Oy-yoy, Tate!
Oy-yoy, Father!
Oy-yoy-yoy-yoy-yoy, God!
That was my way of telling the world how I felt. Menye had his.
First he nuzzled the ground with his wet, black nose. Then he pawed it three times with his front hoof, raised his tail high, leaped straight in the air, landed on all fours, and let out a muffled “moo.” It was such a funny sound that I had to laugh and make it myself. Menye seemed pleased by this, because he repeated the whole act, ending with the same four-legged jump. Naturally, I did the same, mooing and jumping like Menye. It could have gone on forever, a moo from Menye and a moo from me, a jump from me and a jump from Menye, if something didn’t land on my neck. It’s my brother Elye’s hand, all five fingers of it.
“Just look at you, almost nine years old and dancing with a calf! Get into the house, you rascal! Papa will give it to you!”
Bull! Papa isn’t giving me anything. Papa is sick. He hasn’t led a synagogue service since Simkhes Toyreh. All night he coughs. We sent for Dr. Blackwhiskers, the doctor with the big mustache and merry eyes. He’s a friendly man who calls me “Bellybutton” and tickles me in the stomach. He told my mother to take my father off potatoes and put him on clear broth and milk, a steady diet of clear broth and milk.
My mother listened and covered her face with her shawl when he left. Her shoulders shook. After a while she wiped her eyes, called my brother Elye, and spoke to him in a whisper. They were arguing. My mother wanted Elye to go somewhere and Elye didn’t want to. He said loudly:
“I’d rather go to my grave than to them! I’d sooner lie down and die.”
“Bite your tongue, you savage! How can you say such a thing?”
Although my mother spoke quietly, she clenched her teeth and shook a fist as though to knock Elye down. But soon she backed off and asked:
“What should I do, son? We have to help your poor father.”
“We’ll sell something,” my brother said, glancing at the glass cupboard.
My mother glanced at it too. She said softly:
“What is there to sell, our souls? That’s all we have left. You can’t be thinking of that empty cupboard.”
“Why not?” Elye asked.
“Murderer!” screamed my mother. “How did I raise my children to be such murderers?”
She turned red, began to cry, dried her eyes again, and gave in. The same thing had happened with my father’s books; with the silver collar of his prayer shawl; with our two gold-plated kiddush cups; with her good silk dress; and with all the other things we had sold one by one, each to a different customer.
The books went to Mikhl the book peddler, a man with a stringy beard that he’s always scratching. Elye had to go for him three times before he came. My mother cheered up at the sight of him and raised a finger to her lips. Mikhl understood the need for secrecy. He looked at the bookshelf, scratched his beard, and asked in a low voice:
“Well, now, what do we have here?”
My mother signaled me to fetch the books. I didn’t have to be asked twice. I jumped up so fast I crashed into the table and got a clout from Elye for behaving like a wild man. Elye went to the bookshelf and laid the books on the table. Mikhl leafed through them with one hand and scratched his beard with the other while pointing out what was wrong with each book. This one had a torn binding. That one was split in the back. A third had no value. When he had gone through every book, backs, bindings, and all, he gave his beard a scratch and said:
“If you at least had a complete set of the Mishnah, this might be worth something.”
My mother turned pale as a sheet. My brother Elye flamed and shouted:
“If you wanted a Mishnah you should have said so instead of wasting our time!”
“Hush!” my mother said. “Who’s there?” a hoarse voice asked from the next room. “No one,” my mother answered, sending Elye to my father’s bedside. She settled with Mikhl by herself. It couldn’t have been for much because when Elye came back and asked, she told him it was none of his business. Mikhl took the books, stuffed them in his sack, and cleared out.
Of all the things we sold, the glass cupboard was the most fun. In the first place, who could take it? It had always seemed part of the wall; how was it going to leave now? And besides, where would my mother now put the bread, the hallah, the dishes, the tin spoons and forks (our two silver spoons and one silver fork had been sold long ago), and where would we keep the matso on Passover? That’s what I wondered as Nachman the carpenter stood measuring the cupboard with the big raw nail on the fat finger of his greasy hand. In his opinion it wouldn’t fit through the door. The cupboard was this wide, the door was that wide — there was no way of getting it out.
“Then who got it in?” Elye asked.
“Why don’t you ask the cupboard?” Nachman said crossly. “How do I know? Someone, that’s who.”
I felt sorry for that cupboard. I mean, I felt sorry to think we’d be stuck with it. But soon Nachman came back with his two sons, both carpenters too, and it flew through the door as though possessed. Nachman went first, followed by his sons. He gave directions:
“Kopl, that way! Mendl, to the right! Kopl, slow down! Mendl, stop!”
I helped by bringing up the rear. My mother and Elye just stared at the bare wall that was covered with cobwebs and bawled. What a sight!
Suddenly—crashhh! Just as the cupboard reached the door, the glass shattered. The carpenter and his sons blamed each other. “You’ve got the hands of a tin rooster!” “And you have the feet of a bear!” “The devil take you!” “It was a black year you were born in!”
“What’s going on?” a hoarse voice asked from the other room.
“Nothing,” my mother said, wiping her eyes.
“Now what?” So my mother asked Elye one morning, looking anxiously at the bare walls. Elye and I helped her look at them. Then Elye looked at me, all worried and pitying-like.
“Go outside,” he said sternly. “I need to talk to Mama.”
I hopped out on one foot and made straight for the neighbor’s calf. Menye had grown by leaps and bounds and was now a handsome young bull with a cute black muzzle and big round eyes that looked so smart when they asked for something to eat that they were almost human. He liked being chucked with two fingers beneath the chin.
“What’s this? Hanging out with that calf again? The two of you are bosom buddies!”
It was Elye again. This time, though, he was nice. He took my hand and told me we were going to Hirsh-Ber the cantor’s. I would like it there, he said. There would be plenty to eat. Things at home weren’t good. We had to save Papa’s life. Elye opened his gabardine and showed me his vest.
“I’ve even sold the silver pocket watch I was given for my engagement. Brokheh’s father will have a fit if he finds out. He’ll turn the world upside down!”
It’s a good thing Brokheh’s father never found out and the world is still right side up. What would poor Menye do on his head?
“Here we are,” my brother Elye said. He was getting nicer by the minute.
Hirsh-Ber wasn’t a cantor like my father. According to my father, he couldn’t even carry a tune. But he knew music and had a choir of fifteen boys and a temper you had to watch out for. I sang him a synagogue number, jerking it out for all it was worth, and he said I was a soprano. “A soprano?” said Elye. “A soprano to beat all sopranos!” Elye bargained, was given an advance, and said I would be living at the cantor’s. “Do what he tells you,” he said. “And don’t feel homesick.”