“Listen to this, Chani.” Cecil reads from the encyclopedia enticingly, as if he were giving her forbidden candy. “Listen to this. ‘It is uncertain whether the settlers in Palestine can survive “the languid heat; the enervating climate.” ’ ”
NINA takes her husband’s hand as they walk home. “It’s so sad,” she says.
“What is?” Andras asks.
“Emil Heiligman. His story, I had no idea. And then he killed the man too. His own guard. Can you believe it?”
“No,” says Andras. “I’ve never believed a word of that story.”
She pulls away from him. “How can you say that? Are you saying Emil is a liar? Why would a man like that not tell the truth? When he says—”
“Oh, he says what he wanted to happen,” Andras tells her as they climb the front steps. “Emil Heiligman never killed anyone.” He holds open the aluminum-framed screen door for Nina and then lets it snap shut behind them. He can’t tell Nina how he knows that the story isn’t true, but he knows. He has a keen nose for sentimentality and melodrama. A fine sense of disbelief. He rejects stories and remembrances just as he disbelieves ritual and prayer. When he comes to Kaaterskill and sits among his pious neighbors, when he sits in shul in the dark-paneled sanctuary filled with prayer, his own inner voice tells him, no, the words aren’t true. None of it is true.
Andras was sitting in shul the day the Rav collapsed. He sat close to the bima where the Rav stood, and he heard the Rav’s words about the Jews’ dispersions, old and new. He enjoyed the Rav’s tone, his formality, although the message was purely conventional. The Rav’s voice and diction were old and polished, and they matched the bima with its dark polished wood. Nina was sitting with the children in the women’s section, and Andras sat alone in the sanctuary among the hundreds who were fasting, alone, having eaten breakfast that morning, and drunk his coffee black as usual. He sat, listening to the Rav, and the fast day was foreign to him, the community grieving together in this artificial way. The holiday couldn’t move Andras, the day set aside for sadness, the reading of this poetry, all prescribed, as if grief could be expressed that way, as if mourning could be accomplished with these simple and unthinking acts and, at the end of it, put away. This is why he thinks these recitations and acts of prayer are for children—because they are so flat and simple, because magically they are intended to discharge infinite obligations.
When the old man faltered and swayed back, Andras, who was not reading along, was almost the first to realize it. He was there on the bima in an instant. Instinctively, he held up his arms to support the Rav’s frail body. He felt the smooth cloth of the Rav’s suit. Of course, the panicked Kirshners crowded up and Andras retreated. His heart was pounding. He had seen the Rav’s face, and seen the eyes roll back, and he was afraid. Suddenly, in the ornate synagogue, in the midst of prayer, Andras had seen something real.
UPSTAIRS, Nina is sorting clothes in the bedroom closets, packing up the family for the return to the city. She is labeling, making lists, separating new from old and outgrown clothes. Andras carries boxes and old suitcases to the attic for her. “Where is this going?” he asks her, pointing to a large shopping bag.
“Oh, I’m giving those away to Hadassah,” Nina says.
Andras touches the heavy plaid blanket on top. He imagines Una could use an extra blanket in the winter. He could try to give it to her, although she probably wouldn’t accept it. “I don’t like things,” she’s told him. “I’m not here to pile up a lot of things.”
Nevertheless, Andras takes the blanket in a shopping bag and drives up Mohican Road after dinner. With his hazard lights on he parks at the side of the road and walks into the woods toward Una’s light, the kerosene lamp that turns her window gold. He hadn’t realized how dark the trees would be at night. Insects and tiny animals rustle in the leaves. A thousand creatures he cannot identify. Una must know them all by sound.
Una hears Andras coming. She opens her door and comes out to see him.
“It’s late,” she says.
“I wanted to bring you this.” Andras shows her the blanket. “I couldn’t bring it by tomorrow because I’m going back early to the city. Tomorrow’s Monday.”
Una is amused by this. “I have a calendar.”
“I thought you might like this in the winter,” Andras says.
“No, no, thank you.” She stands in the lantern light of her open doorway with a ratty shawl over her shoulders.
“All right,” Andras says. “I thought I’d ask. My wife was going through the closets,” he explains. Then he stops. He hopes Una is not offended.
Una’s eyes shine. “Fire is best,” she says. “Fire takes care of most everything. Old clothes, newspapers, letters, books. When my husband died, I burned all his old clothes and books. He hated waste. This earth is crowded enough, he would say, and it’s not for us to clutter it up. When his heart went bad they said he might live five, or maybe even ten, years, but he didn’t want that. Being half an invalid. We talked about it. And it was selfish, he decided, to keep consuming without producing his share. So one day,” Una concludes matter-of-factly, “he was cleaning out his rifle and it went off.”
Andras stares at her speechless.
“I was prepared,” Una says. “He did the right thing, you know. The sick shouldn’t linger. Whenever one of my friends has a broken wing or gets stuck in a trap, I put an end to it. Those people who try to save every limping squirrel! Pure sentimentality. The little beast can’t be saved, nineteen times out of twenty. And there isn’t place for those poor half-dead creatures in the world. No, my husband was right. The gunshot was for the best. Of course, you’re in the business,” she says.
“What business?” Andras asks her.
“Things, things, selling things. Your toys, your stuffed animals. They’re idols, don’t you think? The worst of it is they make children think the little animals last forever, and then they don’t realize what an important thing death is in the world.”
“Una!” Andras shakes his head.
“They should learn about death,” Una says. “They should be taught. Making room and culling out—that’s what death is. Children will never understand that, if they’re always buying your plush teddy bears. You’re protecting the children with these toys—pretending living things don’t eat anything, don’t excrete anything, don’t struggle against anything, and as a result, last forever. Now, that’s a false religion.”
Andras walks back to the car with the warm blanket in the shopping bag, and he shudders a little in the cold. He can’t make up his mind about Una. Listening to her is peculiar. He finds it funny in a way to hear her cast judgment on him. To hear his warehouse of floppy stuffed animals spoken of as some vast pagan temple. His business, small and profitable, called a false religion. Una is perverse in her views, eccentric, sometimes cruel, and yet at the same time, some of what she says is right; so clearly true. He has never put it to himself that way, what she says about the toys, the plush animals and children. His own Renée and Alex, past owners of numerous toys, really are timid, and terrified of pain. There is some truth in Una’s words. That’s the bitter good in her. She is a tonic. Not an elixir to live by, more like quinine, an antidote against the big houses and hordes of children, the lacy traditionalism of Kaaterskill in summer, the long pious shadows of the men walking to shul. Una lives in luxury, living alone. She has no one sleeping next to her, no one else to consider. She does not have people to her house, does not invite them to dinner or worry about what they think of the food. She has no garden. All her trees grow wild.
It is now September, and the sun begins to fall much from his height. The meadows are left bare by the mouths of hungry cattle, and the hogs are turned into the cornfields. The winds begin to knock the apples’ heads together on the trees, and the fallings are gathered to fill the pies for the household.
—NICHOLAS BRETON
Fantastics: Serving for a Perpetual Prognostication
1
r /> THE city is dark, the air thick with noise. From the living-room window Elizabeth sees a stream of cars and delivery trucks. The apartment’s bedrooms are quieter, but they face on brick and shadowy cement. Elizabeth and Isaac and the girls share three bedrooms. There is a maid’s room as well that Elizabeth has converted into a long, narrow pantry, an annex to the kitchen. One wall of the living room is devoted to Isaac’s books—the tall volumes of Talmud, thick commentaries, Seforim in stately colors, black and brown. There is a reclining chair and a sofa Elizabeth would like to reupholster, except that there isn’t enough money. A large coffee table. The furniture is big, perhaps too big for the space. Almost half of the living room is taken up by the mahogany dining set Elizabeth inherited from her aunt: a pedestal table and ten chairs, a lovely china cabinet, where Elizabeth keeps the candlesticks and the silver spice boxes—a miniature castle with a filigree turret and flag, a tiny sunflower with curling petals. Isaac’s silver kiddush cups stand there as well, the set his grandparents gave him for his wedding, with one large and six miniature goblets gathered on a sterling tray. Isaac’s grandfather had joked at the time about the old tradition—for each kiddush cup Isaac would have a son—“a bochur for each becher.”
In her galley kitchen Elizabeth is working, preparing food for Rosh Hashanah. She stands on a stool and takes the stockpot from its perch on top of the cabinets. The counters are covered with vegetables and bakery bags. There are eight round challahs, four with raisins, four without. The turkey is in the oven, the honey cakes done. She has just taken them out of their loaf pans to cool. The kitchen is hot, and Elizabeth’s legs hurt. The girls are off from school, and she has sent them to the playground with Chani in charge. She needs to use the time. She makes two noodle kugels, one with onions and mushrooms, one sweet with pineapple. She bastes the turkey and turns down the heat on her lentil soup. The refrigerator is stuffed with wine bottles, tomatoes, jars of gefilte fish. She likes to start with a salad for each person: gefilte fish on a bed of lettuce, with two cherry tomatoes and cucumber slices—Malki’s with no tomato, Chani’s with no cucumber, Ruchel’s with no fish. She moves quickly, washing out the pans as she goes, but all the time she feels the pull to stop and sit down. Her imagination is pulling against her, and she has to fight the daydreams slowing down her hands. At last, when Elizabeth is almost, but not quite, done, she gives in. She pours herself some ice coffee and just sits. It’s been a month since she’s returned from Kaaterskill. The great leafy trees are far away, the quiet of the evening, the cool air. She thinks about her idea for next summer. The store she might have, stocked full of kosher food. Then, of course, she thinks about the Rav.
He has still not spoken publicly since he returned from the hospital in August. He has not conducted his shiur, attended services, or granted audiences. And yet the talk is that he intends to resume his duties, that he is planning to teach again and continue leading the community. His son, Isaiah, has not taken the Rav’s place as head of the shiur. The famous Wednesday class has simply been suspended. Nor has Isaiah been allowed to grant audiences to answer halachic questions. There is a committee of rabbis, instead, of which Isaiah is a member. There are no signs that the old Rav is capable of returning to his position, and yet he has not given up and passed on any of his powers or responsibilities. Of course, this is his right and privilege. Like a king he will govern for life. Elizabeth has heard that the Rav will not recover. Some say it’s his heart, others that it is the tuberculosis he had as a child. His lungs are scarred from the disease, and now, perhaps, are weak. Whatever the cause, it means that plans for a store must wait.
THAT evening in the crowded synagogue, the sanctuary iced with central air-conditioning against the muggy September night, Elizabeth and the girls sit in the balcony. The Kirshner women are wearing their best fall clothes—burgundy, deep blue, brown, and black, suits with thick jackets, dresses of wool, despite the Indian summer outside. The men below wear black suits and black fedoras. They are milling about, murmuring together, standing in groups, and settling in their seats. Everyone is wondering if this time it will happen. If today will be the long-awaited day when the Rav returns to take his place before them. And then, gloriously, it happens. At exactly the moment the service is to begin, the Rav enters. He is supported not by one, but by both his sons—Isaiah on one side, Jeremy on the other. The congregation springs up, every last one standing, in ardent reverence. They crane their necks to see him, between Isaiah and Jeremy, his frail figure moving to the front of the sanctuary, his face slightly downcast.
From above, Elizabeth watches the three men make their way up the aisle. Such a strange triumvirate. The Rav and his two sons flanking him, an unmatched pair. And she sees, as everyone else must, that something is changing. Jeremy is a presence again at the Rav’s side. What could it mean but that the Rav’s mood is shifting? Clearly he is honoring Jeremy, bringing him out to be near him. Perhaps whatever divided him from Jeremy, the traveling, or the career at a secular college, is now less important to the Rav. Or perhaps it is Jeremy who has come back to his father’s side. Perhaps, as his friend Cecil did, he has suddenly decided to marry. Perhaps he’s had a change of heart. Jeremy is a mystery. But the service is joyful with the Rav’s presence. The whole community buzzes with delighted speculation, so that every prayer and song is fuzzy with whispering.
Elizabeth’s in-laws speak about the Rav at dinner. Isaac’s younger sister Pearl and her husband, Moshe, have come with their two girls.
“Wasn’t that wonderful? The Rav back in shul,” Pearl says.
“I heard he’s going to be teaching again,” says Moshe.
“Really?” says Isaac.
“He’s having his shiur on Wednesday.”
“It’s wonderful,” Pearl says again. “Baruch hashem.” Blessed be His name.
“And what about Jeremy Kirshner?” Elizabeth asks.
“I heard at the Kollel,” says Moshe, glancing at the children, “that the Rav has asked him to lead the shiur next month as his guest, and Jeremy said yes.”
“Really!” Isaac says.
“But I don’t know if it’s true,” Moshe hastens to add.
“It’s just talk,” says Pearl.
LATE that night with the girls in bed, Elizabeth and Isaac clean up. She clears the table and Isaac stands at the sink, washing the dishes with his sleeves rolled up. For a long time they work in silence, except for the spray of water and the clink of silverware in the dish rack.
“Isaac,” Elizabeth says finally, “if the Rav is going to hold his shiur, could we find out if he’s seeing people?”
Isaac doesn’t answer.
“Never mind.”
“You know—” Isaac begins.
“I know how you feel,” Elizabeth says. “I don’t think you know how I feel.”
He looks up from the sink where the water runs over his hands.
“What is it?” she asks.
“I’ll finish cleaning,” he says. “You go to bed.”
“There are all the pans, still.”
“I’ll do them,” he says. “Go.”
Alone in the kitchen Isaac scrubs the pans. She’s wrong about him. He does know how she feels. He knows how she does things, so passionately, so well. But this plan of hers. It isn’t that he objects to Elizabeth working outside the home. Many Kirshner women work—in schools, and stores, and even office buildings. But to start her own business. That’s something else. To plunge into something like that! And yet he knows why she wants to do it. He sees what it is—her desire to make something from scratch.
He knows he’s right. They don’t have money to throw away. Elizabeth has a little from her grandparents, but she and Isaac also have five daughters. There will be five weddings to pay for, and they must help each of the children set up house. There will be china and furniture, and presents to buy. There will be the customary set of Seforim for each bridegroom. A whole bookcase full of sacred texts. It will be very difficult financially, bu
t there is no way around it. He knows he’s being sensible, but he hates disappointing her. He hates being the one to stand in her way. He tells himself he’s right, but as he turns it over in his mind he admits to himself it isn’t simply prudence guiding him; it’s pride.
Isaac cares little about external things—money, status, advancement in his job. He works hard at the office, but his job is only that to him, simply a way to earn a living. It isn’t creative work. It doesn’t define him, doesn’t express his inner self. The core of his life is his religion, the practice and study of halacha. Isaac is modest in his work, unassuming in the world, because he has so little at stake in it. Inside, spiritually, he is an ambitious, driven man, exacting in his standards. Uncompromising. He is proud of his observance. He cares infinitely about the details of his religious life, the manner in which he prays, the exact timing of each blessing and each fast. The less visible the act, the more he cares about it. His pride is in everything hidden, everything private.
Yet it is not only his inner life that matters to him, but the community as well. And this is where his pride does get the better of him. Isaac can’t help considering what the others think, the men in the minyan and in shiur. His neighbors and friends. In his most secret thoughts, self-critical and self-indulgent, he is painfully aware of the hierarchy within the community, the levels defined by scholarship and rabbinic ancestry. He is aware, because in those terms he has so little. His father was a pious man, but not a learned one. He was a CPA and worked long hours. He was a member of the Kehilla’s burial society and a loyal member of the synagogue upkeep committee until he died. But he was no scholar. Neither a descendant of a great rabbi, nor—he realizes this about himself—a great scholar in his own right, Isaac has none of that kind of capital. He had wanted a son to teach and learn with, a son to be his scholar, partner, protégé, a son who could dazzle where he could not, but it is not to be, and so Isaac learns alone and davens alone in shul, driven, exacting, careful, wary of standing out, afraid of making mistakes. It is this in him that flinches at Elizabeth’s idea, this self-conscious pride in being unexceptionable. His vanity is in self-effacement.