A Time to Love

by Beryl Kingston

  They left the cycling club to its own tame devices and set off at speed to Hymie Levy’s house to ask him, and when he’d recovered from his surprise and agreed and bought them a drink to celebrate, they were off again, this time to Mrs Miller’s to ask Ruby.

  Mrs Miller said she never did, and kissed them both, and Ruby said she was honoured, and Amy wanted to know if they ‘was ’avin’ a weddin’ breakfast’, which was something they hadn’t thought about.

  ‘Monday, perhaps,’ Ellen said. ‘We could ’ave a party Monday. Whatcher think, David?’

  ‘They got ter find ’emselves somewhere ter live first,’ Mrs Miller told her youngest. ‘You thought where yer goin’, ’ave yer?’

  Only vaguely, it had to be admitted. They were both too dizzy with happiness to think straight about anything. ‘I’ll come wiv yer, Wednesday,’ she said to Ellen, laughing at them. ‘Find yer somewhere nice. You don’t want ter get rooked, do yer?’

  She was as good as her word, and that Wednesday afternoon, she and Ruby and Ellen went house hunting. ‘Somewhere tucked away nice an’ private, fer a kick off,’ she suggested. ‘You goin’ on workin’, are yer?’

  They found two attic rooms at the top of a tenement house in Quaker Street, where there was gas laid on and Mrs Undine the landlady was thin and wary and proclaimed her cleanliness and respectability by the whitest doorstep in the street True, the nearest tap was down two flights of stairs and the W.C. was shared by three other tenants, but at least they were both indoors and looked clean even if they didn’t smell too good.

  ‘It’ll do fer a start,’ Ellen said. Anything would have done for a start. It was the start that was important.

  There was so much to do, curtains to make, a hat to trim, furniture to find, Miss Elphinstone to be persuaded that she would work just as well if she lived out and finally in the last week when the rooms were theirs and paid for, floors to scrub and windows to clean, and on Friday evening their own little larder to stock. Hymie came to Quaker Street as soon as he’d finished work and fitted their secondhand gas cooker for them, and Ruby and Ellen hung the curtains, and as the dusk gathered outside their high window they kissed one another goodbye, stunned by the speed of their preparations. And David went home for the last Shabbas meal he would eat with his parents. And he still hadn’t said anything at all to his mother.

  Tomorrow at breakfast, he thought, as she broke the challah bread. I can hardly tell her now. But she was so happy at breakfast time, he couldn’t tell her then either.

  So he departed for his wedding secretly, feeling a little ashamed of his cowardice. But happy. Oh so happy. Happier than he’d ever felt in his life.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Aunty Dumpling was ready and waiting on the steps of Stepney Town Hall for a good twenty minutes before the appointed time. She was honoured to be invited to the ceremony and had no intention of missing a second of it. Her bubeleh was getting married so she was going to be there to support him. Naturally. She was wearing her best straw hat for the occasion, and her tightest corsets, and her plump arms were full of equally plump gifts, a bolster dangling before her skirt like a fat sausage, the folded bulk of a patchwork quilt, homemade and stuffed to capacity, one of Mr Monickendam’s rich cakes for the groom and an armful of red roses for the bride. What with the tight corsets, the bulky parcels and the heat of the day, she was finding it difficult to breath and was quite pink in the face in consequence. But what of that? It was her Davey’s wedding day.

  Ten minutes later Mr Morrison arrived from work and came quietly up the steps to join her, bearing an unobtrusive cardboard box, and smiling shyly. The two of them stood together in the sunshine and told one another what a fine day it was, because there were so many other things that couldn’t be said. Neither of them knew that Emmanuel was standing on the other side of the road. Not that Dumpling would have changed her behaviour in any way if she had.

  He had taken great care to keep well out of sight in the shelter of the pawnbroker’s side entrance, for it wouldn’t have done to let David see him. There’d be trouble enough when Rachel was told, ai-yi, without that. But he couldn’t stay away, not even to please his wife. He wanted to see his son’s wedding, to feel he was offering support even if nobody could see it You need support when you marry, he remembered. So young you are, so little you know. And he grieved again to think that David was marrying alone, except for Raizel, and in secret, when he ought to have been escorted by all the men in his family. Ai yi!

  While he was sighing, David arrived, jumping down from a tram, striding across the road, leaping the steps two at a time, young and eager and obviously happy. And there was the bride tripping towards him through the crowds, trim in a new white blouse, her face shining under the brim of an enormous Floradora hat. Such a pretty pair, he sighed, as they caught hands and smiled their love at each other. Then there was a bustle on the steps as Mrs Levy’s son arrived and he and David cuffed one another in greeting and they all disappeared into the building.

  It was too late for argument. The modern world was rushing them all onwards, regardless of their feelings. Now he could only stand on the edge of the affair and pluck his beard and grieve. He shifted his feet miserably and sighed and prepared himself for a long wait.

  But they were very quick. It hardly seemed any time at all before the party emerged into the sunlight again, all talking at once and laughing and making such a noise he could hear them above the traffic. There seemed to be more of them now but as they were all on the move, hugging and darting and dancing about, it was difficult to tell. It wasn’t until a photographer arrived and stood them in line enough to get a picture that he saw they’d been joined by a plump girl in a pink blouse and a woman who looked like her mother, and was certainly mothering the bride. Relations maybe? Nu, he grunted with approval, just as well, for she was young too and needed support every bit as much as David. Although at the moment, he had to admit, they looked as though they had been blessed. She was clinging to David’s arm and smiling with such obvious happiness, it brought a lump to his throat to see it, and David’s face was glowing in the sunshine, his dark hair springing above his forehead as thick as a mane. Their guests were throwing confetti into the air above their heads, and soon his white shirt and her white blouse were dotted with bright colour so that they seemed to be shimmering.

  ‘Happy the bride the sun shines on,’ the motherly lady called.

  And Emmanuel said, ‘Amen.’

  And then it was over, and they were all going their separate ways, back to work and the ordinary world. Even the bride and groom were parting, and that gave him a pang of the sharpest regret, for it seemed unnatural and cruel. But it was all too late, the steps were empty and the street was full of strangers. Sighing, he trailed back to his work and the dread of the evening when Rachel would finally have to be told.

  It rather surprised him when David came back from work that evening as though nothing had happened. But surprise rapidly changed to pity, for David and his mother, when he saw how clumsily the boy was handling this moment.

  ‘You vill eat now, nu?’ Rachel asked timidly. ‘Kugel ve got.’

  ‘No, Mama,’ he said and his voice was brusque. ‘I ain’t stoppin’. You might as well know. I only come home ter pack, then I’m off.’

  ‘Off?’ she said, hurt and bewildered. ‘Vhat you mean off?’

  ‘I got married terday,’ he told her, his voice cold and his expression withdrawn as though she were an enemy. ‘I’ve come home to get me things, then I’m off.’

  ‘Gottenyu!’ Rachel whispered. Dear God! And she sat down weakly on the edge of his truckle bed as though she’d lost the use of her legs. ‘Emmanuel?’

  ‘It is true, bubeleh,’ he had to confess. ‘Nebbish.’

  David had left a cardboard box out on the balcony. Now he retrieved it and began to fill it with his possessions, his paper and brushes, his paintbox, his folders, his two spare shirts, keeping his eyes firmly focused on his own hands
and working with dreadful speed. She watched him silently, too stunned and miserable to speak, her face pale and drawn, and it seemed to Emmanuel that even her eyes were shrinking.

  It was over so quickly. The box was packed and tied together with string. The cover on the truckle bed was straightened. One dry brief kiss was dropped on his mother’s bowed head. ‘I will visit you,’ he said, and he was gone. It was as quick and cruel and unnatural as the wedding.

  Then the storm broke, and she began to wail, a wordless keening, on and on and on. ‘Ai-yi-yi-yi-yi!’

  ‘Don’t cry, dolly,’ he begged, smoothing her hair. ‘Don’t cry, my chicken. Sooner or later ve had to let him go. You know that, nu?’ But she didn’t hear him.

  It wasn’t long before Rivke arrived. ‘I seen your Davey …’ she began, but then she saw Rachel’s stricken face. ‘Rachel bubeleh, vhat’s the matter, dolly?’

  Emmanuel explained as well as he could, but the fury gathering on his sister’s face chilled the words on his tongue.

  ‘Married?’ she shouted. ‘Vhat you mean married? He’s eighteen yet. He ain’t old enough. Permission he’d need. You ain’t give permission, Manny. You ain’t never give permission. Don’t tell me that.’

  ‘If I could tell you different, I’d tell you different,’ Emmanuel sighed. ‘He’d a’ married her anyvay, I tell you.’

  Rivke’s right eye seemed in imminent danger of sliding off her cheek, her distress was so acute. ‘A fine chawchem ve got here, Rachel,’ she cried. ‘He give permission! Oy oy oy! Ve vas vearin’ him down. Vearin’ him down, good. Another two, three veeks vould a’ seen all the difference. For vhy you vant to do this fool thing?’

  ‘All my childer I lose,’ Rachel wailed. ‘All! All! Only Davey … For vhy he do this, Rivke?’

  ‘To let him marry vid a shiksa!’ Rivke said. ‘Begin vid strange vomen, end vid strange gods, I tell you. Oy oy!’

  ‘I never see him again, I tell you,’ Rachel wept. ‘Never ever again.’

  Then the rest of the family came trooping into the flat, agog for news, Ben and Becky, Jo and his wife, Josh and Maggie and their children, and the noise of astonishment, disbelief and commiseration was so loud it was impossible to hear what anybody was saying, which Emmanuel thought wryly was just as well. When Dumpling came in through the open door ten minutes later they were all shouting at once and Rachel and Rivke were crying with abandon. She made quite a good job of pretending surprise, but there wasn’t any possibility of speech among all that clashing sound. She pushed her way through the howling bodies until she reached her crumpled brother, sitting in the eye of the storm, with his head bent, enduring.

  ‘So I tell you,’ she said, stooping so that her mouth was just above his ear, ‘you are the best brother in the whole vide vorld.’ And she cuddled his beleaguered head against her bosom, and dropped tears of pity on his poor thin hair. ‘Every day I say thanks to the good Lord for such a brother.’

  By the time the shop was shut that evening, Mrs Ellen Cheifitz was feeling very tired. She seemed to have been on her feet all day, running from one moment to the next, and now her back ached and her feet were sore, and to make matters worse she was hungry too, having missed her midday meal. She gathered her belongings together and packed them neatly in Mrs Miller’s carpet bag, and told Maudie not to cry, and at nine o’clock finally let herself out of the staff entrance into the gaslit street, where to her great relief David was waiting for her.

  He took the carpet bag without a word and tucking her hand into the crook of his arm, led her away to the steak house in Norton Folgate.

  ‘It’s all very well this gettin’ married lark,’ he said, ‘but it don’t ’alf make you hungry.’ It was necessary to put a pleasant experience between himself and his cruelty to his mother. ‘I’m starvin’.’

  ‘So’m I.’

  They had a sixpenny steak and fried onions, a great treat, and then much refreshed and with their energies restored, set off arm in arm to take possession of their kingdom.

  It was very quiet in Quaker Street, for most of the inhabitants were home from work and settled, glad to be at ease behind their own closed doors and open windows. The hall was empty, there was no sign of their landlady, and no sound from the rooms below theirs. At the top of the stairs, where their front door blocked off the rest of the house, he put down the carpet bag and took out his key.

  ‘Groom carries bride over threshold,’ he said, picking her up in his arms as though she were a baby.

  ‘Daft ha’p’orth,’ she laughed at him, holding him tightly round the neck. ‘You’ll drop me.’

  But he didn’t. He carried her easily and tenderly, kicking the carpet bag before them, then waiting for her to pull the door shut behind them. And then they were on their own at last in the darkness of their narrow landing with the door to their bedroom invitingly open.

  ‘Welcome home!’ he said.

  They slept late next morning and didn’t get up till nearly eight o’clock, long after the factory sirens had woken them.

  ‘Luxury, nu?’ he said, opening the curtains. ‘What’s for breakfast?’

  ‘After all you ate last night!’ she mocked, laughing up at him from the pillows. ‘You got hollow legs?’

  ‘Good healthy appetite,’ he said, and then the sight of her gazing up at him so lovingly aroused another appetite and he went back to the bed to kiss her hopefully.

  ‘Did we really oughter be goin’ on like this?’ she asked when they finally settled down to their bread and jam breakfast. There was no anxiety in the question, only gratified pleasure and a passing curiosity.

  But he took it quite seriously. ‘Oh yes,’ he said. ‘It says so in the Shulchan Aruch. “A healthy man should perform his duties nightly.”’

  ‘What’s the Shulchan Aruch when it’s at home?’

  ‘It’s a book with all the laws in. All the Jewish laws.’

  ‘D’you mean ter say you got laws about … that?’ It was an amazing idea. The only thing she could ever remember the priests saying about it was that it was sinful and you shouldn’t.

  ‘We got laws about everything,’ he said laughing.

  ‘An’ the law says every night?’ It was making her shiver to think of it.

  ‘If that’s what the wife wants. It’s up to her.’

  That was another extraordinary idea. She bit her bread and jam and thought about it.

  ‘Tell you another thing,’ he went on, ‘after the first time, we’re supposed to say a prayer.’

  ‘Never!’

  ‘Don’t laugh. It’s a good prayer. You’d like it.’

  ‘Go on then. Tell us.’

  He licked his fingers clean of jam and took both her hands in his, very gently. ‘Blessed art thou, oh Lord our God,’ he quoted, ‘King of the universe, who has planted a nut tree in Eden.’

  ‘A nut tree in Eden,’ she said, charmed by the image. ‘Yes, you’re right. It is a good prayer. I like it. A nut tree in Eden.’

  He kissed her fingers. ‘It will grow to the most beautiful tree anyone’s ever seen,’ he said. ‘I promise.’

  And so the weeks passed and the tree grew and they were happy in their private Eden and almost forgot about their parents, although David went to the synagogue with his father every Friday. Before they knew it, it was September and the coalmen were hawking their wares in the streets of Shoreditch and the Thames was grey with the chill of autumn.

  It was quite cold in their two attic rooms, especially first thing in the morning, when the lino struck chill under bare feet warm from bed.

  ‘I shall make a rag rug,’ she decided.

  ‘I’ll design it.’

  ‘I’ll ask me sister fer rags. They’re bound to ’ave lots in that great house.’

  ‘I’ll ask Papa, shall I?’

  She thought about it, puckering her forehead. “Would ’e mind?’

  He was delighted, although he did no more than nod his head in agreement when David asked him. They had taken to walki
ng along Fournier Street when they came out of the synagogue on a Friday evening. It gave them a chance to talk to one another and extended the time they could be together.

  For David, going to synagogue was more often painful than rewarding. It was surprising how frequently the Rabbi spoke of the blessings of a good Jewish marriage, or read the story of Ruth and Naomi. ‘Thy God shall be my God.’ What a marvellous thing for a woman to promise. And to her mother-in-law too!

  Oh, if only Ellen could cook like Aunty Dumpling, he would think. What a difference that would make! But she cooked such English things, cottage pie and chops, and he didn’t really enjoy them at all. And when he brought a Jewish dish home, she wrinkled her nose and ate it slowly as though she was forcing it down. It was all very difficult. Still, at least she was obviously trying to make a home for them, and that was commendable. Look how his father was commending it.

  ‘A sensible woman, nu?’ Emmanuel approved as they reached Christ Church and Itchy Park. ‘I see vhat I find.’

  There was a brown paper parcel full of off-cuts left at the top of the stairs to greet them when they came home from work next day. The note pinned to the topmost piece read, ‘I can get more for you. You tell me the colour maybe. Papa.’

  From that moment on, the rug became a labour of love for all three of them.

  It was certainly very big, large enough to cover the entire space in front of their little fireplace, and when it was finished, they both declared it made the whole room warm and cosy, and Ellen wondered whether they ought to invite David’s parents for a meal to show them how fine it was.

  ‘Not just yet,’ he said. They had to choose exactly the right moment. His mother was still too angry to speak to him, as he knew because he asked his father about her, anxiously, every Friday. ‘Better we just wait a bit longer, bubeleh. We ain’t seen your Ma neither, don’t ferget.’