Among the Living (27 page)

“She seemed concerned about the seating,” Jesler said.

“Pardon?”

“We don’t separate the men from the women,” Jesler said.

“Yes, I know. She’ll be fine.”

“Maybe she can sit in the middle of the girls, do it that way. And we’ll sit with Herb and Joe. Unless you think it’d be better to have her with you?”

Goldah set the bag on the cushion next to him. He crossed his legs. Even the way he was sitting felt borrowed. “She’ll do what makes her comfortable. We’ll be fine.”

In the car she sat behind him with Pearl, who offered a few last-minute suggestions on the angle of Malke’s hat. Goldah watched in the mirror as the hat edged lower and lower on Malke’s face until the shadow seemed to cover the offending cheek entirely.

Jesler parked the car on a side street and they headed toward the crowd making its way through the synagogue doors. The big park — empty on a Monday morning — was just
on the other side of the road and seemed far more wide open than Goldah had ever seen it. He toyed with the idea of making a dash for it — the lure of all those impeccably mown lawns — but the picture of a Jew at full sprint on Rosh Hashanah seemed only slightly more off-putting than the prospect of what lay ahead.

Instead he joined the gauntlet of
“Gut yontifs”
and
“Shanah tovahs”
— the necessary nods to the new year — each passing without moment, although he did see a few widened eyes and whispers as he and Malke moved inside and along the aisle to their seats: A last little sin, he thought, before these days of repentance.

The shul was simple, row after row of pews, a small bimah at the front with a wooden ark to hold one or two Torahs. If Goldah had ever imagined a rustic Judaism, one born of the American frontier spirit, it was here in the sanctuary of Agudath Achim that he found it. Somehow his own appearance within its walls felt less jarring given all that was so foreign around him.

They sat, Malke took his hand, and for a moment Goldah’s mind seized: It was such a small gesture on her part but it lay beyond his comprehension. She had told him again and again how much she was dreading sitting together — for the first time in so many years inside a real shul on Rosh Hashanah — and how they would be throwing away everything they knew because, here, this was how people prayed. He said it was such a small thing to let go of — how much more had they already left behind — but she seemed inconsolable. And yet she was holding his hand and Goldah had no idea why.

“Do you need to leave?” he said.

“Leave? No. Why?”

“You’re all right, then?”

She took a prayer book from the little shelf on the back of the bench in front of them and held it tightly in her free hand. She said, “You remember that beautiful
machzor
my father had, the one with the leather binding and the gilt-edged pages?” He did. She released his hand and, opening the book, stood with the rest of the congregation and said, “So do I. I’m fine.”

When they emerged to the street some three hours later Goldah felt relief, not for himself but for her: All that mattered was that she had made it through without incident. There had been one or two moments of concern — the rabbi’s need to mention “the bravest among us,” every face turning to them with great admiration and feeling — but it had mercifully passed to the real focus of the day, the heroes of the Haganah and the Irgun: “Like our own minutemen,” the rabbi had intoned, “seeking the right to shape their own destiny … 
vesechezena enenu
 … the children of Israel reclaiming their home, two thousand years in the waiting, but at what a cost … at what a cost.” Goldah had feared another turning of the heads but the rabbi had saved them with a firm “Amen” and a return to the liturgical routine that had been keeping Malke occupied.

Now, out on the sidewalk, Jesler pulled his cigarettes from his jacket and said, grudgingly, “It’ll take us over an hour to get there, at least. Why can’t we just go down to the river and do it like usual?”

“Not on
yontif,
Abe,” said Pearl, nodding at his cigarettes.

Jesler slipped the pack back inside his pocket. “I like tossing my sins away as much as the next man — believe me — but the pavilion’s a long way to go. What’s wrong with the river? We’ve always done it down at the river.”

Herb said, “Hell, you can do
tashlich
into a bucket of water, if you want.”

“Two thousand years,” said Pearl. “That’s what the rabbi said. If this is the year Jerusalem becomes ours again, why not make a show of it? Why not cast away two thousand years of sin? I like it, Abe. I like that we’re doing something special. Out to the ocean. Why not?”

“Because it might just be a bit premature, that’s all. And, as I recall, we’re a little touchy on jumping the gun as Jews, aren’t we?”

“Well I don’t see it that way and neither does the rabbi.” She turned to Malke. “Did you enjoy the service, dear?”

“The service,” said Malke, aware that, once again, she stood at the center of attention. “Yes.”

“And the seating was all right?”

She nodded. It looked as if she might remain silent but instead she said, “It was such a small thing to change in order to be with family.”

Pearl beamed. “I just love this girl, Ike.” She reached for Malke’s hat. “But you should have it just a bit lower on the side, dear. Here, let me show you.”

Across town Art Weiss was hanging up the telephone in his study and heading back to the dining room for lunch. He was wondering how he might play out this latest development in front of Eva.

“Who was it?” said Mrs. Weiss, as she handed a plate of potatoes to her daughter.

Weiss sat. “It’s the damnedest thing.”

“Arthur, please. Julian’s at the table.”

The boy was sitting next to his mother, dapper in his holiday clothes and smiling. He was fair-skinned and had Eva’s facial features — a sweet boy, thought Weiss — although
at times he was prone to a look of deep and somber concentration. The doctor had told them not to ask what he might be thinking about during these moments, and it was everything Eva could do to keep her word. His hair had been parted to within an inch of its life this morning, courtesy of his grandmother, the thin strip remarkable for its absence of any gouging or blood. Mrs. Weiss favored a set of silver-plated combs and brushes, the likes of which, in the wrong hands, could mete out a form of torture not seen since the days of the Second Crusade. Mrs. Weiss did
not
have the right hands.

“Sorry there, Jules,” said Weiss. “Grandpa forgot himself for a moment.”

“That’s okay, Grandpa.”

Weiss winked.

Mrs. Weiss said, “So was it Jock Snider?”

“Who?” said Weiss, as he reached for a plate.

“Jock Snider,” she repeated.

Eva spoke for the first time. “Who’s Jock Snider?”

Her mother lifted a plate toward her and said, “Would you care for some carrots, dear?”

“No thank you, Mother.”

Mrs. Weiss took some for herself. “Jock’s an old friend of your father’s — from up north. For some reason over the last few years he’s been finding himself calling on the holidays. Jock’s Jewish, of course, but he calls nonetheless and your father has to remind him. Like clockwork. So was it Jock?”

“No, dear,” said Weiss. “It was the Atlanta
Constitution.
” Leaning in closer to the boy, he said, “A rather important newspaper.” Weiss picked up his knife and fork and started in on his chicken. “They’re interested in reprinting Mr. Goldah’s latest piece. Of course they didn’t know it was a holiday.”

“Mr. Goldah?” said Mrs. Weiss. Even the mention of his name brought a nice edge to her tone. Weiss ignored it and said to Eva, “I’m sorry, sweetheart, but the man’s a fine writer.”

Mrs. Weiss said, “Did you tell them it was a holiday?”

Weiss continued to watch as Eva kept her eyes fixed on her plate; he regretted having mentioned it at all. “Did I tell them?” he said. “Well naturally, dear. Of course I told them. I would have been remiss not to inform the Atlanta
Constitution
and the
Washington Post
— who’ve also called about the piece — that they should be far more sensitive to the Jewish High Holidays. I would have done so in Aramaic but you know how few of them speak it these days.” He caught the first hint of a smile on Eva’s lips.

Mrs. Weiss refused to look at her husband even as she gave in to a small grin of her own. “Now you’re just making fun, aren’t you?”

“Yes, I believe I am.”

Eva said, “Is the piece really that good?”

Weiss tried not to sound too consoling. “It might be for the best, getting that kind of notice. He’d be hard-pressed not to accept a position if they offer one.” He saw a moment of the pain she was feeling and it very nearly broke his heart. “But you never know what a man will do. Yes, it’s that good.”

Eva said, “Well, I’m happy for him then.”

“I know you are.” Again Weiss leaned into Julian. “And that’s what makes your mother the most remarkable young woman I know.”

“And Granny,” said Julian, “is the most remarkable old woman you know.”

Weiss held his laughter in check. “Why yes, Jules. That’s right. Granny is the
very
old woman I know.” The telephone
rang, Weiss set down his cutlery and said, “And
that
will be Jock Snider.”

The drive out to Tybee had a caravan feel to it, twenty or so cars winding their way past the small islands. The group had caught the approach of a fishing boat at one of the drawbridges, which allowed several carloads to step out and enjoy the midafternoon sun. The water was pale here and seemed to cradle the light in a slow wave of cordgrass and reeds.

Malke said she preferred to wait inside the car. Pearl decided to wait with her while Jesler said he wanted to show Ike something up at the bridge.

Jesler led the way. “She knows I’m stealing a smoke,” he said, “but as long as she doesn’t see it, she’ll let us both pretend.” They moved down into the tall grass and Jesler tried to sound offhand. “So … you like Raymond, Ike, don’t you? He’s got something to him?”

Goldah needed a moment to keep up. “He does. Yes.”

“Hard to miss, I guess. The hand … it’s not — well, he’s not letting it get the better of him. That takes a certain kind of man. Mary Royal’s father was the same way. You never knew him but he was just like that. Terrible loss in the war. I suppose that’s why she takes to Raymond.”

Goldah tried to recall the last time he had heard a black man referred to as an equal since he had arrived in America. He couldn’t. Strange how one could become numb to the absence of a word and then shocked by its sudden reappearance. He remembered his own confusion at hearing himself referred to as a man for the first time after so many years in the camp, by a young Russian who had brought him a blanket. At least then Goldah had recognized it as a faint
recollection, somehow right and fitting. He wondered if Raymond ever would.

Goldah said, “I’m not sure he has much of a choice, does he?”

“We all have choices.”

“Only if they’re ours to make.”

Jesler took a long pull as he moved them along. He tried a nod. “I suppose that’s true.” The smoke speared through his nose and he said again with greater conviction, “That’s true.”

They came to the water’s edge where the bridge loomed above. Jesler flicked his cigarette into the water and pointed up. “Just there. It’s the old relay line out to Tybee. You see it? They used it during Prohibition. Government inspectors. They’d roll up and the boys would raise the bridge and tell the inspectors a boat was coming through. One of them would then sneak down here and send the signal out to the island, warn them so they could hide the booze. Inspectors never found so much as a bottle of beer, all because of that little box up there.”

“Clever,” said Goldah without much interest.

“Maybe … or maybe they were just breaking the law.” Jesler seemed to be thinking something through. The bridge began to grind into gear and he said, “I guess we should head to the car.”

They started back and Goldah — sensing Jesler’s need to hear it — said, “Maybe some laws need to be broken.”