East Side Stories:Tales of Jewish Life in the Lower East Side of New York in the 1930's (23 page)

Finished at the sink, Mrs. Levine dried her hands on the damp dish towel, removed her apron and picked up an article of clothing she was mending. She sat down on a chair in the kitchen. Her husband across the table went through the newspaper, grunting in approval at something he had just read.

“Harry,” she said, her arm thrusting out as needle in hand she pulled the long thread taut. “How is the business? All right?”

“Yeh. Sure,” he replied without looking up.

“Thank God,” she said. “I thank God every day we got something.”

Mr. Levine said nothing. Soon he arose and went towards the bedroom. His wife followed him and they went to bed. They slept, occasionally there was a far noise from the bridge, the muted clatter of a vehicle, a cry from an awakening infant, the cries subsiding gradually. Silence came, the building slept.

Suddenly she heard it, the high sharp scream, like nothing she had heard before. Mrs. Levine awoke to its piercing noise, she now heard the woman cry out so sharply, so terribly. Oh, my God, he’s killing her, that poor woman! Mrs. 3B! she thought.

She nudged her husband awake shouting, “Wake up, Harry! Quick! Quick!”

Her husband, rubbed his eyes, became awake. “What is it?” he asked.

“He’s killing her, don’t you hear?”

Mrs. Levine jumped out of bed, grabbed her bathrobe, shoved her feet into her shoes. Now her husband was up, jamming his legs into his pants. They ran out of their flat, out into the hallway, rushing to where the screams, louder and louder, were emanating.

The woman was howling, once more, again, the sounds tearing out of that woman’s throat. A small crowd had gathered in front of the woman’s flat, with Mrs. Levine in front, her husband behind her. Mrs. Levine had only one thought, A Jewish woman, he’s killing her! The screams tore out louder from behind the door.

“Call the police!” Someone was shouting.

The screams continued, there were thuds behind the closed door. Gathered before the flat they heard the thuds, the battering, the awful cries. “No! Don’t! Please! No, no, no!”

Mrs. Levine banged on the door. “Open up!” she shouted hoarsely. The screaming and noises from the apartment continued. “Open up!” She turned to her husband and screamed,
“Gutt in himmel,
God in heaven! Do something, Harry! You can’t let him kill her!”

“Open up!” he began to shout. He banged on the door, it shook, trembled under his fists, a drum-like noise booming out. There was a sudden silence, the noise inside the apartment stopped. They could hear the woman inside whimpering terribly, animal noises. “Open up!” Mr. Levine ordered.

“Go away!” the husband shouted through the door.

“Open this door or I’ll open it for you!” Mr. Levine roared out as he banged furiously on its wooden panels. “I’m coming in, you hear? You better open up!”

The door shook under his hammering, a wood panel began to groan, a small split appeared in the wood. The banging continued,

Mr. Levine was shouting, his face red, a chorus of voices swelled up from the people behind him. Finally the door opened, there was the woman, blood streaming from her nose, a blotch from a hard slap across one cheek, she stood sobbing uncontrollably before them. Behind her, in the apartment, chairs were scattered, broken glass and china lay strewn on the floor. Her husband stood with clenched fists at his side glaring wildly at the crowd.

Mr. Levine entered, followed by two other men. As they approached the woman’s husband, Mrs. Levine and some of the other women entered the flat and crowded around the beaten woman.

Mr. Levine, in a controlled dangerous voice was saying to the man in the apartment, “Who do you think you are, hah? You wake up the whole place, you think—”

“Who do you think you are! Get out of my house!” the man hissed.

“You—you—” Mr. Levine said menacingly as he came closer to the man. “You open up your mouth once more and I’ll show you who I am. They’ll carry you out of this house, you hear me?”

A heavy silence fell. Behind them Mrs. Levine was saying to the battered woman, “You got a towel?” The woman nodded dumbly. Mrs. Levine said to one of her neighbors, “Go get a towel from the kitchen, we got to wipe away the blood. Go quick!” The woman scurried into the kitchen, found a towel near the sink, grabbed it, ran water into it, wrung it out and hurried back to the battered woman. Gently she dabbed at the blood on the woman’s face while Mrs. Levine, her voice uncontrollable now, screamed out to the man,
“Merderer!
Murderer! Animal!” Turning to the woman she said, “Is this what he does, this? Unbelievable! You can’t stay with him.” The woman, sobbing, shook her head in silence, moaned lightly. Mrs. Levine said, “Oh, my God! Will you look at that!”

A neighbor was saying to the woman,
“Shah, shah,
don’t worry. We won’t let him do it to you.” Gently, gently, she cleaned up the woman’s face. “Come,” she said. “Don’t go back in there.”

The woman’s eyes widened. “What? What?” she mumbled between groans.

“You can’t go back there. You can’t live this way. He’ll kill you. What kind of a life is this for a Jewish woman?” Mrs. Levine said.

The woman was shook her head dumbly. A neighbor leaned towards Mrs. Levine, whispered, “Where can she go?”

Mrs. Levine, her arm around the woman’s shoulder, said, “So she’ll come to my house, she’ll sleep there. I’ll make room.”

Mr. Levine was saying to the man, “You’re lucky, this time.” The man was about to say something, he glanced fearfully at Mr. Levine’s physique, said nothing. Mr. Levine shouted “You listen, you! Next time,” he said slowly and deliberately, “I’ll come in and I’ll break your arms and your legs, you hear?” The man, his fists clenched tightly at his sides, stared at Mr. Levine who said, “I’ll come in and I’ll put you in the hospital.” Shaking his fist in front of the man’s face, Mr. Levine said in a menacing whisper, “Don’t fool with me, mister, you understand? I’ll teach you to be a
mensch,
a human being.”

 THE DAY AT CONEY ISLAND

Squeezed, compressed on all sides by the other standing human beings in the BMT subway car, its seats all grabbed long before, the warm sour smell of sweating flesh all around him, Danny managed to turn his head and said to Goldie standing beside him, “It’s goddammed hot. When is this ride going to end?”

On that steaming summer Sunday morning they were on the Sea Beach line to Coney Island, desperately seeking relief from the oppressive heat wave that had enveloped the city for over three days. With temperatures near a hundred degrees during the days, along with humidity near record heights, the nights not cooling down, Danny and his younger brother had attempted to sleep on the tarred roof of the tenement they lived in on the Lower East Side of New York. But it had been impossible, the oppressive heat had been inescapable. The remainder of his family had attempted to sleep on the metal fire escape that jutted out of the aged building, whose entry was a window from their flat.

They called the roof of the tenement Tar Beach, the young people came there to sunbathe during the bright sunlit days of late spring and summer. Under the heat, the tar turned to a semi-liquid glue which spread and squished under their shoes as they walked to find an empty space. During those broiling nights, the roof had been crowded with tossing and turning tenement tenants all trying desperately to pull sleep to them.

Below, all the fire escapes of the building had been filled with people, some staring up at the sky, others moving, all seeking to find a comfortable spot in which to relax, a spot that eluded them.

On the street below, on and near the stoop of the building, in the darkness of the heavy night lit only by the street lamps, people sat dumbly on folding chairs, some had nodded off, some snored, some spoke softly to one another, some sat staring out at the blackness.

The scorching heat had come over the city, a hot heavy felt denseness which had flowed in and around everything. It had seemed that the heat would never go away. Outdoor metal burned to the touch, the sidewalks were frying pans, people sweated in steady streams.

Saturday night, when they usually met on the street corner near the candy store, Danny and Goldie and Max had agreed to go to Coney Island. They would meet early Sunday morning, go to the BMT subway station on Essex and Delancey Streets, take the subway, change for the Sea Beach express train whose last stop was Coney Island.

Danny would have liked to take the special bus that stood on Delancey Street, but the bus ride cost twenty-five cents, it was more than they could afford, while the subway cost a nickel. The bus would have been delightful, Danny thought, it was a special vehicle with no sides, only rows of benches, a floor and a roof for the riders, the roof held up by intermittent vertical narrow beams. The front of the vehicle contained the usual cab for the driver. Danny had also thought of taking the trolley from the Brooklyn end of the Williamsburgh Bride. The special summer trolley too had no sides, but the trolley took forever, it turned and curved all through Brooklyn, it made innumerable stops, it was too hot, Danny had no time to spend on that trolley, he wanted the cool ocean, the sooner the better.

Now jammed in tight in the subway, human flesh pressed to human flesh, Goldie stood nearby gazing out unseeingly across the car, his eyes glazed. Max, the smallest of the three of them, was lost somewhere in the mass of jammed humans in that car. At each stop, in some inexplicable fashion, more passengers were being added to the train, shoved in by subway employees who were called pushers.

Danny held on tightly to his rubberized canvas bag which contained his underwear, a brown paper bag which held his lunch of two hardboiled egg sandwiches and an apple, a towel, a thin blanket with a jagged rip at one of its ends. He was wearing his bathing suit under his clothing. The blanket would serve to stake out his territory once they were on the beach. Later, after he had spent the day swimming, he would get dressed under it..

The train swerved, its wheels screeched, filled the underground with its howl that knifed the eardrums. The massed crowd, as one, swayed into the turn, corrected itself when the train came out of the curve. The underground darkness suddenly became bright sunlight, the train was outdoors now, roaring and clattering along the rails. The car in which Danny stood was still hot but now seemed different, it still smelled of heat and sweat but somehow seemed fresher. The clack of the train over its railroad ties beneath beat a rhythm into Danny’s brain. And he waited, waited, yet wanted it all to be over, for it to be the end of the line, Stillwell Avenue.

At last it was. They poured out of the cars of the train, a flood of humans, all of them running except for the aged. The parents of small children, some carrying babies, moved faster, rushed for the exit and rushed for the street.

Out in the street now, lit brilliantly by the merciless sun, they heard the roar of the ocean’s surf, loud then soft, repeating itself endlessly. The throng began to slow somewhat, Coney Island was under their feet. The beach lay not too far away, just a few blocks and they would finish their long trek.

Max called out from somewhere, “Hey, fellers, wait for me!” Goldie raised his hand so that Max could see them in the crowd. Danny and Goldie stopped, a flood of humans streamed around them. Now Max was there with them, and they walked on.

They were walking up Surf Avenue, past the booths selling ice cream, frozen custard, hot dogs, sodas, knishes, waffles, others selling spun sugar candy. The sidewalks were jammed with stationary people lifting uncapped soda bottles to their lips.

There were some restaurants for these for those who were still affluent in this Depression, but Danny knew nobody who could afford to eat there. There were several stores that sold items for the beach, articles for swimming, thin rubber bathing shoes, bathing caps in many colors, water wings purchased by non-swimmers or by parents for their very young children, which were blown up by mouth then tied to the non-swimmer, the filled off-white bladders seemed like a pair of wings. There were stores which sold salt water taffy, the machines in their windows were bright metal spindles mixing and curling the wide strands of taffy into skeins.

Here and there were small side shows, with canvas banners depicting freaks, Siamese twins, a tremendously fat lady with her immense girth, a bearded lady, someone called a half-man half-woman, a dog-faced boy, dwarves, the misshapen usually hidden human parts of human life.

Danny and his two friends walked quickly past all of this, there were open-fronted places where barkers urged passersby into rides. One of them was shouting out, “Come on in, folks! Ride the autos!” Small metal ovoid cars all in different bright colors which seated two people, all heavily bumpered with wide deep rubber set above their wheels, a single antenna rod in each rear, which touched against the heavy grilled electrified ceiling which sizzled when the cars moved. From somewhere a roller coaster clacked metallic chatter as it roared down its steep incline.

Danny and his friends hurried on, there was The Whip, passengers screaming and laughing with delight and terror. Crowds filled the sidewalks spilling into the streets themselves. There was noise, shouting, confusion, the flow of the throng towards the beach. They passed Steeplechase Park with its multitude of rides. A calliope brayed out a tune, the melody blasted out into the streets. A race with carousel-like horses, their bellies set upon metal tracks roared by, their riders hunched and laughing.

“Let’s hurry it up,” Goldie said. “It’s hot. Let’s get to the beach.”

Danny was sweating, his body clammy and steaming, his clothing glued to himself. The sweat rolled down his forehead, drops trickled into his eyes, the scene became blurry. The sun blazed fire. They turned into Twenty-third Street, up ahead several blocks away, at the intersection, was a portion of the wide boardwalk, the shaded beach beneath it.

Clutching his canvas bag tightly Danny began to hurry towards the beach, the other two beside him. Sweating heavily, they were under the boardwalk, they stopped for a brief moment to feel the coolness of its shadowed depths.

Cool, cool, cool, Danny had forgotten what cool was, now it felt so good. They were walking on sand now and in this dim space ceilinged by the bottom of the boardwalk some people sat escaping the heat.

They stopped to remove their outer clothing, carried their shoes and socks, as they went hurriedly on and entered the exploding sunlight of the beach. There was a mass of people so cramped together that no sand seemed visible.

The heat once again beat down upon them, frying them as they threaded their way down the sand. Young people, old people, teenagers, children, all had already staked out their beach claims for the day. Food was being eaten, children were crying, laughing, babies’ diapers were being changed, young people were laughing, frolicking, others were singing. Beach purveyors were hurrying through the throng shouting out their wares, Popsicles, Eskimo Pies. The Eskimo Pie vendor carried his large round orange metal canister harnessed over his shoulder. When he made a sale and lifted the lid of the canister, white mist, the gas of dry ice, escaped in a small eruption into the air. The Popsicle vendor carried a rectangular insulated container which also contained dry ice. The soda vendor, bottles crammed in a large bucket filled with cracked ice now and then stopped to uncap a soda and sell it to a thirsty buyer.

The hot sand burned fire on the soles of Danny’s feet. He pranced fast and high down the beach. People shoved, pushed, ran, collided with each other. Danny ran on, the soles of his feet more and more had become furnaces. He was at the water’s edge, the roll of the surf had stained the sand a dark brown tint. Danny stood on the damp sand, cooling the soles of his feet as he scanned the beach.

“I can’t find a place,” Goldie said looking around at the mass of humanity. “I don’t see an inch of sand around.”

Out in the surf, near the edge of the beach, wide-bodied women bobbed up and down in the water, never dipping lower than their throats. Men, also flabby and fat, non-swimmers, splashed awkwardly in the water, their arms flailing, and all around were children, some wore water wings and pretended to swim.

Farther out, in the gleaming rolling waves, swimmers were stroking, some of them swimming seriously. On the beach, the lifeguard perched in his chair in a wooden tower, squinted into the sun, watched the swimmers far out, sometimes blowing his whistle and calling out to someone who had gone out too far, asking the swimmer to return.

Danny was saying, “There’s no room now. Look, the tide’s going out, there’ll be more beach later.”

“That’s later,” Goldie said. “But right now we need a place to put our stuff down.”

“I’m looking,” Danny said as he searched the beach. He shook his head and said, “What the hell, let’s find somebody who’ll hold our things for us.” Nearby, surrounded by young teenage boys, was a group of five girls sitting on a blanket. Danny pointed them out to Goldie and said, “Let’s go ask them to mind our stuff.”

The three of them pushed their way towards the girls. As they approached, Goldie said to them, “Hi. How’re you doing?”

The girls looked up, turned to look at each other. One of them said to Goldie, “We’re doing fine,” and laughed as she asked Goldie, “And how’re you doing?”

“We’re just fine,” Danny said. “Do you mind if we just left our things here for a while we took a swim? We’ll be back soon.”

“We don’t mind it at all,” another girl said, “I was just thinking of going in for a dip myself.” She turned to one of her friends and asked, “You’re coming in, right?” Her friend nodded, the two girls began to rise.

Danny placed his bundle of clothing and his canvas bag on the edge of the girls’ blanket. Max, Goldie and Danny joined the two girls, all of them ran towards the surf, their feet splashing in the water as they ran wading and slogging sending up gleaming splashes and beads of water.

Danny dived into a large roaring roller, the water closed around him, dark and salty, stinging his open eyes as he stroked in the greenness, dimly seeing the lower parts of bodies of those nearby. When Danny surfaced, he looked around. Goldie had just surfaced, Max now bobbed up, his mouth open, taking in great gulps of air. One of the girls rose up from the water, the other one, her friend, was stroking expertly towards them.

“Hey! You’re good!” Max said to the girl who was the true swimmer.

“Why not?” she said with a laugh. “You think only you can swim?” She turned to her friend and said, “You’re doing all right, Evelyn. Coming right along.” Evelyn rose from the water and joined her friend.

“What’s your name?” Danny asked the girl who was the swimmer. There was a momentary silence. The surf rolled in, curled, turned white at its crest, tumbled and fell in a roar, ebbed slowly back. Danny said, “Your friend’s name is Evelyn. What’s yours?”

“What’s yours?” the girl asked.

“Danny. And these are my friends Goldie and Max. Now, come on, what’s your name?”

“Clara,” the girl said. The surf boomed, some swimmers, heads in water, collided with them, then went on. “Where do you live?” she asked.

“In a house,” Max said laughing as he glanced at his two friends. “How about you?” The girl said nothing.

“Come on, let’s swim,” Danny said to break the silence. “Why don’t we have some fun and enjoy ourselves? It’s too hot to stand here and ask questions. We can do that afterwards.”

He liked how the girls looked, they were so well-formed, thin, tanned but the memory of that terrible heat still lingered in his mind and more water, this water, could drive that memory away. That was more important than where a girl lived.