The Invisible Wall

by Harry Bernstein

  She bustled about serving refreshments. She had been in charge of the house as she always had been when my mother gave birth to one of us, from the time when Lily was a child herself. I don’t think she minded too much this time. It got her away from the drudgery of the tailoring shop. She rushed about in the kitchen with her cheeks flushed. She still wore her hair long, as she had done when she was going to school. It swished behind her as she swung from place to place among the people.

  The rabbi came at last to perform the circumcision. This was the new young rabbi who had taken the place of our old one. There had been a great deal of consternation among some of the members of the congregation when he first came. He was not only very young, but clean-shaven. That was what had disturbed many people, especially the old women. They had whispered about it in my mother’s shop, and I had heard them ask what sort of rabbi could he be without a beard? Wasn’t shaving with a razor sinful?

  There had been arguments, some defending him. Mrs. Zarembar was one of these, but because he had come to live with her as a boarder she had assumed an almost parental attitude toward him. What was wrong with not having a beard? she wanted to know. What was right with it? Mrs. Mittleman flung back at her. Then, oddly enough, Mrs. Harris had taken Mrs. Zarembar’s side, defending the young rabbi’s right to be clean-shaven, and because she was an authority on such matters, the decision was in the young man’s favor. Nothing more was said about his lack of a beard.

  Besides, he had come to be well liked, especially by those with unmarried daughters. It was perhaps one reason Mrs. Harris had defended him. She still had three daughters waiting for husbands to come along, and she had already had the young rabbi to dinner in her house. So had other families, except ours. I think this was the first time that he had come to our house.

  Not the first time, though, that he had seen Lily. He had asked me about her in cheder. How old was she? Was she engaged to anyone, or anything like that? He had smiled a bit awkwardly when he had asked that, and I saw a little color come into his pale face. It was a rather long, ascetic face, and he wore metal-rimmed spectacles. He spoke with a pronounced Russian accent. He had fled from Russia and the Bolsheviks not too long ago, barely escaping with his life, it was believed.

  The congregation had decided that the former rabbi’s house up the park was much too big and extravagant for a young, unmarried rabbi, and had arranged to board him at Mrs. Zarembar’s house. One of the reasons for selecting her was that the Friday chickens would be close at hand and he could slaughter them in her backyard. The arrangement had worked out well thus far. The chickens were slaughtered immediately, thus saving us a trip to the synagogue. Mrs. Zarembar was pleased with her new boarder, and proud as well. There was no mistaking that as she arrived with him at our house that day. She came waddling in beside him, her rosy cheeks flushed a still deeper hue, the proud smirk on her face.

  “Here he is,” she announced, as if she were presenting a new flock of chickens to the company.

  They had all been waiting for him, and a respectful silence fell over the gathering. They were all wearing their best clothes for the occasion. Fanny Cohen had brought her newest baby along and was holding it in her arms and bouncing it up and down a bit to keep it from crying. The rabbi nodded and bowed slightly to each one, murmuring a greeting, and then his eyes came to rest on Lily, who was flitting about in the background. She had not paid much attention to his entrance.

  He stood there, his eyes following her as she moved about with a tray in her hands, and seemed oblivious for a moment of the rest of them. My mother had come downstairs with the baby a short time before this and was holding the baby in her arms, and I saw her eyes go from the rabbi to Lily.

  “Lily,” she called out, “please bring the rabbi some refreshment.”

  Lily went over to him with the tray, and he took a small piece of sponge cake, and smiled at her.

  “I don’t think we’ve met before,” he said.

  “No, we haven’t,” said Lily.

  “I’m Rabbi Oslov,” he said. “My first name is Abraham. And yours?”

  “Lily,” she said.

  They were all looking, watching, listening. The room was very quiet. My mother’s eyes were shining. The rabbi was smiling and did not seem to know what to say further, but his eyes were fixed on Lily. She herself stood there calmly, not saying anything, not having anything to say. He had looked at her before this, I know. I had seen him once standing in the doorway of Mrs. Zarembar’s house as he was about to go in. Lily had just come out of our house, and he had been watching her as she walked down the street. He had then come into our shop several times to buy fruit, and while conversing pleasantly with my mother had kept glancing around as if in search of something. It had not escaped my mother’s attention, but she had said nothing. She said nothing now.

  The silence in the room was broken by my father’s voice, rough and savage. He had settled himself in a corner of the room, away from people, and had been drinking his whiskey.

  “What the bloody ’ell are we all waiting for?” he shouted.

  The room stirred, and the rabbi roused himself, laughed and said, “Ah, yes. We have a circumcision to perform. Where is the young victim?”

  My mother brought the baby forward, and everyone gathered around. The rabbi began the prayers, and everyone joined in. He then produced a small case from his pocket and opened it. The knife lay inside, very shiny. The baby in my mother’s arms began to cry immediately, and Fanny Cohen’s baby in the background took up the same thing, so there was a howling of two babies while the rabbi expertly snipped off the foreskin.

  I watched fascinated and saw the blood come out of the tiny penis, which the rabbi staunched quickly with a towel, but not before a stream of urine shot up into his face. He gasped and laughed and looked about for a towel, and it was Lily who handed it to him quickly and he wiped himself.

  He was still laughing as he handed the towel back to her, saying, “God has strange ways of speaking to us. It could have been His reprimand for my delaying the ritual.”

  “Perhaps it was the baby’s reprimand,” she said. “He may not have liked what you did to him.”

  “That,” said the rabbi gently, “he should not have objected to. It has made him a Jew, something that he will be proud of someday, don’t you think?”

  Lily gave no answer, and I think this must have troubled the rabbi a bit. But then there were other things about her that troubled him, the most important one being that she did not attend the synagogue.

  He used to ask my mother about it when he came into the shop on the pretext of wanting to buy some of her fruit. The question always embarrassed her. She had no answer to give; she didn’t know why, and she was worried about it. Lily had not been going for a long time, and there were other things that bothered my mother too, like reading strange books that she would not let any of us see, and going to lectures and meetings of various sorts and refusing to explain what they were about.

  She may have suspected that it had something to do with Arthur, and sometimes when Lily left the house to go to one of her meetings she would peer through the window to see if Arthur were leaving too. He would not be so foolish, though, as to leave at the same time, knowing that not only she but the whole street would be watching.

  Besides, Arthur was very busy these days. He had started going to the University of Manchester to study law, and we caught glimpses of him mornings hurrying to catch the tram, and coming home in the evening with his big books tucked under an arm.

  My mother’s fears must have been allayed as far as that was concerned, and with the new young rabbi showing an interest in Lily a new hope, another dream, must have taken possession of her. Other mothers may have had the same hope for their daughters. The competition was keen, not only on our street but up the park where the rabbi could have been certain of a rich dowry. But it was Lily he wanted, and he seemed to be making no bones about that, despite the family he could see with his own eyes
and must have heard talked about by many people: a father who drank and cursed and abused his wife unlike any other Jewish father, a mother trying to make ends meet with a little bit of a shop that sold fruits and vegetables, five growing children and now another ten years after the last one, to add to the din, the quarrels, the poverty.

  Who would want to get mixed up with a family like that?

  It must have been whispered in his ear more than once. Yet, with all the rewards being dangled before him, he couldn’t seem to look at any girl except the one in this family. True, the other girls being offered him were no great beauties, and some of them a good deal older than he. But he was no bargain when it came to looks—frail and thin, and wispy, looking as if a strong wind could blow him over—so the joke went in the tailoring shops—and that walk of his! He had a mincing gait that gave him a slightly effeminate look. And he had a big nose, and thick-lensed glasses through which he peered at you myopically, making you feel that he was not quite seeing you. And worst of all, he had a slight lisp.

  But he was a rabbi, a man of God, and pleased everyone with his performance. He did everything that the other rabbi had done—and for less money because he was young and unmarried and didn’t need a big house or to support a family. He was brisk and efficient at his duties and delivered a sermon every Saturday.

  As a rule, we used to leave promptly when the service was over. But now we remained seated while the rabbi spoke to us. It was mostly about Zionism, and Chaim Weizmann and the great pioneering work that man was doing to bring about the Jewish homeland in Palestine, and he spoke of the need for all Jewish people to make that their goal and to help the cause. He spoke passionately, with a fiery eloquence, and when he did, the frailty, the gait, even the lisp seemed to vanish. He became a giant standing before us, with eyes flashing. We listened spellbound and before he was done the old women were weeping in the gallery and the men were gripping their hands.

  He was obsessed with this topic. When he was with people he could speak of nothing else. In cheder, too, he spoke to us of it, and he organized us into groups of Maccabees and sent us out to collect money for the cause from Jewish homes. He was altogether different from our other rabbi. He was young to begin with—perhaps not more than twenty-two or so, perhaps old to us but young enough. There were times indeed when he actually became one of us, and laughed and joked. Once, catching Zalmon bouncing a ball in the back row, instead of boxing his ears as the other rabbi would have done, he invited him to throw the ball to him. Then suddenly we were all having a wild game of catch right there in the cheder, with much hilarious shouting and shrieking.

  In the midst of this, the tall, gaunt figure of Max Korer, the treasurer, appeared in the doorway, taking in the scene with a grim, disapproving look on his thin, gloomy face. A hush fell, and the ball rolled over toward his feet as we watched.

  If the young rabbi felt embarrassed, he did not show it. He ran to pick up the ball, a smile on his face, and said cheerfully, “Come in, Mr. Korer, come in.”

  “Is this how you conduct a Hebrew lesson?” Mr. Korer asked.

  “Not always,” the rabbi joked. “Most of the time we are busy with our books, but for once I thought I would give their minds a rest and exercise their muscles. They will be still better Jews if they can gain some physical strength.”

  The treasurer was not amused. In fact, he was furious. He turned on his heel and stamped out. Later, there was a great to-do over the matter. There was talk of sacking the young rabbi. But he had his champions, and my mother was one of them. In her shop, where the argument raged pro and con one day, she defended him loudly, her cheeks flushed.

  “What do they want from him?” she demanded. “He works hard all the time, and for the little money he gets for it he is doing plenty. What if he plays ball now and then with the boys? Better that than shouting at them all the time.”

  Old Mrs. Harris was inclined to agree with her. Huddled in her shawl, she adjusted the wig under it slightly, and nodded in agreement, muttering something indistinct. Mrs. Jacobs, though, threw her hands and one eye upward to heaven, and cried out, “God in heaven, what is happening to us? What is the world coming to? What kind of rabbis is God giving us?” She had been fiercely opposed to the rabbi from the start because of his lack of a beard. No rabbi could be worthy of his calling if he did not have a beard, she had maintained. Now she was more sure of it than ever. “This is a rabbi?” she asked. “What sort of a rabbi is it that does not have a beard, first of all, and second of all, spends his time playing ball in cheder with the children?”

  Mrs. Mittleman had not been sure about the matter until now, but, disliking Mrs. Jacobs as she did, swung over immediately to the defenders. “So what of it?” she said, “What’s wrong if he plays ball a little with the children? I have no objection. I can understand though,” she added a bit slyly, “why some might object, especially those who have a son who would like to be married.”

  “What’s that?” Mrs. Jacobs bridled and turned to face her, the one good eye flashing fire. “Are you perhaps talking about my son?”

  “Your son?” said Mrs. Mittleman innocently, shrugging her shoulders. “I wasn’t even thinking about your son. I was just saying, a lot of mothers might be jealous of the rabbi because he is young and so eligible and is getting so many offers.”

  “Well, I’m not one of them,” snapped Mrs. Jacobs. “And I’ll have you know my Rafael has plenty of offers.” The others avoided looking at one another, but they all wanted to laugh, knowing that the one-eyed woman was indulging in dreams. Mrs. Harris especially kept her eyes bent downward. As desperate as she was to find a match for her remaining unmarried daughters, the gawky idiot son of her neighbor was the last one she’d ever consider. But Mrs. Jacobs continued defiantly, “My Rafael doesn’t have to worry. All he has to do is snap a finger and the girls would come running. He is now head presser at the shop. True, the shop has been idle for a few weeks and he is not making so much as he used to. But when things get better he will be making plenty.”

  No one said anything further. As far as they were concerned, the discussion was over. They began to drift out one by one. My mother was left thinking. A week later she invited the rabbi to Friday night dinner. It was a further attempt to show her support for him. But it was time already. Others had also invited him to Friday night dinner. My mother had hesitated only because she was afraid, first, of my father, who would have to be there, and, second, of Lily and whether she would want it. She decided to take the chance without consulting either one of them first, and the rabbi accepted her invitation with alacrity.

  FRIDAY NIGHT DINNERS were always the best of the week. They were like holiday feasts, and the whole atmosphere was festive. We came home from the synagogue into a house that smelled of chicken soup and freshly baked cakes. The table was decked out with a crisp, snow-white cloth, and set with the best dishes and cutlery. In the center, the candles burned in the shiny brass candlesticks that my mother had smuggled out of Poland. The fire glowed in the grate, with pots simmering over it.

  The rabbi came home with us that Friday night, chatting cheerfully all along the way, with everyone envying us. He sniffed and sighed as we came in, rubbed his hands together briskly, and said, “Ah, what lovely smells.” He then called out, “Good Shabbos, good Shabbos!”

  My father was there, a surprise to my two brothers and myself, who were unprepared for his presence. He was already seated at the table, with his head turned to one side, and if he answered the rabbi’s greeting it was barely audible, and just a mutter of something. Rose and Lily did a little better, though Lily was noticeably cold and her eyes looked red and swollen, as if she had been crying.

  Well, she had. My mother had had enough trouble getting my father to be there for dinner, and if it hadn’t been for the new baby she might never have got him to do it. Since the baby’s arrival, he had been a little easier for her to handle. As for Lily, however, she had run into a storm of protest. Outraged when she h
eard at the last moment that the rabbi was to be a guest for dinner, Lily had wanted to leave, had bitterly accused my mother of trying to make a match for her, had burst into a torrent of tears, and had carried on like that, to my mother’s despair, until my father intervened, roaring that if she didn’t shut her bloody mouth he’d shut it with his fist.

  All that took place only moments before our arrival. If the rabbi sensed anything in the rather tense atmosphere, he gave no indication of it. He said a blessing before the dinner began, and then chatted cheerfully about various things, the weather, nothing of importance, just enough to make us feel at ease with him. He was never without words. He was really a personable fellow, and it was no wonder most people liked him. He directed his attention to Rose.

  “I hear you are to become a dressmaker,” he said to her.

  “I am a dressmaker,” said Rose stiffly.

  “Ah, I beg your pardon,” he apologized. “I thought you were still learning. What kind of shop do you work in? Is it a big one?”

  “It’s not a shop,” Rose said in the same stiff tone. She had difficulty speaking to people, and never looked at them when she did. She was much like my father in many respects. She had problems getting along with others, and was a loner on our street, without friends, aloof and superior. Since working in the dress shop she had also affected a haughty, artificial way of speaking that was supposed to be upper-class. She still, I am sure, lived in her dream world, but fantasized less about dukes and duchesses and lords and ladies and more about the rich women of today’s world who were patrons of the dress shop where she worked. Someone had once told us that they had seen her wandering about the streets near the park, pausing every now and then to look at the fancy houses there. I have no doubt that in her mind she was living in one of them, dreaming as she walked along by herself.

  It was in her fancy, would-be upper-class British voice that she answered the rabbi now. “It is an establishment, not a shop,” she said. “I work for Madame La Cossita, and we are very exclusive. Madame La Cossita accepts just a select few for her clients. Lady Bramhall is one of them.”