There's something I must ask you about, I said. Tell me, aren't your people Jewish?
Of course, he replied. Why? Did she try to make you believe she was a Gentile? She was the only one who resented being Jewish. It used to drive my mother crazy. I suppose she never told you our real name? My father changed it, you see, on coming to America. It means death in Polish.
He had a question now to put me. He was puzzling how to frame it. Finally he came out with it, but blushingly.
Is she giving you trouble? I mean, are you having marital difficulties?
Oh, I replied, we have our troubles ... like every married couple. Yes, plenty of trouble. But that's not for you to worry about.
She's not running around with ... with other men, is she?
No-o-o, not exactly. God, if he only knew!
She loves me and I love her. No matter what her faults, she's the only one—for me.
What is it, then?
I was at a loss how to put it without shocking him too deeply. It was hard to explain, I said.
You don't have to hold back, he said. I can take it.
Well ... you see, there are three of us living here. That stuff you see on the walls—that's the other one's work. She's a girl about the same age as your sister. An eccentric character whom your sister seems to idolize. (It sounded strange saying your sister.) Sometimes I feel that she thinks more of this friend than she does of me. It gels pretty thick, if you know what I mean.
I get it, he said. But why don't you throw her out?
That's it, I can't. Not that I haven't tried. But it won't work. If she leaves, your sister will go too.
I'm not surprised, he said. It sounds just like her. Not that I think she's a Lesbian, you understand. She likes involvements. Anything to create a sensation.
What makes you so sure she might not be in love with this other person? You say yourself you haven't seen much of her these last few years...
She's a man's woman, he said. That I know.
You seem awfully sure.
I am. Don't ask me why. I just am. Don't forget, whether she admits it or not, she's got Jewish blood in her veins. Jewish girls are loyal, even when they're strange and wayward, like this one. It's in the blood...
It's good to hear, I said. I only hope it's true.
Do you know what I'm thinking? You should come to see us, have a talk with my mother. She'd be only too happy to meet you. She has no idea what sort of person her daughter married. Anyway, she'd set you straight. It would make her feel good.
Maybe I'll do that, I said. The truth can't hurt. Besides, I am curious to know what her real mother looks like.
Good, he said, let's fix a date.
I named one, for a few days later. We shook hands.
As he was closing the gate behind him he said: What she needs is a sound thrashing. But you're not the kind to do it, are you?
A few days later I knocked at their door. It was evening and the dinner hour was past. Her brother came to the door. (He was hardly likely to remember that a few years ago, when I had called to see if Mona really lived there or if it was a fake address, he had slammed the door in my face.) Now I was inside. I felt somewhat quaky. How often I had tried to picture this interior, this home of hers, frame her in the midst of her family, as a child, as a young girl, as a grown woman!
Her mother came forward to greet me. The same woman I had caught a glimpse of years ago—hanging up the wash. The person I described to Mona, only to have her laugh in my face. (That was my aunt!)
It was a sad, care-worn looking countenance the mother presented. As if she hadn't laughed or smiled in years. She had something of an accent but the voice was pleasant. However, it bore no resemblance to her daughter's. Nor could I detect any resemblance in their features.
It was like her—why I couldn't say—to come straight to the point. Was she the real mother or the step-mother? (That was the deep grievance.) Going to the sideboard, she produced a few documents. One was her marriage certificate. Another was Mona's birth certificate. Then photos—of the whole family.
I took a seat at the table and studied them intently. Not that I thought they were fakes. I was shaken. For the first time I was coming to grips with facts.
I wrote down the name of the village in the Carpathians where her mother and father were born. I studied the photo of the house they had lived in in Vienna. I gazed long and lovingly at all the photos of Mona, beginning with the infant in swaddling clothes, then to the strange foreign child with long black ringlets, and finally to the fifteen year old Rejane or Modjeska whose clothes seemed grotesque yet succeeded somehow in setting off her personality. And there was her father—who loved her so! A handsome, distinguished looking man. Might have been a physician, a chancellor of the exchequer, a composer or a wandering scholar. As for that sister of hers, yes, she was even more beautiful than Mona, no gainsaying it. But it was a beauty lost in placidity. They were of the same family, but the one belonged to her race while the other was a wild fruit sired by the wind.
When at last I raised my eyes I found the mother weeping.
So she told you I was her step-mother? What ever made her say such a thing? And that I was cruel to her ... that I refused to understand her. I don't understand ... I don't.
She wept bitterly. The brother came over and put his arms around her.
Don't take it so hard, mother. She was always strange.
Strange, yes, but this ... this is like treason. Is she ashamed of me? What did I do, tell me, to cause such behavior?
I wanted to say something comforting but I couldn't find words.
I feel sorry for you, said her mother. You must have a hard time of it indeed. If I hadn't given birth to her I might believe that she was some one else's child, not mine. Believe me, she wasn't like this as a girl. No, she was a good child, respectful, obedient, eager to please. The change came suddenly, as if the Devil had taken possession of her. Nothing we said or did suited her any more. She became like a stranger in our midst. We tried everything, but it was no use.
She broke down again, cupped her head in her hands and wept. Her whole body shook with uncontrollable spasms.
I was for getting away as fast as possible. I had heard enough. But they insisted on serving tea. So I sat there and listened. Listened to the story of Mona's life, from the time she was a child. There was nothing unusual or remarkable about any of it, curiously enough. (Only one little detail struck home. She always held her head high.) In a way, it was rather soothing to know these homely facts. Now I could put the two faces of the coin together ... As for the sudden change, that didn't strike me as so baffling. It had happened to me too, after all. What do mothers know about their offspring? Do they invite the wayward one to share his or her secret longings? Do they probe the heart of a child? Do they ever confess that they are monsters too? And if a child is ashamed of her blood, how is she to make that known to her own mother?
Looking at this woman, this mother, listening to her, I could find nothing in her which, had I been her offspring, would have attracted me to her. Her mournful air alone would have turped me from her. To say nothing of her sense of pride. It was obvious that her sons had been good to her; Jewish sons usually are. And the one daughter, Jehovah be praised, she had married off successfully. But then there was the black sheep, that thorn in her side. The thought of it filled her with guilt. She had failed. She had brought forth bad fruit. And this wild one had disowned her. What greater humiliation could a mother suffer than to be called step-mother?