Big League Dreams (Small Worlds)

by Allen Hoffman

  Boruch Levi started to stand up when the rebbe entered the kitchen, but the rebbe told him to remain seated and to complete his Sabbath meal. Reb Zelig, however, did stand and remained at attention next to the rebbe’s chair. Although the rebbe did not eat, he insisted that Matti recite aloud the appropriate blessings over the cake and tea so that Boruch Levi could answer “Amen.”

  “It is important that you two begin your relationship at the Sabbath table,” the rebbe said.

  Both Boruch Levi and Matti raised their eyebrows at this suggestion.

  “Boruch Levi will be working with you,” the rebbe said.

  “With me?” Matti asked.

  “Yes, he was trained by the chief of police himself and makes a very fine lieutenant,” the rebbe said.

  Boruch Levi nearly dropped his glass of tea. Suddenly, Rabbi Max appeared much less distasteful. Compared to Matti, Rabbi Max seemed positively attractive, even with the distillery in the synagogue, and Boruch Levi had not been commanded to serve Rabbi Max, merely to pray with him. Here was the Krimsker Rebbe ordering him to serve Matti Sternweiss, the baseball-playing clown, as he served Michael O’Brien, the chief of police. Why, just equating the two seemed a vulgar sacrilege.

  “Matti, if you need any help in your holy endeavor, do not hesitate to call upon Reb Boruch Levi.”

  Matti’s eyes met Boruch Levi’s and he saw the same confusion that he himself must have shown when the rebbe told him he was the American Moses.

  “Reb Boruch Levi, are you ill?” the rebbe asked.

  “Yes, I think so, Rebbe.”

  The rebbe was not surprised. “What’s the matter? Would you like to lie down?”

  “Rebbe, no, it’s—” Boruch Levi began.

  “What is it, Reb Boruch Levi?”

  “It’s Matti,” Boruch Levi said. He looked at the baseball player, who wore a sympathetic expression that seemed to encourage Boruch Levi. “He’s a plain thief.”

  Boruch Levi was not one to say things behind a man’s back that he would not repeat to his face. He stared directly at the man whom he had reviled. Not the least bit offended, Matti nodded in agreement and looked at the rebbe for a reply. Slightly embarrassed at having uttered such harsh remarks in the rebbe’s presence, Boruch Levi turned slowly to face the Krimsker Rebbe.

  “Do you wish to serve me or not?” the rebbe asked wearily, suggesting that Boruch Levi’s contribution was welcome but not essential.

  “Yes, but not him. I don’t think the Rebbe understands who he is,” Boruch Levi said very openly.

  “You, who once received divine messages through your horse’s backside, do not trust your rebbe.” Yaakov Moshe shook his head mournfully at the deep enslavement that blinded his hasidim. “Reb Boruch Levi, yes, what you say was once true, but now it is so no longer. As for yourself, Matti Sternweiss is your only hope to bring St. Louis and Krimsk together.”

  “He is?”

  “Yes, what you only dreamed about, he has already done.”

  “He has?”

  “Yes, in Krimsk, when you dreamed of burning cats, he actually did so. Here in St. Louis you again dreamed your dream of destroying evil. You must help him, because only he can realize it.”

  Boruch Levi looked incredulously at Matti, who, although embarrassed to have such things revealed, did not deny anything.

  “I don’t understand,” Boruch Levi confessed.

  “You don’t have to, but let me remind you: pharaoh’s advisers warned him that Moses aspired to steal his kingdom. They suggested that pharaoh test the child’s nature by placing before the boy a shiny golden crown and a smoldering coal. Like any normal child, Moses reached for the crown, but the angel Gabriel guided his hand to the coal. Tonight you have guided Matti aright, and in return you shall be guided.”

  Boruch Levi saw for himself that Matti had changed in the short time they had been at the rebbe’s. There was no trace of arrogance or rudeness; if anything, he could be described as humble. But what about tomorrow’s baseball game? There was still the other team.

  “What shall I tell the police?”

  Animated, the rebbe sat up. “You must tell them the truth—that the Detroit Tigers will lose.”

  “They will?” Boruch Levi asked skeptically.

  “Of course they will. It is a matter of holiness. On the holy Sabbath the impure spirits lose their powers. They are totally impotent. Whoever bets on the St. Louis Browns stands to make a fortune.”

  Boruch Levi did not wear his usual scowl; that would have been disrespectful, but he did look uncomfortable.

  “Boruch Levi, you must not fear sanctity and the Sabbath. For if you protect the Sabbath, then it will protect you,” the rebbe said.

  “It will?”

  “Boruch Levi, have you ever dreamed of the chief of police?” the rebbe asked, slightly exasperated.

  “No,” said Boruch Levi.

  “Of course not, because your dreams come true. You cannot serve them both. You dreamed of burning cats, and Matti will defeat the Detroit Tigers. Serve him, but beware of the police, for they are murderers.”

  “Oh.” Boruch Levi gasped.

  “Now, Matti, you must rest for tomorrow’s test. You must remember that they had nothing to do but pick up the letters because the pilot succeeded in his mission.”

  Matti nodded.

  “Boruch Levi, take him home so he can rest.”

  “Yes,” Boruch Levi answered, but the rebbe was no longer listening. He had closed his eyes and was breathing very evenly and silently. Boruch Levi and Matti left the kitchen quietly so as not to disturb him.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  MATTI AND BORUCH LEVI WALKED BACK IN SILENCE. Matti wanted to apologize to Boruch Levi for embarrassing him, but he couldn’t. That would mean explaining things that he himself didn’t understand. Matti had arrived at the rebbe’s as a failed cheat and had emerged as—what?—a prince of his people? It was more than a little confusing. Nor could Matti admit to his confusion, for that would only make Boruch Levi’s job—difficult as it was—even more difficult. The only comforting statement that he managed to pronounce was, “You can rely on the rebbe.” When Boruch Levi looked at him noncommittally, Matti added, “I’m sure of it,” as confidently as he could.

  Matti returned to his thoughts about the surprising connections between Krimsk and St. Louis. Everything that had seemed so new was suddenly not very new at all. Even Penny Pinkham, especially Penny Pinkham. Matti realized that she had been present in his Krimsk childhood fantasy; when he sat as the powerful Polish noble in his glorious manor house, she had been the blond princess at his side. He smiled, remembering that even as a boy in Krimsk, he had realized that in the imaginary castle with its culinary splendor, milk and meat were never served together. As for Penny Pinkham herself, Matti no longer felt angry and hurt. She had proven to be as ephemeral as the blond princess. How could he blame her for not realizing his fantasies? She had made the right choice in Dufer; after all, a blond princess was entitled to serve milk and meat together to a blond twenty-game prince. The rebbe was right about that; baseball was America’s majesty. Matti suddenly felt sorry for the real Moses. Like Matti, Moses could never have become a true prince in pharaoh’s court. Had he remained, he would have been only a court jester. Moses had no real choice, and neither did Matti. Nor did Lieutenant Max Miller, according to the rebbe. Did anyone? Matti wondered. At any rate, Matti felt more comfortable with himself than he had for a long time. He did, however, have something on his conscience.

  “Barasch was only doing what I asked him to do,” Matti stated apologetically.

  “He shouldn’t have done it.”

  “I shouldn’t have asked him.”

  Boruch Levi’s lack of response suggested that Matti hadn’t improved the cripple’s position with his rigid, uncompromising brother-in-law.

  “None of the money was his,” Matti added.

  As they passed under the silky glow of gaslight, Boruch Levi turned to examin
e Matti in disbelief. “None?”

  “None. It was all mine. He refused to gamble with Malka’s money.”

  “Then why did he do it?” Boruch Levi asked drily.

  Matti realized that Boruch Levi didn’t believe him. For a very good reason: Matti couldn’t explain Barasch’s motive.

  “I don’t know, but it, too, has something to do with Krimsk,” Matti said.

  Boruch Levi heard the uncertainty in Matti’s voice—it was the same vulnerable tone in which Matti had spoken to the rebbe—and it inspired belief.

  “I thought no one was further from Krimsk than America’s Bernard Limp Legs,” wondered Boruch Levi. Yet he believed Matti. Hadn’t they all stumbled upon Krimsk in the streets of the New World? Why not Barasch Limp Legs, too? Cripples had all the more reason to stumble.

  “For some reason, he wasn’t so American in his dealings with me,” Matti replied. Although he wanted to tell Boruch Levi about Barasch’s unbridled enthusiasm for Matti’s pursuit of the blond princess, he couldn’t do so without betraying Barasch’s confidence. Vulgar Malka was Boruch Levi’s sister. Revealing Barasch’s infatuation for wispy blondes wouldn’t sit well with his puritanical brother-in-law.

  “That’s strange,” Boruch Levi said.

  “Yes, it is,” Matti answered honestly. What did Penny Pinkham have to do with Barasch’s Krimsk? His Krimsk had consisted of Beryl Soffer and his match factory. Then Matti suddenly recalled the one essential act that had slipped from his fine memory. He had burned the cats with Faigie Soffer, the wispy blond wife of Barasch’s master. Matti understood: Faigie Soffer was Barasch’s Penny Pinkham. Both Beryl’s Faigie and Dufer’s Penny were the master’s wife and beyond Barasch’s and Matti’s reach.

  “The rebbe understood all that, too!” Matti whispered.

  “Understood what?” Boruch Levi asked.

  Matti wanted to share his discovery, but that would be baring another man’s soul.

  “Understood everything that happened to me and everything I was doing,” Matti answered. “I thought I knew so much, and I know so little.”

  “You understand the rebbe, don’t you?”

  “In some ways,” Matti answered.

  “Why did he say that the chief and the inspector were murderers?” Boruch Levi asked quietly.

  Matti heard the disbelief in Boruch Levi’s tone. Given the jolting shocks that Boruch Levi had absorbed tonight, Matti didn’t want to add another. When he didn’t answer immediately, Boruch Levi asked again, “Are they really murderers?”

  “It’s not who they are; it’s what the world is,” Matti carefully enunciated.

  “I don’t understand,” Boruch Levi said plaintively.

  “They may be as decent as you think they are, but in this distorted world—the world of Prohibition and syndicated crime and fixed ball games—a man licensed to carry a gun and sworn to enforce the law would have to be a saint not to abuse his authority. It really wouldn’t be his fault so much as the fault of the way things are.”

  Boruch Levi remained silent for a while before he ventured, “So they’re not really murderers?”

  “Well, I suppose they’re not to you and to me, but they are to the rebbe. He deals with life on a different level.”

  “Can we rely on him in our world?” Boruch Levi asked with a touch of embarrassment.

  “Absolutely!” Matti replied reflexively, although he himself wasn’t so sure. How could he be? Yet he had an overwhelming desire for Boruch Levi to have such certainty. Why? Did he think Boruch Levi desired it, or was Matti hoping to convince himself through another?

  “He knows about baseball?”

  “More than anyone I have ever met.”

  “He’s a rebbe,” Boruch Levi said, his confidence having returned.

  “Yes, he is. For a while I had forgotten,” Matti confessed.

  “I did, too.”

  Having arrived at Matti’s building, they stopped. A gaslight was not far away, and they could see each other clearly as they stood under the magnificent, broad-leafed, soaring sycamores that covered them like a great penumbral cloud. No longer strangers to each other, they sensed the night and their standing together against the encircling darkness.

  “Would you like to come in for some tea or a drink?” Matti asked.

  “What do you drink?”

  “The hooch Rabbi Max sells,” Matti said with a faint touch of irony that he should be offering Boruch Levi such refreshment on their holy Krimsker Rebbe’s Sabbath.

  “I’ll send you over some good whiskey,” Boruch Levi announced without his usual lordly, patronizing air.

  “Thank you,” Matti said, but he remained where he was and made no move to leave.

  Aware of the rebbe’s command to serve Matti, Boruch Levi asked, “Is there anything I can do?”

  “No, everything is fine. It’s just that a lot of unexpected things have happened tonight.”

  Boruch Levi nodded in agreement. “Do you want me to come in?”

  “Yes, but I don’t think you should keep the chief waiting,” Matti said.

  “I should see them. We’ll make it some other time.”

  “I’d like that,” Matti said, extending his hand. “Gut Shabbos and thank you.”

  Boruch Levi firmly grasped Matti’s hand and warmly returned the blessing. As Matti turned to go, Boruch Levi said, “Matti, I’m sorry that I didn’t bring you a letter from Krimsk.”

  “But you have already, Boruch Levi, and it’s a very fine one at that. Thank you,” Matti said.

  Although Boruch Levi didn’t understand exactly what Matti meant, he sensed that on some level it was true. With a newfound respect, even affection—Matti after all had assured him that the chief and Doheen weren’t really murderers—protectively Boruch Levi watched Matti return home.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  A WEARY BORUCH LEVI CLIMBED INTO BED NEXT TO HIS sleeping wife. He began to toss uneasily as he wondered about everything that had already happened and was about to happen tomorrow. His mind kept returning to the chief and Doheen. His second meeting had gone very well, hadn’t it? He wasn’t sure.

  Doheen had ushered the confident Boruch Levi into the parlor. The chief was seated in an easy chair, with a glass of whiskey on the lamp table at his side.

  “Unless I miss my mark, I think Boruch Levi has good news for us,” Doheen said in what was for him a veritable explosion of small talk.

  “I had expected no less from our faithful friend, but good news is always welcome,” the chief agreed.

  Boruch Levi nodded and sat on the sofa next to Doheen, who also had a heavy whiskey glass by his side. He poured a generous one for Boruch Levi.

  “Yes, relax a moment. I’ll wager you’ve had a busy evening.”

  The chief sat back and sipped his drink. Boruch Levi eyed the short, massive, hexagonal glass in his strong hand. All precise angles and thick reflecting surfaces of mellow light and Irish whiskey, it was a match for his powerful grip. So unlike the way Jews drank from simple little shot glasses, balanced between thumb and fingers. He swallowed deeply and felt the fiery liquid coursing down his throat. It was too warm for a Jew to be drinking at such an hour, but the chief welcomed his participation. The Krimsker Rebbe had, too. So this was Irish kiddush, then, a secular sanctification, if such a thing existed. He would have to ask Matti about that. He might know. The thought of Matti warmed him almost as much as the liquor.

  “We have nothing to worry about. The St. Louis Browns will win tomorrow,” he informed them, speaking over his glass, as if the golden whiskey were his audience.

  They both sat up with a sense of relief tempered by a veteran wariness at his innocent certainty.

  “Can you be so sure?” Doheen asked.

  “I can, but I might not be able to explain it. It involves men’s souls and destiny.”

  Doheen smiled at the mention of souls; the chief did not.

  “I can promise you that Matti Sternweiss will do his very best, and t
hat no other unexpected bets will be placed on the Detroit team. He and my brother-in-law were in this alone.”

  “Good, that’s the important thing,” the chief said, sipping his whiskey. “Boruch Levi, you are very sure, but in these things a man can’t be too sure. Do you think he might be pulling a fast one on us?”

  Boruch Levi put his glass on the coffee table and shook his head.

  “We trust you like a brother. But can you be so sure? I’ve been a policeman too long not to be a little apprehensive when the devil discovers a sudden impulse to do the Lord’s work.”

  Not wanting to hurt his trusted friend, the chief said this gently, as if whispering to his dark whiskey.

  “I’ve never been a policeman, but I do know my own. I know where he came from and where he’s going. I give you my word.”

  “Boruch Levi, your word is golden with us, but these are earnest matters. Men can get killed in such affairs,” the chief said, trying to instruct his young foreign friend in the ways of the wicked American underworld.

  Boruch Levi flinched at the mention of death.

  “Whoever bets on our home team stands to make his fortune. If you have a charity that needs some money, bet on our St. Louis Browns. I will insure you against any loss,” Boruch Levi declared.

  Boruch Levi stood up. How could he be any more forthright than that? He reached to take the chief’s wounded hand in his. “Thank you for calling me about this. Don’t worry any more about it. You must rest. We no longer have a problem. Trust me.”

  “Yes, I do, my friend,” the chief said wearily.

  Opening the door, Doheen had asked in a feverish whisper, “Boruch Levi, are you sure?”

  “Absolutely,” he had said with his stubborn certainty. And he walked into the mellow darkness that seemed to smell of Irish whiskey.

  Things seemed to have gone well. Boruch Levi had reported good news, but they had remained doubtful. How could he have told them about the Krimsker Rebbe, Zloty the cat, and his own prophetic dreams? What was more, Boruch Levi didn’t want to tell them—it wasn’t their business—but he still resented their doubts. Things really hadn’t gone so well. Just as the rebbe predicted, he couldn’t serve them both. Boruch Levi never thought it would happen so quickly, much less that he himself would cripple the relationship. And what about the chief’s remark that men could get killed in such matters? He tried to imagine what Matti might say about that, but a heavy blanket of weariness descended upon him. He rolled over, and within a minute he was snoring.