That’s what she said, Brokheh did, all in one breath, praying with her hands clasped together:
“London, I wish you would burn!” God Almighty! When will we get to America?
Part Two
CONGRATULATIONS! WE’RE IN AMERICA!
Congratulations, we’re in America!
That’s what they tell us, anyway. No one has seen America yet because we’re still on Ella’s Island. Why did they name it for Ella? “Because Ella had no fella,” Pinye says. Pinye can’t resist a rhyme.
Pinye is peeved at Ella’s Island for keeping us poor immigrants here while the rich ones go ashore. That’s something you would expect from a thieving Russky, he says, not from a free country like America. In America rich and poor are supposed to be equal. Pinye starts spouting words: “Columbus …Shakespeare …Buckle …Civilization …” He’s decided to write a poem sending America to the devil but he doesn’t have pencil or paper.
Elye says that if Pinye doesn’t like America, he can turn around and go home. I’ve told you they never agree. “Mr. Summer and Mr. Winter,” Brokheh calls them. Elye doesn’t take that sitting down. “Fat cow” and “Nanny goat” are two of his names for Brokheh. (Some of the others aren’t fit for print.) My mother tells Brokheh that whoever doesn’t want to get scratched should stay out of a fight between tomcats.
What are we doing on Ella’s Island? We’re waiting for our friends and acquaintances to get us out. We’ve been in and out of so many places since leaving London and boarding ship that we know all the questions by heart. “What are your names, please?” “Where are you going?” “Whom do you know in America?”
We give the same answers each time. Once there was a Jew named Peysi the cantor. Peysi died and left a widow: that’s my mother. My mother has a son: that’s Elye. Elye has a wife: that’s Brokheh. He also has a friend: that’s Pinye. Pinye has a wife: that’s Taybl. And there’s me, Motl, and my friend Mendl. Brokheh calls him Teeny because he’s already in his teens.
Whom do we know in America? Why, half the country and just about every Jew! To begin with, there are our neighbors Moyshe the bookbinder, Fat Pesye, and their gang. We list their full names for the immigration officials: “There’s Pinye-Log, and Velvel-Tomcat, and Mendl-Ratface, and Hayyim-Ox, and Faytl-Petelulu, and Berl-Give-Me-More, and Zerakh-Butternose, and Hirshl-Bumpy. Bumpy is called Bumpy because—”
The immigration officials stop us. “All right, we’ve had enough children. Let’s have some adults.”
We give them some adults. “There’s Yoyneh the bagel maker, a mean Jew if ever there was one. That’s one. There’s Yoyneh’s wife, Riveleh-Chemise. That’s two. The chemise was stolen at the border …”
My mother hears “border,” remembers her linens, and begins to cry. Elye scolds her. My mother tells him she’s in America. Now that she needn’t worry about her eyes, she’ll cry all she wants.
It’s a miracle they let her in with those eyes — to say nothing of surviving the sea voyage. The times we saw the Angel of Death face to face! The times we said good-bye to life!
Everything seemed fine and dandy when we boarded the Prince Albert. My friend Mendl and I explored the ship from prow to stern. We couldn’t have been more thrilled. Picture living in a three-story house on water! You take a turn around the deck with your hands in your pockets and you’re traveling to America. You stop to have a drink and you’re traveling to America. You sleep in a bed at night and you’re still traveling to America. And the people — a whole city! They’re all traveling to America like you and everyone knows everyone in no time. You find out more about a person in a day than you normally would in a year.
Whew! The number of women my mother, Brokheh, and Taybl have made friends with! That’s nothing, though, compared to Elye and Pinye’s new friends. They talk on and on. The women discuss household things: kitchens, pantries, laundry, linens, socks, pillowcases. The men talk about America, jobs, Columbus, anti-Semitism, pogroms.
A person might think they couldn’t live without pogroms. I’ve told you I don’t like to hear about them. The minute someone starts on a new one, I’m off. I take Mendl by the hand and we go for a walk in the streets of the Prince Albert.
The Prince Albert is a big, fine-looking ship. It has marble stairs, brass railings, and lots of iron and steel. And the crew! Some are stewards and some are sailors, a whole bunch of them. They run around all over. Mendl and I are green with envy. We promise each other that we’ll go to sea when we grow up.
The one thing wrong with the Prince Albert is that you’re not allowed everywhere. Try going beyond the steerage deck and you’re chased away. The sailors are a rotten bunch. And the first-class passengers are no better for letting the sailors behave like that. Are they afraid we’ll bite them? Mendl doesn’t like it one bit. He can’t understand why a ship needs different classes. America has no classes, he says. If I don’t believe him I can ask my brother Elye.
Elye hates those kind of questions. It’s better to ask Pinye. Pinye loves to talk about such things. He’ll bombard you with words. Get Pinye started and he’s like an alarm clock that keeps going until it runs down.
I found Pinye sitting on deck with his nose in a book. Pinye doesn’t read with his eyes. He reads with the tip of his nose. That’s because he’s nearsighted. When I was practically on top of him I said: “Pinye, I have a question.”
Pinye took his nose from the book.
“What’s up, little man?”
“Little man” is Pinye’s name for me. I mean it’s his name when he’s in a good mood. He’s almost always in a good mood, even when he’s fighting with Elye or Taybl is sulking.
I asked Pinye if Mendl was telling the truth.
You should have seen him catch fire and shoot sparks! Why, America, he said, is the only country in the world with real freedom and equality. Only in America can you be sitting with the President on one side of you, and a bum, a down-and-outer, on the other, and next to the bum is a millionaire. Civilization! Progress! Columbus!
Pinye cut loose with his biggest words. A Jew standing next to us, a stranger, mixed in:
“If it’s such a wonderful country and everyone is so equal, how come there are down-and-outers and millionaires? You’re not being logical.”
But let Pinye fight his own battles. I had found out what I wanted to know. Mendl was right. There are no classes in America. Classes are bad. So are first- and second-class passengers. Just don’t ask me why. What have they ever done to me?
Mendl says: “Who do those fat cats think they are shutting themselves up with a lot of shiny mirrors? Do they think they’re too good for the likes of us lower-deckers? Aren’t we human too? Don’t we all pray to the same God?”
In the end, they got their comeuppance. It happened on the night of Yom Kippur, when the upper crust had to stoop and join us in steerage.
Since the Prince Albert sailed after Rosh Hashanah, we spent Yom Kippur at sea. Our last meal before the fast was roast potatoes. All our meals were potatoes, because the Prince Albert had no kosher kitchen. There was also bread and tea with sugar. I tell you, it wasn’t half bad. I could live on nothing else for a whole year. Brokheh says too many potatoes make you fat. But what doesn’t Brokheh say? When did Brokheh ever like anything?