The Melting-Pot
Page 9
DAVID
Yes, it is true. Even Christianity did not invent hatred. But not till Holy Church arose were we burnt at the stake, and not till Holy Russia arose were our babes torn limb from limb. Oh, it is too much! Delivered from Egypt four thousand years ago, to be slaves to the Russian Pharaoh to-day.
[He falls as if kneeling on a chair, and, leans his head on the
rail.] O God, shall we always be broken on the wheel of history? How long, O Lord, how long?
BARON [Savagely]
Till you are all stamped out, ground into your dirt.
[Tenderly] Look up, little Vera! You saw how papasha loves you-how he was ready to hold out his hand-and how this cur tried to bite it. Be calm-tell him a daughter of Russia cannot mate with dirt.
VERA
Father, I will be calm. I will speak without passion or blindness. I will tell David the truth. I was never absolutely sure of my love for him-perhaps that was why I doubted his love for me-often after our enchanted moments there would come a nameless uneasiness, some vague instinct, relic of the long centuries of Jew-loathing, some strange shrinking from his Christless creed--
BARON [With an exultant cry]
Ah! She is a Revendal.
VERA
But now--
[She rises and walks firmly toward DAVID] now, David, I come to you, and I say in the words of Ruth, thy people shall be my people and thy God my God!
[She stretches out her hands to DAVID.]
BARON
You shameless--!
[He stops as he perceives DAVID remains impassive.]
VERA [With agonised cry]
David!
DAVID [In low, icy tones]
You cannot come to me. There is a river of blood between us.
VERA
Were it seven seas, our love must cross them.
DAVID
Easy words to you. You never saw that red flood bearing the mangled breasts of women and the spattered brains of babes and sucklings. Oh!
[He covers his eyes with his hands. The BARON turns away in
gloomy impotence. At last DAVID begins to speak quietly, almost
dreamily.] It was your Easter, and the air was full of holy bells and the streets of holy processions-priests in black and girls in white and waving palms and crucifixes, and everybody exchanging Easter eggs and kissing one another three times on the mouth in token of peace and goodwill, and even the Jew-boy felt the spirit of love brooding over the earth, though he did not then know that this Christ, whom holy chants proclaimed re-risen, was born in the form of a brother Jew. And what added to the peace and holy joy was that our own Passover was shining before us. My mother had already made the raisin wine, and my greedy little brother Solomon had sipped it on the sly that very morning. We were all at home-all except my father-he was away in the little Synagogue at which he was cantor. Ah, such a voice he had-a voice of tears and thunder-when he prayed it was like a wounded soul beating at the gates of Heaven-but he sang even more beautifully in the ritual of home, and how we were looking forward to his hymns at the Passover table--
[He breaks down. The BARON has gradually turned round under the
spell of DAVID'S story and now listens hypnotised.] I was playing my cracked little fiddle. Little Miriam was making her doll dance to it. Ah, that decrepit old china doll-the only one the poor child had ever had-I can see it now-one eye, no nose, half an arm. We were all laughing to see it caper to my music.... My father flies in through the door, desperately clasping to his breast the Holy Scroll. We cry out to him to explain, and then we see that in that beloved mouth of song there is no longer a tongue-only blood. He tries to bar the door-a mob breaks in-we dash out through the back into the street. There are the soldiers-and the Face--
[VERA'S eyes involuntarily seek the face of her father, who
shrinks away as their eyes meet.]
VERA [In a low sob]
O God!
DAVID
When I came to myself, with a curious aching in my left shoulder, I saw lying beside me a strange shapeless Something....
[DAVID points weirdly to the floor, and VERA, hunched forwards,
gazes stonily at it, as if seeing the horror.] By the crimson doll in what seemed a hand I knew it must be little Miriam. The doll was a dream of beauty and perfection beside the mutilated mass which was all that remained of my sister, of my mother, of greedy little Solomon-Oh! You Christians can only see that rosy splendour on the horizon of happiness. And the Jew didn't see rosily enough for you, ha! ha! ha! the Jew who gropes in one great crimson mist.
[He breaks down in spasmodic, ironic, long-drawn, terrible
laughter.]
VERA [Trying vainly to tranquillise him]
Hush, David! Your laughter hurts more than tears. Let Vera comfort you.
[She kneels by his chair, tries to put her arms round him. ]
DAVID [Shuddering]
Take them away! Don't you feel the cold dead pushing between us?
VERA [Unfaltering, moving his face toward her lips]
Kiss me!
DAVID
I should feel the blood on my lips.
VERA
My love shall wipe it out.
DAVID
Love! Christian love!
[He unwinds her clinging arms; she sinks prostrate on the floor
as he rises.] For this I gave up my people-darkened the home that sheltered me-there was always a still, small voice at my heart calling me back, but I heeded nothing-only the voice of the butcher's daughter.
[Brokenly] Let me go home, let me go home.
[He looks lingeringly at VERA'S prostrate form, but overcoming
the instinct to touch and comfort her, begins tottering with
uncertain pauses toward the door leading to the hall.]
BARON [Extending his arms in relief and longing]
And here is your home, Vera!
[He raises her gradually from the floor; she is dazed, but
suddenly she becomes conscious of whose arms she is in, and
utters a cry of repulsion.]
VERA
Those arms reeking from that crimson river!
[She falls back.]
BARON [Sullenly]
Don't echo that babble. You came to these arms often enough when they were fresh from the battlefield.
VERA
But not from the shambles! You heard what he called you. Not soldier-butcher! Oh, I dared to dream of happiness after my nightmare of Siberia, but you-you--
[She breaks down for the first time in hysterical sobs. ]
BARON [Brokenly]
Vera! Little Vera! Don't cry! You stab me!
VERA
You thought you were ordering your soldiers to fire at the Jews, but it was my heart they pierced.
[She sobs on.]
BARON
... And my own.... But we will comfort each other. I will go to the Tsar myself-with my forehead to the earth-to beg for your pardon!... Come, put your wet face to little father's....
VERA [Violently pushing his face away]
I hate you! I curse the day I was born your daughter!
[She staggers toward the door leading to the interior. At the
same moment DAVID, who has reached the door leading to the hall,
now feeling subconsciously that VERA is going and that his last
reason for lingering on is removed, turns the door-handle. The
click attracts the BARON'S attention, he veers round.]
BARON [To DAVID]
Halt!
[DAVID turns mechanically. VERA drifts out through her door,
leaving the two men face to face. The BARON beckons to DAVID, who
as if hypnotised moves nearer. The BARON whips out his pistol,
slowly crosses to DAVID, who stands as if awaiting his fate. The
BARON hands the pistol to DAVID.] You were right!
[He steps back swiftly with a touch of stern heroism into the
attitude of the culprit at a military execution, awaiting the
bullet.] Shoot me!
DAVID [Takes the pistol mechanically, looks long and pensively at it as
with a sense of its irrelevance. Gradually his arm droops and lets
the pistol fall on the table, and there his hand touches a string
of his violin, which yields a little note. Thus reminded of it, he
picks up the violin, and as his fingers draw out the broken string
he murmurs] I must get a new string.
[He resumes his dragging march toward the door, repeating
maunderingly] I must get a new string.
[The curtain falls.]
Act IV
Saturday, July 4, evening. The Roof-Garden of the Settlement
House, showing a beautiful, far-stretching panorama of New York,
with its irregular sky-buildings on the left, and the harbour
with its Statue of Liberty on the right. Everything is wet and
gleaming after rain. Parapet at the back. Elevator on the right.
Entrance from the stairs on the left. In the sky hang heavy
clouds through which thin, golden lines of sunset are just
beginning to labour. DAVID is discovered on a bench, hugging his
violin-case to his breast, gazing moodily at the sky. A muffled
sound of applause comes up from below and continues with varying
intensity through the early part of the scene. Through it comes
the noise of the elevator ascending. MENDEL steps out and hurries
forward.
MENDEL
Come down, David! Don't you hear them shouting for you?
[He passes his hand over the wet bench.] Good heavens! You will get rheumatic fever!
DAVID
Why have you followed me?
MENDEL
Get up-everything is still damp.
DAVID [Rising, gloomily]
Yes, there's a damper over everything.
MENDEL
Nonsense-the rain hasn't damped your triumph in the least. In fact, the more delicate effects wouldn't have gone so well in the open air. Listen!
DAVID
Let them shout. Who told you I was up here?
MENDEL
Miss Revendal, of course.
DAVID [Agitated]
Miss Revendal? How should she know?
MENDEL [Sullenly]
She seems to understand your crazy ways.
DAVID [Passing his hand over his eyes]
Ah, you never understood me, uncle.... How did she look? Was she pale?
MENDEL
Never mind about Miss Revendal. Pappelmeister wants you-the people insist on seeing you. Nobody can quiet them.
DAVID
They saw me all through the symphony in my place in the orchestra.
MENDEL
They didn't know you were the composer as well as the first violin. Now Miss Revendal has told them.
[Louder applause.] There! Eleven minutes it has gone on-like for an office-seeker. You must come and show yourself.
DAVID
I won't-I'm not an office-seeker. Leave me to my misery.
MENDEL
Your misery? With all this glory and greatness opening before you? Wait till you're my age--
[Shouts of "QUIXANO!"] You hear! What is to be done with them?
DAVID
Send somebody on the platform to remind them this is the interval for refreshments!
MENDEL
Don't be cynical. You know your dearest wish was to melt these simple souls with your music. And now--
DAVID
Now I have only made my own stony.
MENDEL
You are right. You are stone all over-ever since you came back home to us. Turned into a pillar of salt, mother says-like Lot's wife.
DAVID
That was the punishment for looking backward. Ah, uncle, there's more sense in that old Bible than the Rabbis suspect. Perhaps that is the secret of our people's paralysis-we are always looking backward.
[He drops hopelessly into an iron garden-chair behind him. ]
MENDEL [Stopping him before he touches the seat]
Take care-it's sopping wet. You don't look backward enough.
[He takes out his handkerchief and begins drying the chair. ]
DAVID [Faintly smiling]
I thought you wanted the salt to melt.
MENDEL
It is melting a little if you can smile. Do you know, David, I haven't seen you smile since that Purim afternoon?
DAVID
You haven't worn a false nose since, uncle.
[He laughs bitterly.] Ha! Ha! Ha! Fancy masquerading in America because twenty-five centuries ago the Jews escaped a pogrom in Persia. Two thousand five hundred years ago! Aren't we uncanny?
[He drops into the wiped chair.]
MENDEL [Angrily]
Better you should leave us altogether than mock at us. I thought it was your Jewish heart that drove you back home to us; but if you are still hankering after Miss Revendal--
DAVID [Pained]
Uncle!
MENDEL
I'd rather see you marry her than go about like this. You couldn't make the house any gloomier.
DAVID
Go back to the concert, please. They have quieted down.
MENDEL [Hesitating]
And you?
DAVID
Oh, I'm not playing in the popular after-pieces. Pappelmeister guessed I'd be broken up with the stress of my own symphony-he has violins enough.
MENDEL
Then you don't want to carry this about.
[Taking the violin from DAVID'S arms.]
DAVID [Clinging to it]
Don't rob me of my music-it's all I have.
MENDEL
You'll spoil it in the wet. I'll take it home.
DAVID
No--
[He suddenly catches sight of two figures entering from the
left-FRAU QUIXANO and KATHLEEN clad in their best, and wearing
tiny American flags in honour of Independence Day. KATHLEEN
escorts the old lady, with the air of a guardian angel, on her
slow, tottering course toward DAVID. FRAU QUIXANO is puffing and
panting after the many stairs. DAVID jumps up in surprise,
releases the violin-case to MENDEL.] They at my symphony!
MENDEL
Mother would come-even though, being Shabbos, she had to walk.
DAVID
But wasn't she shocked at my playing on the Sabbath?
MENDEL
No-that's the curious part of it. She said that even as a boy you played your fiddle on Shabbos, and that if the Lord has stood it all these years, He must consider you an exception.
DAVID
You see! She's more sensible than you thought. I daresay whatever I were to do she'd consider me an exception.
MENDEL [In sullen acquiescence]
I suppose geniuses are.
KATHLEEN [Reaching them; panting with admiration and breathlessness]
Oh, Mr. David! it was like midnight mass! But the misthress was ashleep.
DAVID
Asleep!
[Laughs half-merrily, half-sadly.] Ha! Ha! Ha!
FRAU QUIXANO [Panting and laughing in response]
He! He! He! Dovidel lacht widder. He! He! He!
[She touches his arm affectionately, but feeling his wet coat,
utters a cry of horror.] Du bist nass!
DAVID
Es ist gor nicht, Granny-my clothes are thick.
[She fusses over him, wiping him down with her gloved hand. ]
MENDEL
But what brought you up here, Kathleen?
KATHLEEN
Sure, not the elevator. The misthress said 'twould be breaking the Shabbos to ride up in it.
DAVID [Uneasily]
But did--did Miss Revendal send you up?
KATHLEEN
And who else should be axin' the misthress if she wasn't proud of Mr. David? Faith, she's a sweet lady.
MENDEL [Impatiently]
Don't chatter, Kathleen.
KATHLEEN
But, Mr. Quixano--!
DAVID [Sweetly]
Please take your mistress down again-don't let her walk.
KATHLEEN
But Shabbos isn't out yet!
MENDEL
Chattering again!
DAVID [Gently]
There's no harm, Kathleen, in going down in the elevator.
KATHLEEN
Troth, I'll egshplain to her that droppin' down isn't ridin'.
DAVID [Smiling]
Yes, tell her dropping down is natural-not work, like flying up.
[Kathleen begins to move toward the stairs, explaining to FRAU
QUIXANO.] And, Kathleen! You'll get her some refreshments.
KATHLEEN [Turns, glaring]
Refrishments, is it? Give her refrishments where they mix the mate with the butther plates! Oh, Mr. David!
[She moves off toward the stairs in reproachful sorrow. ]
MENDEL [Smiling]
I'll get her some coffee.
DAVID [Smiling]
Yes, that'll keep her awake. Besides, Pappelmeister was so sure the people wouldn't understand me, he's relaxing them on Gounod and Rossini.
MENDEL
Pappelmeister's idea of relaxation! I should have given them comic opera.
[With sudden call to KATHLEEN, who with her mistress is at the
wrong exit.] Kathleen! The elevator's this side!
KATHLEEN [Turning]
What way can that be, when I came up this side?
MENDEL
You chatter too much.
[FRAU QUIXANO, not understanding, exit.] Come this way. Can't you see the elevator?
KATHLEEN [Perceives FRAU QUIXANO has gone, calls after her in
Irish-sounding Yiddish] Wu geht Ihr, bedad?...
[Impatiently] Houly Moses, komm' zurick!
[Exit anxiously, re-enter with FRAU QUIXANO.] Begorra, we Jews never know our way.
[MENDEL, carrying the violin, escorts his mother and KATHLEEN to
the elevator. When they are near it, it stops with a thud, and
PAPPELMEISTER springs out, his umbrella up, meeting them face to
face. He looks happy and beaming over DAVID'S triumph.]
PAPPELMEISTER [In loud, joyous voice]
Nun, Frau Quixano, was sagen Sie? Vat you tink of your David?
FRAU QUIXANO
Dovid? Er ist meshuggah.
[She taps her forehead.]