LITTLE BLUE BOOK NO. 489
Edited by E. Haldeman-Julius
Yiddish Short Stories
Edited by Isaac Goldberg
HALDEMAN-JULIUS COMPANY GIRARD, KANSAS
Copyright, 1923,
Haldeman-Julius Company
YIDDISH SHORT STORIES
CONTENTS
Introduction
Three Gifts
The Judgement
A Tale of a Hungry Man
A Strange Climate
A Game
The Kiss
INTRODUCTION
Of the authors represented in this little collection, Isaac Leib Perez
stands foremost in time and in renown. By more than one competent
critic he has been found worthy to occupy a distinguished place
among the writers of the nineteenth century in any tongue. Mediocre
as a dramatist, he rises as a poet and particularly as an artist
in prose to moments of unaffected genius. Rarely is his allegory
without that humanizing quality which keeps it from degenerating into
merely pictorial evasions of thought. If allegory, even in the hands
of a Dante, cannot always be kept free from the adulteration of a
wilful symbolism, there are times when it represents so successfully
the inner intention of the creator that it becomes in a very true
sense a creation. That arch-enemy of allegorical writing, Benedetto
Croce, has shown how in many a passage of the great Florentine’s
_Commedia_ it is possible, indeed, esthetically necessary,--to throw
all thought of Dante’s concealed meanings to the winds and let the
picture and the words speak for the human Dante behind them. Before
Croce, Federico De Sanctis--who anticipated more than a little of
Croce’s methods in literary criticism, and to whom Croce is so greatly
indebted--demonstrated the same sanative truth. In such simple tales
of Perez as “Bontsche the Silent,” or the “Three Gifts” here included,
the allegorical method is purged of all cryptic allusions. It becomes
essentially human, essentially of the earth, for all its preoccupations
with heaven.
Pinski, perhaps the foremost dramatist of his race, first won his
reputation for his stories of the rising Yiddish proletariat. He is,
indeed, the discoverer of the proletariat in Yiddish fiction, and was
himself “discovered” by Perez. Pinski is pre-eminently a psychologist.
Whether one reads his numerous plays[1] or the book of tales that
appeared in English a number of years ago, one divines first of all
the prober of human souls and the passions engendered within them. His
“Beruriah” is, to me, one of the masterpieces of the short story in
modern days, none the less contemporaneous for its origin in a Talmudic
setting. “The Tale of a Hungry Man,” by which he is here represented,
combines in admirable fashion his early proletarian interests with his
psychological methods.
Asch is to the Yiddish novel what Pinski is to the drama. He is that
rare phenomenon, a spontaneous artist with all the virtues and defects
of improvisation. Of his longer novels, “Mottke the Vagabond” and
“Uncle Moses,” both in English, give an idea of his accomplishments
with old-world and new-world settings. In his short fiction he is
notable for a poetic realism, a mingling of the so-called romantic and
the so-called realistic, that is evident in so outwardly coarse a play
as “The God of Vengeance.”
Raisin is, in fiction, the artist of miniatures, of cameos, of
impressions. He is hardly concerned with the surprise-ending, the
“punch” and other commercial desiderata of our lesser American stories.
With the facility of journalistic comparisons he has been called “the
Yiddish Chekhov”; who, among the Jewish writers, has not at one time
or other been the “Yiddish This-or-That”? Yet there is an element of
suggestive virtue in the coupling of the names, and there have been
moments when Chekhov and Maupassant signed worse things than “A Game,”
though often they signed far better.
Shapiro, of the writers here included, is the least widely known.
There is something unreal to his visions, yet for all their external
unreality they grip the reader with an indubitable power. “The Kiss” is
one of his best pogrom tales. If he is scarcely known to outsiders it
is because he deserves a far greater recognition from his own people.
Opatoshu (pen name of Joseph Opatovsky) has strengthened a reputation
as short story writer with his added success as a novelist. His
fondness for nature, for animals and for Khassidic types provides
a rich background for his restless imagination. Of the younger
writers--if a writer is still young under forty--he shows as good
promise as any of attaining to a lofty place.[2]
ISAAC GOLDBERG.
[Note 1: See the end of the book for Yiddish works procurable in
English.]
[Note 2: For permission to include Pinski’s _A Tale of a Hungry Man_
from the volume of his short stories published by Brentano’s under
the title _Temptations_, I am indebted to both the author and the
publishers.--I. G.]
THREE GIFTS
ISAAC LEIB PEREZ
I. THE SCALES OF JUSTICE
Somewhere many and many a year ago, a Jew breathed his last.
No one, of course, may live for ever. The man was dead; the attentions
due the dead were paid, and a grave among the folk of his own faith
lodged him.
The grave closed over him, the orphaned son recited his Kaddish and the
soul flew upward--to Judgment.
On arriving there it found the scales of Justice already swinging in
the court chamber. Here the good deeds and the evil were to be weighed.
And forthwith the dead man’s Advocate enters, the Good Spirit of his
former life. A pure, snow-white sack is in his hand and he stands near
the right scale of the Balance.
And behold the dead man’s Accuser enters--the Evil Spirit of his former
life. An unclean sack is in his hands and he stands near the left
scale of the Balance. The sack of pure white contains the good deeds.
The sack that is begrimed and black--the evil, sinful deeds. And the
vindicator of the soul pours out the contents of the white sack on the
right scale. The good deeds are of the odor of incense and glow with
the radiancy of the stars. The Accuser pours out the contents of the
unclean sack on the left scale of the Balance. The evil deeds--Heaven
protect us--are as black as coal, and reek of the very stench of tar
and pitch.
And the poor soul stares at it all--and gasps. It never dreamt to
behold such a distinction between the “Good” and the “Evil.” “There” it
had often recognized neither of them and had mistaken the one for the
other.
The scales rise gradually. Now the one, now the other moves up and down
... and the indicator oscillates now a hair’s breadth to the left, now
a trifle towards the right. But a hair’s breadth variation and that
gradually ... an ordinary mortal this soul must have been; neither
rebellious to the Holy Spirit nor yet dwelling much within it ...
capable of trivial virtues and trivial vices only. The scales held but
little particles, tiny dots of things, at times hardly visible to the
eye.
And yet, what a clamor of joy and of gladness from the empyrean when
the Balance indicator turns but a trifle towards the right and what
racking cries of agony mark every turn to the left. And slowly, ever so
slowly the angels empty the sacks. With a zest they show up the tiny
particles, just as decent burghers will add one farthing to another in
self-exhibition to a seeing world.
However, the deepest well will run dry--and the sacks, too, are soon
empty.
“Is that all?” inquires the court-usher. He, too, is an angel among his
like. Both the Good and the Evil Spirits turn their sacks inside out.
Absolutely nothing more. The court-usher steps forward to the Balance.
He examines the indicator to see whether it is inclined towards the
right or the left; and he stares at it good and long; for he beholds
something that none ever saw since first the Heavens and the Earth knew
creation....
“Why such hesitancy?” demands the Chief Justice. And the usher mutters:
“But one moment! The index is exactly in the center. The Evil deeds and
the Good are exactly of the same weight.”
“Is that absolutely so?” queries a voice from about the table.
The usher looks yet again: “Yea even to a hair’s breadth.”
The Heavenly Tribunal holds its consultation and the decision as to
the sentence is thus pronounced: “Since the Evil deeds do not weigh
more than the good--the soul, of course, is free from Hell. But, on the
other hand, since the Good deeds do not prevail over the Evil--neither
can Paradise receive her.[3] Therefore she is to be neither here, nor
there, but a wanderer between the realms of Heaven and Earth, until the
Lord have mercy upon her and in His goodness call her unto him.”
And the usher of the courts leads the soul away.
She sobs, and bemoans her fate.
“Why art thou weeping?” he asks her. “’Tis true thou wilt not know the
joy and the gladness of Eden, but neither will the agonies and pangs of
Hell be thine.”
But the soul, unconsoled, replies:
“The worst agony is preferable to nothing at all. Nothing is most
dreadful....”
And the heavenly usher pities her and offers her some advice.
“Fly downward little soul, and hover about the living world of men.
Gaze not unto heaven. For what canst thou see on the other side, but
the little stars. Radiant little people--they certainly are, but alas,
very cold. They know no pity. They’ll never speak to the Lord about
you. Only the pious souls of Paradise will go to such trouble for a
poor, exiled soul ... but they ... hearken unto me ... they do love
gifts, fair and beautiful gifts.”
The usher talked bitterly. “Such are the ways of Paradise, nowadays.
Fly downward, then, to the living world and watch life there and its
course. And if thou only catchest a glimpse of something that is
surpassingly fair or good, seize thou it, and fly up to heaven. Present
it as a gift to the pious there. Knock at the little window and in my
name, speak to the angel-guard. And when thou wilt have brought three
gifts--why then be certain that the gates of Heaven will be unbarred
... they will manage to have it so for thee.... At the Throne of Honor,
the well-born are not loved ... but the well-grown....”
And in this wise, and with compassion, he thrusts her out of Paradise.
II. THE FIRST GIFT
The poor little soul flies downward to the world of the living in
search of gifts for the pious people of Heaven. It hovers about,
everywhere; about the villages and the towns, about every habitation of
man, amid the burning rays of hottest summer; amid the drops and water
spears of rainy autumn; amid the silver web, fantastical, in the last
days of summer; amid the snowflakes that fall from above.... It gazes
about and about till it well-nigh spends its sight.
Wherever and whenever it spies a Jew it runs hastily up to him and
looks at him intently--perhaps he is on his way to Prayer--to bless
the name of the Lord. Wherever a light breaks through the chink of
a shutter--she is there, to peep inside, to see whether the Lord’s
fragrant flowerets, the secret deeds of good, blossom in that silent
house. Alas!... most of the time it must dart away from the window in
agony and dismay....
And thus season follows season, and year follows year. Oft, the soul
becomes moody and sullen. Cities turn into graveyards, the graveyards
into fields of pasture; forests are felled. The pebbles of the brook
become sand; rivers have changed their courses; myriads of stars
have fallen and myriads of souls have flown upward; but the gracious
Lord has never thought of her; neither has she found aught that was
beautiful or good.
And she thinks within herself: “How poor the whole world is. Its
people--how mediocre; their souls--how dark and obscure.... How can
aught good be found here? Alas! I must rove about--an exile, forever.”
But suddenly a red flame bursts before her. Out of the dark and gloomy
night a red flame leaps forth. She stares about her.... ’Tis from an
upper window of a house that the flame has shot forth. Robbers are
attacking a wealthy man. Masks are on their faces. One holds a burning
torch in his hands; another holds a blazing knife at the man’s breast
and repeats his threat again and again:
“Jew, make but the slightest motion and you are dead. The knife will
most assuredly pass through your back, then.” The others are all busy,
opening chests and drawers. The man looks serenely about him, although
the knife is at his breast. The brows above his lucid eyes do not
quiver. Not a hair of that gray beard that reaches to the waist moves.
All of it seems to be something that is not his concern. “The Lord
hath given, the Lord taketh away,” he muses, and his pale lips mutter:
“Blessed be the name of the Lord.”
“One is not born thus and one may not carry it all to his grave.” He
views them calmly when they are about to clear the last drawer of the
last bureau and watches, in absolute silence, the pillage of the gold
and the silver, the jewelry and other precious things!
Perhaps he is renouncing it all!
But all at once--as the robbers are about to lay hold upon the last
hidden treasure--a little sack, hidden in the most secret nook of
all--he forgets himself--trembles all over, his eyes are bloodshot, and
he stretches his right hand forward, to the weapon. He would, as it
seems, cry out!
“Touch it not!”
But the cry is unuttered. A red, vaporous stream of blood shoots
forth, the knife has done its work.... It is the heart’s blood that
besprinkles the little sack. He falls to the ground. The robbers
tear the little sack open in a hurry. That will be the best--the most
precious gain of all!
But what a grievous error! The blood had been shed in vain--neither
silver, nor gold, nor jewels were there. Naught of any value in this
world. It was a little measure of sand from the Holy Land, to be strewn
on his face at burial. That, the wealthy man had wished to save from
the hands and gaze of strangers. That had shed his blood ... and the
soul seizes a blood-soiled particle of the sand and knocks at the
little window of Heaven. Her first gift found ready acceptance.
III. THE SECOND GIFT
“Remember now,” said the angel as he barred the window. “Remember--two
more offerings.”
“The Lord will aid me”--thinks the soul, grown hopeful; and joyously
flies down again. However, her gladness lasts but a little while.
Again, years follow years and she can find nothing that is surpassingly
beautiful. And her melancholy returns to her. “The world has, it seems,
forsaken the way of the Lord, and like a spring ever runs out and out.
The more the water that flows into the soil, the more sucked in--the
more the soil becomes foul and unclean. Fewer are the gifts for heaven
then. Men become ever petty and more petty. Their good deeds grow tiny;
their evil deeds blacker and blacker dust--their deeds are hardly
visible to the eye!...”
And thus speaking to herself she seems to think that should the Lord
command all the evil deeds and the good of the world to be weighed in
the Balance, that the needle would hardly move, yea, not even tremble.
The earth can hardly rise or fall now, she is but a wanderer from the
empyrean above to the black abyss of Sheol below. A splendid cause for
an eternal disputation between the spirits of good and of evil; just
such a one as the eternal dispute between darkness and light, heat and
cold, life and death....
The earth rocks to and fro. She can neither ascend nor descend. Thus
we ever have weddings and divorces, parties and funerals, love and
hate--ever, forever.
Suddenly the blare of trumpets and of horns resounds. The soul looks
down--and beholds an ancient German town. All sorts of roofs, narrow
and bent, surround the courthouse. A motley crowd fills the place.
People peer out of the windows; others throng the roofs, and some sit
astride the beams at the edge, where they are propped up by the wall.
A table, covered with a green cloth stands at the head of the
court-hall. The cloth has golden tassels and fringes. The men of the
court are held with golden hooks. They wear sable caps and large
feathers stick from the shining buttons to which they are sewed. At
the head of the table, the President of the court is seated. An Eagle
hovers overhead....
A young Jewess, all bound, stands on one side. Ten slaves hold a white
horse firmly near her. The president has risen and with his eyes
towards the market-place, he reads the paper he has in his hand--her
sentence.
“This Jewess,” he says, “is guilty of a monstrous sin. Even the Lord,
in his graciousness and great mercy, could not forgive her that....
“On our last and most sacred holiday, she slunk out of her ghetto and
walked through the clean streets of our town....
“She has sullied the Holy procession. Her eyes have defiled the sacred
images that we bore with hymnal song and music through the streets....
“The hymns of our innocent children, or our young, clad in snow-white
garments, her ears have sucked in--and the beating of the holy drum
likewise ... who knows whether the devil, the foul fiend, has not
transformed himself into this image of the Jewess, of this cursed
Rabbi’s daughter? Who knows whether thus, he has not touched and
polluted a holy treasure of ours?
“What was the fiend up to, in this fair disguise? We need not
equivocate. Undoubtedly, she is fair; a devilish beauty is hers--Do but
look at the wicked sparkle of her eyes, and the modest and humble pose
of her silken eyelashes....
“See you her alabaster face? It has indeed grown paler since her
imprisonment, but duller not a whit!... Look at her fingers. How thin
and long and how transparent they seem in the sunlight!...
“What could the fiend have wanted but to dissuade a soul from its Holy
faith, and that he has done indeed:
“What a beautiful maiden!” exclaimed one of our own Knighthood--a member
of one of our best families....
“It was more than patience could endure. The crowd noticed her and lay
hands upon her--The fiend did not even stir for defense--How could she?
There were all pure of sin. They had been absolved. He had no power
over them.
“Let this then be the sentence of the devil--of the fiend disguised in
this form of a Jewish maiden:
“Bind her hair, her fiendishly long hair, to the tail of this savage
horse....
“Let the horse fly over the streets and drag her like a ‘corpse’ across
the very streets she has polluted in defiance of our sacred laws.
“May her blood besprinkle them and wash those that her feet have
besmirched!”
Savage cries of joy fill the market-place and when the great din is
over the convicted woman is asked her last wish.
She answers calmly: “I have one wish. Give me but a few pins.”
“Her grief has made her mad!” think the men of the court.
“Not so,” she answers serenely and frigidly: “This is my last wish; my
last desire.”
They gratified her in that.
“Now, bind her!” commands the President of the Court.
The hands of the servants tremble as they bind her long dark braids
to the tail of the horse, which is so wild that he can hardly be
controlled....
“Make room!” the command is heard. There is a wild rush forward. The
crowd huddles close to the walls of the buildings. All raise their
hands. All are ready to goad the horse along. Some have whips, some
have cords, others wiretips. Their breath is stifled for the moment;
their faces are aflame, their eyes sparkle and in all this hubbub no
one notices how the convicted maiden bends down and pins her skirts
at the seam and pushes the pins deep into her body, so that it may be
covered absolutely when she is dragged about in the streets. Only the
exiled soul notices it all....
“Free the horse,” the command is heard again. The slaves have leaped
away. The horse bounds forward. A deafening shout fills the air. Whips
and cords and wires are whirled about and whistle loudly. The horse,
wild with terror, rushes across the market-place, across the streets,
over the alley and far, far out of the town....
The vagrant soul has drawn a blood-stained pin out of the victim’s body
and is on her way to heaven with it!
And the angel at the little window soothes her, saying: “But _one_ more
gift!”
IV. THE THIRD GIFT
And downward again the soul wends her way. But one more gift! And
as before, year follows year and melancholy has its grip upon her.
The world has grown little indeed. Men are becoming ever more
insignificant. Their deeds too are tiny and more so; the good and the
evil alike....
And a new thought occurs to her:
“What if the Lord, Blessed be His name, were to halt the world process
this very moment and announce the final Judgment; would not then the
Advocate appear on the right side of the Balance and pour out the
contents of his white sack, its tiny particles and little grains of
sand; would not the Accuser follow and empty his sack on the left
scale--his little wee bits and fragments? What a long process that
would be! What a multitude of little things!
“And when the emptying of the sack is completed, what then? Of course,
the indicator would be pointing right to the center!
“Such insignificant things weigh nothing; no matter what their number.
Indeed, what can be the weight of a tiny thread, of a straw or of an
empty husk?
“What might the decision of the Lord be then?
“Would he turn the whole into a void again? Certainly not; for the Evil
deeds do not weigh more than the good.
“Perhaps he might grant salvation to all. But that, too, is unlikely,
for the deeds of Good do not prevail over those of Evil.
“It is hard to see what would follow then.
“Might he not say: ‘Pass ye along. Rove ye from the realms of Hell to
Heaven amid Love and Hate, in tears of mercy or vaporous blood ... from
cradle unto grave, rove ye farther--even farther.’”
However, Destiny seems to have planned the deliverance of the Soul
from her gloomy reflections. The din of beating drums arouses her....
“Where am I now, and what the time?” She cannot recognize the place.
She has no idea of the time.
She beholds the courtyard of a prison. The rays of the sun hover about
the little windows and even penetrate the iron bars.... They glide
along the wall and fall upon a heap of sundry weapons supported there.
The soldier-guards have but a moment ago received their whips....
Two long rows of soldiers and only a narrow passage between.
Who is it that must run the gauntlet here? Oh, it is but an
insignificant Jew. A torn shirt is on his emaciated body and a
skull-cap on his half-shaven head. There he is being led forth.
But what is his crime? What has he stolen? Has he robbed any
one,--murdered?... Perhaps it is but a false accusation. Is that not an
ancient custom and were not many such before?
The soldiers smile as they ponder: What was the use of having all of us
here? Would not half the number have sufficed!
He is thrust into the passage. He steps forward. He walks directly on.
The lashes fall upon him. But he curses no one, neither does he falter
or fall....
A fit of rage overwhelms the soldiers. He walks on and on!
The whips whistle in the air, fiendishly. They grip and coil around the
body as serpents do. The blood of the emaciated frame gushes forth and
does not cease!
Whoop--whack! Whoop--whack! Suddenly a whip falling high, throws the
skull-cap down to the ground. The doomed man notices it after a few
paces.... He stirs and reflects. He turns round again and walks onward,
serenely calm though covered with streaming blood. The skull-cap is on
his head.[4] He walks on till he falls....
And when he fell thus, the Soul ran swiftly up to him, and seized the
cap that had cost so many innocent lashes, and with it she flew up to
the little window of Heaven.
And the third gift also found acceptance! The pious Souls tried their
best and spared no trouble: the doors of Eden were now open! And a
voice of the “Oracle” was heard:
“These are truly beautiful gifts, of surpassing fairness.... They may
be of no practical use. They may not even serve for show.... But they
are marvelous.”
--Translated by Samuel P. Rudens.
[Note 3: Soul is feminine in Yiddish. (tr.)]
[Note 4: The head must be covered during all religious services.]
THE JUDGMENT
JOSEPH OPATOSHU
I
Simka, the fisherman, a massive, uncouth man, lived near Pincus, the
teacher. Simka’s peasant hut, with its straw roof that was black with
age, stood at the end of the Joldovka, where the latter descends,
stairlike, between towering cliffs and falls roaring into the Vistula.
From far it seemed that the hut grew out of the cliffs, that it rocked
and washed in the water like a little boat, surrounded by great silver
ribbons.
The fisherman and his three sons stood coatless and barefooted with
their trousers rolled about their knees, smearing large two-eared pails
with cheese; Simka’s wife, a strong, ruddy woman with a three-cornered,
white shawl on her head, also stood barefooted. The toes of her feet
were webbed like those of a goose. She was mending great nets. The men
put stones into the pails to prevent the current from carrying them
away. When a pail filled with fish, they swiftly lit pieces of thin
wood, so that the fish would not see their way out, and pulled the pail
to the shore. The quivering fish were dumped into a net, which was
fastened to a raft tied to the shore with thick ropes.
Simka’s youngest son, Zelik, sat on the raft. He was about ten and had
a wart near his ear. He threw pieces of bread into a flask of water in
which a little goldfish swam about.
Zelik grew in the woods like a wild goat. Often he disappeared for
days at a time. He would climb into a salt barge and go miles down the
river. Nobody ever missed him. Once when he was gone for a week, his
mother said something about it, but the rest remained silent. There
was a reason. When Zelik was born with the wart, his mother was very
frightened and sent for the old witch to exorcise the child. The witch
advised her to keep a close watch over the child, lest Wanda, the queen
of Vistula, steal him. The fisherman and his sons firmly believed
that the stretch of water near which they lived was demanding a human
sacrifice, for their catches were diminishing every year. The water
must have what belonged to it.
Each time Zelik disappeared, all of them kept still, thinking that the
water had at last taken its prey. But each time he came back, as if to
spite them.
The Vistula had cast him forth three times. And because of this Simka
wished to know nothing of him, and did not want to teach him, and Zelik
always walked around in rags and tatters.
“Why are you sitting there doing nothing, you fool?” the mother cried
out at Zelik.
“Go over to the ‘teacher’ and ask him how much fish they want by
Saturday.”
The boy caught up the flask with the goldfish, and ran into the wood.
Zelik thought that when he grew older he would not fish with pails. He
would build himself a raft and catch fish with nets. And when he would
grow rich (and he would surely grow rich) he would buy a pair of rubber
boots with those long tops that would fasten with a buckle under the
stomach, also a leather coat, and he would sail over the water in a
real fishing smack, with a large steering wheel. Then he would build
himself a house with a glass veranda, exactly like the one Pincus, the
teacher, had. And perhaps he would give the goldfish to Rachel. She had
been angry at him for the last two days, because he had cut off the
tail of her black cat. But then, the cat deserved it. When the fish lay
eggs she had no business to eat them. Yes, he would give the fish to
Rachel. True, goldfish aren’t to be found everyday in the Vistula. But
that was nothing. When he grew older he would catch a whale, cut its
insides out, and sew a pair of trousers and a coat for himself from the
skin, so that only his eyes would show. And then he would swim with his
fins all standing straight up, down to the goldfish. He knew that they
lived in the deepest whirlpools. But he would tell Rachel to change the
water, and to throw in a few bread-crumbs.
Rachel sat on the veranda consoling the black cat that lay with a
swollen back on a soft basket.
“My poor little cat. Does it hurt much? Don’t cry. Nikolai says it’ll
heal soon. And Zelik’s wart will get so big, so big, see, like this,”
and she stretched out both hands. “It’ll be ugly,” she laughed. “Zelik
with a tail on his cheek!”
“Rachel, see, I’ve got a goldfish. Want it?”
Rachel turned away and pouted.
“I’m mad.”
“Why are you mad?”
“Because you’re a murderer.”
“But my father told me to. I swear. He even told me to put your cat in
a sack and throw it straight into the water from the hill.”
“And you think you’ll be forgiven? God will punish you. Nikolai says
your wart must become as big as the tail you cut off.”
Zelik lost himself for a moment. He put his hand to his cheek and it
seemed to him that the wart was already becoming longer.
“It’s a lie. How much will you bet that I won’t have it at all by
tomorrow? I’ve got something that’ll take it away.”
“What have you got?”
“I’ll put pigeon blood on it a few times, and it will dry and fall off.”
“Why didn’t you do it before?”
“Because mama says a wart is lucky. If I take it off before I’m
thirteen, my luck will go.”
“Are you lucky?”
“Of course, see, the Vistula threw me up three times. And I can swim in
the sea, too. My father is a fisherman so long, and he never caught a
goldfish. And I know where they live, too. And you don’t know.”
“Where?”
“In the whirlpools.”
“Zelik, is it true that a whirlpool must get a man each year?”
“Of course. They live there together with the goldfish. You know, when
I grow older, I’ll swim down there to the goldfish.”
“And if they won’t let you go back?”
“Eh, they’ll let me go back.”
“And what will you do there?”
“All the treasures of the sea are there. I’ll fill my pockets with gold
and diamonds, and come back.”
“And you’ll take me, too?”
“You? You’re mad at me.”
“Of course I’m mad.”
“Then I won’t take you.”
“Don’t take me, then.”
“Give me back my goldfish.”
“The goldfish? Why are you so bad? Why did you take my cat and--”
“I swear I won’t cut the tail off again.”
“But you’ve cut it off already.”
“Rachel, where are you? The dinner is cold,” came the old servant’s
voice from the house.
“I’m coming,” Rachel answered, and arose.
“Come to us tomorrow, Rachel. The storks are here already. You’ll come?”
“I’ll come.” She entered the house.
II
The woods whispered happily. The air was filled with resin.
Zelik, tanned like a gipsy, walked barefoot through the forest.
He avoided the common path and trudged over the black, swampy,
moss-covered earth. He was happy to feel the cool, soft earth yield
beneath his feet like well kneaded dough. The boy had a key in his
mouth, and whistled for all he was worth.
Rachel, happy, with flaming cheeks, with her shoes and stockings in her
hands, followed him.
Sunbeams that had been hidden deep in the woods suddenly began to play
and weave themselves around Rachel. They stole up from the rear, kissed
her, sprang back, and all of a sudden sprayed her with such silver
light, she half closed her eyes, and shrieked happily.
The birds became happier, springing up suddenly from the deep grass,
and flapping their wings. They remained hanging against the flaming
sun, trilling their songs.
The woods whispered joyously. They smelled of resin. It seemed that
scores of fiddlers were scattered all over the woods. They had grown
tired and gradually had ceased their playing. But seeing the barefooted
children hand in hand on the soft ground, they began to feel younger,
and rubbed their bows rapidly against the yellow resin, and the tall
pines trembled like tightly stretched violin strings, and they roared
like a far, quiet sea--Youth, O Youth.
When they came out of the wood the two sat down on the bank of the
Vistula, and began to bathe their muddy feet in the clear water.
Wide green fields spotted with yellow flowers stretched on the other
margin of the Vistula. A white stork with a black tail startled over
the field. He lifted his red legs like stilts. He raised proudly his
long neck with its red beak, and noisily swallowed small green toads.
When the sun appeared from behind a cloud, and began to shine, the
stork stood up on one leg, hid its beak and half of its head under its
wing, and remained standing in the middle of the field as if it were
painted.
“Rachel, you know what would be nice?”
“What?”
“Swear you won’t tell anybody.”
“I swear.”
“Go ’way. I think you will tell.”
“I swear I won’t, Zelik.”
“Remember now.” He lifted a finger to his nose. “You know what I’ve
thought of?”
“What?”
“You’ll never guess,” he laughed.
“Oh, tell me,” Rachel begged, taking Zelik’s hand and rubbing a little
wet foot against his.
“You know, if we could get a goose-egg, it would be so nice.”
“Why do you need a goose-egg?”
“I would put it into the stork’s nest, and it would hatch out a
half-stork, half-goose.”
“Will the stork let you do it?”
“I’ll put it in before dawn, when both aren’t in the nest.”
“Zelik, you know what brings babies? Braina says that a stork brings
the babies in a little basket. Where do the babies live?”
“In heaven.”
“And when it rains?”
“When it rains? I don’t know. I suppose they hide when the clouds come
down to the Vis’la to drink.”
“And the stork that stands over there, can it bring babies, too?”
“Of course,” and Zelik stretched his hands. “Such a heap of babies.”
“Go ’way, I’d be ashamed of Braina to bring a baby home. A little girl
mustn’t have babies. You must marry first, no?”
“Well, why did the Forester’s Franka have a baby? She never married.”
“But she’s not a Jewess.”
A second stork, slightly smaller, with chalk white wings, gently
descended on the field. The he-stork in the middle of the field, seemed
to awake as from sleep, spread his wings, lifted his long neck, yawned,
and began to run around and around the she-stork with his head lowered,
crying, “Clia-clia.” He stopped, lifted his slightly opened, red beak,
in which he held a green toad, looked at the she-stork proudly, as if
saying, “My wife will never die of hunger,” and gave her the toad. And
while she scarcely lifted her neck, rolled her eyes and swallowed the
toad that was averse to make the journey down her throat, he pecked
her lovingly with his beak, put his head under her wing and looked for
something. He stood on one leg again, began to slap his wings, flew
around the she-stork, ogled her, stretching his long, limber neck, and
the erstwhile silent bird began to sing, “Clia-clia-qua, Clia-clia-qua.”
Zelik came out of the water.
“Go home, Rachel, and bring an egg. The nest is empty by now. Put on
your shoes.”
Rachel joyously put on her shoes. She felt more comfortable, and jumped
up.
“Well, why don’t you go?”
“I’m too lazy to go myself.”
“Then I’ll go with you. All right?”
The children leaping up and taking each other by the hand, were lost
from sight in the woods.
III
Zelik approached the barn where the storks had built their nest. He
took the egg from Rachel, held it in his lips, and swiftly like a cat
began to climb the straight wall. He grasped a jutting piece of wood,
waited a little as if seeking balance, and threw his body on to the
roof. The nest was made of an old wooden harrow. In the harrow lay a
basket, filled with grass and twigs. The close odor of fish, toads, and
chickens, struck Zelik in the face. Three large eggs lay in the nest.
He took out one of them, replaced it with the goose-egg, and wanted
to descend from the roof, when the two storks suddenly appeared and
flew at him with wide-spread wings. Zelik barely had time to get down,
but he was so frightened lest the storks attack him that he remained
standing with the egg in both hands.
Rachel shrieked loudly.
“Zelik, jump down.”
Zelik, crouched, covered his face with both hands, like one expecting a
blow, and began to slide down the incline of the roof.
The he-stork, flying swiftly by, stretched his long neck and directed
his sharp beak at Zelik’s face. Zelik dodged the beak of the stork,
caught the blow in his back, and fell from the roof like a stone. The
egg broke and covered him with yellow liquid.
Rachel thought that Zelik was surely dead from the blow. She began to
pinch herself from fear, fell to her knees before Zelik, embraced him
with both hands, and began to kiss him and to cry.
“Zelik, my dear, does it hurt you much, tell me? It’s all my fault. Why
did I bring the egg?”
When Zelik recovered from the blow, he felt a sharp pain in his back,
and remembered that the stork had picked at him. Rachel, when she saw
blood on his coat, put her hands to her head.
“O, mama, blood.”
She again dropped to her knees before Zelik and began to entreat.
“Zelik, my dear, come to us. Braina will put something on it. She won’t
tell anybody. You’ll see. I beg you, Zelik, come.”
She kissed him and began to cry again. “It’s all my fault.”
Zelik, seeing her cry, became really frightened. He forgot his pain,
and stood up.
“Come, Rachel. We’ll go down to the water. You’ll wash off the blood.
All right? Don’t cry. It’s nothing. I have had bigger holes in my head
and they healed.”
“Are you mad at me, Zelik?”
“No.”
“You want us to be friends forever?”
“Of course.”
“See, I love you so much,” Rachel said, and bit hard into the flesh of
the arm above the elbow. All her teeth left red marks on the skin.
They were silent. They walked over the dry branches that cracked under
their feet, in the direction of the River.
Rachel, like a little mother, began to attend on Zelik. She took off
his coat, then his shirt, forgetting that a girl must not look on a
naked boy. She took her white apron, dipped it into the cold water, and
washed Zelik’s wound. Zelik lay on his stomach like a little wounded
animal. He did not move. He was happy to know that Rachel was busy
about him. When she had washed the wound, she removed the stains from
the apron, wrung it out, put it on the wound, went with him into the
bushes in the shade, and told him to lie down with his face in her lap,
so that the wound should dry a little.
Zelik obeyed. He fell asleep almost at once.
At short intervals Rachel lifted the apron, and looked to see if the
wound had dried. But the wound still ran blood. Her heart overflowed
with sorrow, and she began to weep quietly. And thus, weeping with red,
brimming eyes, Rachel nestled her little head among the leaves, and
also fell asleep.
IV
The she-stork did not leave her nest the whole morning. She watched how
her young pecked their way out of the shells.
The he-stork was upset. He flew about the nest uttering strange cries,
every now and then fetching something to his mate, strutting swiftly
above the nest with a shrunken neck almost hidden beneath his wings. He
resembled a young man whose wife is giving birth to her first child.
The she-bird emitted a strange “Clia-clia.” The he-bird sat down,
spread his wings, and guarded the nest. For a moment he seemed to be
confused and looked at his mate who had lowered her head in shame as if
she were saying, “I swear I am not guilty.” A little gosling rolled out
of a broken egg-shell. The he-stork felt that all in him was trembling,
and like a cuckold husband he threw himself at this mate, pecking her
feathers with his beak. She lowered her head still more, moved closer
to him and like a really guilty one, made no resistance. All in her
seemed to say, “Go on beating me.”
The he-stork picked the gosling up with his beak, caught it by the
head, and threw it down from the barn top. He began to destroy the nest
with his beak and legs, looking no longer at his mate. Then he rested
awhile, and flew away.
The she-stork smoothed her feathers, and began to sharpen the point of
her beak, knowing that she was lost, that “he” had flown to tell the
flock about her sin.
She lifted one foot, began to sharpen her beak still harder against
the harrow, and wept in her own way. She was sure that it was not her
fault, that a misfortune had befallen her, and she thought she would
tell it to the elders of the flock. She would show them the two other
children, real little storks, with red feet and red beaks. And she wept
again.
Zelik and Rachel sat on the raft.
“You know, Rachel?”
“What?”
“From now on I’ll be able to swim just like a duck.”
“How?”
“I’ll cut into my toes--”
“You mustn’t do it, do you hear, Zelik? I swear, I’ll always be mad at
you, always!”
“Well, let me finish. Listen to me first.”
“I won’t let you anyway.”
“I’ll take the skins of some goose-feet, fasten them between my toes,
and keep them there till they grow into me, and then--”
“And won’t your toes bleed?” Rachel cut him short.
“Of course, they won’t. Ofelo taught me to cut a finger with the
sharpest knife so that no blood would flow. And her mother is a witch.”
“But you are mad with Ofelo.”
“Of course, I’m mad with her. You know, Rachel, Ofelo knows of a grass
that if you lick it, you sleep a whole day and night. You don’t believe
me? I swear it.”
“She does?”
They were silent for a while.
“Zelik, is it really true that Ofelo’s mother walks in shoes made of
the veins of men?”
“Of course, you know, Ofelo’s mother can turn into a straw and hide
herself in the smallest crack. She is a real witch.”
The Vistula rippled. The ripples widened into rings. The rings grew
longer, swallowed each other and grew still larger and larger, and the
erstwhile quiet Vistula, that had looked like a crystal mirror, grew
dark and rigid.
A swallow fluttered by, and seeing other swallows in the water he
dropped from on high, dipped his beak into the Vistula. The Vistula
rippled again.
Zelik related that below the “black stone,” in a glass palace lived
Wanda, the queen of the Vistula. In the summer, during the great heat,
when the Vistula grew shallow, Wanda and her sisters gathered on the
stone and kidnapped little children. She had attempted to catch him
three times but he knew a secret saying, which he uttered and that
caused a fiery ring to grow between him and her, and she could not
reach him.
“Zelik, why does Wanda need so many children?”
“Why does she need them? She kisses them till their souls leave their
bodies, and then she eats their hearts.”
The children saw a flock of storks settle on an island in the middle of
the Vistula.
“They’re going to have a wedding,” Zelik said, turning to Rachel.
“Come, we’ll get there with the boat.”
He unbound the boat from the raft. Rachel looked around to see if any
of her folks noticed them, and sprang joyously into it.
Rachel saw the little crystal waves leap up, swallow each other, and
blend before her eyes. She became still happier, and gave a strange
shriek.
They landed on the island, dragged the boat on to the shore, and lay
down in the grass.
The storks sat in a wide semi-circle. Two old storks like two prominent
citizens, walked in the center of the ring. The “he-stork” came flying,
holding the dead gosling in his beak, and carried it to the old pair.
“Here, look.”
The old storks looked long at the gosling, smelled it, threw it around
with their long necks, made some strange sounds and two storks rose and
flew away.
Soon they came back with the “she-stork.” The messengers with a
“Clia-clia, clia-clia,” told of her explanation.
The storks again became noisy and excited, broke their ring, pressed
into one heap, and from far it seemed that a broad-boned monster, with
tens of agile heads stood in the middle of the Vistula, and cried
“Clia-clia, clia-clia.”
The storks surrounded the “she-stork.” The mate approached her, poked
her in the head, and then great long necks with open beaks flew at her
from all sides, feathers whirled in the air, and the bird was torn to
pieces.
It was late. Rachel sat and cried, knowing that she and Zelik were
guilty of everything. Zelik lifted her.
“Come, Rachel. Let’s go home.”
They entered the boat. Heavy clouds suddenly rose from the Vistula,
stood up like walls and all became complete darkness. A bolt of
lightning lit up the whole river. Rachel became confused. She saw
nothing in the blinding light, forgot that she was in a boat, and
jumped up. A thunder rolled, as if rocky hills were being sundered. A
flood came down from heaven.
Rachel was no longer in the boat. Zelik threw off his coat, and
searched for her, diving into the water. But she was not to be seen.
The Vistula stormed.
Black waves, like angry animals with foaming mouths stood up high and
threatening, roared, and threw themselves at Zelik. And lightnings like
fiery ribbons, blinded his eyes on all sides. The boat was already far
from him. It drifted down the river. A wave covered Zelik, and he felt
that he was growing lighter. He ceased to struggle, and saw a palace
with green lights closing towards him. Wanda, surrounded by whitish
lightning, hung in the air above him. She called him to her, showed
him Rachel, sent lightning to him, and the flashes like long tongues
became thinner and thinner. The lightnings tickled him, kissed him,
burned him, and his mother stood over him, squeezed lemons into sugar,
and put it into his mouth. And suddenly Wanda spread out her watery
tresses. They became longer, enfolded him, and water poured on him from
a thousand pipes, extinguishing the lightning flashes. He felt so well,
so well. And he swam on.
--Translated by Jacob Robbins.
A TALE OF A HUNGRY MAN
DAVID PINSKI
Itsye had for two days in succession had nothing in his mouth; in other
words, he had been hungering. But on the third day, for three brass
buttons he wheedled the lunch out of a little Hebrew school pupil that
studied in the school of his yard--two little buttered cakes--and
swallowed them eagerly. Then he became angry. The cakes were a mere
morsel to him, but now he had at least a little strength with which
to feel anger, and was seized with an impulse to accomplish evil. His
fingers itched with the desire. First of all he launched a wicked kick
in the direction of Zhutshke, the little dog which the landlady of his
house held dearer than her own children. Zhutshke ran off yelping with
pain, but this was not enough for Itsye. He tore up a stone that had
been frozen to the earth and with all his strength sent it flying after
the dog. It did not strike the animal, however, but landed on the door
of Simkin the lawyer’s house. It struck with a resounding blow, and
Itsye felt satisfied, for he wouldn’t have cared had the stone struck
Simkin or Simkin’s wife on the head.
But with all this his hunger was not appeased in the slightest,
nor was his seething heart calmed in the smallest degree. He waxed
still angrier, for he felt that these were mere trifles, that he had
accomplished nothing with them. He walked through the gate, glanced up
and down the street, and felt that he was an enemy to every passer-by,
and especially to every one that rode. He cursed them with bitter oaths
and would gladly, with his own hands, have executed all tortures upon
them.
Another little pupil approached the gate; he was wrapped in a broad
scarf and wore the large shoes of a grown-up person. He held his hands
inside the scarf, and whether because he was indifferent or because it
was too cold, did not remove them to wipe his nose, from which mucus
leaked down to his mouth.
Out of his pocket peeped a crust of bread. Itsye was seized with a
longing for it, but the appearance of the poor child restrained him.
He sought, however, to convince himself that he was incensed against
the child, even as he was against the whole world, and that he ought to
give him a hard kick, as he had just done to Zhutshke. He seized the
child by the nose, then struck him on the cap and scowled, “Slob, it’s
running into your mouth!” The child was frightened, brought his elbow
up to his nose and ran off. But soon he turned back, looked at his
unexpected enemy and began to cry, “Wicked Itsye! Itsye the bad man!”
And he disappeared through the gate. Itsye did not even deign to look
at him.
He leaned against the gate. Why? He did not himself know. At any rate,
he was weary. Angry and exhausted. The two cakes had only excited him.
Food, food! He could see before his eyes the piece of bread in the poor
boy’s torn pocket. That would have come in very handy. He was sorry
that he hadn’t taken it away. A whole big piece of bread....
He leaned more heavily against the gate, not knowing why and not
knowing what was to come, or what would result from his standing there.
The cold grew intense, but Itsye did not feel it, for he was angry and
paid no attention to it. Besides, he had no place of refuge. Up there
in his garret it was still colder. Moreover, there was nobody there,
and he would have none upon whom to vent his wrath.
He stood thinking of nothing. It was impossible for him to think. He
no longer knew precisely that he was in a rage; it seemed to him that
today he would work a very clever piece of malice. He knew nothing
about dynamite; otherwise he would have thought unceasingly of bombs,
and would have painted himself pictures of the whole city, the whole
country, the world itself, being blown by him into atoms. But he gave
no thought to any definite project. He was certain that he would do
something malicious enough. He felt it.