Saturday the Rabbi Went Hungry (20 page)

“According to him, Hirsh should have been buried on the side somewhere with no ceremony or anything. He told me about one that he had seen in the old country when he was a young man. There was this girl who took her own life. She was going to have a baby, and she was still a girl – I mean, she was unmarried. They just put her in the ground, and the next day her father went to work as though nothing happened. I mean, they didn’t even mourn her for the seven days. It must have made a terrible impression on him, because he was terribly upset about Hirsh getting a regular funeral. He said if she was buried that way then Hirsh should be, too. Of course, he was confused because there’s no connection.”

The rabbi made to rise, now that the amenities were over, but Ben Goralsky waved him back. “My father’s dozing right now. I told the nurse to let me know when he wakes up. Are you in a hurry?”

“No. As a matter of fact, I wanted an opportunity to talk to you. I understand you knew Isaac Hirsh.”

“Yeah, I knew him. I knew his whole family. They lived next door to us in Chelsea, years ago. I knew his father and mother, and I knew him.”

“And that’s why you recommended him for that job at Goddard’s?”

His thick lips parted and his heavy face relaxed in a grin. He shook his head slowly. “I recommended him for that job, and I put enough muscle behind it to make sure he got it. We’re good customers of Goddard Lab, and I can talk turkey to Quint who runs the place. I got Hirsh that job because I hated his guts.” He laughed aloud at the look of surprise on the rabbi’s face.

“Like I said, they lived next door to us, the Hirshes. Both our families were mighty poor. We had this chicken business, his father had a little tailor shop. Mrs. Hirsh was all right. She was a good woman, and when she died I went to the funeral. We all did. My father closed the store so we could all go. Mr. Hirsh, he was something else again. A lazy good-for-nothing, always bragging about his precious son. We were four kids. I got two brothers and a sister, and every one of us worked in the store, after school, Sundays, nights. You had to in those days to make a living. I didn’t even finish high school. I quit at the end of my first year and went to work in the store full time. But Ike Hirsh, he finished high and then went on to college and then went on after that to become a doctor – not a regular doctor, a doctor of philosophy. He didn’t play with the other kids in the street. He was a little fat, roly-poly kid, the kind the other kids make fun of. So most of the time, he stayed inside reading books. And his father would come over to our house and brag about him. You know how Jews feel about education, so you can imagine how my father felt about us, especially in comparison with him. And old man Hirsh never let him forget it. But let me tell you something, Rabbi, my father never threw it up to us.

“Then Mrs. Hirsh died, and Mr. Hirsh waited just one year, practically to the day, to remarry. Now you know, you don’t meet a woman and ask her to marry you and get married in a day or two. Not at that age, you don’t. That means he was making arrangements during the year of mourning, while his wife was hardly cold in her grave. Ike had got himself a government job – big deal, after all that build-up – and didn’t even come to the wedding. And he didn’t go to his father’s funeral a year later. My father went. He wanted me to go, but I wouldn’t.

“Well, things had been getting better for us right along. The war helped. We had gone on living in the same little old house in Chelsea, in the same old neighborhood even though at that time we could have afforded a lot better. By the time the war was over, we were pretty comfortable. My father had done a little speculating in real estate. He had bought some good stocks. And still he went to work every morning in the store. We had expanded there too, doing a big wholesale business, but my father was down there every morning in his apron and straw hat. That’s the kind of man my father is.”

“And in all this time, I take it you hadn’t heard from Hirsh?”

“That’s right. Then one day he comes to visit us. He’s got an idea for manufacturing transistors. Nothing revolutionary, you understand, but it can cut costs anywhere from ten to twenty percent. I hardly knew what a transistor was, let alone my father, but he was convincing and my father had great faith in him. I guess without realizing it, my father had been sort of sold on the idea that he was a genius. Hirsh had it all worked out, and it looked good. He had contacts with all kinds of government agencies and we’d be sure to get government contracts. Well, to make a long story short, my father agreed to invest ten thousand dollars. Hirsh didn’t have to put up a dime and he was a full fifty percent partner.

“We got a warehouse and we set up our plant and started to operate. He was the big idea man, and I was the dumb slob that knew just enough to check in supplies, check shipments, see that the employees worked. And in a year we had lost ten thousand dollars on top of our original investment. Then we got a contract. It wouldn’t show us much of a profit, but it would carry us for a while. I went out and bought a bottle to celebrate. We had a couple of drinks, drank each other’s health and success to the business. In the middle I got called away and had to be gone the whole afternoon. When I got back, I found Hirsh still in the office – dead drunk.”

His face portrayed his shock of the memory. “Imagine, Rabbi, an educated Jewish boy – a drunkard. I didn’t tell my father. I was afraid to. I was afraid to admit it to myself. I kept telling myself it was an accident, that he had got a little high and didn’t realize how much he was taking. The next day he didn’t come in. But the day after, he was there right on time as if nothing happened. And the next day, he was drunk again. I stood it for a couple of weeks, and then I told my father. ‘Get rid of him’ – that’s what my father said. ‘Get rid of him before he ruins us.’ “

“I take it you did.”

Goralsky nodded his head in grim satisfaction. “I put it up to him to buy us out or let us buy him out. Of course he couldn’t raise the money, and it wouldn’t have done him any good if he could. Could a man like that run a business? We paid him fifteen thousand in cold cash, and said goodby. And you know, Rabbi, it was like pulling up an anchor. A couple of months later we got a really good government contract and we were on our way.”

“Did you know about the contract when you made him the proposition?”

“As God’s my witness, Rabbi. We had filed our bid months before, but we hadn’t heard a word about it.”

“All right. Then when did you see him next?”

“I never saw him again. We went public and sold stock and we got to be a big operation. We moved to this house. And then one day I got a letter from Hirsh telling me he’s applied for a job at Goddard Lab and figures that perhaps I can help him because they must know me. So I called Quint and put it to him as strong as I could, and made sure that in his letter to Hirsh he’d say they were giving him the job largely on my say-so.”

“But I don’t understand. You say you did it because you hated him.”

“That’s right. There he was with his Ph.D. from Tech and I hadn’t gone beyond the first year high. I wanted him to know that with all his education, he had to come to me for a job, and that I could deliver.”

“But didn’t you see him after he came?”

Goralsky shook his head. “He called a couple of times, and each time I told the girl to say I was out. I’m like superstitious, Rabbi. You had trouble with some hard-luck guy, I’m afraid it can rub off. And you want to know something: I was right. Twenty years ago, this Hirsh almost ruined us. He comes back to town and, sure enough, the son of a bitch almost ruins me again.”

“How do you mean?”

“We had a little problem here and I gave it to Goddard to chew on to see what they can come up with. So after a while, we get a preliminary report and it says they think they’ve found a way to lick it and then some – a kind of breakthrough. At this time we’re sort of playing with the idea of merging with another outfit – on a stock transfer basis. You understand?”

The rabbi nodded.

“This is confidential, Rabbi.”

“Of course.”

He laughed. “Confidential! Every brokerage house in Boston knows about it, but all they’ve got is rumors. You can’t keep this sort of thing secret. Still, I wouldn’t want it known that it came straight from me. See?”

The rabbi nodded again.

“So our stock starts going up. It’s normal whenever there’s news of a merger. It goes up for a couple of days and then slides back, sometimes even below where it was originally. But it doesn’t work that way with us. It keeps climbing, and after a couple of weeks it’s almost double. And I know damn well it isn’t the rumor of the merger that did it. It was something else – a rumor that we had something special in the works. I guess you can’t keep that kind of secret either. Maybe I’m a little sore about it. Maybe I got some idea that those double-domes over at the lab are playing the market, but I’m not hurting. After all, I’m in a merger situation on a stock transfer basis. Where I planned to give two of my shares for one of theirs, it looks now that I’ll be swapping even, so what harm is done? And it’s perfectly legit, you understand, because if I’ve got a new process coming through then my stock is worth that much more. Get it?”

“Yes.”

“And then I get a call from Quint at Goddard Friday afternoon, just as I was leaving. It was Kol Nidre night, and I was leaving early. And he tells me he’s very sorry, the preliminary report was premature – premature, hell, they’d flubbed the dub. You understand?”

“I think so,” said the rabbi doubtfully. “They had made a mistake.”

“That’s right. So where does it leave me? Here I am involved in a merger with a high-class outfit, and it looks like I’ve been manipulating my stock to get a better deal.”

“I see.”

“What can I do? It’s Yom Kippur, and when I get home I find my father is really sick. And the next day, he’s no better – maybe even a little worse. And the next day, Sunday, I get a call from these people, and they’re sore – and suspicious. Well, Monday I went down to Goddard to have it out with Quint. Maybe you never had any experience with these army types. He used to be a general, very dignified, very efficient, very businesslike. Bip, bip, bip. But I can see he’s uncomfortable, and he’s squirming. And finally, you know what he says? ‘Well, it’s your man who was at fault, Mr. Goralsky. You put him here. You practically forced us to take him – Isaac Hirsh!’ How do you like that? The first time I ever did business with him, he almost ruins me. Then for twenty years I don’t see or hear from him. When he comes here I’m careful to have nothing to do with him. And again he almost ruins me. See what I mean when I say you’ve got to keep away from guys like that? You want to know something, Rabbi? I’ll bet you’re wondering why I went to his funeral.”

“Well, to go to a funeral is traditionally considered a blessing, a mitzvah.”

“Mitzvah nothing! I wanted to make damn sure he got buried… “

The maid put her head in the door. “Your father is awake now, Mr. Goralsky.”

As they started up the staircase, Goralsky said, “Not a word about the cemetery business, Rabbi. I don’t want my father upset.”

“Of course not.”

The old man was out of bed and sitting in a chair when his son and the rabbi entered. He extended a thin, blue-veined hand in greeting.

“See, Rabbi, I fasted and now I’m getting better.”

The rabbi smiled at him. “I’m happy to see you looking so well, Mr. Goralsky.”

“So well, I’m not yet.” He glared at his son. “Benjamin, are you going to let the rabbi stand? Get him a chair.”

“Oh, really you don’t have to trouble.” But Ben had already left the room. He came back carrying a chair, and set it down for the rabbi. He himself sat on the edge of the bed.

“I missed Kol Nidre,” the old man went on, “for the first time in my life. Not once, since I was maybe five years old, did I stay away from the Kol Nidre service. My Ben tells me you gave a fine sermon.”

The rabbi glanced covertly at Ben, who pursed his lips in a mute plea not to give him away. The rabbi grinned. “You know how it is, Mr. Goralsky, for Yom Kippur one tries a little harder. Next year, you’ll be able to judge for yourself.”

“Who knows if there’ll be a next year. I’m an old man and I’ve worked hard all my life.”

“Well, that’s what gives you your vitality. Hard work –”

“He’s been saying that for as long as I can remember,” said Ben.

The old man looked at his son reproachfully. “Benjamin, you interrupted the rabbi.”

“I was only going to say that hard work never hurt anyone, Mr. Goralsky. But you mustn’t worry about what will happen a year from now. You must concentrate on getting well.”

“That’s true. One never knows whose turn will come next. Once, a few years ago, I had a sore on my face like a wart. I read the Jewish papers, Rabbi, and they have there every day a column from a doctor. Once it said that a sore like this could become, God forbid, a cancer. So I went to the hospital. The young doctor who examined me thought maybe I was worried the sore would spoil my looks. Maybe he thought I was an actor and wanted to look pretty. He asked me how old I was. Then I was maybe seventy-five. So when I told him, he laughed. He said if you were younger maybe we’d operate, like with a man my age it was a waste of time. So he gave me a salve, I should put it on and come back the next week. The next week when I come back, is already a different doctor. So I asked where’s the doctor from last week, and they told me he had been killed in an automobile accident.”

“Serves him right,” said Ben.

“Idiot! You think I was complaining he was making fun of me? He was a fine young man, a doctor. What I mean is you can’t tell who God will pick first. I understand the Hirsh boy died, right on the night of Kol Nidre. He was a good boy, too, and educated.”

“He was a drunkard,” said Ben.

The old man shrugged his shoulders. “Used to be, Rabbi, a drunkard was a terrible thing. But only a couple days ago I was reading in the Jewish paper, in this same column from the doctor, how a drunkard he’s like a sick person – it’s not his fault.”