FINN WAS ALMOST AT Charles Street, lost in the reverie of his pervasive contentment, when he remembered his promise to Vanessa. He had told her he’d pick up her dresses from Schumann for their upcoming weekend away.
Swearing under his breath, he turned back. Now he was going to be late getting home. He’d been so busy congratulating himself, he’d forgotten to behave in a way worthy of congratulation. If he came home without the dresses, Vanessa might cancel the trip because she’d have nothing to wear. If he arrived late, but with the dresses, she would also be out of sorts. One measure of me as a man, Finn thought, is that I don’t forget what I’m supposed to do.
Less composed, Finn hurried back uphill.
When he got to the elevated train separating Boston proper from the immigrant enclave of Boston improper, known as North End, he slowed down, evened out his stride and took deep breaths to calm his lungs.
But though Finn walked more slowly as he crossed under the clanging trains, shadowed in the artificial darkness of the elevated track and the tall buildings packed around the narrow winding alleys, he didn’t search for a glimpse of his reflection in the sooty North End windows. He already knew what the looking-glass would reveal: that his shoulders were slumped and his head was lowered. On the corner of Salem and Prince, Finn walked into Schumann’s tailor shop not as a conqueror but as the great unwashed, which was the truest measure of who he felt he was, in the deepest deep from which his soul sprang.
Finn liked coming to see Schumann. His shop was unlike other places Finn frequented, and in that lay some of its appeal. The bank was spacious, gleaming, full of glass, and Schumann’s place was dark and narrow, with only two windows and a front door for light. Schumann’s bell never stopped ringing. The tailor was somewhat of a celebrity in the North End. When Vanessa would ask Finn why he insisted on going “all the way there” when there was a perfectly good tailor right around the corner on Myrtle, he would tell her it was because Schumann was the best.
He was also inordinately fast. Need the shirts starched and pressed by five this evening? Not a problem. I’ll have them ready for you. You want your wife’s dress taken in four inches in the waist and the length hemmed and biased? Give me till 6:15 tonight.
It wasn’t just for Finn that Schumann worked like this, it was for all people, even those who hadn’t lent him the money to start his business. Schumann was the man who got it done, no matter what it was.
But Finn knew—Schumann worked for Finn the fastest of all.
Finn watched the tall, thin tailor discuss various holes, fadings, and stains with the customers ahead of him. Schumann was soft-spoken and polite. He treated everyone with the same level of courtesy, be they chimney sweeps or vice-presidents. Occasionally he wore a yarmulke, but not today, and he sported a beard that he often shaved clean off, as if he wasn’t particularly attached to it either. His gray hair was still impressively thick. He was in his late fifties. His back was stooped from bending over the looms, and this made him appear shorter, but in fact he was taller than Finn, though half as wide. There was something calming about the man, his mouth full of thread, his sharp eyes smiling. Maybe that’s why Finn liked coming to him. And not just Finn. Schumann’s clients regaled him with more than just the rips in their fabric. They also plied him with minute details of their aches and pains, their inflammations and congestions. And Schumann, courteous to the last, listened to them all.
Schumann’s face always lit up when Finn walked through his door, but today, he looked even brighter than usual. His voice pitched louder. “Finn, hello there! Just a moment, sir, just one moment.” His finger flew up, beseeching Finn to wait. The tailor remained polite with his other customers but became less patient.
Finn watched him approvingly. There was nothing that Schumann wouldn’t or couldn’t do. Finn had tried. He’d tested the man.
Schumann, I have a silver button missing off my suit jacket.
Not a problem, Finn. I’ll replace it for you.
But it was custom-made in Brookline!
When do you need it by, tomorrow morning?
Schumann, my girls got purple paint on my favorite shirt.
Not a problem; leave it with me. The tailor would smile. Unless you want me to dye the whole shirt purple color? I can do that, too. Purple can be quite fetching.
A purple shirt, for a man, Schumann? Are you being funny?
Yes, sir, a little bit.
And so it went.
He had found Schumann by accident years ago, even before he got married. Back then, it was just the tailor, his iron, a sewing machine, and a steam hose. And to be perfectly accurate, Finn didn’t find Schumann. Schumann found Finn. One day when Finn was walking up Salem Street, a man had stopped at the corner to let the produce carts pass. The man said to Finn in heavy English, “You have rip in back of your suit, sir. Very big. Yes, afraid so. Would you like me to fix for you?”
“I can’t just take off my jacket and give it to you,” said Finn. Gentlemen didn’t take off their coats in public!
“Of course not, sir. Step right here with me. Right here, into doorway. Now, take jacket off. I fix.” Like a magician, from the depths of his seemingly bottomless pocket, Schumann produced a spool, a thread, and a small pair of scissors. In a minute or less he had repaired the damage. “All done,” the tailor said. “Good like new.”
“Where are you from?” an impressed Finn had asked.
“Right here, on Salem Street, sir.”
“They taught you well in the old country.”
“I wasn’t tailor in old country. That was my, how you say—relaxation.”
Finn thought Schumann had a wife who helped with the sewing. He never indicated one way or another if he had any children. But then the woman vanished and was replaced by another woman at the sewing machine. After a while, she too disappeared and was replaced by someone else.
“Everything good, Schumann?” Finn asked this evening when the tailor was finally free.
“Very,” Schumann replied. “Thank you for asking.”
Finn glanced at the new girl sitting at the table, stitching. “Where do you get them from?” Finn smiled. Was Schumann an old dog?
“They come from the old country.” Schumann didn’t rise to the bait.
Finn smiled. “Not quite what I was asking, but okay. Listen, I have a question for you.”
“And I have something to ask of you,” Schumann said. “But you go first.”
“I meant to mention it the last couple of months,” Finn said, casually tapping his fingers on the counter. “I’ve been looking through the weekly business, and I noticed odd activity in your business account.”
“Odd?”
“Yes, you’ve been withdrawing your money.”
“Is that strange to manager of a bank?” Schumann asked. “When people withdraw their own money from their own accounts? What kind of activity do bankers find normal?” His eyes twinkled teasingly.
Finn continued drumming. “Here’s the odd thing,” he said. “While you’re withdrawing your money, everyone else is depositing theirs.”
The tailor shrugged.
“Why are you taking your money out, Schumann?” Finn asked. “We’re all booming, sky high. What do you know that I don’t? You can tell me. I’m like your financial doctor.” Finn smiled.
“Very good. Like I’m your clothing doctor.” Schumann smiled back and stroked his beard, watching Finn thoughtfully. “There is nothing to tell. I have some money left in the accounts, no?”
“Ten percent of what you had in the spring. Why did you withdraw 90 percent of your savings?”
Schumann leaned forward and lowered his voice. “Because, Finn, the price of thread has gone up.”
Finn was silent, his brain assessing.
“Thread,” Schumann repeated. “It’s gone up in price.”
“Oh, I heard you. So?”
“That’s a big deal to a tailor. Thread, you see. Vital to my business.”
“What about U.S. Steel? Is that not vital to your business?”
“It is, sir! My needles are very important. Steel has also gone up.”
“You don’t mean the price of steel shares,” said Finn. “You mean the price of actual steel?”
“Well, I suppose both,” said Schumann. “But I am more concerned with the price of actual steel.”
Finn straightened the sleeves of his suit jacket. “You wouldn’t think rising prices are a bad thing if you had invested in the company that produces the steel for your sewing needles, as I have been advising you to do for years.”
“Let’s see how the year ends for steel, and then we can revisit.”
Finn was still mulling. “If thread has gone up, Schumann, just increase your own prices to cover it.”
“I can’t.”
“Why?”
“I will lose customers. Wages have not gone up.”
“Okay, but coal and gasoline have also not gone up,” said Finn. “Or rents. Or taxes.”
“No, Finn. Just thread,” said Schumann. “And it’s gone up in price because Coats and Clark is producing less of it. Now why would that be?”
“That’s not possible.” Finn frowned. “Schumann, for the love of God, stop speaking in riddles.”
“You asked. I’m telling you.”
“There must have been a bad cotton crop.”
“No, record crop,” the tailor said. “Three years in a row.”
“Maybe the looms broke.”
Schumann shook his head. “Nothing’s broke. Harvest is excellent, nothing’s broke. C and C simply have too much inventory.”
“There’s your answer. They’ve been making too much thread.”
“No.” The tailor lowered his voice for emphasis. “People have stopped buying thread.”
Finn frowned again. “If that’s the case, then the cost of thread should come down, to level out the surplus.”
An animated Schumann slapped the counter. “Exactly!” he exclaimed. “Prices should have come down. And yet—they went up instead.” The tailor looked anxious but self-satisfied. “That’s why I’m taking my money. When strange things happen around me, I become like the keeper of light.” He lifted his hand to his brow. “Watching out for my ships at sea.” He paused, glancing over to the silent girl by the sewing machine, then coughed his angst into a handkerchief.
“And now all your ships are under your mattress,” Finn said. “I thought you were stepping out on me.” He smiled. “Giving your business to someone else.”
“Never, sir. But perhaps you can step outside with me for a moment?”
“Outside?”
“For a moment.”
This was unprecedented. Schumann had never asked Finn to step outside. Hanging a sign on the door that said he would be back in five minutes, Schumann led Finn by the elbow out into the street.
“I have a big favor to ask of you, Finn.”
“You want me to lend you money to buy a bigger mattress?”
But Schumann didn’t smile, and he didn’t hem and haw. “Would you please hire the girl in my shop? I need to find her a situation as soon as possible.”
Finn was not expecting this. For a moment he was too stunned to speak. He stammered. “You want me—what—you want—I—to hire your sewing girl? But, Schumann, I don’t need any sewing done at my house.”
“That’s good,” Schumann said, “because she can’t sew to save her life.”
“Is that why you’re trying to get rid of her?”
“I’m not getting rid of her,” Schumann said tensely. “Just the opposite. I want to find her a good position. But also, I do have some others who need my help. I can’t find them adequate employment. Nate brought too many. Even though the ship crashed, and some of them died. Despite the deaths, still too many.”
“Um—who is Nate?”
“Least important detail, Finn.”
“What ship?”
“Also not vital.”
“Why did the ship crash?”
“Why do ships crash, Finn? Bad luck? Ill will? Dark omens?”
Finn’s head was spinning around the merry-go-round of startling details. “Who is she?”
“Now we’re getting somewhere,” said Schumann. “Someone who needs my help.” He paused. “And yours.”
“Is that the real reason you’ve been withdrawing your money?”
“So I can what? No.” Schumann coughed. “Though Nate does need to find a new ship now.”
“Because his ship crashed?”
“Exactly!” Schumann frowned. “Or are you being ironic?”
“Exactly.” Finn ran his hand through his hair. He was stupefied. “What am I supposed to do with a refugee who doesn’t speak English? How can she help me?”
“I didn’t say she speaks no English,” Schumann said. “She is very good with languages, and she is a quick learner. In everything but sewing. She speaks Ukrainian, Romanian, Polish. Russian.” The tailor said the last word like he was spitting it.
“Less helpful than you think to have a polyglot in the house who knows Romanian.”
“She will learn, I promise. And it’s just her.”
“As opposed to what?”
“There could have been a whole family. There could have been another person.” Schumann looked wrecked when he said it.
Finn stepped away, defeated as always by the magnitude of things he didn’t understand. “What you’re asking is not a favor, Schumann.”
“I know, Finn,” Schumann said. “What I’m asking for is an act of service.” He pressed his fists to his heart and stared pleadingly into Finn’s face. “It’s not lending money or writing a letter. It’s much bigger than that. I understand. But she is very important to me. I know she will be safe with you and your family. And I will not forget it. I will never forget it.”
Finn was still reeling. “Who is Nate?”
“A young man who thinks he knows everything, and who doesn’t listen. I’ve got serious problems, Finn. I don’t ask you to help with all of them. Just this one.”
“Schumann, what is this woman going to do in my house?”
“She can assist your wife with your daughters. Don’t you say your wife needs help sometimes?”
Finn blinked. “We have a governess.”
“She can clean.”
“We have a housekeeper. And a maid. Two maids.”
“She can cook. To be honest, I don’t know if she can cook.”
“I have a cook. And a cook’s assistant.”
“Maybe she can work for you at the bank?”
“Maybe she can work for me at the bank?” Finn repeated incredulously.
“Why not? She will do whatever you need. She can drive, she can make deliveries. Uh—actually, I don’t know if she can drive. She can ride a horse.”
“Aye,” Finn said, nodding. “And there you have it. There’s the rub. The bank doesn’t make deliveries by horse.” Finn narrowed his eyes, realization dawning. “But you don’t want me to just give her a job. You want me to take her home and give her a place to live.”
“Yes,” the tailor said, his lip trembling. “But just her. Not a family. Not another person.” He looked as if he were about to cry.
Finn rocked back on his heels. He knew how hard it was for a proud man to ask a favor. It had been a long time since he himself had asked anyone for anything. What a watershed life he led.
“When do you need me to do this?” Finn said in a resigned voice. No sooner had the words left his mouth than the young woman was out of the shop and by his side, all three of them warily looking up and down Salem Street.
Finn watched them say goodbye, Schumann embracing her like one of them was going off to war. His shoulders were shaking. The young anesthetized woman patted his back, but her expression read, you foolish soul, if only you knew all the things to weep about. The tailor wiped his face and said something to her in a foreign language, brushing away from her cheek some loose cotton thread. The only part Finn understood was, “Come on, chin up. You’re in America now.”
What had Finn done? What was he going to tell Vanessa? And their families, who were sitting in his lush garden, relaxing, waiting for him to come home. It was barely acceptable that an Evans should cross the uncrossable divide, head into the fetid square mile—the walled Irish-Italian-Jewish ghetto that was North End—into a hovel owned by a runaway Jew to drop off and pick up his own suits and his wife’s dresses. Maids did this. Servants! His old friend John Collins from Harvard would never live down the doggerel his father the poet had written about this very thing: “This was good old Boston, the home of the bean and the cod, where the Lowells talk only to Cabots, and the Cabots only to God.” The Evanses and the Adamses did not bring home fresh-off-the-boat refugees, gaunt, pale, emaciated, in clean but squalid dress, nothing but eyes and mouth and barely breath.
Finn Evans was about to. He hadn’t thought it through. Except . . .
She was so numb and haunted, her eyes the color of Boston Harbor in a storm, some indefinable green slate. She wore a maroon-colored head scarf, wrapped around her head and tied in a large knot at the front over her prominent forehead. “What’s your name, anyway?” he asked, unable to keep the sigh out of his voice, expecting no response or perhaps just some guttural croak.
But the young woman raised her granite eyes to him, straightened her spine, and with a proud air of old-world grandeur said in a deep, strong, androgynous alto, “Isabelle Martyn Lazar.” Her lip trembled slightly.
They stood, facing each other.
“I’m Finn,” he said.