Chapter 42

Yetta was in bed when Gershon got home. It was unusual for her not to wait up, a cup of tea and a slice of cake set out for his return. She didn’t stir when he slipped under the covers beside her. He touched her shoulder hesitantly. Yetta did not shrug him off, but neither did she roll closer.

“I’m tired,” she said. “Ruchel schlepped me to another of her meetings. All those ladies talking and making plans. So many words, my head got dizzy from listening.”

“Next time, you can be the one to speak,” Gershon told her.

“Me? What would I say?”

“Tell them that by the year after next, every family will have a toilet and electricity.”

“And by what miracle is this supposed to happen?”

“No miracle. I talked the Community Board into passing a resolution. If landlords don’t comply, they’ll be reported to the City authorities and fined. Maybe even jailed.”

His wife sat up and planted a big kiss on Gershon’s dry lips. Tears ran down his cheeks. “So you’re not going to leave me?” he asked.

“What in God’s name are you talking about?”

Gershon hesitated. Was he crazy to have imagined Yetta was fed up with him? Had two years of searching for Shmuel, followed by two years of remorse for failing, made Gershon lose his mind? Half embarrassed, half desperate for reassurance, the words tumbled out. “Now that you see I still have influence, you won’t move out with Ruchel or move in with Zipporah?”

Yetta got on her knees and turned to face him. Light from the street lamp illuminated the window shade behind her, making her look like an actress on a movie screen, but her words were better than a script. “What did I ever care if you were rich or poor, a big macher or a little pisher? Money I had growing up. You I married because I wanted an adventure. You gave me a life in America I never would have had in Lemberg. Here I learned everyone is a worthwhile person.”

“Including me?”

“Especially you.” Yetta held Gershon tight. “I love you, not for winning, but for being a mensh. You stand up for others, even if it’s a losing cause.”

“I’d rather win.” Gershon unpinned Yetta’s hair, whose silvery strands tumbled down in the moonlight. Tomorrow he would buy her an expensive gift to celebrate.

“Nu, there’s nothing wrong with winning.” Yetta touched his chest like the flirtatious girl who’d slipped her handkerchief into his pocket at the bakery thirty years ago. “You won me.”

Not a fancy present, Gershon reconsidered. Tomorrow he’d bring home a watermelon.

***

A week later, Gershon had just gotten off the phone after arranging housing for a family newly arrived from Russia when Yetta and Ruchel came home from a women’s tenement association meeting at Walhalla Hall. Ruchel had persuaded the men’s American Federation of Labour union local to let the women use their reserved space that night. They’d even donated a coffee urn and paid for the rented chairs.

Yetta had been excited but nervous about announcing the board resolution to the group. “What do I know from making speeches? Why can’t you explain it to Ruchel, she should tell them?” she’d asked. Gershon couldn’t admit that he was scared to tell his daughter. Suppose Ruchel resented his interference or taunted him for bragging? She might dismiss its significance, along with him. Instinct told him it was better for Ruchel to hear about the resolution from Yetta.

Usually Ruchel went to her room when they got home, while Yetta stayed up with him. Tonight, however, Yetta nudged Ruchel toward the kitchen while she went into their bedroom without saying anything. Gershon was afraid things had gone badly. Ruchel asked if he’d like a cup of tea. Stunned by her offer, Gershon could only nod. He watched his daughter fill the kettle, not bothering to wipe the water she dripped on the floor, and take down a china plate reserved for company, on which she arranged an assortment of cookies. They were both silent waiting for the water to boil. Before the tea had fully steeped, Ruchel brought their cups to the table. Gershon asked her for the sugar cubes. She stared around the kitchen, until Gershon got them from the cupboard where Yetta kept them in a cut glass dish and brought them to the table himself.

Gershon took a rugelach but his throat was too constricted to swallow. He wanted to wash down the cookie with the weak tea, but it was too hot. He blew on it, hoping it would cool off quickly. He prayed for Yetta to emerge from the bedroom and fill the kitchen with her chatter.

At last, Ruchel broke the silence. “It should have been a woman who addressed the board and got them to pass the resolution.” She demolished a cookie in two bites, dropped three lumps of sugar in her tea, and took a gulp, apparently immune to the scalding water.

Gershon shivered, his body tensed for a scolding.

“But until more women find their voices, we still need men willing to speak up for us.” She slid the sugar dish back toward him. “So, I suppose I should thank you.”

Gershon took a tentative sip of tea, slowly emptying his cup before trusting himself to answer. “The words I said to the board were the same ones you spoke at City Hall. I couldn’t have said it better. They were ready to take action, just like the crowd who cheered at your rally.”

Ruchel’s face flushed. Gershon hadn’t expected his praise would matter to her. “Maybe you should reconsider being a teacher,” he told her. “Think how many girls you could talk into making something more of their lives.”

“I thought you and Mother wouldn’t rest until I got married.” Ruchel snorted and refilled their cups. “I don’t want to be responsible for our family being the subject of gossip.”

“I’ll persuade your mother that marriage can wait, especially if Zipporah and Jonah give her a grandchild. Besides, Mama’s stronger than she looks.” Stronger than me, Gershon thought.

“And you?” Ruchel asked. “Will you be ashamed before the whole community?”

“I’ll be happy to see you find a purpose in life.” Gershon stopped, afraid she’d see him as pushing her and deliberately reject his suggestion.

Instead Ruchel laughed and looked at the puddle on the floor and crumbs scattered on the counter. “I’m not marriage material anyway.”

Gershon let out his breath and savoured a cookie. He’d settle for Zipporah alone carrying on his wife’s talent in the kitchen. “I’ll pay your tuition. You can quit your job at the hosiery store.”

“What’s wrong with my working?”

“Nothing,” Gershon sputtered. Somehow she’d scrambled the gist of his words. “I meant, I don’t mind paying. I want to encourage you.”

“I’m going to keep working, Father. I refuse to lose touch with women who don’t have a choice.” Ruchel paused and scooped up the crumbs. “I might be willing to accept a loan.”

Gershon risked a smile and quoted Leviticus. “When you lend money to a kinsman, do not charge interest or otherwise take advantage of him.”

“What about a kinswoman?” Ruchel’s voice was edged with impatience.

“We’re family!” Gershon said, getting mildly annoyed himself.

Ruchel leaned forward, all childish petulance suddenly gone. “Suppose I wanted to start a school for girls only? Not to teach them homemaking skills, although I’d make sure they learned the latest information about health and hygiene, but to enroll each one in a pre-college track.”

“I’ll underwrite your school.” Gershon reflected that in Lemberg, poor boys were forced to end their education at thirteen. Here in America, poor girls had a chance to go to college. What immigrant, even in his wildest dreams, had imagined such a thing?

“You’d acknowledge that I was the headmistress and let me make the rules?”

“Agreed. I’d stay in the background, even moonlight as the invisible night-time janitor.”

“If you behaved, I might let you teach a course in accounting.”

“So you’re going to encourage young women to become capitalists?”

“I’m going to encourage them to become whatever they want. That’s how it works here.”

“Yes. That’s how it works in America.”

***

Gershon sat alone in the kitchen late into the night. Ruchel thought the way he had upon arriving in this land of opportunity. Power meant money and running the lives of others. In the last year, he’d come to a different understanding. Success did not depend on accumulating wealth or status. Gershon’s ultimate achievement was to stand alongside the poor and disenfranchised and, above all, earn the love of his family. Genuine success called for humility.

He hoped that someday Ruchel would learn the true meaning of being an American too. That would be the ultimate proof that not only had Gershon himself arrived, he’d passed along his wisdom, l’dor vador, from one generation to the next. Like the contentious Jews in the Torah, railing against authority was a necessary step on the road to the Promised Land. Henceforth, Gershon would take pride in his daughter’s rebellion. Even when it hurt, he’d remind himself she was continuing the journey he started.