The Anatomy Lesson (30 page)

They passed through the tunne
l, turned sharply along a steep
railroad embankment littered with rusted chunks of abandoned machinery, and there, across the road, beyond a high black fence of iron palings, the gravestones began, miles and miles of treeless cemetery, ending at the far horizon in a large boxlike structure that was probably nothing but a factory, but that smoking foully away through the gray of the storm looked like something far worse.

“
Here!
”
Mr. Freytag was rapping on the partition.
“
This gate!
”
And saw for the First time that their driver wasn
’
t a man. He pulled at Nathan
’
s sleeve but Nathan wasn
’
t there. Out where everything ended, he had ended too. He was no longer even that table.

Ricky had unfurled a black umbrella and was shepherding the two passengers to the cemetery gate. A job to do and she did it. Dignity. For whomever.

“
I saw the braid, a girl
’
s braid, and it didn
’
t even register.
”
Mr. Freytag had struck up a conversation.
“
All I see is grief.
”

“
That
’
s all right, sir.
”

“
A young girl. With a car this size. In weather like this.
”

“
I began my career for a Jewish funeral home. My first position as a chauffeur.
”

“
Is that so? But—what did you drive?
”

“
The relatives of the deceased.
”

“
Amazing.
”

“
I always used to say to my husband that there must be Jewish ESP, the way the word gets out when a Jewish person dies. The mourners come in droves, they come from everywhere to comfort the bereaved. It was my first experience of Jewish people. My respect for Jews began right there.
”

Mr. Freytag burst into tears.
“
I got three shoeboxes filled with condolence cards.
”

“
Well,
”
Ricky said to him,
“
that shows how much she was loved.
”

“
You have children, young lady?
”

“
No, sir. Not yet.
”

“
Oh, you must, you must.
”

Along a whitening path, alone, the two men entered the Jewish burial ground. They stood together before a mound of raw earth and a headstone bearing the family name. Now he was in a rage.
“
But this is not what I wanted! Why haven
’
t they flattened it? Why hasn
’
t this been leveled off? They left it like a garbage dump! Three whole weeks and now it
’
s snowing and they still
haven
’
t made it
right
!
Here i
t
is—I don
’
t get it. Julie
’
s grave, I say the words, they have no meaning. Look how they left it!
”
He was leading Zuckerman by the hand from one family plot to the next.
“
My brother is here, my sister-in-law here, then Julie
”
—
the pile left like a garbage dump—
”
and I
’
ll be here. And there,
”
he said, waving toward the smoking factory,
“
off there, the old part—her father and mother, my father, my mother, my two beautiful young sisters, one of them age sixteen years, dying in my arms…
”
They were standing again before the footstone engraved
“
paul
freytag
1899-1970.
”
“
You got pockets in there, Paul? My stupid brother. Made his money in gloves. Wouldn
’
t spend a penny. Bought day-old bread all his life. AH he thought about was his money. His money and his pecker. Pardon me but that
’
s the truth. Always on his wife. No consideration. Wouldn
’
t leave his poor wife alone, not even when she had cancer of the vagina. Little guy who looked like a candy-store owner. And she was a doll. The sweetest nature. A clever woman too. The best card player, Tilly—she could beat
‘
em all. What times we had, the four of us. Sold his business in 1965 for a hundred thousand and the building for another hundred. They paid him three, four thousand a year just to stay on and look after his accounts. But he wouldn
’
t give th
at
wonderful woman a nickel to buy a thing. For the two years he was sick wouldn
’
t even buy himself a remote-control switch so he doesn
’
t have to get out of bed to change the channels. Saving it right to the end. The end. The end, Paul! You got pockets in there, you tight bastard? He
’
s gone—they
’
re all gone. And I stand on the edge and wait to be pushed. You know how I live with death now? I go to bed at night and
I
say,
‘
I don
’
t give a shit.
’
That
’
s how you lose your fear of death—you don
’
t give a shit anymore.
”

He drew Nathan back to the upturned chunks of frozen earth heaped up over his wife.
“
Her Bobby. Her baby. How she nursed him in that dark room. How that kid suffered with those mumps. And that
’
s what changes a life.
I
don
’
t believe it. Zuck, it
’
s idiotic. Would Bobby have chosen that girl for a wife if he had known he was a hundred percent? Not in a million years. He actually didn
’
t think he was good enough for anything better. That Julie
’
s Robert should have such a thought! Yet this, I believe, is what happened. With what that kid had to offer, with all his achievements, the respect and admiration he has in his field—and his downfall? The mumps! And a son who tells his father to eat shit! Would Bob
by have produced, on his own, a
boy so full of contempt? He would have had a child who has
feelings,
feelings like
we
have feelings. A child who worked and who studied and stayed home, and who wanted to excel like his father. Is that what death and dying is supposed to be about? Is that what the hardship and the struggle is for? For a piece of contempt who gets on the phone with his father and tells him to go eat shit? Who thinks to himself,
‘
This family, these people, I
’
m not even theirs and look what they do.
’
Who thinks,
‘
Watch me bend them around my finger with all their stupid Jewish love!
’
Because who is he? Do we even know where he comes from? She wanted a baby, right away, off the bat, had to have a baby. So they found a little orphan baby, and what in his roots that we don
’
t know makes him behave this way to Bobby? I have a brilliant son. And all that brilliance locked in his genes! Everything we gave him, trapped like that in Bobby
’
s genes, while everything we are
not,
everything we are
against
—
How can all of this end with Gregory? Eat shit? To his
father!
I
’
ll break his neck for what he
’
s done to this family! I
’
ll kill that little bastard! I
will
!”

Zuckerman, with what strength remained in his enfeebled arms, pounced upon the old man
’
s neck.
He
would kill—and never again suppose himself better than his crime: an end to denial; of the heaviest judgment guilty as charged.
“
Your sacred genes! What do you see inside your head? Genes with
jew
sewed on them? Is that all you see in that lunatic mind, the unstained natural virtue of Jews?
”

“
Stop!
”
Mr. Freytag began pushing him off with his thick gloved hands.
“
Stop this! Zuck!
”

“
What
’
s he do all night long? He
’
s out studying fucking!
”

“
Zuck, no—Zuck. the dead!
”

“
We
are the dead! These bones in boxes are the Jewish living! These are the people running the show!
”

“
Help me!
”
He struggled free, turned to the gate, stumbled
—
and Zuckerman slid after him.
“
Hurry!
”
Mr. Freytag called.
“
Something
’
s happened!
”
And wailing for help as he ran, the old man to be strangled was gone.

Just white snow whirling now, all else obliterated but the chiseled stones, and his hands frantically straining to throttle that throat.
“
Our genes! Our sacred little packet of Jewish sugars!
”
Then his legs flew off and he was sitting. From there he began his recitation, at the top of his voice read aloud the words he saw carved all around him in rock.
“
Honor thy Finkelstein! Do
not commit Kaufman! Make no idols in the form of Levine! Thou shalt not take in vain the name of Katz!
”

“
He—he—snapped!
”

“
O Lord,
”
cried Zuckerman, sledding inch by inch on his palms and his knees,
“
who bringeth forth from the earth the urge to spurt that maketh monkeys of us all, blessed art thou!
”
Eyes all but blinded by the melting snow, icy water ringing his collar and freezing slush filling his socks, he continued to crawl toward the last of the fathers demanding to be pleased.
“
Freytag! For-bidder! Now I murder you!
”

But the boots stopped him: two tall cavalry boots burnished with oil and shedding the snow, ominous powerful sleek splendid boots that would have prompted caution in his bearded forebears too.

“
This
”
—Zuckerman laughed, spewing flakes of burning ice
—
“
this is your protection, Poppa Freytag? This great respecter of the Jews?
”
He strained to find the power to leave the graveyard ground.
“
Out of my way, you innocent bitch!
”
But against Ricky
’
s boots got nowhere.

He awoke in a hospital cubicle. Something was wrong with his mouth. His head was enormously large. Ail he was aware of was this huge echoing hole which was the inside of his head. Within the enormous head there was something barely moving that was just as enormous. This was his tongue. The whole of his mouth, from ear to ear, was just pain.

Standing beside his bed was Bobby.
“
You
’
re going to be all right,
”
he said.

Zuckerman could begin to fee! his lips now, lips swelled nearly to the size of his tongue. But below the lips, nothing.

“
We
’
re waiting for the plastic surgeon. He
’
s going to sew up your chin. You
’
ve burst all the skin on the underside of your jaw. We don
’
t know whether you
’
ve broken it, but the gash under your chin he can put together, and then we
’
ll get some X-rays of your mouth and see the extent of the damage. Also of your head. I don
’
t think the skull
’
s fractured, but we better look. So far it seems you got off lightly: the gash and a few smashed teeth. Nothing that can
’
t be fixed.
”