“Well, you know what she’s doing. Office and night school. She’s the one who told us tonight.”
“You didn’t listen to what I had to say,” Mamie intervened. “You didn’t listen till I finished.”
“Okay. What?” Hannah accorded audience.
“I already know what you’re going to say,” said Joe.
“You know. But Hannah thinks,” Mamie stressed with upraised grubby finger, which flowed in gesture toward the front room. “And Stella, indeed: the reason the grandsire left was because of the radio and the Charlesburg, azoy—”
“He had dreams,” Hannah interrupted.
“So he says,” Mamie added. “But the true reason is that we were beginning to bicker about you, about you and Stella. He would not allow good Jewish youth into the house, only you, Ira. And he knew that I was vexed. I told him time and again this was America, and not Galitzia. It didn’t help. If his sons work on Shabbes, that’s their affair. But to encourage — he thinks — that some youth and his granddaughter should embrace each other, seize each other, he would be guilty of sinning before God: fornication, you understand?”
“Oh, tseegekhappen!” Hannah scoffed, echoed her mother’s Yiddish word.
“Yeh, yeh, tockin. He, the patriarch, all the household sins would be upon his head. The coming and going by night, who knows: whether he imagines, whether he feigns?”
“So he isn’t here. Don’t think we won’t invite boys, now.”
“Invite, invite, to your heart’s content. Why do I have a new radio? As long as they’re good Jewish boys. A little fluden?” Mamie offered Ira. “I baked such good fluden today.”
“No, thanks, Mamie. It’s late. I just dropped in to get the news to tell Mom. She said something about your traveling out to Flushing together.”
“Indeed. We’ll have to pursue him now.”
“Who is it you don’t see here tonight?” Stella proposed a riddle, as she appeared in the doorway, textbook in hand.
“We just told him,” Hannah informed her sister scathingly. “What do you think we’ve been talking about?”
“I know,” Ira said to mitigate Hannah’s sharpness. “Minnie told me.”
“So who do you think is gonna have his room? Guess.”
“You?”
“Naturally. She gets everything,” said Hannah.
“Aza mensh.” Mamie locked gross fingers and deplored. “Whatever I cooked for him, no matter how good it was, he never praised it. He would just nod his head. It passed. Shoyn—”
“It was coming to him,” Hannah seconded.
“Shah! Don’t interrupt your mother,” Jonas chided.
Hannah refused to be squelched: “What is it about these European fathers — just because they begot you, like the Bible says, you owe them everything.”
“You think he’s strict,” said Joe. “You should have known my father. We quivered. I had a brother, Leibele. He was eighteen already. It was Yom Kippur, and he was hungry. So he ate something. Freg nisht. When he came back to the shul, my father said, ‘Where have you been? Let me see your tongue.’ Noo, noo. He gave him with the stick right in front of the synagogue. I can still see Leibele with the blood running from his face. With my father, his word was law. Life and death. Zaida is nothing compared to my father.”
“That’s because he’s here in America,” Hannah remarked.
“Well, just the same, I’m not sorry he’s gone,” Stella said boldly. “Why should I be sorry? If you want to know, I’m glad. Would you want somebody in the house who’s always chasing out every fellow that comes in? And good Jewish fellows too. You’re the only one he’d let into the house. Everybody else was a trombenyik.”
“Yeah?” Ira scratched an eyebrow.
“Go, who’s talking of such things,” Mamie rebuked her daughter. “What he wanted I ran to get: the freshest bulkies. I went to the bakery three times a day to bring back fresh bulkies—”
“You ran five times a day,” Hannah contradicted.
“Noo, five times a day. And those hard egg biscuits I got him for a nosh between meals. They had to be just so. If they were too brown, too crisp, he wouldn’t eat them. If they were too soft, he wouldn’t eat them. All I did for him, and he leaves. What? He flees. All right, he was an embittered man: nothing suited him; he was that kind of a man. But flee without saying a word, I don’t understand.”
“Iz nisht gefilte fish,” Joe remarked humorously. “Another kosher home like this he won’t find again.”
“Yeah, that’s what Pop said.” Ira watched his uncle cut a slice of kholleh into small cubes and pop them into his mouth as if they were bonbons.
“Well.” He stood, went for his coat and hat on the washtub surface. Though he had ruled out another visit for the weekend, he had much to be thankful for. He was cleared of all suspicion. That was certain. And besides, when he called at Mamie’s again, Zaida would no longer be there: one hazard less when he got Stella alone. Still, why had the old man recited that business about getting a wife, especially that business about coming upon her and having sexual relations with her? Only a week ago, and so pointed in Ira’s direction. There was only one person who might know, who could clinch matters. Stella. He had screwed her in the front room only minutes before. Was it possible the old man said something to her after Ira had departed? She was about to leave the kitchen for the front room.
“What are you reading, Stella?” Ira called after her.
“I’m not reading. It’s Pitkin shorthand.” Her voice trailed from the hall.
“Yeah? I studied Gregg years ago. Is Pitman better?”
“Oh, a lot.”
“Well,” Ira hesitated. No, he was sure he was out in the clear. Why bother to follow Stella into the front room?
“Well, good night, everybody.” He slid into his coat. “Excuse me for coming so late, but you know when Minnie told us—”
“It’s nothing, it’s nothing,” Mamie reassured.
“O-o-h, Papa.” Hannah turned to Joe suddenly. “You’re gonna let Ira go away without your goodbye thing?”
“Let him be,” Mamie interceded. “He has other things on his mind besides that. And on Friday night.”
“Noo, it won’t harm anything,” Joe countered, smiling. “The old man isn’t here, so I may. Wait, I’ll go get it.”
“A goodbye thing?” Ira repeated, nonplussed.
“Yeh. Wait, wait. It’s in my jacket pocket.” Joe left the kitchen for the back bedroom.
“What’s he up to?” Ira inquired of Mamie.
“A foolish thing,” was her answer.
But Joe seemed to have difficulty finding the object he sought. “Maybe it’s in my overcoat,” he said. “Where did I — when did I show you?”
“Do you wanna see how Pitman looks, Ira?” Stella called from the front room.
“Sure.” Ira was certain she was sending him some kind of signal. Why of course: she wanted to remind him that with Zaida gone, Joe working, and Mamie escorting Mom to Flushing, the house would be virtually empty Sunday. He made for the front room.
“Don’t go away,” Joe urged.
Mamie kept on the subject of Zaida’s departure as Ira tried to insinuate his way into the front room after his prey. “For the children, for me, it’s easier. You can see. Would they dare play the new radio tonight? But that has nothing to do with it.”
“New radio?” Ira asked in surprise.