiled anyway. “Hello,” she said.

  “Hello.”

  “Let’s go swimming,” she said quickly. “You can eat when we get back.”

  Noah started as though to say something. A protest began in his eyes. But Miriam stopped him, putting her hand gently to his mouth. He smiled feebly. Each of them suffered from a sudden, deeply felt pain. “Whatever it is,” Miriam said softly, “it’ll keep for a bit.” He seemed doubtful of that and Miriam pressed his hand and smiled as well as she could. “Don’t worry, darling,” she said. “I know.”

  They got into the car together and drove for a mile without a word being spoken. Finally Miriam turned to him. “Can you stay the night?”

  “Yes. Certainly.”

  Then they looked at each other. Amazed. Both of them remembered the last time that question had been asked.

  “I guess our roles have been reversed,” Miriam said.

  The beach was deserted. They walked hand in hand out into the lake. Her inscrutable smile smacked richly of superior knowledge and he shirked from it.

  “We could swim out far and not come back,” she said.

  Her voice had a hard, dangerous edge to it. There was still some sun left; and it passed through her hair unfairly lovely. Noah touched her cheek gently. “The first time I went to a restricted beach,” he said, “a guy chased me with a canoe paddle. But I got away.”

  “You’ll always get away.”

  That hurt. He pushed her back into the water with the flat of his hand and then swam out after her. They swam for about half an hour and then ran back on to the beach and flopped down exhausted on their blanket. The sky darkened. The hills, a blur at first, were gradually consumed by the night. Noah smoked.

  “What if I were pregnant?”

  Noah jumped up and rubbed his shoulders with a towel. “Stop teasing,” he said.

  They didn’t talk driving back. He waited on the porch steps while she went inside to prepare sandwiches. A slight wind came up from the stream. Noah got up and found her in the bedroom. Three bobbypins were held between her teeth and her wet hair adhered to her bronzed shoulders. She had one leg in her slacks. Her bra, flung hastily over her shoulders, had not yet been strapped. Noah reached out for her impetuously and held her tight to him. “No. Please, Noah. I can’t.” Her cheeks were salty from tears. “The toast’ll burn.” She wiggled out of his arms.

  Noah changed and sat down on the porch steps again. From far away, up from the next valley perhaps, came the sound of people’s laughter. Others were having a party.

  “Are you cold? Can I get you a jacket?” Miriam asked.

  She was wearing black slacks. Her hair had been combed back straight and in her eyes there was some terror, some tenderness, and a lot of the child. She set the tray down on the porch. There was a bottle of whisky and sandwiches. She sat down beside him and lit a cigarette. “Go ahead,” she said.

  Noah slapped his arm and killed a mosquito. “I’ll have a drink,” he said. “You?”

  “All right.”

  Her needs were contradictory. She despised him for what she thought he was going to say, but, on the other hand, she was afraid that he was suffering immensely, and that made her feel tender towards him.

  He told her about the scrolls that his father had supposedly died for. He said that he couldn’t believe it. He told her about Melech’s letters, and about the empty tin of kerosene. “There is the kind of Jew,” he said, “who gets the same nourishment out of a Goy as the worst type of communist gets from a lynching in the south. Take the Goy away from him and you’re pulling out the thread that holds him together.” Those people in the next valley, the ones who were having a party, were playing music loud. The music came to them in gusts. “Another kind of Jew claims all the famous dead and flings them into the faces of prejudiced persons like bits of coloured paper. Einstein, he says. Anti-Semites always begin by telling you that Jesus Christ was a Jew. The Rosenberg case, if it didn’t prove anything else, proved that the middle-class Jew is more middle-class than Jew. Hell, that wretched judge.”

  “Hold on,” Miriam said. “I’m going to get more soda. I’ll be right back.”

  Noah got up and walked over to the road and picked up a pebble and tossed it towards the stream. The pebble swooshed through the trees, bounced off a rock, and plopped into the water.… A frog croaked. There were plenty of fire-flies. “Hell,” Noah said.

  Somebody shrieked at the party in the next valley. Laughter followed, splattering into the night. A bottle crashed. More shrieks, more laughter.

  “Noah?”

  “Coming.”

  Drinks were poured, but they didn’t start talking right away.

  Miriam wept inwardly, certain that this was their final night and hoping against that certainty. She recalled all the devious routes, beginning with Queen Street, that had brought her to these porch steps to share a bottle with a rueful lover. “Tired?” she asked.

  “No.”

  He’s resentful, she thought, because I pushed him away from me in the bedroom.

  “Funny,” Noah said. “Ten years ago a man who was religious was a fool or a liar. Now the pendulum has swung back.” He laughed. “The West have got God again the way the middle-aged light up on their childhood. If God weren’t dead I guess he’d be editing Time today. Maybe he is. Who knows?”

  There was a fine, cool smell to the night. The moon, red and altogether too pretty, was high and perfectly round in the pitch-black sky.

  “I’m getting drunk,” she said.

  He grinned and brushed her hair back with his hand and momentarily felt a resurgence of his old love for her. Changing, he thought. Even two people sitting together, two people who know each other damn well, and there’s always the changing back and forth.

  “It’s too bad,” he said, “that there is no longer anything that one could wholly belong to. This is the time of buts and parentheses. All that seems to remain are one’s responsibil … Oh, Miriam, I wish that most men – me included – were taller and all women lovely. I …”

  Two headlights shone into their eyes, then moved sideways and away. There was the clean hard knock of pebbles being kicked up on the road – and then the car appeared. A woman leaned out and shrieked and waved a bottle at them. They couldn’t make out what she had said. Then zoom and away. Tail lights, red, into the night.

  “I guess they’re coming from the party,” she said.

  “I’ll bet they’re back in an hour,” he said. “They’ll swim in the lake. Somebody will catch somebody with the wrong somebody and …”

  “I’ll be right back,” she said.

  Noah felt the liquor taking hold. He wanted to make love to her, but he couldn’t. He wanted to tell her that he was leaving her, but he couldn’t do that either. Heart, he thought. I wonder if she’ll ask me when the time comes, ask me like he asked her, i
f there was a light. Well, he thought, my father was a hero. That calls for another drink. He emptied the bottle and then flung it into the grass. “Cheers,” he said. He stared at the dark trees that wobbled just a bit before him and listened for the rushing of the water between the rocks. The stag at eve had drunk its fill/As danced the moon on Monan’s Rill. Christ, he thought. I should have hit Itzik. “Miriam.” She didn’t answer. Noah got up. He staggered into the living-room. She was seated on the sofa. “Miriam?” She puffed hard on her cigarette and he made out her face as something chill and quite alone in the quick light.

  “Noah, did you come here to tell me that we’re through?”

  He choked. “I came here to ask you to marry me,” he said.

  Again her face in the quick light. She wielded that cigarette like a star. He followed it with fascination and because he couldn’t bring himself to look into her eyes. Why did I say that? he thought.

  “You’re drunk,” she said.

  “All right. I’m drunk.”

  “When shall we get married?”

  “Whenever you like,” he said, swaying.

  “Do you love me?”

  “I did, but … I – I feel a tremendous affect …”

  “Pity?”

  He felt something knot deep inside him.

  “It’s not good enough, Noah.”

  The bottom has fallen out, he thought. He turned away from her. “What’ll you do?” he asked.

  “That’s none of your business.”

  He sat down beside her and tried to take her in his arms, but she moved away.

  “Are you going to take care of her?” she asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Is that why?”

  “No.”

  “You’re a fool.”

  “Perhaps.”

  “A coward.”

  “I want to rest for a bit. I’m confused. So much has …”

  “So you’re going to become a member of the community after all?”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  The room began to brighten a bit.

  “I’ll be able to forgive you everything in time,” she said. “Except your having had to get drunk. Except your having asked me to marry you.”