Whitechapel Road
It was a Saturday night, and the street was lit by a few flickering lamps, the courts and alleys off it by none. But those that knew this place could see that the clump of shadows on the stairs was women talking, hands folded under their aprons. That small patch of darkness in the passage was a baby sleeping, and the grayness over there by the archway was only boys tossing stones. The faint rustling was rats. The shadows that lay too still in pools of deeper darkness was somebody else’s business and you ought mind your own. Nehama had learned to see well in the night, and she made her way easily, walking with Sally to the high road, where everything was bright.
In Whitechapel Road the darkness was layered with torches and the stalls with everything edible. There were gin palaces and public houses, clubs and shooting galleries, music halls and preachers saving souls, and every store that sold books or bread or hats was open till midnight. Nehama fed Sally hot pies and cider until she looked like a healthy girl. They watched the stilt walkers dance, and the puppet Punch beat up his wife, Judy, and the contortionist put his legs around his neck as he walked on his hands, jumping out of the way of the donkey pulling a barrow of cabbages. And their laughter made them happy girls clapping along with the crowd. Then Nehama took Sally into a pub she knew that was in an alley off the high road. One that was quiet and dimly lit and as old as the first king. The men that came here didn’t sing or play darts. Their wage packets were thick, and they meant to spend it all.
Nehama slid next to a man who had a glass and a bottle that was nearly empty. “Have you ever had two girls, mister?” she asked in a voice as hushed as the darkness. “And one never been with a man?”
The man slowly turned to look at Sally. “How old are you, girl?” he asked.
Sally only smiled. “She’s my little sister, mister,” Nehama said.
The man drank the rest of his bottle. “How much?”
“I daresay more than you’ve got.”
“That what you think?” He grabbed her arm. But she just smiled. And Sally smiled, and her cheeks were the red of a Spanish child.
“It’s all right, sister,” Sally said in her high voice.
And the man never knew how well she picked his pocket clean while they lay with him in the back room of the pub.
By morning, Sally had picked the pockets of five men. She was very pleased with her work in the high road. “The Squire’s going to be fond of me today,” she said as they were walking back.
“I’m not giving mine to him.” The wind was whistling through the cracks in the dawn, and it was singing her grandmother’s song.
“You’re having me on, Nell.”
“Keep your share, but don’t say you got it with me. I’m putting it aside for something.”
She wouldn’t have the baby in Dorset Street. It would be by the sea in a nice boardinghouse where she’d have a room to herself. After the baby was born, she’d carry it outside to the good sea air, walking along the pier and listening to the music of minstrels and bands. At the end of the pier would be the theater where she’d see the new plays, nursing the baby to sleep. Her baby would have fair hair like her sisters, and when the golden curls touched its shoulders, the baby would be dressed in a white cap and a white dress and she would have a picture taken of her baby sitting on a donkey. The photograph would be sent home, and everyone would see the beauty of her child.
Dock Street
Nehama hid the money from that night. The railway station was just a fifteen-minute walk straight down from Dorset Street, and she didn’t see anyone follow her as she took a roundabout route through alleys and courts. She hadn’t even said good-bye to Sally but slipped away in the afternoon, when everyone was just rising from sleep. Now she waited alone on the track while the red locomotives came in puffing smoke under the iron ribs and glass roof of the train station, looking here and there for someone who might have followed her, but she didn’t see anyone she knew. There were so many people standing on the platform, holding third-class tickets. There was nothing to worry about. No reason for her hands to sweat. She was just another person who’d got soaked on the way to the train station. The woman next to her was asking, “Is this the train for Brighton, then?” Nehama could feel the heat of the train as it rushed into the station. She was nodding, about to say, “Are you having a holiday?” when she saw Lizzie standing over there by the clock tower, her thin hair falling over her face. And then the Squire was pushing between two men carrying fighting cocks in a crate. In front of her the train had stopped, around her the crowd was waiting for the doors to open, there was nowhere for her to go when he grabbed her arm.
He walked with her behind a pile of rubbish in the train yard, holding her tightly against him, so tightly that she stumbled like a drunk and nobody took notice. The rain had stopped and the fog come up. It hid the river and the Tower, it softened the rattle of trains. But the Squire was larger than the fog and the whistle of his walking stick louder than church bells as they reached the back of the rubbish heap. She didn’t see the first blow; the stick swung behind her legs, knocking the breath out of her as she fell against a broken wheelbarrow, covering her head with her arms and curling her legs as she tumbled into the mud. He struck again, and she screamed loud to please him so that he wouldn’t kill her as she fought for breath. She couldn’t faint, she had to think of the baby.
“I’m sorry,” she gasped, half sitting, her back against the rubbish heap. In the distance ordinary people were boarding the train. Porters pushed carts loaded with trunks. “I won’t do it again.”
“I don’t give chances. Not to them as runs away. It’s a matter of what’s mine,” he said, lifting the walking stick. It was made of blackthorn, a cane for warding off vicious dogs. The top was curved, the stick burred with thorns. “Did I pay for you? Was you worth it?”
“Yes,” she said, arms crossed over her belly. “I mean no. Don’t hurt me.”
“And why not? This is mine,” he said, bringing the stick down. “And this and this.” The stick followed her as she rolled from side to side, taking everything it could find. She gave it her back, she gave it her bottom and her legs, but the baby she hid under her cloak, under her arms, inside her skin.
“Please don’t kill me,” she begged. She was lying on her side, cheek in the mud. It was a thick mud, a gray clay mud. “Please.”
The Squire leaned on the cane, wiping his face of sweat. He wore a plaid waistcoat and a green scarf around his neck. Behind him a train blew steam as it left the station.
Her body was burning; she could feel every bruise, and the only place she didn’t hurt was her belly. “It was a mistake. I was just out walking,” she whimpered. “Lizzie saw me just walking.”
“Then you won’t walk so far again.” He tapped her arm with the stick. It was wet with mud and blood. “You’ll remember?” he asked, squatting beside her. “Give me your hand on it.” She reached out a hand, and he held it for a moment, looking at her closely as if she were naked and he was noticing the oddness of her private parts.
“I’ll remember,” she whispered, kissing his hand as if she loved it.
Then he took out his knife. Gravel bit her cheek. The clock tower chimed as he lifted her dress. “I’ll make sure of it,” he said, and the knife was dull in the dull light.
He was getting rid of the baby, that was it, and then she would bleed to death. Her eyes were blurred with mud. She wanted to see the clock tower so she’d know the time that her life ended. Never mind. What did it matter? She’d follow her child into the other world so it wouldn’t be there alone.
But it was only her thigh that he stroked, saying, “Here’s the mark to remind you of what you owe. You forget and you’re dead.” Only now, when the Squire cut into the flesh of her thigh, could she run from her body, hiding up there with the unseen moon, and there she stayed, listening to her grandmother sing: “The wind, the wind, the raging wind…”
Dorset Street
The ceiling slan
ted down toward Nehama as she slept and woke, unsure of the time. Fingers of light and dark came in through the cracks with the whistling wind as she listened to the sounds of the lodging house. Mice in the walls. Feet on the stairs. The squeaking of beds on old floors. Shouting. A thump. A song. Coughing. That was Sally, sitting on the floor, resting her head and arms on the bed. Nehama was naked. Even her thin nightgown had been taken away so she wouldn’t leave the room. She thought it was Sally who’d covered her with the blanket. In the stupor of her waking and sleeping, it felt like a soft blanket. Soft and thick. The beating hadn’t got rid of the baby. Anything was believable.
“Are you awake?” Sally asked. “There’s something for you to eat.”
Nehama shook her head. She only wanted to talk about the seaside. The promenades. The donkey rides. The colored sand and shells and pebbles to arrange in a box with seaweed. The theater at the end of the pier. “When my horse places, we’ll go to Brighton,” she said.
“Then I’ll want a chair for the beach,” Sally said. Her short hair stood around her head in thin puffs.
“We’ll hire two. And have a bag of cherries.” Nehama touched a wisp of her dark hair. The baby’s would be fair. There would be a cap trimmed with lace to protect it from the sun.
“A drop of white satin for me.” Sally didn’t care how thin a gown she wore. It could be as transparent as glass. But as long as there was the feel of cloth against her skin, she believed that her body wasn’t visible, and she was sure that the priest would give her absolution before her death because no man had seen her naked.
“Not me. I’ll drink chocolate made with cream and whipped egg.”
“We’ll swim in a bathing machine.”
“For hours,” Nehama said. But the blanket was starting to scratch her. It was made of rough, cheap wool, and her eyes watered, the tears mixed with mud.
The air was mild, the sun shining palely, and Nehama could hear bells—maybe a school bell or a church bell. She sat hunched in the doorway of the Horn and Plenty, watching the sign swing on one bolt as if about to fall but never falling. No one paid her any mind. A dead wife could lie on a table for a week for want of money to bury her, and there were plenty of men and women smoking a fag or nursing a wound, crouched in the doorways of doss-houses.
The baby was coming out of Nehama like a foggy drizzle. What luck, the other girls would say. The rags she’d stuffed into her underthings were soaked. It must be four o’clock. The muffin man was ringing his bell, a tray of muffins on his head. The sad-looking costermonger with his barrow of old vegetables bought a muffin for tea. So did the knife grinder, and also the little tailor that mended whores’ dresses, stepping high as if he might avoid the muck of sewage and blown-about rubbish.
Sally opened the door. “The Squire’s placing his bets. I’m to stay with you till he’s done.” She took a drink from her bottle of laudanum. Soon her eyes would glaze. “You’re looking awful white.”
“So what?” Nehama was losing the baby and with it every desire. Eating was too much effort. Sleeping impossible. Her friends would have to watch out for themselves. Sally held out the bottle of laudanum, but Nehama shook her head. She needed nothing.
Sally pulled her bonnet forward. “The sun’s in my eyes. And I’m getting awfully sleepy.” She sat down on the step. “Someone might beg a copper off a cove and go to the infirmary and I wouldn’t know nothing.” Her voice was very soft and tired.
“Someone might.” Nehama didn’t move. The Horn and Plenty stood at the corner of Dorset Street and Bell Lane. Within a block there were Jewish shops. It was as close as that, her old life. But she was someone else now, a bit of cabbage leaf left on the ground at midnight when the Saturday night market packed up and the lamps went dark.
“There’s not much left in this bottle. I’ll have another drop, I think.” Sally leaned back against the door and closed her eyes.
“I’m too tired to move.”
“You’re sick.” Sally opened her eyes, momentarily wakeful. “Get on or I’ll call the Squire.”
“All right, already.” Nehama pulled herself to her feet. If she died in a Jewish street, maybe someone would say the prayer for the dead. Sally didn’t say good-bye as she slumped in the doorway, holding tight the nearly empty bottle of laudanum.
Frying Pan Alley
Buyers and sellers pressed close together, with wares spread on the ground in front and stalls behind, one leaning up against the next. The market stretched along Petticoat Lane to the surrounding streets, Goulston and Wentworth, and the smallest passageways like Frying Pan Alley. People thronged among bright awnings and painted tables, admiring the jugglers and fingering nearly new coats, looking at masks and pastries, for it was the eve of Purim and there was a queue at the green coffee stall. It had four tin cans mounted with brass plates, separate compartments for bread, sandwiches, and cake, and only a penny for a warm cup of coffee mixed with chicory.
“FRIED FISH! ’TATERS HOT! BUY MY PRETTY MEAT!”
“ALL THE NEW SONGS ONLY A PENNY!”
“Excuse me.” A fat woman wearing a kerchief and a dark red shawl looked at Nehama nervously, her hand over her pocket, and Nehama, with her face burning, bumped the old cow as she walked by to push her into the gutter the way a girl from Dorset Street should, though the pain in her belly made her dizzy.
“TONIGHT IS PURIM, BROTHERS. GET YOUR MASKS!”
“HAMMENTASHEN FRESH!”
She had to sit down. In the shadows of a narrow alley, no one would notice her. Past the school. Past the stall that sold toffee and monkey-nuts to children. Past the girls dancing around the organ-grinder. To sit on a stoop and enter a dream where nothing mattered as blood seeped through her dress.
Her sisters used to tell her what Grandma Nehama said about the good inclination and the evil inclination. Everyone has both the yetzer-hara and the yetzer-hatov. The rabbis explain that the yetzer-hara, the evil inclination, is necessary for a man to build a house or make a family. But Grandma Nehama said that when a woman has a child, she puts her good inclination into it and that their mother had given them everything, you could see it in their golden hair. But you, her sisters would say to Nehama, are dark. Your hair is dark and your skin is dark; Mama gave away everything good to us. There wasn’t anything left for you. Thank God our grandmother isn’t here to see you filled with the evil inclination.
They said this on the day the two middle sisters found her standing on the doorstep of a tavern and they smacked her so she’d remember. The song she heard that day was a Polish drinking song, and it was the same melody as the last hymn sung in the synagogue on Sabbath mornings. Hymns and drinking songs often share the same tunes. But a woman’s voice was not to be heard in the synagogue as the sound of it might inflame the evil inclination of men, which when harnessed properly begat children in houses but when allowed to run free—well, the results were all around.
Grandma Nehama cooked and cleaned, hauled the water, hung the laundry, and kept the accounts, which she taught the oldest sister. When any of the men on the street began a business venture, their wives came to Grandma Nehama so she could calculate what interest would be on a loan of capital to buy a barrow and a stock of lemons, or a machine and some leather, or a counter and shelves with goods to put on them. You have to sell this much, she would say, just to pay the interest, and don’t forget on top of that you need to make enough money to buy food for the children. She did her figuring on brown wrapping paper, standing next to the tile oven, where it was warm. Then she would say whether it was a good idea or not. Mr. Pollack, who lent money when no one else would, didn’t like Grandma Nehama. She was depressing his business. A handsome man with brains enough not to threaten her, he came to see her about it, offering her a percentage. She considered it for a week. The evil inclination and the good inclination fought hard, and she got a chill because the instinct for self-preservation, the yetzer-hara, was weakened. But when she rose up from her sickbed, she started the Women’s
Singing Society. On Thursday evenings there was no sewing in the workshop. Women came to sing and drink tea, and if each of them put a few groschen in a jar like the men did in their friendly societies that doled out sick benefits and gave out loans, then it was no one else’s affair.
Of course those were in the days when she was living. A grandmother’s spirit can’t lift a feather in this world. But she can see what’s going on. And if you could hear her, she’d be whispering prayers in a graveyard:
Holy souls, I greet you. May our sins not be judged harshly, for we are all dust and ashes and we have no strength to contend with the fiery angel, the evil inclination. So I bow before the King of kings, the Holy One, and ask for mercy for this child. Let it be a time of compassion. The wind from the east is blowing so hard that the river will overflow with the mama-loshen. For the sake of our mothers, turn the wind and bring them safely into the channel.
The full moon was climbing secretly into the sky. Later it would look down on the small Jewish corner of London, where people would wear masks and eat pastries and watch skits that made them laugh. And they’d drink until they couldn’t tell the difference between the good uncle of the Jewish queen and her enemy, the minister who’d issued the king’s decree to kill all the Jews on Purim. But you never know how things will turn out. On that day, he’d met his downfall. And a hundred generations later, Nehama was born on Purim. She’d made her first appearance just as the moon came into a black sky. And if a grandmother’s spirit had watched her then, why shouldn’t it watch now? The sky stretches from Plotsk to London, after all. And the moon is just as full.
The Singing Fire Page 6
