by Talia Carner
The baby on Surale’s side reached his arms to Batya. She took him, hugging him to her chest while feeling Vida’s arms wrap around her thighs.
“Ima, Mommy,” the little girl said. The new name—her new identity, Vida’s mother—never failed to warm Batya’s heart.
Surale spread a blanket on the ground, and Batya sat down, pressing Vida to her and kissing the girl’s fair-haired head, like her own. The baby was pawing at her chest, and Batya lifted her shirt to let him suckle.
Her pregnancy had been the greatest surprise after the monthlong voyage from Uruguay. One more miracle to add to the list of improbable events that had happened at the time of her escape. God had blessed her with her own son, who wouldn’t be scraped out of her womb by the brothel’s doctor. The sense of wonder hadn’t lost its newness in the eleven months since his birth. It didn’t matter who his father was—though she hoped that he inherited Ulmann’s sensitivity. Her baby was all hers to love.
She had sold her jewelry, and the Jewish Colonization Association office in Jaffa had cashed her savings booklet. Combined with a subsidy from the Baron de Hirsch’s coffers—he now worked with another Jewish baron, the French Edmond Rothschild, for the latter’s colonization program in the Holy Land—she was able to acquire her own lot, hire masons, and build a small stone home for herself and her sisters’ families. Surale’s husband, Duvid, fashioned the furniture, and had since been earning money in the neighboring villages doing carpentry work. A new, proud Jew in the Holy Land, Duvid rode on the back of his mare, a gun strapped on his right side, his tool belt on his left, and his saw mounted behind him. He was a fine young man, and every time Batya witnessed the tenderness with which he treated his wife, she thanked the strength she had mustered to stave off her parents’ pleas to bring Surale to Argentina. Her mother in heaven must have since forgiven her.
Batya switched the baby to her other breast, and he sucked hungrily as if he hadn’t just emptied its twin. Her finger stroked the soft spot on his skull that reminded her of his vulnerability. Her baby. Yaakov, her father’s real name, not its diminutive Koppel, because here her son would grow up to stand tall and proud, like his namesake ancestor, Jacob, who walked this land, promised to his grandfather Abraham.
In another miracle, her father had lived through his illness in Odessa and made his dream of seeing the Holy Land come true. He had been able to make the voyage from the Black Sea into the Mediterranean, and, upon disembarking the rowboat that had transferred him from the ship to the dock in the port of Jaffa, fell on the ground and kissed it. However, too sick to continue the three-day trip to reach the Galilee by a diligence, the stagecoach passenger service, he was checked into the missionaries’ hospital. There, he wavered between life and death, waiting for Batya’s arrival.
He was lucid the day she stood by his bed, holding his hand, both of them weeping. She bent and buried her face in his beard, breathing in the never-forgotten dairy scent, now mixed with the odor of the looming Angel of Death.
“I’m sorry you lost your fine husband,” her father murmured, his eyes closed.
This was the moment to erase the lies that her father would otherwise take with him to the next world. Her mother, who was surely waiting for him to continue their decades of bantering, would reveal to him Batya’s secrets. The obedient daughter must be cleansed from the lies.
“Moskowitz wasn’t the man we all hoped for,” she said, unsure whether her father had heard her, and she added for good measure, “He was a very bad man.”
His hand gave a light squeeze, and a wave of relief washed over Batya. He’d heard her and she’d rid herself of the falsehood. Her mother would tell her father the rest. Batya brought her father’s hand to her lips the same moment that he took his last breath.
She had managed to get her family out of Russia and at least give three of her four sisters a better future. Was it worth the suffering? The longer Batya lived, the more it became evident that God’s plans were beyond her human comprehension.
Batya finished nursing Yaakov and bounced him on her knee. He squirmed, eager to slip from her hold and crawl on the ground. His hazel eyes took in the world around him with awe. Nothing escaped his scrutiny, and he seemed to want to touch and taste everything.
“In a month or two he’ll be walking.” Surale laughed. “He’ll be a handful.”
Batya smiled. “What did you bring me to eat?” she asked. Besides caring for the youngest children while the older ones were in school, Surale raised chickens, baked the family bread, and tended to the kitchen garden. Keyla alternated between toiling with Batya in the family’s field and hiring herself out to care for farmers’ cows. Batya hoped that in a year or two they’d be able to buy their own cow. They would name her Aggie.
Surale didn’t answer but remained sitting on her haunches, grinning into Batya’s face.
“What is it?” Batya asked.
“You got a letter. The mailman said it’s from Argentina.”
From Argentina? Dread and curiosity mixed in Batya’s heart. No one from her old life knew where she’d gone. She had never mailed Ulmann her apology, concerned that, misguided or revengeful, he might reveal her whereabouts to Moskowitz.
“Maybe it’s about money for Yaakov from your late husband’s family?” Surale ventured. “You should sue her, for your son’s sake, so he receives his just inheritance—”
“So she comes here to claim my baby? The law there says he belongs to the father’s family.” Batya knew of no such law, and she hated the lies that would never end. Luckily, Surale’s illiteracy and the many months it took any letter to travel blurred the few months’ lapse between Reb Moskowitz’s supposed passing and Batya’s pregnancy. Batya went on. “Freda should never know where I am. Another reason for you never to mention Argentina to anyone.”
For the girls in the brothel, she had disappeared forever in the Pampas. They must have surmised that she had been murdered by Zwi Migdal. Batya missed her friends, especially Rochel. She still found it hard to reconcile the benevolent, gentle friend she had adored with the merciless pimp she suspected Rochel had become. These days, Rochel might be visiting auctions, probing a frightened naked girl’s private parts, assessing the value of the merchandise.
Stop it, Batya told herself, watching her son crawl on the blanket, babbling. His baby sounds were music to her ears. She must shut off that world, just as once she had shut the real Batya away to allow Esperanza to take over.
She turned the envelope in her hands. It was stained, corners fraying, the ink of the return address smeared, testifying that it had made a long journey through oceans and mountains and too many hands. In spite of this, the chipped red wax seal was unbroken. She slipped a fingernail beneath it with care, so as not to damage the envelope any further.
The letter began with Dear Batya. She turned it over to see the signature. It was signed Sergio Rosenberg.
Sergio. Her heart skipped a beat. With a smile, she began reading.
Dear Batya,
I hope that this letter finds you in good health and spirits. Our office in Jaffa has reported that you purchased your own land and built a house on it. This is wonderful. I also know that you are reunited with your family, although I am sorry about your father’s passing, may his soul live in the heart of your new baby.
After your departure I, too, left Buenos Aires. I have been learning agriculture in Moïseville, just as you have been doing in the Holy Land. However, your family’s story has inspired me to follow in your footsteps to the land of our ancestors, and I plan to travel there as soon as the winter ocean winds calm down to make the long voyage less taxing.
I have been thinking about you a great deal these past many months. I cherished our tango dancing. Had life been written by a different divinity, we would be performing together now, maybe winning more competitions. It is my greatest regret that we failed in our mission. Señor Joaquin Ramos’s unfortunate fate will discourage another brave prosecutor, district attorney, or j
udge for years to come.
Batya stopped and placed her hand over her heart. How many more thousands of girls would be lured and snatched to South America? Could the Baron de Hirsch be this powerless against Zwi Migdal?
You’ll be glad to hear, though, that by an interesting twist of events we recovered that critical lost document I cannot name here. God willing, may it one day be used for the purpose you and I had intended.
She heard her own gasp. The ledger was back in the possession of those who could help the sisters! Probably it had been bought from a policeman on a night shift at the station.
“What is it?” Surale asked. “Bad news?”
“No. A letter from an old friend. Everything is well.” She read on.
On a more personal note, I would like to be brazen and tell you that during our collaboration—both on the dance floor and the investigation—I developed a great admiration for your bravery and valor. In spite of all that had befallen you, I saw neither bitterness nor the harsh cynicism that can chip away pieces of the soul until there’s nothing left of humanity. At a time that you could have saved yourself, you thought not only of your family but also of all your suffering sisters.
You also taught me to look into myself and recognize my own prejudices even when I had meant well. I ask your forgiveness for any cruel remark I thoughtlessly uttered. Your values and morals should have been beacons of character to anyone who ever met you.
You have inspired me to do in the Holy Land what I am doing in Moïseville: be a gaucho. I wish to come live in your village, where, no doubt, a strong laborer will be able to raise a herd of milk-producing cows.
I recall how confident you sounded when you insisted that you could learn agriculture and help establish a women-only village for your lost sisters. If this is still your dream, once I am settled, I can liaise with the Baron’s office in Buenos Aires to help establish such a village for formerly subjugated women who wish to immigrate and, like you, start a new life in the Holy Land.
Respectfully yours,
Sergio Rosenberg
Batya hugged the letter to her chest. There would be no tango in their future, but together they could choreograph their own dance.
“Yes,” she whispered. “Yes.”
Author’s Note
This novel is inspired by real events, a buried shameful chapter in history that has rarely been explored in English-language fiction. It is the tragic story of over 150,000 women who in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries were deceived and lured from Eastern Europe into prostitution in South America.
The Yiddish storyteller Sholem Aleichem hinted about this outrage in his short story “The Man from Buenos Aires” (which appeared in the same Railroad Stories collection that features the memorable character of Tevye the Dairyman).
This novel is the fictional story of a young Jewish woman who meets that mysterious, shady man from Buenos Aires. It is a tribute to the few women who found the strength and courage to rise above the tragedy of their fate and fought back.
The historical events in the novel actually took place between 1892 and 1910; however, the pimps’ union, Zwi Migdal, operated with impunity for seventy years. All the characters in this novel are fictional except for the Jewish German baron Maurice de Hirsch, whose ambitious vision for world Jewry and his unprecedented generosity have been largely forgotten.
—New York, 2019
Acknowledgments
First, I would like to thank the anonymous librarian in Buenos Aires with whom I chatted in 2007. When I asked her about “the Jewish prostitutes and pimps,” she forgot her English. That was my first clue to the depth of the dark secret of this shameful, long chapter not only in the history of Argentine Jews but in the history of all my people.
In researching The Third Daughter, I was greatly helped by Ana (Anita) Weinstein, director of the Documentation and Information Center on Argentine Jewry in AMIA, Buenos Aires, who also read the final manuscript for accuracy. My Spanish-language, Argentina-based assistants, Henry Osman and Mónica Correa, translated material and helped me study architecture, food, dress, urban development, and customs in Buenos Aires of the late 1800s.
The medical information research began with Dr. MaryAnn Millar, followed by Dr. Wendy Macias-Konstantopoulos, director, Human Trafficking Initiative, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston. The latter’s appreciation and interest in helping me make this complex subject public reconfirmed the importance of my telling the story of one such young victim.
My knowledge of tango dancing was enhanced by lessons from Jean Maurasse, Scott Edholm, and Craig Gordon and the comments of tango experts Sherry Palencia and Camille Cusomano.
I could not have written this novel without the steady constructive feedback of my writing group, Two Bridges, led by Walter Cummins. The thoughtful editing by Linda Davies and Susan O’Neill helped reshape the manuscript.
In the fall of 2015, I asked my friend Emily White (Klores) to walk with me in Central Park in New York City, where I mulled aloud my ideas for a new novel dealing with trafficking. Emily’s free associations clicked synapses in my brain, and although the story that emerged once I sat down in front of my computer was not the one we had discussed, she had fueled my creative process and later commented on an advanced draft.
I found an abundance of English-language research material about Zwi Migdal on the internet and at university libraries. Among the many sources, I would like to single out Isabel Vincent’s excellent book Bodies and Souls: The Tragic Plight of Three Jewish Women Forced into Prostitution in the Americas (William Morrow, 2005) and Mir Hayim Yarfitz’s Ph.D. dissertation, “Polacos, White Slaves, and Stille Chuppahs: Organized Prostitution and the Jews of Buenos Aires, 1890–1939” (UCLA, 2012). Also worth mentioning are Donna J. Guy’s Sex and Danger in Buenos Aires: Prostitution, Family, and Nation in Argentina (University of Nebraska Press, 1990) and Nora Glickman’s The Jewish White Slave Trade and the Untold Story of Raquel Liberman (Garland, 2000).
No birthing of a novel can take place without the dedicated midwifing of a team, starting with my wonderful agent, Annelise Robey from Jane Rotrosen Literary Agency. To my delight, my editor at William Morrow, the extraordinary Katherine Nintzel, had thought the topic “stupendous” when I first introduced it to her and loved the final product. Birthing The Third Daughter from its manuscript form, she has brought it to its final destination—the hands of my readers.
I could not have hoped for a better marketing team at HarperCollins—Jen Hart, Molly Waxman, Amelia Wood, Bianca Flores, and Vedika Khanna. I have been impressed by their professionalism and encouraged by their enthusiasm about the novel. Their dedication to making The Third Daughter a success has been reinforced by my own events coordinator, Lisa Bernard, who has galloped out of the gate to fill my calendar with dozens of speaking engagements.
And as always, there is Ron, whose love, devotion, and support are forever the wind in my wings that lifts me to new heights.
Glossary
Glossary (Yiddish or Hebrew, unless listed otherwise):
a bissele—A little.
abacus—(Latin) A calculating tool constructed on a wooden frame with beads sliding on wires.
abrazo—(Spanish) Embrace, a tango position.
adornos—(Spanish) Embellishments of tango moves to demonstrate skill.
aliyah—Being called to face the congregation and read aloud a Torah portion.
alte-zachen—Old things. Refers to the ragman who sells them.
aperitivo—(Spanish) Appetite-stimulating alcoholic drink.
bandoneón—(Spanish) Early version of accordion played at milongas.
bella—(Spanish) Beautiful (feminine).
caballero—(Spanish) Knight, cavalier, gentleman, or horseman.
cachaça—(Spanish) Distilled spirit made from fermented sugarcane juice.
caftan—(Spanish) Pimp. Derived from cafetão, the long coat worn by religious Eastern European Jews.
casa chorizo—(S
panish) A long and skinny row of attached dwellings.
casita—(Spanish) Small house or a guest villa.
challah—Braided bread used for Shabbat and Jewish holidays.
charoset—Traditional Passover food of chopped apples, dates, raisins, nuts, and honey.
chazzan—Cantor.
chimichurri—(Spanish) Sauce made of herbs.
compadritos—(Spanish) Rural gauchos who appeared in Argentine cities as a result of urbanization.
conventillos—(Spanish) Little convents. An ironic name for Jewish tenements in Buenos Aires.
davening—Reciting the prescribed Jewish liturgical prayers.
diligence—(French) A horse-drawn stagecoach/passenger conveyance service.
dreck—Rubbish.
dulce de leche—(Spanish) Sweet condensed milk.
dybbuk—A malicious possessing spirit that enters the soul.
farshlepte plog—Chronic plague.
farshteyst—Do you understand?
ganef—Thief.
gehenom—Hell.
get—Jewish divorce.
goy—Non-Jew (plural goyim).
Haggadah—The Passover text recited at the Seder dinner, describing the Jews’ exodus from Egypt over three thousand years ago.
halacha—Jewish law and jurisprudence, based on the Talmud.
Hashem—God (literally “the name”).
ima—Mommy, mother.
kaddish—A prayer for the dead, recited in Aramaic.
kashrut—The overall rules determining what’s kosher.
klezmer—Musician.
kneidlach—Matzo balls (for soup).
knish—Dough filled with either ground meat, mashed potatoes, kasha, or onions.
kosher—Food that adheres to Jewish dietary restrictions.
kreplach—Dumplings stuffed with meat, potatoes, or cheese.
