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Authors: Bernard Malamud

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BOOK: The Assistant
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Glancing at her watch she saw it was already past one. Shivering, she rose, then sat down to wait five last minutes. She felt the stars clustered like a distant weight above her head. Utterly lonely, she regretted the spring-like loveliness of the night; it had gone, in her hands, to waste. She was tired of anticipation, of waiting for nothing.
A man was standing unsteadily before her, heavy, dirty, stinking of whiskey. Helen half-rose, struck with fright.
He flipped off his hat and said huskily, “Don't be afraid of me, Helen. I'm personally a fine guy—son of a cop. You remember me, don't you—Ward Minogue that went to your school? My old man beat me up once in the girls' yard.”
Though it was years since she had seen him she recognized Ward, at once recalling the incident of his following a girl into a lavatory. Instinctively Helen raised her arm to protect herself. She kept herself from screaming, or he might grab her. How stupid, she thought, to wait for this.
“I remember you, Ward.”
“Could I sit down?”
She hesitated. “All right.”
Helen edged as far away from him as she could. He looked half-stupefied. If he made a move she would run, screaming.
“How did you recognize me in the dark?” she asked, pretending to be casual as she glanced stealthily around to see how best to escape. If she could get past the trees, it was then another twenty feet along the shrub-lined path before she could be out in the open. Once on the plaza there would be people around she could appeal to.
God only help me, she thought.
“I saw you a couple of times lately,” Ward answered, rubbing his hand slowly across his chest.
“Where?”
“Around. Once I saw you come out of your old man's grocery and I figured it was you. You have still kept your looks,” he grinned.
“Thanks. Don't you feel so well?”
“I got gas pains in my chest and a goddam headache.”
“In case you want one I have a box of aspirins in my purse.”
“No, they make me puke.” She noticed that he was glancing toward the trees. She grew more anxious, thought of offering him her purse if he only wouldn't touch her.
“How's your boy friend, Frank Alpine?” Ward asked, with a wet wink.
She said in surprise, “Do you know Frank?”
“He's an old friend of mine,” he answered. “He was here lookin' for you.”
“Is—he all right?”
“Not so hot,” said Ward. “He had to go home.”
She got up. “I have to leave now.”
But he was standing.
“Good night.” Helen walked away from him.
“He told me to give you this paper.” Ward thrust his hand into his coat pocket.
She didn't believe him but paused long enough for him to move forward. He grabbed her with astonishing swiftness,
smothering her scream with his smelly hand, as he dragged her toward the trees.
“All I want is what you give that wop,” Ward grunted. She kicked, clawed, bit his hand, broke loose. He caught her by her coat collar, ripped it off. She screamed again and ran forward but he pounced upon her and got his arm over her mouth. Ward shoved her hard against a tree, knocking the breath out of her. He held her tightly by the throat as with his other hand he ripped open her coat and tore her dress off the shoulder, exposing her brassière.
Struggling, kicking wildly, she caught him between the legs with her knee. He cried out and cracked her across the face. She felt the strength go out of her and fought not to faint. She screamed but heard no sound.
Helen felt his body shuddering against her. I am disgraced, she thought, yet felt curiously freed of his stinking presence, as if he had dissolved into a can of filth and she had kicked it away. Her legs buckled and she slid to the ground. I've fainted, went through her mind, although she felt she was still fighting him.
Dimly she realized that a struggle was going on near her. She heard the noise of a blow, and Ward Minogue cried out in great pain and staggered away.
Frank, she thought with tremulous joy. Helen felt herself gently lifted and knew she was in his arms. She sobbed in relief. He kissed her eyes and lips and he kissed her half-naked breast. She held him tightly with both arms, weeping, laughing, murmuring she had come to tell him she loved him.
He put her down and they kissed under the dark trees. She tasted whiskey on his tongue and was momentarily afraid.
“I love you, Helen,” he murmured, attempting clumsily to cover her breast with the torn dress as he drew her deeper into the dark, and from under the trees onto the star-dark field.
They sank to their knees on the winter earth, Helen
urgently whispering, “Please not now, darling,” but he spoke of his starved and passionate love, and all the endless heartbreaking waiting. Even as he spoke he thought of her as beyond his reach, forever in the bathroom as he spied, so he stopped her pleas with kisses … .
Afterward, she cried, “Dog—uncircumcised dogl”
While Morris was sitting alone in the back the next morning, a boy brought in a pink handbill and left it on the counter. When the grocer picked it up he saw it announced the change of management and reopening on Monday, by Taast and Pederson, of the grocery and fancy delicatessen around the corner. There followed, in large print, a list of specials they were offering during their first week, bargains Morris could never hope to match, because he couldn't afford the loss the Norwegians were planning to take. The grocer felt he was standing in an icy draft blowing from some hidden hole in the store. In the kitchen, though he stood with his legs and buttocks pressed against the gas radiator, it took an age to diminish the chill that had penetrated his bones.
All morning he scanned the crumpled handbill, muttering to himself; he sipped cold coffee, thinking of the future, and off and on, of Frank Alpine. The clerk had left last night without taking his fifteen dollars' wages. Morris thought he would come in for it this morning but, as the hours passed, knew he wouldn't, maybe having left it to make up some of the money he had stolen; yet maybe not. For the thousandth time the grocer wondered if he had done
right in ordering Frank to go. True, he had stolen from him, but also true, he was paying it back. His story that he had put six dollars into the register and then found he had left himself without a penny in his pocket was probably the truth, because the sum in the register, when Morris counted it, was more than they usually took in during the dead part of the afternoon when he napped. The clerk was an unfortunate man; yet the grocer was alternately glad and sorry the incident had occurred. He was glad he had finally let him go. For Helen's sake it had had to be done, and for Ida's peace of mind, as well as his own. Still, he felt unhappy to lose his assistant and be by himself when the Norwegians opened up.
Ida came down, puffy-eyed from poor sleep. She felt a hopeless rage against the world. What will become of Helen? she asked herself, and cracked her knuckles against her chest. But when Morris looked up to listen to her complaints, she was afraid to say anything. A half-hour later, aware that something had changed in the store, she thought of the clerk.
“Where is he?” she asked.
“He left,” Morris answered.
“Where did he leave?” she said in astonishment.
“He left for good.”
She gazed at him. “Morris, what happened, tell me?”
“Nothing,” he said, embarrassed. “I told him to leave.”
“Why, all of a sudden?”
“Didn't you say you didn't want him here no more?”
“From the first day I saw him, but you always said no.”
“Now I said yes.”
“A stone falls off my heart.” But she was not satisfied. “Did he move out of the house yet?”
“I don't know.”
“I will go and ask the upstairske.”
“Leave her alone. We will know when he moves.”
“When did you tell him to leave?”
“Last night.”
“So why didn't you tell me last night?” she said angrily. “Why you told me he went early to the movies?”
“I was nervous.”
“Morris,” she asked in fright. “Did something else happen? Did Helen—”
“Nothing happened.”
“Does she know he left?”
“I didn't tell her. Why she went so early to work this morning?”
“She went early?”
“Yes.”
“I don't know,” Ida said uneasily.
He produced the handbill. “This is why I feel bad.”
She glanced at it, not comprehending.
“The German,” he explained. “They bought him out, two Norwegians.”
She gasped. “When?”
“This week. Schmitz is sick. He lays now in the hospital.”
“I told you,” Ida said.
“You told me?”
“Vey is mir. I told you after Christmas—when improved more the business. I told you the drivers said the German was losing customers. You said no, Frank improved the business. A goy brings in goyim, you said. How much strength I had to argue with you?”
“Did you tell me he kept closed in the morning his store?”
“Who said? I didn't know this.”
“Karp told me.”
“Karp was here?”
“He came on Thursday to tell me the good news.”
“What good news?”
“That Schmitz sold out.”
“Is this good news?” she asked.
“Maybe to him but not to me.”
“You didn't tell me he came.”
“I tell you now,” he said irritably. “Schmitz sold out. Monday will open two Norwegians. Our business will go to hell again. We will starve here.”
“Some helper you had,” she said with bitterness. “Why didn't you listen to me when I said let him go?”
“I listened,” he said wearily.
She was silent, then asked, “So when Karp told you Schmitz sold his store you told Frank to leave?”
“The next day.”
“Thank God.”
“See if you say next week ‘Thank God.'”
“What is this got to do with Frank? Did he help us?”
“I don't know.”
“You don't know,” she said shrilly. “You just told me you said he should leave when you found out where came our business.”
“I don't know,” he said miserably, “I don't know where it came.”
“It didn't come from him.”
“Where it came I don't worry any more. Where will it come next week I worry.” He read aloud the specials the Norwegians were offering.
She squeezed her hands white. “Morris, we must sell the store.”
“So sell.” Sighing, Morris removed his apron. “I will take my rest.”
“It's only half past eleven.”
“I feel cold.” He looked depressed.
“Eat something first—your soup.”
“Who can eat?”
“Drink a hot glass tea.”
“No.”
“Morris,” she said quietly, “don't worry so much. Something will happen. We will always have to eat.”
He made no reply, folded the handbill into a small square and took it upstairs with him.
The rooms were cold. Ida always shut off the radiators
when she went down and lit them again in the late afternoon about an hour before Helen returned. Now the house was too cold. Morris turned on the stopcock of the bedroom radiator, then found he had no match in his pocket. He got one in the kitchen.
Under the covers he felt shivery. He lay under two blankets and a quilt yet shivered. He wondered if he was sick but soon fell asleep. He was glad when he felt sleep come over him, although it brought night too quickly. But if you slept it was night, that's how things were. Looking, that same night, from the street into his store, he beheld Taast and Pederson—one with a small blond mustache, the other half-bald, a light shining on his head—standing behind his counter, poking into
his
cash register. The grocer rushed in but they were gabbing in German and paid no attention to his gibbering Yiddish. At that moment Frank came out of the back with Helen. Though the clerk spoke a musical Italian, Morris recognized a dirty word. He struck his assistant across the face and they wrestled furiously on the floor, Helen screaming mutely. Frank dumped him heavily on his back and sat on his poor chest. He thought his lungs would burst. He tried hard to cry out but his voice cracked his throat and no one would help. He considered the possibility of dying and would have liked to.
 
Tessie Fuso dreamed of a tree hit by thunder and knocked over; she dreamed she heard someone groan terribly and awoke in fright, listened, then went back to sleep. Frank Alpine, at the dirty end of a long night, awoke groaning. He awoke with a shout—awake, he thought, forever. His impulse was to leap out of bed and rush down to the store; then he remembered that Morris had thrown him out. It was a gray, dreary winter morning. Nick had gone to work and Tessie, in her bathrobe, was sitting in the kitchen, drinking coffee. She heard Frank cry out again but had just discovered that she was pregnant, so did nothing more than wonder at his nightmare.
He lay in bed with the blankets pulled over his head, trying to smother his thoughts but they escaped and stank. The more he smothered them the more they stank. He smelled garbage in the bed and couldn't move out of it. He couldn't because he was it—the stink in his own broken nose. What you did was how bad you smelled. Unable to stand it he flung the covers aside and struggled to dress but couldn't make it. The sight of his bare feet utterly disgusted him. He thirsted for a cigarette but couldn't light one for fear of seeing his hand. He shut his eyes and lit a match. The match burned his nose. He stepped on the lit match with his bare feet and danced in pain.
Oh my God, why did I do it? Why did I ever do it? Why did I do it?
His thoughts were killing him. He couldn't stand them. He sat on the edge of the twisted bed, his thoughtful head ready to bust in his hands. He wanted to run. Part of him was already in flight, he didn't know where. He just wanted to run. But while he was running, he wanted to be back. He wanted to be back with Helen, to be forgiven. It wasn't asking too much. People forgave people—who else? He could explain if she would listen. Explaining was a way of getting close to somebody you had hurt; as if in hurting them you were giving them a reason to love you. He had come, he would say, to the park to wait for her, to hear what she had to tell him. He felt he knew she would say she loved him; it meant they would soon sleep together. This stayed in his mind and he sat there waiting to hear her say it, at the same time in an agony that she never would, that he would lose her the minute she found out why her father had kicked him out of the grocery. What could he tell her about that? He sat for hours trying to think what to say, at last growing famished. At midnight he left to get a pizza but stopped instead in a bar. Then when he saw his face in the mirror he felt a nose-thumbing revulsion. Where have you ever been, he asked the one in the glass, except on the inside of a circle?
What have you ever done but always the wrong thing? When he returned to the park, there was Ward Minogue hurting her. He just about killed Ward. Then when he had Helen in his arms, crying, saying at last that she loved him, he had this hopeless feeling it was the end and now he would never see her again. He thought he must love her before she was lost to him. She said no, not to, but he couldn't believe it the same minute she was saying she loved him. He thought, Once I start she will come along with me. So then he did it. He loved her with his love. She should have known that. She should not have gone wild, beat his face with her fists, called him dirty names, run from him, his apologies, pleadings, sorrow.
Oh Jesus, what did I do?
He moaned; had got instead of a happy ending, a bad smell. If he could root out what he had done, smash and destroy it; but it was done, beyond him to undo. It was where he could never lay hands on it any more—in his stinking mind. His thoughts would forever suffocate him. He had failed once too often. He should somewhere have stopped and changed the way he was going, his luck, himself, stopped hating the world, got a decent education, a job, a nice girl. He had lived without will, betrayed every good intention. Had he ever confessed the holdup to Morris? Hadn't he stolen from the cash register till the minute he was canned? In a single terrible act in the park hadn't he murdered the last of his good hopes, the love he had so long waited for—his chance at a future? His goddamned life had pushed him wherever it went; he had led it nowhere. He was blown around in any breath that blew, owned nothing, not even experience to show for the years he had lived. If you had experience you knew at least when to start and where to quit; all he knew was how to mangle himself more. The self he had secretly considered valuable was, for all he could make of it, a dead rat. He stank.
This time his shout frightened Tessie. Frank got up on
the run but he had run everywhere. There was no place left to escape to. The room shrank. The bed was flying up at him. He felt trapped—sick, wanted to cry but couldn't. He planned to kill himself, at the same minute had a terrifying insight: that all the while he was acting like he wasn't, he was really a man of stern morality.
 
Ida had awakened in the night and heard her daughter crying. Nat did something to her, she thought wildly, but was ashamed to go to Helen and beg her to say what. She guessed he had acted like a lout—it was no wonder Helen had stopped seeing him. All night she blamed herself for having urged her to go out with the law student. She fell into an unhappy sleep.
It was growing light when Morris left the flat. Helen dragged herself out of bed and sat with reddened eyes in the bathroom, sewing on her coat collar. Once near the office she would give it to a tailor to fix so the tear couldn't be seen. With her new dress she could do nothing. Rolling it into a hopeless ball, she hid it under some things in her bottom bureau drawer. Monday she would buy one exactly like it and hang it in her closet. Undressing for a shower—her third in hours—she burst into tears at the sight of her body. Every man she drew to her dirtied her. How could she have encouraged him? She felt a violent self-hatred for trusting him, when from the very beginning she had sensed he was un-trustable. How could she have allowed herself to fall in love with anybody like him? She was filled with loathing at the fantasy she had created, of making him into what he couldn't be—educable, promising, kind and good, when he was no more than a bum. Where were her wits, her sense of elemental self-preservation?
BOOK: The Assistant
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