“Mom’s dusting.”
“Oh, great. Ask her if ’she’s got a free day,” Llona said sarcastically. “I’ve been looking for a cleaning lady.”
“Shh!” Reb turned back to the keyhole.
“Harumph!” Reb’s father cleared his throat.
“Yes?” Reb’s mother chose to regard it as a verbalism, which meant that by breaking the silence he had spoken first.
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You did so. I heard you!”
“I was only clearing my throat.”
“If you didn’t smoke like a chimney, you wouldn’t always be choking to death.” She knelt down to dust the shelf of one of the end tables.
“What do you think you’re doing, woman?”
“I’m playing pick-up-sticks. What does it look like? I’m dusting. As long. as I’m here with nothing else to do, it shouldn’t be a waste, my hands at least should keep busy.”
“If you’re so ambitious, why not go home and clean?”
“A home I don’t have any more with black power and anti-Semitism and who knows what.”
“You’re being ridiculous!” He pulled back as his wife bent over so that her rear end was almost sticking in his face. “Now what the devil are you trying to do?”
“To clean under the couch. 0y! The dust is so thick under here it hasn’t been cleaned since I don’t know when.”
“Ohmigod!” Reb was on his feet, remembering that he’d shoved Llona’s clothes under the couch, but it was boo late.
“Ohmigod!” Reb’s mother unknowingly echoed him. She’d found the garments. “Look at this!” She pulled the clothes out from under the couch and showed them to her husband.
“What is it?”
“From Brooks Brothers they aren’t,” she told him. “It’s female clothes hiding under our son’s couch.”
“I don’t get it.” Reb’s father scratched his head.
“And you think I do?” Confronted with what looked like a problem, Reb’s mother forgot that she was supposed to be mad at her husband. “You think maybe our son’s a hermaphrodite?” she said, tragedy in her voice.
“What makes you think that?”
“I got here before, he wouldn’t let me in. I bet you he had the female clothes on and he had to get them off in a hurry and he hid them under the couch. How else?”
“Queer.”
“You shouldn’t be calling him names. He’s sick and he needs our help.”
“I didn’t mean that. I meant it’s odd, unusual. Besides, you’re jumping to conclusions. There could be another explanation."
“Give me a for instance.”
“For instance maybe he’s got a girl in there. Maybe the clothes belong to her.”
“Oy! A girl! My son?” Reb’s mother rocked back and forth on her heels. “Oy!”
“For God’s sake, it’s normal enough. Get hold of yourself. Would you rather he was a fairy?”
“I suppose not.” There was a note of reluctance in her voice. She picked up Llona’s and looked at it suspiciously. “A shiksa!” she decided.
“How do you figure that?”
“Such a short skirt a hamishe Jewish girl wouldn’t be wearing.”
“Maybe she’s a short girl.”
“A midget she’d have to be. No, it’s a shiksa. I could feel it in my bones. I’m going to go in there and see for myself.” Holding the skirt gingerly, chin high, she marched toward the bedroom door.
“Quick!” Reb turned to Llona. “She’s coming in here. Get under the bed.”
Llona bent over and tried to wriggle under the bed. “The space is too small. I can’t fit,” she hissed at Reb.
Her naked posterior jutting out was the first thing Reb’s mother saw when she opened the door. She stared at it for a long moment. Then she closed the door and turned toward her husband, her eyes wide and staring.
“What is it?” He was concerned at her expression. “You look like you saw a ghost. Here, sit down.” He crossed over to her and led her back to the couch.
“There’s a naked woman in there!” Her voice quivered up the scale.
“There is?” Reb’s father sounded interested.
“A thing like that I wouldn’t lie about. See for yourself.”
“All right.” Reb’s father crossed to the bedroom door, opened it, looked inside, closed it again and turned back to his wife. “She’s under the covers.” He sounded disappointed. “How could you tell she didn’t have any clothes on?”
“She wasn’t under the covers before.”
“Just my luck,” Reb’s father muttered to himself.
“A shiksa! Just like I expected,” Reb’s mother sighed. “A shiksa!"
“A white shiksa!”
“Don’t start again! We don’t have time, we got real trouble. What should we do?”
Maybe the best thing would be just to go away quietly and leave them alone.”
“I should leave my son all alone with a nudenik hussy a shiksa? Never! What kind of mother do you think I am?”
“A Jewish mother,” Reb’s father sighed.
“Don’t start! We’re going to go in there and talk to them.”
“I don’t think we should.”
“Look, Mr. Black Power, you’re his father. So come on!” She took her husband’s hand and led him to the bedroom door and threw it wide open. “Reb, your father has something to say” she announced.
“Yes, Dad?”
“Uh— Well— Now, Reb—- Eh, how’s the job coming, son?”
“Fine, Dad.”
“Good. Good. I’m happy to hear that.”
“From such fatherly advice a boy could just as well be an orphan!” Reb’s mother shot her husband a withering look. She took a deep breath. “What do you call this?”
Her arm snapped straight out, the finger at the end quivering with indignation as it pointed at Llona.
“That’s a girl,” Reb answered quiefly.
“A white girl,” his father amended.
“She’s Jewish?” his mother demanded.
“I don’t know. I never asked her.”
“Aha! She’s got a name, maybe?” '
“Yes. Llona. Llona, I’d like you to meet my mother.”
“How do you do?” Llona said, huddling under the blankets on the bed.
“So tell me, Llona, you’re Jewish?”
“No, I’m not.”
“Almost, I’m relieved. A Jewish girl wouldn’t be naked in a boy’s apartment,” Reb’s mother confided to her husband.
“Now, just a minute—!” Llona was beginning to get mad.
“What do you want to get mixed up with white girls for anyway, son?” Reb’s father asked. “Why don’t you stick to your own kind?”
“The way you did, Dad?” Reb asked sarcastically.
“Look,” Llona interrupted. “I wonder if one of you would be good enough to bring me my clothes.”
“I’ll get them.” Reb’s father went into the living room, picked up the clothes and brought them back to Llona.
“Here.”
“Thank you.” Llona took them and vanished beneath the covers which rippled and heaved with the movements of her dressing.
“So, Reb, my son, this is the way a good Jewish boy to act?” his mother demanded.
“This kind of thing doesn’t reflect well on our people,” his father told him disapprovingly.
“Where are my panties?” Llona’s head popped out from under the covers.
“Search me.” Reb played innocent.
“It wouldn’t be necessary.” His mother pointed toward Reb’s hip where the black Nymph panties were sticking out of his pants pocket. “Here.” She. extricated them gingerly and handed them to Llona. “As short as that skirt is, I’m surprised you should bother with panties,” she told Llona disapprovingly.
Llona wriggled into the panties, threw back the covers and got out of the bed. “I’m leaving now,” she announced. “It’s been very nice meeting you all.”