And the witch stands over her and adds in her mannish voice, “He should be whipped, the little demon! Flogged till the blood runs! A boy must know that this is what happens to a th—”
My mother doesn’t allow her to utter the word thief. “He’s an orphan, a poor orphan,” she pleads with the doctor’s wife. She kisses her hands and begs her to forgive me, it’ll never happen again! She swears with many oaths that this is the last time, otherwise may she herself die, or may she bury me!
“Let him swear that he will never so much as look into my garden,” the doctor’s wife demands with her mannish voice, without a drop of compassion for an orphan.
“May my hands wither! May my eyes fall out!” I say, and go home with my mother. She lectures me through her tears until finally I break down in tears myself.
“All I ask is, what will become of you?” my mother cries, and tells my brother Elyahu the whole sad story. My brother Elyahu hears out the story and turns pale, it seems out of anger. My mother sees he is mad at me and is afraid he might beat me. She whispers something in his ear, saying he shouldn’t beat me because I’m an orphan.
“Who’s touching him?” says my brother Elyahu. “I’d just like to know what will become of him? What’s to become of him?!”
My brother Elyahu gnashes his teeth and rivets his eyes on me to make sure I see him while he’s demanding what will become of me. Do I know what will become of me? Maybe you know what will become of me?
IV
MY BROTHER ELYAHU GETS MARRIED
A.
Mazel tov! Do you know why? My brother Elyahu is getting married!
My, oh my, what’s going on! The town’s in an uproar. The world is quaking! So says our neighbor Fat Pessi. She says it’ll be a grand wedding such as hasn’t been seen in our town for a long time!
Why all the fuss? Some of it’s out of pity, because my mother is a widow and the bridegroom is an orphan. And some of it’s out of respect for my father’s reputation. My father, may he rest in peace, left behind a good name! While he was alive no one ever spoke highly of Peysi the cantor, but ever since his death he is praised to the skies!
People tell my mother that the bride’s father can afford to pay for the expenses plus more. He mustn’t forget that he’s getting Peysi the cantor’s son for a son-in-law! When my brother Elyahu hears this, he becomes embarrassed and strokes his little beard like a grown man. He is grown up! Not too long ago his beard began to sprout. Surely that came from smoking. After our father died, he started to smoke. At first he gagged on the smoke and coughed. Now he can inhale and blow the smoke out through his nose. That’s quite a trick!
Do you think I can’t do that? The only problem is, I don’t have tobacco. So I smoke whatever I can get hold of — paper or straw. My brother Elyahu caught me at it and gave me what for! He may smoke, but I may not! But is it my fault that I’m not yet nine years old? I promised him, swore on the Bible, that I wouldn’t smoke anymore. How long do you think I kept my word?
I ask you, who doesn’t smoke nowadays?
B.
Soon the world will turn upside down. So says our neighbor Pessi. She came back from visiting the bride’s father in a rage. It’s an ugly story. The father had bought the bridegroom a fob watch as a gift. Then he found out the groom didn’t have it anymore. It was a genuine silver fob watch. What happened to it? Did my brother lose it playing cards, God forbid? No, he sold it and used the money for doctors and medicines to try to save my father’s life. So argues Pessi. But the bride’s father is a crude, unfeeling man. What do people’s fathers have to do with his fob watch? he objects. He is not obliged, he says, to support other people’s fathers with his fob watches. One measly fob watch suddenly became “fob watches,” and one poor father becomes “fathers”! Pessi says, what can you expect? From a pig’s tail you can’t make a fur hat! She means the bride’s father. He remains a crude, unfeeling person.
By trade he is a baker and is called Yoneh the baker. “You might as well lie in the earth and bake your bagels,” Pessi says to him, probably joking, or maybe she really means it. I don’t understand how you can lie in the earth and bake bagels. Who will buy them?
Our future in-law is a rich man. Pessi claims he’s really wealthy! She says to his face that even if she had half of what he had, she wouldn’t make a match with any of his children. She hates a greedy pig. He’d better be quiet — if someone falls into her trap, watch out! He’s willing to forget the fob watch as long as she shuts up. But Pessi says she isn’t willing to shut up. She wants him to buy the groom a new fob watch. It’s not right for a groom to go under the wedding canopy without a fob watch. Yoneh the baker argues back: what business does Pessi have with the groom? She says it’s her business because the groom is Peysi the cantor’s son, and he, Yoneh the baker, is both a rich man and a greedy pig. This hurts his feelings. He slams the door and shouts, “Go to hell!” She retorts, “You’re in better shape than I to go where it’s hot — you’re a baker!”
My mother is worried that Yoneh might break off the match. Pessi tells her to sleep peacefully — you don’t break off a match with an orphan. Who do you think won out? We did! Yoneh bought the groom a new fob watch, also silver, but even better than the first one. He even brought it over himself. If only I had such a fob watch! What would I do? First I’d remove the insides to figure out how it works. And then? And then — I know what would happen.
My mother congratulates the bride’s father and wishes he live long enough to buy her son a gold watch. The bride’s father congratulates her as well, wishes that she live to see her youngest marry. He means me. I’m willing to get married this very day as long as I get a fob watch.
My mother caresses me and says that a lot of water will flow before then, but in the meantime her eyes become moist. Why does so much water have to flow before I get married? Why does she have to cry about it? Crying is for her a habit, I think, something she has to do every day. For her crying is like your daily praying, or eating. When the tailor delivers the groom’s clothes, ordered by his future father-in-law, she has to cry. When Pessi bakes a honey cake for the wedding, she has to cry. Tomorrow is the time for the wedding ceremony — again crying! I do not understand where people get so many tears from!
C.
It turns out to be a magnificent day — like in paradise! It’s the middle of the month of Elul, springtime, and the weather is actually springlike. The sun isn’t hot enough to sweat, but it still makes you want to swim. It warms and caresses and kisses like a mother. The sky is decked out for Shabbes.
The whole town is happy that my brother Elyahu is getting married. Early in the morning a fair is being set up in the town square. Fairs are something I can’t miss — I’m crazy about fairs. People run around like mice, sweat, shout, and yank the goyim by their shirt-tails, eager to earn money — it’s a real show! But the goyim have plenty of time; they stroll around slowly, push their caps back, and look, touch, and scratch themselves, haggling for bargains. Peasant women wear strange shawls and wide-open blouses, exposing their breasts. Into these open blouses they stick bits of merchandise when no one is looking. Jews know this trick and look out for it. If they see it, they make sure to shake out the pilfered goods, which leads to a scene. Sometimes a peasant woman buys a candle in church and hides it in her shawl. Young folks, with nothing else to do, want to have some fun — they sneak up behind her and light the candle. Everyone points at the peasant woman and laughs. She doesn’t know why the Jews are laughing and reviles them with deadly curses. This makes them laugh even more. Sometimes this leads to a fight between peasants and Jews. I tell you — you don’t need a theater!