to him and laid her hands lightly over his. “I feel peaceful,” she said.
She stretched and yawned, covering her mouth. Ten chimes struck delicately from the clock on Joseph’s dresser.
“Pompous, silly thing,” Anna cried.
“What, the clock? I don’t know what you’ve got against that beautiful clock. You just don’t like the people who gave it to us.”
One day, a few months after their marriage, a delivery man had brought a package from Tiffany.
“He looked puzzled,” Anna said. “I don’t suppose he’s ever delivered in this neighborhood before.”
It was a gilded French mantel clock. Joseph had placed it carefully on the kitchen table and wound it. Through the glass sides they had watched its exquisite rotating gears and wheels.
“I knew the Werners were going to give us a present,” he had said. “I wasn’t to tell you, but they sent their chauffeur down to Ruth’s to ask about your health and she told him we were married. Aren’t you pleased? You don’t seem pleased.”
“I’m not,” she had answered.
“I can’t understand,” he remarked now, “why you resent those people so. It’s not like you, you’re always so kind.”
“I’m sorry. Yes, it was good of them to do. But it’s too rich for this house. We’ve no place to put it, even.”
“True. But well have a better place someday. Good enough for this and your silver candlesticks, too.”
“Joseph, don’t strain so much, don’t work so hard. I’m satisfied the way we are now.”
“Satisfied with a basement flat on Washington Heights?”
“It’s the best place I’ve ever lived in.”
“What about the Werner house?”
“I don’t really
live
there. It wasn’t mine.”
“Well, it ought to be. That’s the way I want you to live. You will live like that, too. You’ll see, Anna.”
“It’s after ten,” she chided him softly. “And you have to be up by five.”
Anna’s breathing whispered in the dark. She moved her legs and the sheet rustled. Footsteps hurried, clacking on the sidewalk only a few feet from his head. The little clock went
ting!
eleven times. There was no sleep in him, only a rush of thoughts, sharp and clear, one after the other, clear as etching on glass.
He worried. It seemed to him that as far back as he could recall he had always known worry. His parents worried. All the people in the houses on Ludlow Street, all the way over to the East River, worried. They worried about today and tomorrow. They even worried about yesterday. They were never able to let yesterday die.
Naturally, he had never seen the Old Country, yet he knew it well. It was a landscape of his life as surely as the street and the five-story tenements, the crowds and the pushcarts. He knew the Polish village, his grandfather’s horse, the frozen walls of snow, the sliding mud, the bathhouse, the cantor who came from Lublin for the holidays, the herring and potatoes on the table, his mother’s baby sister who died in childbirth, his grandmother’s cousin who went to Johannesburg and made a fortune in diamonds. He knew all these, as well as the terror of hooves on the road and the whistle of whips, the heavy breathing in the silence behind closed shutters, the rush of flames when a torch is put to a roof and the sigh of ashes settling in the morning breeze.
The burning of Uncle Simon’s house had been the act that decided his parents. They were a strange couple, still without children, so without reason for living, no? (What else is there to live for but to have children and push them up, healthy and learned, to a region higher than your own? That’s what it’s all about, isn’t it?) But they had none, andhis mother grew old before her time. Not fat and old from birthing and nurturing, but dry-old, pinched-old, empty-old. She had a stall in the market, and was known for her charity. His father was a tailor with round shoulders and red eyelids. He sighed as he worked, unaware that he was sighing. When he put his
She stretched and yawned, covering her mouth. Ten chimes struck delicately from the clock on Joseph’s dresser.
“Pompous, silly thing,” Anna cried.
“What, the clock? I don’t know what you’ve got against that beautiful clock. You just don’t like the people who gave it to us.”
One day, a few months after their marriage, a delivery man had brought a package from Tiffany.
“He looked puzzled,” Anna said. “I don’t suppose he’s ever delivered in this neighborhood before.”
It was a gilded French mantel clock. Joseph had placed it carefully on the kitchen table and wound it. Through the glass sides they had watched its exquisite rotating gears and wheels.
“I knew the Werners were going to give us a present,” he had said. “I wasn’t to tell you, but they sent their chauffeur down to Ruth’s to ask about your health and she told him we were married. Aren’t you pleased? You don’t seem pleased.”
“I’m not,” she had answered.
“I can’t understand,” he remarked now, “why you resent those people so. It’s not like you, you’re always so kind.”
“I’m sorry. Yes, it was good of them to do. But it’s too rich for this house. We’ve no place to put it, even.”
“True. But well have a better place someday. Good enough for this and your silver candlesticks, too.”
“Joseph, don’t strain so much, don’t work so hard. I’m satisfied the way we are now.”
“Satisfied with a basement flat on Washington Heights?”
“It’s the best place I’ve ever lived in.”
“What about the Werner house?”
“I don’t really
live
there. It wasn’t mine.”
“Well, it ought to be. That’s the way I want you to live. You will live like that, too. You’ll see, Anna.”
“It’s after ten,” she chided him softly. “And you have to be up by five.”
Anna’s breathing whispered in the dark. She moved her legs and the sheet rustled. Footsteps hurried, clacking on the sidewalk only a few feet from his head. The little clock went
ting!
eleven times. There was no sleep in him, only a rush of thoughts, sharp and clear, one after the other, clear as etching on glass.
He worried. It seemed to him that as far back as he could recall he had always known worry. His parents worried. All the people in the houses on Ludlow Street, all the way over to the East River, worried. They worried about today and tomorrow. They even worried about yesterday. They were never able to let yesterday die.
Naturally, he had never seen the Old Country, yet he knew it well. It was a landscape of his life as surely as the street and the five-story tenements, the crowds and the pushcarts. He knew the Polish village, his grandfather’s horse, the frozen walls of snow, the sliding mud, the bathhouse, the cantor who came from Lublin for the holidays, the herring and potatoes on the table, his mother’s baby sister who died in childbirth, his grandmother’s cousin who went to Johannesburg and made a fortune in diamonds. He knew all these, as well as the terror of hooves on the road and the whistle of whips, the heavy breathing in the silence behind closed shutters, the rush of flames when a torch is put to a roof and the sigh of ashes settling in the morning breeze.
The burning of Uncle Simon’s house had been the act that decided his parents. They were a strange couple, still without children, so without reason for living, no? (What else is there to live for but to have children and push them up, healthy and learned, to a region higher than your own? That’s what it’s all about, isn’t it?) But they had none, andhis mother grew old before her time. Not fat and old from birthing and nurturing, but dry-old, pinched-old, empty-old. She had a stall in the market, and was known for her charity. His father was a tailor with round shoulders and red eyelids. He sighed as he worked, unaware that he was sighing. When he put his
Similar Books
