Son of a Smaller Hero (31 page)

Something stirred within Melech. She is my child, he thought. He was certain that she, his daughter, would comfort him. Her door was opened. Ida, holding an absent partner, glided to and fro before the mirror. Her eyes were shut, her expression dreamy; she wallowed in a smile that said life was good, life was full. She danced naked. Dancing away from him, like the years. His eyes blurred.
Helga, Helga, forgive me
. He saw, more real than her, the rusting springs and the mattress abandoned on the floor. Fading marks on the walls and white, white sheets. Ida opened her eyes and approached the mirror as though she expected to be received by it. She saw an old,
bearded man staring at her. She reached for her dressing-gown in a panic and whirled about to face her father. I caught him, she thought. Melech smiled and nodded in a friendly manner. Smiled, and saw too late that she misunderstood his intentions. His shoulders slumped. He was surprised and ashamed that his daughter could think of him in such a foul way. So he turned away, hoping to be gone before she could speak things that, once heard, could never be forgotten. But she couldn’t understand that either. Besides, he was against Stanley.

“Can’t I have privacy in my own room even? Spying on me, eh? I’m going and I’m glad. What are you looking? Did you ever let me do what I want?
Once
. Ever ask me how I felt? I’m going. I’m glad, you hear?”

Noah, who at that moment was parked across the street from his grandfather’s house, occupied an unique position in the Adler family. He was, to begin with, Leah’s son. Leah wasn’t liked. He was the grandson of a man whom Melech Adler had deeply respected – Jacob Goldenberg the Zaddik. He was the son of Wolf Adler, who, as far as the others were concerned, had died for the Torah. The Adlers lived in a cage and that cage, with all its faults, had justice and safety and a kind of felicity. I wonder what will happen, he thought, now that I’m leaving? They’ll need something to blame me for. Noah stared at the snow. He was immensely happy. He had spent the previous evening with Panofsky. They had sat in the kitchen drinking beer and listening to the music of Vivaldi. Even Aaron had been cheerful. He had given Noah his old suitcase. He had told him stories about Madrid. Panofsky had had lots of beer and had said that he might turn the business over to Karl next summer and come to Europe himself. Aaron had laughed. He had said that the old man was getting lecherous in his last days and that he would be fleeced by the first
D.P
. he met up with. Noah had laughed, too. But he had known that Panofsky would never quit City Hall Street. A new crowd is
arriving, Panofsky had said. Perhaps this time things will work out better. What do I need Europe for? Noah will write us everything. Remembering, Noah grinned. The cold blue sky was without clouds. There was a dry, clean feeling to the day. Miriam had asked him what he wanted. He hadn’t been able to tell her because at that time he had wanted to love her the way he had at first, and he hadn’t been able to. He could tell her now, though. He could tell her that he wanted freedom and that innocent day at Lac Gandon and the first days of their love and many more evenings with Panofsky and the music of Vivaldi and more men as tall as Aaron and living with truth and, maybe, sometime soon, a wiser Noah in another cottage near a stream with a less neurotic Miriam. Oh, he wanted plenty. I’m free, he thought. Max can go to hell. You require me to be an alcoholic, he thought. But you’ll never get that, Max. Not out of me, you won’t. Noah blew on his hands. Remembering his mother, he felt that wire tightening around his heart again. He rubbed his hands together anxiously. She’ll be fine, he thought. Now that she knows I’m really going she’ll pull through. I’ll write every week. Noah dug into his pocket and pulled out two envelopes. One of them contained his rail ticket to New York and his boat ticket. Tomorrow afternoon at four, he thought, I’ll be on that train to New York. What can stop me? The other envelope contained Melech’s letters and receipts and photographs. Giving it to him will be difficult, Noah thought. Why shouldn’t I tell him that Shloime started the fire? He knows that Wolf didn’t die for the Torah. He knows.

The door opened.

Noah stood before him confidently. “I’m leaving,
Zeyda,”
he said. “I came to say goodbye.”

Melech Adler took off his glasses and folded up his paper. “I told you long ago,” he began slowly, “that you are no longer welcome here.…”

Noah placed the envelope on the arm of Melech’s chair. “I brought you this,” he said. “I’m sorry that I took it. But there were many things that I didn’t know then.”

Melech ignored the envelope. “I suppose you want a thank you for such a big favour? Maybe you want I should give you a blessing for giving me back what you stole from me? Look at you! A nothing. You would mix into the affairs from your
Zeyda.”

“Had I known what was in the envelope I wouldn’t have taken it.”

Mr. Adler got up. “You are by me de greatest shame I had. Go.”

“Did my father know what was in the box?”

Melech stared. He had known that one day Noah would come to ask him that question. A wild, vengeful part of him wanted to tell Noah the truth. Ever since he had been a boy Noah had denied him the respect that was justly his. The boy was going away. They might never meet again. Melech didn’t know that Noah already knew the truth about the box. He rebelled against the idea that Noah should come to respect Wolf and not him. Wolf, who had died for a cash-box. Melech walked over to the window. He tugged slowly at his beard. Had I told him about Moore that day, if I had explained it to him first, everything would have been all right. Melech pursed his lips. He remembered that from the first he had always wanted Noah to ask him a favour. He had wanted the boy to be in his debt. He turned to him. “Your Paw knew that I had in the box scrolls. About the other stuff he didn’t know. Nobody knew.”

Noah turned away from him. A lump formed in his throat. He understood the gift of Melech’s lie, and he was speechless.

“You came here another day,” Melech said, “and told me I should try to understand. What should I try to understand?”

“I started out here today with anger,
Zeyda
. I came here to tell you things that I’ve found out. Facts, I guess. But now – you are no longer the same man that I had in mind. I have changed too. I …” Noah paused. He realized gladly that Shloime had been wrong. For
Melech, in Noah’s place, would have told his grandfather that his youngest son had started the fire. Melech, in his place, would have had God and would have done what was just. “You said you wanted me to be a Somebody. A Something. I’ve come to tell you that I have rules now. I’ll be a human being. I’ll …”

“You are going from us?”

“I am going and I’m not going. I can no more leave you, my mother, or my father’s memory, than I can renounce myself. But I can refuse to take part in this …”

“I understand that you are going. Finished. Go. Go, become a
Goy
. But have one look first at what the
Goyim
did to your
Zeyda
. That girl in the picture had she been willing to become a Jewess, to … Stones they threw at me, Noah. My heart they made hard against my children. Who burned me down my office? Who murdered my first-born?
Goyim Goyim
. Now go. Go. Go join, become my enemy.”

Melech Adler sat down and picked up his paper again.

Their eyes met briefly. An old man crumpled up in a chair.

Noah reached out and touched his shoulder. “Would you give me one of the scrolls, one of – one of the scrolls you copied …?”

“The scrolls?
You
. I’m not a scribe … I …”

“I would like to have one to remember – one that you made.”

“They are not very well done, child. There are errors. My father now, he … I …”

Melech got up and opened up a drawer. He glanced wordlessly through several scrolls, selected one, and handed it to his grandson.

“I planned so much for you,” Melech began faltering, “I … Money you could have had – anything, but …”

“You have given me what I wanted,” Noah said.

Melech sat down again. Noah bent over and kissed him. “I’m sorry,” he said.

After he had gone Melech touched his cheek and felt that kiss like a burn. He touched his cheek and felt that he had been punished.

Early the next morning Leah sat in her armchair by the window waiting for Harry to come and get her. In seven hours, she thought, he’ll be gone. There’s nothing I can do.

“Leah – Leah, did you … If – if there is a light …”

Oh yes. Yes. Years, years, years. Noah was no picnic I can tell you that much, but … Her breath began to come quickly. Her father had been a poet and, having lived too long in another country, had died a character. Her husband, a – that man died a hero. Sweat streamed down her face. Her skin turned grey.
A gathering yellow fog of exploding yellow lights, and Leah reached up wearily but in vain for a fading retreating Noah before she was washed back down under many, heavy seas
. God, God. There is nothing I can do to stop him. Nothing. Her head throbbed. A vice-like pain twisted, tightened, in her chest. Tighter and tighter. An enormous weight passed down on her. Leah gasped. Stared. A fierce pain shot down her left arm and crackled in her two little fingers. Another – and fiercer – pain sped swiftly up her jaw. Tighter.

“A light … If you should see … If –
Boyele.…”

Harry knocked on the door. Knocked, and knocked again. There was no answer.

About an hour later Mrs. Adler brought in a glass of lemon tea for Melech. “Noah was here?” she asked.

“Last night. So?”

“He is leaving?”

“He’s going to Europe this afternoon. Finished.”

“All I did was to ask.”

“Ask.”

Each man creates God in his own image. Melech’s God, who was stern, sometimes just, and always without mercy, would reward him and punish the boy. Melech could count on that.

“I’ll get you some buns.”

Melech didn’t protest. He picked up his prayer-book and began to read. And why not? Hadn’t the Angel of Death passed over King David because he was at his prayers?