The River Midnight (23 page)

“Fairy tales,” Emma sniffed. “Exactly what I said. Religion is just another fairy tale.”

But Hayim said slowly, “You, you have to look, look hard to see what’s there inside.” Hayim looked at Alta-Fruma and she looked at him.

“Go on,” Izzie said. And Hayim did. But by the end of the seder he had agreed to plant Alta-Fruma’s garden in compensation for the damage his pig had done to her root cellar.

T
HE FIRST
week of May. The Friday after Passover. While the children were still asleep, Alta-Fruma opened the door to watch the sky awaken. It was her favorite time of day, after she said her morning prayers, when the sun was still yawning, like a man coming from dream to wakefulness with slow pleasure, opening his eyes and smiling in a glow of welcome at the woman in his bed. Alta-Fruma stretched slowly to ease her morning stiffness, inhaling the smell of earth in spring as she walked, barefoot, into the yard. The hens scattered before her sweeping broom, loose pebbles and twigs flying. They squawked and scolded, making little runs at her toes as if they were plump
worms, but never quite pecking. She stood for a moment, looking down the lane that on one side turned off into the woods and on the other continued on into the village square, obscured now by mist. The haze was soft and restful, like the tent of Sarah our Mother. Inside the tent Sarah had spoken directly to God and didn’t have to veil her face.

Hayim, emerging from the fog, carried rake and hoe instead of buckets over his shoulders. Alta-Fruma waved, he nodded and set about his task of reparation in the garden at the side of the house.

Standing over the earth like a night watchman, Hayim scooped careful hollows, spilling seeds into the darkness. He worked in the earth steadily, unhurriedly, the same way he walked through the village square with the yoke balanced across his broad shoulders, lifting his head now and then to look at the sky or bending to watch the bird wrestle a worm out of the freshly turned earth. Wiping his forehead with his cap, Hayim said something Alta-Fruma couldn’t make out, as if he were talking to himself, or perhaps to the bird, which cheeped and fluttered its wings in answer. She was curious about what Hayim, who spoke so seldom, would be saying now. I should see what he’s doing, she said to herself, maybe he’s thirsty, I should ask him if he wants a glass of water, I should ask him how long he’ll be. Just then he turned to look at her, silently looking with his golden cat’s eyes, taking in her stance, leaning on the broom, head tilted, shawl fallen over one shoulder leaving her head bare, a crown of gray curls that she rushed to cover. Dropping her broom, she was suddenly conscious of her bare feet and bare legs and how it would look if anyone walked by. “Put your eyes back in your head,” she called out and stalked into the house.

Alta-Fruma broke up the branches lying in a neat pile beside the oven, thrusting them under the cooking grate. What hutzpah he had, this Hayim! She filled the kettle from the water barrel and set it onto the cooking grate. The quick fire burned high, spilling embers in a red-black fury. What was he? A nobody. Did he think he was still the miller’s son? With a pair of tongs, she picked out a lump of coal from the fire, carrying it carefully to the samovar. It was part of her dowry, a simple brass samovar reflected in the polished pine of the sideboard on which it stood. What gave him the right to stare? Lifting the lid, she dropped the coal into the inner cylinder, then brought another ashy lump, and another. Didn’t he know that a man isn’t supposed to look
at a woman? She touched her hand to the side of the samovar, feeling the warmth. Pouring the boiling water into the space around the tin tower of coals, she felt her back tingle as if someone were watching her, someone who wasn’t fooled by the appearance of things. She dropped a handful of tea leaves into the water, a moat of tea to defend her from the day of children, cows, and watercarriers.

She could hear them stirring in the other room. The clump of Emma’s boots, Izzie’s familiar cough, the squeak of the cot as he rose, the rattle of the rod as he pushed the dividing curtain aside to roll his cot under the other bed.

His face looked pinched as he came into the front room. There were dark circles around his eyes, like the rings around a full moon forecasting storms.

“Did you have bad dreams again?” Alta-Fruma asked. He nodded. “Then have a cup of tea with bread and honey. You have to eat after a bad dream, it drives away the spirits.” The boy is too thin, she thought, he should eat.

He sat at the table, chin in his hands, considering what she said. He took every word seriously, pondering its meaning as if an angel had spoken it, staring at the emptiness above the table as if the angels studied Torah there. “I don’t want to drive away the spirits,” he said finally. “A dream is a letter from God. It says so in the Talmud. It would be a terrible thing not to open a letter from God. No, Auntie, I won’t have any bread with honey.”

He looked, in his white nightshirt, with his thin white hands clasped under his pointed chin, as if he himself might soon float up to heaven. “Well, then, Izzie. You have your bread with jam. Spirits aren’t at all bothered by jam, only honey. There’s still some blackberry preserves left. It’s your favorite, isn’t it? Use it up so it won’t go to waste.” She looked approvingly as the boy smeared his bread thickly, eating while he read one of his Hebrew books.

“Don’t fill his head with superstitions,” Emma said as she came in, tearing off a chunk of bread.

“You sit down, too. If you eat running the food won’t stick to you.”

“I have to go out,” Emma said. “I’m working on something with Ruthie.”

“I need you in the dairy. And the garden is dry. You can bring some water from the river. Hayim is too busy.”

“Well if heaven really heard people’s prayers, it would rain, wouldn’t it?” Emma asked Izzie. “Make it rain!” she shouted.

Izzie ran to the window. “It’s a miracle. It’s a miracle. Look Auntie!” Sheets of water poured down the window.

“Thpoo, thpoo, thpoo,” Alta-Fruma said, automatically spitting to avert the evil eye. Could it be that Emma, too, had inherited a little gift, an annoying little talent from their mischievous ancestress? Alta-Fruma shook her head. Don’t be silly, she said to herself, it’s May. In May it rains. Through the window she saw Hayim running for cover. Rain beat the tin roof. Alta-Fruma wished that she were outside, her skin soaking in the spring rain. But that would be foolishness. Of course.

“Ruthie’s waiting for me,” Emma said as she flew out the door.

What could Alta-Fruma do? Hit Emma with a stick the way Alta-Fruma’s father had hit Rakhel for reading Polish history in the woods on
Shabbas?
No, Alta-Fruma would just have to wait for Emma to come back.

O
N THE
second
Shabbas
in May, people began to notice that Misha was showing. By the third week of rain some peasants claimed they had seen a shower of frogs, indicating a fertile spring, but Alta-Fruma was working in the dairy at the time. And then, on May 22nd, a Tuesday, Ruthie was arrested.

After the farmers delivered their milk, Alta-Fruma set it to ripen overnight and went home. She checked the level of water in the water barrel, put some tea in the samovar, and went down to the root cellar to get some cabbage and potato for supper. It was while she was cutting up the cabbage for borscht that she heard the sound from the bedroom. A creaking, crying little noise. “Izzie? Emma?” No answer.

Alta-Fruma put down her knife, wiped her hands on her apron, and walked through the hallway where the hens roosted in the winter. In the back room, Emma was sitting on the bed she shared with her great-aunt, hands folded in her lap, blinking.

“Emma, what is it? Where’s Izzie? Did something happen to him?”

“Izzie’s all right. He’s at the Rabbi’s house. Studying.”

“What is it, Emma? Tell me.” The bed frame was iron, the white linen embroidered with red thread to keep away the evil eye, the feather pillows piled high behind Emma so that she looked as small as a little girl.

Emma looked up at her great-aunt, her face pinched, her eyes wet. “I can’t tell you.”

“What did you do, Emma?” The girl looked faint. “Is it so bad?” Alta-Fruma reached behind Emma, picking up the pillows one by one to plump them so the child wouldn’t have to look at her.

“Ruthie was arrested.”

Alta-Fruma’s hands stilled. “Arrested? It can’t be.”

“On the road from Blaszka to Plotsk.”

“What business did she have in Plotsk?” Emma just shook her head. “How did it happen?” Alta-Fruma asked. “I want the truth.”

“I wasn’t there.” Emma wrapped her arms around her knees. “I didn’t see what happened.” The girl hid her face in her arms.

And what was Emma doing? Alta-Fruma thought. If Ruthie was arrested, then Emma must be mixed up in it. Was I too lenient? Did I let her run around too much on her own? I have to be stricter with her. Even if she hates me. Ruthie arrested. Dear God in Heaven, what if it had been Emma?

Wednesday morning. It rained. Emma got her period. She ran off while Alta-Fruma was trying to talk with her.

Wednesday afternoon. Hayim’s pig tore up the garden. Then it got into the dairy and spoiled a vat of cheese. Alta-Fruma chased it home and Hayim offered to work off the damage.

Wednesday evening. Alta-Fruma threatened to send Emma to an orphanage unless she started to obey.

Thursday morning. Emma ran away. Alta-Fruma thought she would go out of her mind.

Hayim brought Emma home.

Emma was quiet, willingly helping Alta-Fruma in the dairy. It was unnerving.

The community council came around to collect money for a
bribe. It wouldn’t be much, not enough to persuade the Governor to release Ruthie, but at least it would make her life a little easier. Alta-Fruma gave as much as anyone, but not any more. How could she? People would ask questions.

On Friday, Faygela left the bakery, marching across Blaszka to accost Alta-Fruma in the dairyhouse. The dairyhouse was cool, shaded by willows, and clean as a stone in the river. Not a strand of spiderweb dared cross the beams in the presence of Alta-Fruma’s broom. Steel milk pans shone like silver. The air floated gently, dust motes softly spinning in the sweet-sour, pungent smell of butter, milk, and ripening cheese.

Emma was outside milking the cow. Her fingers were thin but she pulled thoroughly, not leaving a drop to block the teats. The two girls who worked in the dairyhouse had called Alta-Fruma to cut the curd. She always did it herself, carefully, so as not to bruise it. After she sharpened the knives on the blue-gray whetstone, she cut the curd lengthwise with the perpendicular knife and across with the horizontal knife until it was in squares the size of peas. The Klembas sisters were setting the vat on the fire, and Alta-Fruma was just in the midst of stirring the curd with her hands, when Faygela came in. Engrossed in the rubbery sensation of the curd bouncing into her cupped hands and falling between her fingers, Alta-Fruma didn’t notice Faygela until she began to speak.

“Ruthie wouldn’t say who gave her the pamphlets, but I know it wasn’t her own idea. Not my Ruthie. She wouldn’t put a foot in the wrong direction. It could only be Emma. How could you let her get involved in something so dangerous?”

“There’s going to be no more of such foolishness,” Alta-Fruma said. “I allowed Emma to run around too much, but she won’t have time for it anymore. She’ll help out in the bakery in Ruthie’s place, and she’s taking in some piecework, too.”

“Well, at least in the bakery I can keep an eye on her. I hope that I can see what’s in a child’s heart before she leads all of the young people in Blaszka to the authorities.” With that, Faygela left and Alta-Fruma could only shake her head and wipe her hands on her apron.

“What else does she expect me to do?” she asked Hayim, who had been silently cleaning out the curding vats. Hayim didn’t say anything.
In his eyes she thought she saw a flicker of reproof. “You see what’s going on, tell me,” she said. “If I’m doing something wrong to the child …” She looked away, embarrassed, unable to bear his unflinching gaze.

“You, you’re always saying she’s like her grandmother. Another Rakhel.” Alta-Fruma nodded, waiting for him to catch his thoughts in the precarious net of speech. He went on, “I remember her, Rakhel. She, she wasn’t like Emma. Not really. Rakhel was always in the middle of the village square, talking about something.” Alta-Fruma nodded. “But always something different. In ’63 it was Polish independence. I remember even though I was just, just thirteen.”

“She made a speech,” Alta-Fruma said. “Like Emma.”

“Not, not like Emma. Later Rakhel read poetry in the village square. And then she became the
zogerin.
For Emma there’s only one thing. Justice. You have to look, look at Emma and see Emma, not Rakhel. The child has no mother to look at her.”

“The cows are milked,” Emma said as she came in. She spoke meekly, her face as solemn as her brother’s. “What should I do now, Auntie?”

Alta-Fruma told herself that it was an improvement, this new meekness of Emma’s. Remorse was good for her. It made her into a proper girl at last, as obedient as anyone could ask for. Why then, last night, did she find herself watching over Emma when she was asleep, touching her cheek and forehead, worrying that she was too warm, painfully listening to the tiny moans as the child tossed and turned?

“Auntie?” Emma asked. “Should I churn the butter?”

“No, you need stronger arms to make good butter. Why don’t you go get one of your books? You can read something to us about this oppression of the workers that you’re always going on about. To make the time pass.”

After Emma left, Alta-Fruma turned to Hayim. “Do me a favor. Stay for
Shabbas
dinner.” On her way to the butter churn, as she brushed by him, she thought perhaps he had reached for her, but it could only have been her imagination.

I
N THE
long days,
Shabbas
was slow to arrive, like a bride lingering in her girlhood. Children called to one another in the woods, men
waited for the
shammus
to summon them to prayer, and women, preparing all things of pleasure, reveled in the long hours of evening sunshine. There were several
Shabbas
dinners with Hayim and when they worked together in the dairyhouse, Alta-Fruma found herself walking by Hayim just to be near him. Every day there was another sketch of Hayim’s pinned to the wall. He began to lose his stammer. She began to think she was letting something get out of hand.