IT WAS STILL dark out, and music still drifted from some of the windows on Seventh Avenue. When ever we heard a snatch of jazz music, Solly stopped to listen.
It would be swell, living in Irma Lee’s basement, having fun with her, and being a gonif with Solly. Plus getting enough to eat and not going to school. And then I thought, What about my buddies? What about Mr. Hillinger’s classes? I shook my head. I was leaving the HHB.
“So, Daveleh. Did you like being in high society?”
“Uh-huh. Are you going to any rent parties soon?” We turned the corner of 127th Street and Saint Nicholas Avenue, where Saint Nicholas Park started.
“Almost every night I go. It’s my business.”
“Where will you be tomorrow? I mean, today.” It was morning already.
“I don’t know so far in advance.”
The same day was too far in advance? “When will you know?”
“Tonight.”
“So, nu?” I said. “Can I come with you?”
“When will you sleep, boychik? Me, I have all day to nap.”
I felt wide awake and ready for a game of stickball. “I’m not tired.”
“Daveleh, why don’t you stay safe and sound in your HHB?”
Safe and sound and cold and hungry. I didn’t answer.
Solly waited and then said, “Meaning you’ll do what you want, never mind what I say?” He sighed. “Better you should be with a responsible gonif. Listen, boychik. Tonight you’ll sleep. Tomorrow night you’ll meet me at the Tree of Hope.”
What was that? A speakeasy? “What is it?”
“It sounds biblical, doesn’t it, Daveleh?”
“Is it a real tree?”
“What else would it be? Musicians go there, and people looking for musicians hire them there. And I go there too.”
Oh. That’s how he found out about rent parties. “Where is it?”
“The Tree of Hope is on Seventh Avenue and a Hundred and Thirty-second Street. We passed it on the way to the party. You didn’t notice?”
I shook my head.
“Suppose I wait for you from twelve to one. Is that good?”
I nodded. “Thanks.” I wished I had a watch. I’d have to listen for the chimes.
“If you don’t come Monday, I’ll wait Tuesday. If a week goes by and no boychik, I’ll shlep to the HHB and shmeer the nebbish again. What’s a little money to a rich man like me?”
We were five minutes late getting back to the orphanage. Mr. Meltzer was mad till Solly gave him another shmeer, a quarter “for his trouble.” Then Mr. Meltzer smiled, which almost cracked his face into splinters.
As I followed Mr. Meltzer down the halls, I thought how bare and dead the Hollow Home for Boys was compared to Irma Lee’s jumping party.
But our room came alive as soon as the door shut behind Mr. Meltzer.
“I thought you were gone for good,” Mike said.
“Where would he go?” Harvey said.
Irma Lee’s basement. That’s where.
“Did somebody die?” Mike asked. “One of your relatives?”
“No. Nobody died.” I reached under my jacket. “Here.” I handed the bread to Mike, who almost dropped it. “It’s potato bread.”
“One bite, then pass it,” Eli said.
The bread went around twice. Meanwhile, I pulled my suitcase out from under the bed and put my drawing of Irma Lee inside. I wanted to ask Mr. Hillinger about it, but I didn’t want anybody else to see it.
“Where did you go?” one of the twins asked.
I told them. They didn’t know about Solly, so I started with him. Then I told them about the party. “A lot of famous people were there.”
“Like who?” Harvey said.
“Like Langston Hughes and W. E. B. Du Bois and a colored crook, Caspar Holstein.” I couldn’t remember the names of the others.
“Never heard of them,” Harvey said.
“Like the prince and princess of Sheba.” That shut him up. “And I got a place to stay when I leave.” I told them about it.
“You’d stay with the shvartzehs?” Harvey said.
“Sure.”
“How’re you going to get the carving?” Mike asked.
“I’ve thought about that,” Eli said.
We all looked at him.
“We have to spy on Mr. Doom to see if he ever leaves his office unlocked. We’ll take turns.”
They’d be taking a big risk to help me get out of here, to help me become an ex-buddy. Well, I might leave, but I’d be their buddy forever. “Thanks!”
Harvey said, “Good idea.”
“What about Mr. Cluck?” I asked.
Jeff laughed. “Remember when Alfie and Bernie went to the toilet at nine-thirty and didn’t come back till—”
“Till after lunch,” the other twin finished. “Mr. Cluck never noticed.”
“Mr. Doom will kill you if he catches you,” I said. I wished there was a way to take these guys with me when I left.
“Nobody’s going to catch me,” Harvey said. “Eli and I will go first. We’ll take breakfast.”
“Mr. Doom doesn’t get here till after breakfast,” I said. “Mr. Meltzer told me.”
“Then we’ll go right after breakfast.”
“Where will you watch from?” I asked. “They’ll notice if you look suspicious.”
“I’ll think of something,” Harvey said.
The bell rang to wake us up. Everybody rushed back to bed before Mr. Meltzer came in. But we talked about it more on the way to breakfast. Harvey kept insisting he wouldn’t look suspicious, but he wouldn’t explain why not.
“We could stand in a stairwell, open the door a crack, and look out,” I said. “Nobody in the hall would see us.”
“That’s a good idea,” Mike said, kicking the door to the basement open, stubbing his toe, and hopping around.
“It’s lousy,” Harvey said. “Anybody on the stairs would see us.”
“What if we just walk up and down the front halls,” I said, “and act like we know where we’re going.”
“Boy, are you stupid,” Harvey said. “Then everybody would see us.”
I wanted to punch him in the nose.
“Dave’s right,” Eli said as we sat down at our table. “We walk along quickly like we’re running an errand, and then we turn at the end of the hall and go back again if nobody’s watching. If someone is watching, we go around a corner, walk along, act like we forgot something, and turn around.” Eli hit his forehead with the heel of his hand, like he just remembered something. “Like that.”
“But what if somebody stops us?” Mike asked.
Moe and his sidekick bullies took their places at our table.
“Then we say Mr. Cluck sent us to the library for a book.” Eli ignored the bullies. “We go around the corner as if we were going to the library, and then we come back again when the coast is clear.”
Harvey nodded. “That’s what I’d do.”
“Or, if we’re going the wrong way for the library,” Eli added, “we say Mr. Cluck told us to get Ed to fix something and we head for a stairwell.”
“What should we do if Mr. Doom leaves?” Fred asked.
That was a dumb question. “Come and get me,” I said.
“Uh-uh,” Eli said. “You should only get Dave if he leaves for a special onetime reason. If it looks like he’ll do it every day, just watch to see how long he’s gone.” He turned to me. “Then you’ll know how much time you have.”
He was right. The food came. Moe kissed his rabbit’s foot and started on my oatmeal. We stopped talking and started shoveling.
“I’ll watch Mr. Doom’s office first,” I said when I finished eating, “since it’s my carving. You and Eli can come after me.” Just saying the words made my heart skip. I didn’t want to go near Mr. Doom’s office.
Mike said he’d come with me. We were going to do it in twos, since that’s how Mr. Cluck sent us to the toilet.
“Who’ll do this afternoon?” Harvey asked. “You know I can’t do anything once Visiting Day starts.”
“We only need to see if Mr. Doom locks the door when he leaves his office before lunch,” Eli said. “We’ll do it. We might be able to get in then.”
Mr. Doom was all over the place while visitors were here. He shook hands, bragged about what a fine superintendent he was, and smiled his fake smile at everybody.
Harvey yelled, “I’m not robbing anybody’s office while my mama’s here.”
Our bullies looked startled. “Shh,” we all said.
“It’s not robbery,” I said. “He stole from me. And I’m the one who’s going into his office.”
“Today would be the day to do it,” Mike said, knocking his spoon off the table. “He couldn’t beat you too bad during Visiting Day, not with all the families here.”
“He won’t beat me,” I said. “Because he won’t catch me.”