A Pain in the Tuchis

by Mark Reutlinger

  “I think she was just afraid. She took my hand and pleaded with me to help her, to protect her. I didn’t know what to say, except that I would do what I could. But really, what could I do?”

  “Of course. And did you ask her if she suspected any particular person?”

  “That’s maybe the strangest part,” Fannie said. “She first said she did, but then, as if she had changed her mind, she refused to tell me who she suspected. But just the question—that is, who she suspected—seemed to upset her more than anything else. It was as if she didn’t want anyone to find out. Or maybe she just wanted to be more certain before accusing anyone.” She sighed and looked down. “And maybe I just imagined she was upset. I don’t know.”

  “Hmm. I see,” said Mrs. K. I could not tell for sure whether that meant she sees what a problem this was, or she sees that Vera was completely meshugge and it is time to close the subject. But then she said, “Have you any idea what motive someone would have for poisoning your sister? I mean, she was not exactly popular, but…”

  “No, she wasn’t, but that’s no reason someone would kill her, is it?”

  “I wouldn’t think so, no. Did she have a will?”

  Fannie thought for a moment, then said, “I don’t know, but I assume everything would go to Daniel with or without one, so that can’t be important.”

  “No, I suppose not. So then tell me, Fannie, what do you think? Do you take what your sister said seriously?”

  Fannie seemed to consider this for a moment before she answered. “To be honest, Rose, I’m not sure I did at the time, but I think I do now. When I put Vera’s very real fear that she was being poisoned together with the fact that, from everything I could see and the doctor said, she was actually getting much better, and that the day after she tells me this she dies, I think I can’t just let it pass without some kind of…some kind of investigation, or whatever you would call it. Some minimal attempt at least to find out if it’s possible Vera was really poisoned. I mean, it’s been so stressful for me, not knowing whether to try to forget what Vera said or to do something—anything—to look into it, as I’m sure my sister would have wanted.”

  “Yes, I see,” Mrs. K said again. She now seemed to be thinking it over, her eyes focused on the table in front of her. I could almost hear the wheels turning in her head. I wish the wheels in mine turned half as fast; perhaps they have too much rust on them. Finally, she said, “I can see you are quite distressed by this, Fannie, and I know I would be too under the circumstances. I will try to help if you wish, at least to the extent of putting your mind at rest, if at all possible.”

  I thought it was very generous of Mrs. K to offer like that, because surely she did not consider it at all likely Vera had been poisoned. Clearly she was just trying to make Fannie feel better, to help her to accept her sister’s passing without feeling guilty about it. Fannie obviously appreciated it also, because she took Mrs. K’s hand and squeezed it and thanked her for agreeing to help.

  “Perhaps the first thing for us to do,” Mrs. K said, looking a little embarrassed at Fannie’s show of gratitude, “is to talk with Dr. Menschyk. After all, it is he who attended Vera during her illness, together with the specialist, and he who signed the death certificate.”

  “I suppose that makes sense,” Fannie said. “I don’t know whether he’ll be able to say for sure whether Vera could have been poisoned, but we should at least ask him. Can we go to see him together?”

  “Yes, certainly,” Mrs. K said. “I’ll call him and ask for a few minutes of his time when he’s next here on his calls.”

  Fannie again thanked both of us and, looking somewhat relieved, she got up from the table and left the dining room, left us to look at each other in silence.

  “Nu, what do you make of that?” I asked.

  “I don’t know what to make of Fannie’s story, at least at this moment,” she replied. “But I do know one thing: Yom Kippur is the Day of Atonement. It is the holiest day of the year, when we are supposed to repent of our sins of the year that has passed, ask for God’s forgiveness, and promise to try harder next year.

  “It would be a very bad day to commit a murder.”

  Chapter 5

  It took a few more minutes before either I or Mrs. K could put our thoughts together. I mean, how do you react when a sensible, respected woman, not just some gullible shmendrik, tells you something it is difficult to believe and asks you to believe it too? Do you let her swim by herself or jump into the water with her?

  With both feet we jumped in, and now we had to paddle.

  So Mrs. K telephoned to Dr. Menschyk and made another appointment to talk with him, like the time I told you about, when Rena’s cat was in danger of eviction. Fortunately, Menschyk is a gracious man who tries to accommodate others when he can, and such an appointment was made, for three the next afternoon in Mrs. K’s apartment. We told Fannie; she seemed pleased and relieved. It was understandable.

  The next morning Mrs. K and I could not discuss Fannie’s situation during breakfast, because both Isaac Taubman and Karen Friedlander were there. Certainly it would be the worst kind of lashon hara to pass along the information Fannie had given us. But as soon as we had finished our breakfast (just a little oatmeal and some tea for me), we excused ourselves and made our way to the lounge. We plopped ourselves down on one of the soft sofas out of range of other ears and returned to the topic of Fannie and Vera.

  “So, Ida, having had overnight to think about what Fannie told us, do you have any further thoughts on it?” Mrs. K asked.

  “To tell you the truth,” I said, “I could not help but wonder, if Vera was right about someone wanting to poison her, and if someone did—I know these are very large ifs, but like I said, I could not help myself—then who might possibly have done it, and why?”

  “Hmm, yes,” Mrs. K said. “And did you come up with any suspects?”

  I sighed. “No, I could not think who it could have been. Or to put it another way, I decided it could have been almost anyone.”

  “Yes, I’m not surprised. The problem with wondering who did it at this point is that we don’t have enough facts even to speculate. Who would gain from her death? Who might have wanted to kill her? For what reasons? And is this just a sick woman’s imagination?”

  “So do you then have thoughts of a different kind?”

  “Not really. I was thinking last night more about the question that comes before who did it—the one you skipped over, namely, what are the chances that Vera was in fact poisoned, given all the circumstances?”

  “And what did you conclude?”

  “The same as you, for the same reason: not enough facts. Who had access to her food or medicine? What made her suspect she was being poisoned? Taste? How she felt? Were there symptoms that would even remotely indicate she might have been poisoned?”

  “At least this last thing we will learn this afternoon,” I said, “when we talk with Menschyk.”

  “I hope so, Ida. If he cannot give us a definite answer, we are back to having no facts, and likely to stay that way.”

  —

  With Fannie’s problem put aside for now, I picked up a copy of Hadassah Magazine and began to read a story about some big medical discovery in Israel when Mrs. K taps me on the shoulder.

  “I just remembered,” she said, “that I have not yet given Lily Lipman the package of lokshen I picked up for her at the grocery.”

  “You bought noodles for Lily? Can she not buy them herself?”

  “Of course, but the kind she likes they only have at one market, and I happened to be going shopping there last Tuesday, so I offered to buy them for her. I really should go and get them and take them to her.”

  I nodded. “Maybe I’ll go with you,” I said. “I haven’t spoken to Lily lately, or seen her around much except at mealtimes. I might as well go and say hello.”

  I put down the magazine and followed Mrs. K to her room, where she found the lokshen after a few minutes of searc
hing (hiding under a box of matzoh meal), and we then headed for the Lipmans’ apartment.

  Sol and Lily Lipman have one of the larger, two-bedroom apartments at the Home, intended for couples like them. It isn’t terribly spacious, but it certainly is bigger than the single-bedroom apartments like I and Mrs. K have, and it has a small but fairly complete kitchen.

  Mrs. K knocked on the door. As we waited, we could hear what sounded like shouting inside, and a door slamming. We could also smell just a shmek, a whiff, of some pungent odor. Mrs. K knocked again, this time louder. More shouting, another door slamming, then everything went quiet and we heard footsteps approaching the door. Finally it was opened by Sol.

  As soon as the door opened, we were struck by an almost overwhelming smell. It was as if someone had dumped a truckload of boiled cabbage in their apartment.

  Sol did not look happy. You remember what I said about how opposite in appearance and temperament are—or I should now say were—Vera Gold and her sister, Fannie? Well, the same is true of Sol and his wife, Lily. And sometimes, nice, easygoing Sol can be found looking like he has lost his best friend, because high-strung, excitable Lily has gone off like shmaltz in a hot pan. (That’s chicken fat. You cook with it.) And more than once it is the bathroom where she locks herself. If their broom closet had a lock on the door, she would probably spend time in there also.

  “Hello, Sol,” Mrs. K said, as we both tried to ignore the odor. “I have something for Lily. Is she home?”

  Sol rolled his eyes. “Is she home?” he said. “You cannot tell? You think maybe it is I who is making boiled cabbage in the kitchen? And who is yelling like a fishwife when I complain?”

  “Well, no…”

  Sol laughed softly. “Actually, Rose, to be fair, it is Lily’s mother who is doing the cooking, and Lily who is doing the yelling.”

  “Lily’s mother? I did not know she was visiting you. It must be a little crowded.”

  Sol made a deep sigh before speaking again.

  “Yes, Lily’s mother lives quite nearby, and Lily visits her often, but last month she ‘dropped in’ for a short visit. Dropped in? More like squeezed in, like a tuchis in a teacup. Not only is it crowded, she has been staying with us for almost a month now. You probably have not seen her because she almost never leaves the apartment.”

  “Lily’s mother. She would be…would be quite elderly, I assume?”

  “Over ninety. Yes, this is one reason she does not leave the apartment. And that is the reason I have to leave it.”

  “I do not understand,” Mrs. K said, and neither did I.

  Sol looked back into the apartment, then turned and said, “Listen, Rose, give me that package and I’ll leave it in the kitchen for Lily. Now would not be a good time to bother her. Then if you both have a few minutes, maybe we could go down to the lounge and, well, you could give me some advice, like you did when Lily got so upset over that…that book I bought.”

  Sol was referring to a book called something like Enjoying the Golden Years, which Lily found opened to a chapter called “Sex After 65,” together with a bottle of those pills that the commercials say make men “perform better.” Anyway, Lily thought Sol was “sex mad” and was shtupping some tsatskele—you know, fooling around with some cute young woman—when really Sol just wanted to “reinvigorate,” as he put it, his relationship with Lily. It was quite a mishmash.

  “Certainly, Sol,” Mrs. K said, “if you think we can help.”

  So the three of us moved to the lounge, Sol leaving his apartment quietly so Lily should not hear. Oy, what a way to live.

  Once we were seated, Sol next to Mrs. K and me across from them, Mrs. K asked, “So Sol, what is the problem? Is Lily still locking herself in the bathroom?”

  Sol smiled and said, “No, not this time, Rose. This time she says she has left me.”

  Now, I realize it is not that unusual for a wife to leave a husband these days, or perhaps the other way around, though not usually after almost fifty years of marriage. But it happens.

  “Left you?” says Mrs. K. “Didn’t you say she and her mother were just now in your apartment? And that her mother never leaves the apartment? Where did they go?”

  Sol’s smile now was what you would call ironic. He said, “Go? No, you don’t understand. Lily is leaving me, but apparently I am the one who has to go. She says she will stay in the apartment. She and her mother.”

  At least this is a new script for an old production. One way or the other, though, poor Sol seems always to be the victim.

  “Let me get this straight,” Mrs. K said. “You say Lily is leaving you, but it is you who are leaving, because of Lily’s mother, who does not leave. Is that right?”

  Now by this time, sitting and listening to this conversation between Sol and Mrs. K, I am getting totally confused. But I am patient, because I am confident Mrs. K will somehow clear up the confusion so that even I will understand. If not, I shall go and have a cup of tea and wait for Mrs. K to come and explain it to me.

  “Yes, that is more or less the story,” Sol said. “Lily wants to leave me because she says I insulted her mother.”

  “And did you insult her mother?”

  Again the ironic smile. “Well, that depends what you consider an insult. I did call her a kvetcher, as she is complaining all the time; and maybe I did let slip an occasional a khalerye….”

  “You wished the plague on her?”

  “Not really; but, Rose, you don’t know what that woman has put me through.”

  “What could a ninety-something-year-old woman do to you to make you, who I have never heard even raise your voice, say such things to her?”

  Sol’s features changed so he was no longer smiling, even ironically. He obviously was thinking of all the sins of Lily’s mother.

  “What could she do, you ask. I’ll tell you what she could do. She takes up the only bathroom in the apartment for hours at a time—I don’t know what she does in there, but I always find there enormous pieces of underwear hanging on the towel racks and shower rod—so that I actually have to go down the hall to the public restroom just to pish! Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to say that. I mean to go to the bathroom.”

  “Don’t worry, we have heard worse. Go on.”

  “Well, she criticizes or complains about almost everything we do. Like she complains we do not keep kosher, which is true, but Lily and I have never kept kosher, and it was never an issue with us.”

  “Well, I can understand that when someone visits who keeps kosher it is difficult when the host does not, because—”

  “No, no, you don’t understand. She complains we do not keep kosher, but she does not herself. She claims she would, but she cannot get kosher food where she lives. She says she should at least get kosher food when she visits us.”

  That woman has chutzpah, I am thinking.

  “And does Lily also get upset at this constant kibitzing?”

  “No, she gets upset with me for telling her mother to stop! And there’s more. Did you notice what our apartment smells like?” How could we not? “She cooks things that stink up our whole apartment, like borscht made from the beets. Or boiled cabbage. Or gefilte fish. I mean, I like to eat these things, but they should not be cooked in a small apartment like ours. Certainly not several times a week.”

  “No, I can see your point,” Mrs. K said. I nodded in agreement. No one wants to have a farshtunken apartment, no matter how good the food tastes.

  “The last straw was when she called me lazy, because I do not work. Rose, I am retired for ten years and have no need or desire to go back to work. But this crazy woman—this meshuggeneh—is making my life hell.”

  “So was it your asking her to stop doing these things that made Lily tell you to leave?”

  “Well, not exactly. Her mother was supposed to be staying with us for a few days, and now she’s been here almost a month. And all this time she’s been doing the things I’ve described to you. This morning, after she spent ten
minutes criticizing what I was wearing—as if she was some kind of men’s fashion maven—I was fed up with it and I told her she will have to leave.”

  “And that is when Lily told you to leave instead?”

  “No, what she actually said was if her mother leaves, she goes with her. I guess I lost my temper and said, ‘Fine. You can both go.’ Of course, I didn’t really mean it, but then Lily starts crying and wailing, ‘Oy vey iz mir, where will we go? What will become of us?’ and, well, before I know it I am the one who is supposed to leave and Lily and her mother are to stay in the apartment with the borscht and boiled cabbage.”

  At least he escapes the smell.

  For a little while, we all were quiet. It is a Yiddish saying that a guest is like rain: good for a little while, but inconvenient if staying too long. It appeared that Sol was by now soaking wet.

  Sol was looking down at the carpet, Mrs. K appeared to be thinking, and I was simply waiting to see if Mrs. K had any ideas for Sol.

  She did. “Well, Sol, if you want a suggestion, I think you should stay away from the apartment for a day or two,” Mrs. K said. “I am sure you can stay in one of the guest rooms here at the Home. As you know better than I, when Lily is in this highly upset state, there is no point in trying to reason with her. I think she will cool off in a day or two, especially if you are not there to argue with.”

  “And what then? I cannot live in the guest room forever.”

  “Of course not. Perhaps by then I will have thought of some way to resolve your problem.”

  Sol looked like he was thinking it over, but after all, what choice did he really have? He was not the fighting type. I had never seen him lose his temper, even when Lily went off the deep end. If he insisted on staying in the apartment now, not only would he be facing a very upset wife, but also her mother.

  Two against one.

  Chapter 6

  At three in the afternoon, after lunch and a little nap, I knocked on the door of Mrs. K’s apartment. When I entered, I saw that Dr. Menschyk and Fannie were both already there.