Conversation touched on many subjects, drifting from the problems of the printing trade and the possibilities of a union among the printers to the problems and possibilities (and blessings, said Luter with a smile) of marriage. And then from this land to the old land and back again to this. And whether David’s mother kept a kosher house — at which she smiled — and whether David’s father still had time to don phylacteries in the morning and what synagogue he attended — at which his father snorted, amused. Most of what they said interested David only vaguely. What did fascinate him, however, was the curious effect that Luter had on his father. For once that brusque, cold manner of his had thawed a little. A faint though guarded deference mitigated somewhat the irrevocable quality with which his voice always bound his words. He would ask at the end of a statement he had just made, “Don’t you think so?” Sometimes he would begin by saying, “It seems to me.” It was strange. It disturbed David. He didn’t know whether to be grateful to Luter for softening the harsh, inflexible edge of his father’s temperament, or to be uneasy. Somehow it was a little unreal to see his father expand this way, uncoil warily like a tense spring slowly released. And urged on by only a sympathetic look from Luter, to hear him speak of his youth, he, who was so taciturn and thin-lipped, whom David never could think of as having a youth, speaking of his youth, of the black and white bulls he had tended for his father (and try to hide a frown at the word, father, he, who never hid displeasure), how they had fed them mash from his father’s yeast mill, how he had won a prize with them from the hand of Franz Josef, the King. Why did Luter need to look that way to make his father speak? Why did Luter only need to say, “I don’t like the earth. It’s for peasants,” to make his father laugh, to make his father answer, “I think I do. I think when you come out of a house and step on the bare earth among the fields you’re the same man you were when you were inside the house. But when you step out on pavements, you’re someone else. You can feel your face change. Hasn’t that happened to you?” And all that Luter needed to say was, “Yes. You’re right, Albert,” and his father would take a deep breath of satisfaction. It was strange. Why had no one else ever succeeded in doing that? Why not his mother? Why not himself? No one except Luter.
His questions went unanswered. He only knew that when supper was over he wanted very much to like Luter. He wanted to like any man who praised his mother and guided his father into untrodden paths of amiability. He wanted to like him, but he couldn’t. But that would pass, he assured himself. As soon as Luter came again he would like him. Yes, the very next time. He was sure of it. He wanted to. As soon as he got used to his eyes. Yes.
A little while after dinner, Luter got up to go. His father protested that he had just come, that he ought to stay at least another hour.
“I also have to work in the morning,” Luter reminded him. “Otherwise I would stay. It’s heaven compared to my landlady’s.” And then he turned to David’s mother, and in his slow way, smiling, extended his hand. “I want to thank you a thousand times, Mrs. Schearl, I haven’t had so good a dinner or so much to eat since my last uncle was married.”
She reddened as she shook hands with him and laughed. “You’ve praised everything but the water you drank.”
“Yes.” He laughed also. “And the salt. But I was afraid you wouldn’t believe me if I said their flavor surpassed all others.”
And after exchanging “Good-nights” and patting David’s head (which David wasn’t quite reconciled to) he left.
“Ha!” his father exclaimed exultantly after he had gone. “I told you this cursed wandering from job to job would end. I’m working for Dolman’s Press to stay. Now time may bring something — who knows. There are two other foremen there. I’m as good a pressman as any of them. I know more about that iron juggler than they do. Who knows? Who knows? A little money. In time I might even suggest to him that we try— Well! In time! In time!”
“He looks like a very decent man,” said his mother.
“Wait till you really know him!”
And from Luter’s departure to his bedtime, David never remembered spending so serene an hour in his father’s presence.…
IV
“NOT a single one?” Luter was asking with some surprise. “Not in the old land either?”
The old land. David’s thoughts turned outward. Anything about the old land was always worth listening to.
“Not one,” his mother answered. “Nothing ever came to my hamlet except the snow and the rain. Not that I minded. Except once — yes. A man with a gramophone — the kind you listened to with ear pieces. It cost a penny to listen to it, and it wasn’t even worth that. I never heard anything labor so and squawk. But the peasants were awed. They swore there was a devil in the box.”
Luter laughed. “And that’s all you had seen before you came here to this turmoil?”
“I’ve seen little enough of it! I know that I myself live on one hundred and twenty-six Boddeh Stritt—”
“Bahday Street!” Her husband corrected her. “I’ve told you scores of times.”
“Boddeh Stritt,” she resumed apologetically. He shrugged. “It’s such a strange name — bath street in German. But here I am. I know there is a church on a certain street to my left, the vegetable market is to my right, behind me are the railroad tracks and the broken rocks, and before me, a few blocks away is a certain store window that has a kind of white-wash on it — and faces in the white-wash, the kind children draw. Within this pale is my America, and if I ventured further I should be lost. In fact,” she laughed, “were they even to wash that window, I might never find my way home again.”
His father made an impatient gesture. “Speaking of Yiddish plays,” he said, “I did see one. It was when I stayed with my father in Lemberg, the days of the great fair. They called it the Revenge of Samson. I can see him yet, blind, but shaggy again, waiting his time against the pagans. It moved me greatly.”
“For my part,” said Luter, “I go to the theatre to laugh. Shall I go there and be tormented when life itself is a plague? No, give me rather a mad jester or the antics of a spry wench.”
“I don’t care for that.” His father was brief.
“Well, I’m not mad about it either, you understand, but I was just saying sometimes when one is gloomy it does the heart good. Don’t you think great laughter heals the soul, Mrs. Schearl?”
“I suppose so.”
“There, you see! But listen, I have an idea. You know that the People’s Theatre always gives Dolman the job of printing its placards. Well, it has a stage that is never empty of tears — at least one good death rattle is heard every night. And if you like that sort of play, why I can talk to the agent or whatever he’s called and squeeze a whole month’s pass out of him. You know they change every week.”
“I don’t know whether I want to.” His father frowned dubiously.
“Why, certainly! It won’t be any trouble at all. And it won’t cost you a cent. I’ll get a pass for two, you watch me. I wish I had known this before.”
“Don’t trouble about me,” said his mother. “Many thanks, but I couldn’t possibly go away and leave David here alone.”
“Oh, that can be solved!” he assured her. “That’s the least of your worries. But first let me get the pass.” Luter left early that evening, before David was put to bed. And when he was gone, his father turned to his mother and said, “Well, did I make a mistake when I said this man was my friend? Did I? Here is one who knows how to express friendship, here as well as in the shop. Tell me, do I know a decent man when I see him?”