GOLDA
Everything takes so much time, Golda thought. While Ben was out finding a rabbi to see about the burial and the circumcision, she waited in Cousin Surah’s kitchen. Soon Mrs. Singer came out, having finished nursing the baby. She handed him to Golda, who whispered, “Thank you.” She held the infant as, sated, he fell into a deep sleep, and for the moment she relaxed. But she knew it wouldn’t last. In two or three hours he would be up crying again, needing food. It would start with him squirming a little in his sleep, then a few plaintive cries, and soon he would be screaming in hunger. And then what would she do?
She hesitated only a moment and then said, “Mrs. Singer, will you help? For the next few days? Until we can decide what to do with this poor orphan baby?” Her voice choked on the word “orphan.” Was he an orphan? He had a father but no mother.
Cousin Surah transferred the baby girl to her mother’s arms. She patted Mrs. Singer on the back. “You are very kind,” she said. “Can you help a little longer?”
Mrs. Singer hesitated, then sighed. “I will keep him for the next two days, but then you have to decide. It costs money to keep a baby. I have my own little girl. But I will help for now because she asks me.” Mrs. Singer nodded at Cousin Surah. “Bring him to me with some clean diapers, some clothes. I’ll see you soon.” She went to the door, and before she left the apartment, she said to Golda, “This will not be easy for you. Think hard about what you do.”
Golda sat holding the baby. She heard the words as a warning and felt she was drowning, foundering in deep water, unable to swim. And the baby was wet. She had not changed his diaper since morning. She wondered what you did to clean diapers here in the city. At home her mother had a big washtub outside the house. She hung clothes on a rope tied between trees. But this was the city. Where did you wash clothes in the city? She looked at Cousin Surah, a kind and sturdy woman who seemed to know how to solve problems. Golda watched her bustle about the kitchen, felt her gentle pat on the shoulder as she passed her. “Nu?” Cousin Surah asked. “Are you hungry?”
Golda shook her head. She hadn’t had a morsel of food since early morning, but she didn’t think she could swallow any now. This was all too much for her. She couldn’t answer the questions buzzing in her head or make decisions. “What should I do?” she asked Cousin Surah at last. The question reverberated in her head. It met with silence in the kitchen.
Cousin Surah stirred the tea she had brought to the table. “Your sister’s baby?” she asked at last. Golda nodded. After a long while the older woman said, “There are not so many choices for you, I think.”
Golda closed her eyes and nodded, but she wondered what Cousin Surah meant. Not so many choices. She wanted to hear the choices, and she didn’t want to hear them. She was afraid that saying them would close the doors to every dream she had. Cousin Surah did not speak again until Golda opened her eyes and looked straight at her.
“How old are you?” Cousin Surah asked.
“Eighteen.”
“Why did you come with your sister? You’re a pretty girl. Were there no boys to marry in your town?”
Golda was startled. No one had called her pretty before, except her beloved grandmother, Bubbie Zlata, who would pinch her cheeks and say she had a shayna punim, a pretty face. But Golda knew she was not pretty—not when she stood next to Esther, who was so beautiful. She shook her head. “Esther found her own destiny—her bashert. My father wanted me to marry this widower I didn’t like. He already had two children.” She closed her eyes and remembered him . . . a much older man with a large belly and a double chin. Just thinking of him made Golda shiver. His clothes were not so clean. He smelled of sweat. When he looked at Golda, he kept licking his lips, as if he were anticipating a meal. After he left, Golda turned to her parents. “I won’t marry him. You can’t make me marry him.”
“We have no choice,” her father said. His voice was stern. “He is the only offer we have, and we have no dowry for you to entice younger men. You cannot be choosy.”
“I won’t marry him,” Golda said. “I’ll go to Przemysl and go into service. I can cook and sew. Someone rich will hire me to help.”
Her father raised his hand as if to slap her, but her mother caught his arm and begged. “No, Chaim, no.”
He’d shaken her arm away and said, “You don’t have a choice. Prepare yourself.”
Golda shook her head as if ridding herself of the memory. She answered Cousin Surah. “I didn’t have a dowry. The only way I could escape was to come with Esther to America. And besides, I didn’t want her to go alone, so pregnant. She wasn’t supposed to deliver on the ship. She was barely eight months.”
Cousin Surah looked skeptical. “The baby looks big. Maybe she was wrong in counting.”
Golda nodded. “That’s what the nurse on the ship said.”
“The nurse, did she help deliver the baby? How did you manage, a maiden?”
Golda closed her eyes, and it came flooding back. The steerage of the ship, a big room with double berths, so many women and children, babies crying. And Esther, her beautiful face contorted in pain.
“At first, I thought it was just a normal birth. I had been around my mother when she gave birth to my three younger brothers. I even helped the midwife with the youngest. So I thought I could help Esther. When her water broke, I ran around the steerage asking if there was a midwife there. But there wasn’t. So I held her, I rubbed her back, I breathed with her. At first everything was fine, but then it wasn’t. She started to bleed. I never saw that before.”
Golda looked behind Cousin Surah’s head, as if seeing something that wasn’t really there. The quilt had been on the bed when Esther began to labor. It was too soon, she remembered saying to Esther. But Esther said no, just a little. She had fibbed about when the baby should come, she said. She was eight months, not seven. Her pains were hard, and Golda sat behind her, holding her between her legs, rubbing her back, when the blood came gushing.
Golda closed her eyes, shook her head. “I didn’t know what to do. This nice woman had put up a quilt around us so no one would see. I was calling, ‘Help me, help me!’ I got off the bed, put the quilt—the beautiful quilt she had made—between her legs to stop the bleeding. One of the women ran for the doctor . . . we were lucky there was a real doctor on the ship and a real infirmary . . . and I kept saying a prayer: the doctor will come, the doctor will come.
“When he came, he took one look, and next thing Esther was taken to the infirmary, and I was waiting outside the door, sitting on the floor in the hallway.” It was in the fancy part of the ship. There was red wallpaper with velvet flowers and blue-and-red carpeting. At first, she could hear Esther screaming, and then quiet that sounded like the end of the world. Golda waited and waited. It was hours, and then a small sound, like a tiny kitten mewing.
“After a while, I heard the baby, and I knocked and went into the room. The doctor was standing by the tall bed where Esther lay covered in a white sheet. Her skin was pale. She seemed to be breathing but faint. A nurse, who by a miracle spoke some Polish as well as English, stood by the doctor’s side holding the baby wrapped in a white sheet.
“I asked the nurse if it was alive. She nodded. The doctor told me that he had to do an operation to take the baby. I remembered that there was a woman in the village who had that. ‘He cut her open?’ I asked.
“‘Yes,’ the nurse answered. ‘It was the only way to save the baby. And hopefully your sister.’”
Golda had felt like she was moving through water. Esther’s eyes flickered. Her breaths were shallow. Her skin was white, drained of all color.
“The doctor said we had to wait until she came out of the anesthetic, and then we would see if she survived. She lost so much blood.
“They let me hold the baby, and the nurse said he was a big healthy boy, ready to be born. He was very pretty, not a scrunched-up face like the babies my mother had.” Golda looked down. “Esther had said she was only seven months pregnant, but that wasn’t true. I think she was already expecting when she and Ben married.”
Cousin Surah nodded. She seemed to understand. Golda was quiet then, remembering how Esther had moved her mouth, but no sound came out. Golda went to her side and bent low to hear what she said, but the words were garbled. Her eyes seemed to be pleading. Golda thought she said, “Take him.”
“The doctor said I had to leave the infirmary and come back the next day. He said, ‘We’ll see if she survives.’ He told me to change my clothes and wash.” Golda remembered the smell of blood on her hands . . . like metal. “I washed as good as I could, and my dress I saved; I don’t know if it will come clean. I only have this dress I’m wearing if it doesn’t. I do have Esther’s clothes, but she is small, and I am tall. I don’t know if they will fit me.”
Golda was talking too much, too fast. “I threw away the feather quilt that Esther was lying on. There was no saving it.” Golda’s heart ached doing it, remembering the countless hours Esther had spent stitching it to bring to America. Thankfully Golda had rescued the quilt cover she herself had embroidered as a wedding present. It was very fine work with sprays of yellow forsythia and purple lilacs, green vines, and pink and red roses. She had sat for hours, stitching flowers and trees on the fabric. The women in the village said Golda’s needlework was beautiful, and many of them asked her to make embroidered blouses and skirts for special occasions.
“I left Esther’s suitcase with the nurse. She said when they come for the body, they can take the suitcase too. I couldn’t carry it all.”
Cousin Surah silently reached out for Golda’s hand and patted it. Golda was silent for a long time, remembering. Then she continued, tears choking her voice. “The next morning, when I went back to the infirmary, my sister was gone. The nurse was feeding the baby with a bottle filled with evaporated milk. Two days later, the ship arrived, and I came off alone with the baby. When I walked off that ship, I waited and waited, and then finally came Ben. I don’t think he understood when he first saw me, what had happened. I feel very sorry for him.”
They sat in silence for a long time. Finally, Cousin Surah sighed. “You poor girl. What do you want to do? Do you want to go back to your village?”
The “No!” was out of Golda’s mouth before the question was finished. She knew if she went back, she would have to marry whoever her father picked. And they would blame her for Esther’s death; she knew they would, even though it was not her fault. At least she didn’t think it was her fault.
“Okay. So, if you stay, you must work. Do you have a skill?”
Golda hesitated, then said, “I sew. I embroider.” Golda stumbled over the words. She didn’t want to brag. Her mother was always admonishing her, “Don’t brag. It isn’t becoming.” But Golda knew her embroidery was special. Bubbie Zlata had taught her how to embroider, saying she could earn good money with the skill. Bubbie Zlata had been a talented tailor until her arthritic fingers kept her from the work. Like her bubbie, Golda could look at a piece of cloth and see a design on it. Without tracing it first, she could stitch the different colors into patterns or scenes. People said her work on fabric was like a painting. Golda took a deep breath. “I cook too.”
She thought she was good at cooking and embroidery, but that was not what she wanted to do. She wanted to have a life of her own, not doing what she had always done in the village. She thought again about the young nurse on the ship. Wouldn’t that be a wonderful life? Not that she could ever even think of something like that. A dream.
“You cook good?”
“Yes,” Golda said. “I did most of the cooking and baking at home. My mother didn’t like cooking.”
“I don’t either,” Cousin Surah said, and smiled. “But I have to cook. I have a husband, a daughter, a son, and two boarders who must eat. If you cook for us and help me clean and wash, you can stay and sleep in the parlor for now.”
Golda was so grateful she could barely speak. “Thank you,” she whispered. She thought that Cousin Surah was only offering work out of kindness. She had never known anyone so kind before.
“But for the baby, we have to find help. Mrs. Singer said she does not want to nurse him, but I think she will do it for a favor for me if we pay her. Maybe Ben can pay her. If not, maybe we can find someone else, or else we have to find money for canned milk. Either way it will cost money.”
“Why are you so kind?”
“Ben is my cousin. My mother is his mother’s oldest sister. Didn’t you know?”
Golda nodded. “Yes, I know, but still, I think you are kind.”
The older woman smiled. “Maybe kind. But not rich.” She patted Golda on the arm, took the baby from her, and said, “We will try to work it out. I will bring the baby to Mrs. Singer, and then you and I will go on the avenue, find some things the baby needs and bread for supper. Then Ben will be back, and we will see what he found out about the loan and the funeral and the bris. I hope it will be all right.”
Golda hoped so too.
When Ben came back to the apartment, Golda and Cousin Surah were deep in conversation about how Golda would write a letter to her parents to tell them about Esther’s death and the birth of their grandson. Then it was Ben’s chance to tell how the rabbi was arranging for the chevra kadisha, the synagogue burial society, to take care of Esther’s burial. They were pious Jews; they would not let Esther go to a pauper’s grave. And the rabbi had also arranged for the baby’s circumcision. He assured Ben that he would help procure a loan from the Hebrew Free Loan Society to feed the baby. They would loan the money, and Ben would pay it back, but he would not owe any interest. A free loan.
Ben sat in the kitchen while Cousin Surah and Golda cooked potatoes and carrots and sliced the bread for supper. Tomorrow morning, Ben told them, he and the rabbi would go to the ship and arrange for the burial society to get Esther’s body, and they would bury her in a Jewish grave. When he heard that Cousin Surah was going to let Golda sleep in the parlor, Ben said she should take his bed and he would sleep on the floor in the parlor.
“And maybe,” Cousin Surah said, “when Mrs. Singer brings the baby back, he should sleep in the bedroom with Golda.”
Golda saw Ben look from Cousin Surah to her and back again. What should she say? But after a few minutes it seemed clear to her. She nodded her agreement. She would take her sister’s baby in the room with her.
At least Ben is beginning to act like a man again, she thought. A mensch. He even asked to see the baby, who hadn’t been named yet. Cousin Surah asked him if he had a name for the baby; he nodded, and they let the subject go. It was customary not to name the child until the circumcision, and even not to tell anyone beforehand what the name would be. A few minutes later, he went next door to Mrs. Singer’s apartment, saw his son, and when he came back to his cousin’s, his face was drained and tear streaked. He sat at the table and whispered, “I don’t know how I’ll take care of him.”
Cousin Surah patted his back. “It will come to you soon,” she said. “Meanwhile, we will get through the next days, one by one.”
The conversation lagged, picked up, lagged again. Golda’s exhaustion was overwhelming, and she could barely listen to the talk. Surah’s husband, Yaacov, came home from his job as a bookkeeper and kindly acknowledged Golda, the new boarder. Cousin Surah took him aside and whispered to him for a few minutes. He nodded, came to the table, and said, “Welcome to our home.”
Over supper, they discussed everything, revealing new ideas one after the other. Golda was astonished at the thought that this very morning she had walked off the ship, carrying a famished infant, dreading how she would find her sister’s young husband and tell him what had happened. And this evening she had a bed, a meal, a temporary place for the baby, and a way to get her sister an honorable and kosher funeral. It seemed a miracle. A funeral, a bris, a job, and a place to sleep, Golda repeated. She dragged herself up, took the dishes off the table, and began to wash them. She needed to prove to Cousin Surah that she hadn’t made a mistake taking Golda into her home. And Golda knew that after Esther’s graveside funeral, and the seven days of shiva and deep mourning, and the baby’s circumcision, Ben would go back to work, and she would start her life as a helper to Cousin Surah and a surrogate parent to the newly named baby Mordechai—Morton.