Among the Living (10 page)

“I thought it was an excellent picture,” Goldah said with a first stab at charm.

“Did you?” Eva looked out at the square again and followed the path of the woman. “It’s funny, but Savannah gets its hottest in the late afternoon, five or six o’clock. Have you noticed?”

He hadn’t.

“You will. It’s a surprise at first, but then you know it. It’s as if the heat can’t find anywhere else to hide and just lets itself go. You can’t really find fault with something if it can’t be helped, can you?”

He was enjoying the effortlessness of this, the kind of ease the untested and the very young confuse with love. And he liked the way she spoke of the city as if it were her intimate, a friend who needed protecting, or at least one who deserved the admiration she felt for it. Goldah remembered having greatly admired that quality in people.

She said, “Have you seen the pavilion out on Tybee Island?”

“I haven’t. No.”

“We’ll have to remedy that, won’t we?”

They glanced through several of her father’s editorials, the first few written during the war, one simply titled “Did They Know?” There were more recent ones about the GI Bill and Mrs. Roosevelt — her father was a great enthusiast when it came to Mrs. Roosevelt — and a cautionary series on the future of Palestine. The man wrote in crisp, aggressive prose, and with a sophistication that seemed well beyond the scope of the provinces. Goldah liked him at once. It was only in an article, written for an Atlanta paper, that he finally saw her father’s byline.

“Weiss?” Goldah said. “Arthur Weiss? I don’t think I understand.”

“Yes,” she said. “My maiden name is Weiss. De la Parra is my married name.”

And with that the air in his chest became a dry heat. He thought: I’ve missed it, haven’t I, missed it entirely — the pity and the unwanted kindness. She had gone to such lengths, offered so much of herself, that to call this malice would have been a mark of his own callousness. It was inadvertent, nothing more. Or perhaps in her eyes he was someone not to merit such ideas, not to be capable of those things beyond the most basic needs of a life. He had seen himself as a man. She hadn’t. It was as simple as that. He reminded himself that the fault had been his.

“Yes,” he managed, his eyes focused on the black and white of the printed page now in his hands. “Of course.”

She said, “I’ve kept his name, my husband. He was killed in March of 1945 in Germany.”

The shock of this second blow struck Goldah with equal force. He looked up and saw the unimaginable stillness in her face. There was nothing halting in her voice, nothing to match his own self-pity, which, by comparison, seemed all the more pathetic.

“We received the telegram in May after V-E Day,” she said. “That was very hard. We thought he’d been celebrating but, of course, he hadn’t.”

Goldah nodded as if to console and felt shamed by this intimacy. “I’m sorry,” he said.

“I only mention it because you asked.”

He noticed he was still clutching the clippings in his hand and all he wanted was to stand and to run.

She said, “Are you all right?”

“Yes.”

“Perhaps you need to get back?”

He nodded. She started to get up and he said, “I haven’t spent much time with women — young women — not for a very long time. I apologize if I seem unfeeling.”

She looked genuinely touched by this. “You don’t at all, but perhaps that’s something else we’ll work on.” She stood. “Would you walk me back to Broughton? I have my car there.”

He walked at her side, feeling relief and a strange sensation that he took for safety. He hadn’t felt it in years and only much later would he recall it as happiness.

Pearl was sitting on the porch swing when Goldah got home. Her short legs reached just to the ground and her toes were on point as she pushed herself back and forth. Goldah wondered if perhaps she was in one of her moods: She hadn’t taken the slightest notice of him as he walked up the path.

“Hello,” he said cheerily, surprising himself with his tone. “Did you enjoy the service this morning?” He moved up the steps and she looked over, her stare empty, peaceful, unnerving all the same.

“Yes. Yes, I did. That’s very kind of you to ask. All about endings. The old year done, the new one about to begin. I think Abe liked it as well.”

“I didn’t see him down at the store this afternoon.”

“Oh, so you’ve been down to the store?”

“Yes, since this morning.”

“Good. Good for you. Did you get some lunch?”

“I did.” He was doing what he could to maintain the artifice of this. “Jacob introduced me to Gottlieb’s.”

“Oh, Gottlieb’s. What a treat. I love Gottlieb’s. Did you try a chocolate chewie for dessert?”

“I did. Yes. Delicious.”

“They call them the come-back cookies because you just keep coming back for more. Isn’t that funny? Abe’s been on the telephone since after lunch. He’s in a bit of a mood. Not before lunch but ever since.”

Goldah said, “Is he inside?”

“He is. I was wondering, Ike” — there was just the smallest hitch in her tone — “while you were down at the store, if you happened to spend some time with a Mrs. De la Parra? I’ve had a telephone call myself. From Irene Jelinek. She takes her newborn for a walk during the sermon at the AA and she called to say that she thought she had seen you with Mrs. De la Parra. Was Irene Jelinek correct in thinking what she saw?”

Goldah was struck more by the words “De la Parra” — strangely emanating from Pearl’s mouth — than by the revelation that the two of them had been seen together. It took him a moment to answer.

“As a matter of fact, I did. Yes.”

“Really?” said Pearl no less buoyantly. “And how would you have come to meet Mrs. De la Parra and spend such intimate time with her?”

Intimate time, he thought. Evidently uncomfortable phrases were going to be at a premium. He said, “It turns out Mrs. De la Parra heard I had been a journalist before the war.”

“And how would she have heard that?”

“From the article you showed me,” he said easily. “It mentioned I had written for a newspaper in Prague.”

Pearl hesitated then nodded, perhaps too quickly. “Yes, that’s right. Of course. The article. And how would that article have brought Mrs. De la Parra to a bench in Johnson Square?”

Goldah appreciated the strong detailing in Mrs. Jelinek’s report.

“Is there something I should know about Mrs. De la Parra?” he said. “I hope it wasn’t a mistake of mine to meet with her? She seemed quite pleasant.”

“Of course she’s pleasant,” Pearl said without losing steam. “I’m sure she’s a lovely person. And to lose her husband. I know all that. It just seems strange to me that on a Saturday morning, after she’s been to the temple, she finds herself in close quarters with you on a bench in downtown Savannah with everyone in the world to see the two of you together. So I’m simply asking how it is that such a thing might have happened when I know myself you spend all your time either here or at the store or on an evening walk — all by yourself — which I must say is probably very calming for you.”

Goldah listened and nodded — always at the right moments — and now stepped over and held out the envelope. Pearl stared at it and Goldah said, “Mrs. De la Parra’s father is an editor at the newspaper.”

“Yes, I know that, Ike.”

“Yes … and these are a collection of some of his editorials. She came by the store and thought I might like to see them. It seemed very … thoughtful to me.”

Pearl continued to stare at the envelope, her mouth pursed. Phrases formed, inched ever closer to the lips, and then retreated before she finally said, “Well that
is
thoughtful. Of course it is. I just don’t see how that would have prompted her to take you to Johnson Square.”

“She didn’t take me. I was the one who suggested it.” Goldah realized this might lead to another barrage. He quickly sat with a conciliatory nod; there might even have been a quiet smile behind it. “Perhaps it was my mistake.”

“I’m not saying there’s been a mistake.”

“If only I’d known.”

“A gentleman can suggest any number of things but it’s a young
woman
who makes her own decisions. That’s all I’m saying.”

“Yes, you’re right,” he said, enjoying this perhaps more than he should. “A young woman does make her own decisions. This wouldn’t have anything to do with her having been at the temple this morning, would it?”

“And what is that supposed to mean?”

“I just know you and Abe don’t approve of the Reform Jews.”

“Approve? That’s not what I …” Pearl’s voice trailed off as she shook her head. “Ike, you have to understand how things are. I’m sure the De la Parras and the Weisses have their ideas about how we go about things, and I’m not sure I’d care to hear them, but I will say there’s a good deal of looking down noses — and I’m not saying that’s
always
the case — but you should know better than anyone how certain Jews look at other Jews, and some don’t even want anyone to know that they’re Jewish. But that’s neither here nor there. It’s about the way a woman
behaves.
”

“Yes,” said Goldah, “you’re absolutely right. Although she did seem perfectly respectable.”

“Ike.” Pearl was coming to the end of her rope. “I just don’t want you getting hurt by any kind of person. That would just kill me, you know that, after everything you’ve been through, and what we’ve done to have you come here.”

“I appreciate it all, you know that.”

“I do. I do. And that’s not for you to say. You know I don’t like hearing it. We just care for you so much. You fill our house. That’s what you do. You just fill it. And if I want everything to be perfect for you, well then
I’m
the one to be blamed. That’s all I’m saying. You know that we’re here, and if you need clippings and such, well you just ask and I’ll go get them. I really
will.” This brought a smile and a little laugh. “You see what I’m saying?”

“I do. Yes.”

She patted her hand on his knee. “Well good.” She stood. “So enough about that. I just wanted you to know. Between you and me. No need to bother Abe with any of this.”

“Of course.”

“And I made you a strudel. How about that?” She was at the door when she turned. “Oh, and I completely forgot. Abe said he’s not coming tonight. He’s just not in the mood after … Well — he just wouldn’t be any fun.”

“Of course,” said Goldah, feigning understanding. He had no idea what she was talking about.

“And I’d hate to cancel, so I told Fannie and Selma you’d make a sixth and they’re ecstatic. You don’t have any plans, do you?”

The pleasantness of the day slipped quickly away as Goldah knew it was only a matter of hours before “And how are you enjoying Savannah?” would send him reeling into the grip of untold weariness.

“And how are you enjoying Savannah?”

Goldah sat at the center of the banquette, keeping his elbows in as he tried to spread some butter on his corn-bread roll. Two rounds of martinis had squeezed him ever tighter between Pearl and Fannie, a tall narrow woman with strikingly blue eyes that seemed always in need of a receptacle for their caring. Her husband, Herb, sat on the other side with the Kerns — Selma and Joe — owners of Kern’s Grocery on … Goldah nodded and smiled as if he knew the place and now tried to re-angle the bread.

“Here,” said Pearl, reaching over, “let me help you with that.”

Goldah was quick enough to get his knife free and set the piece moving toward his mouth.

Beyond the rise of Fannie’s hair lay the wide oval of the dining room, flush with tables and linen cloths, and smelling of cooking oil and men’s cologne. Johnny Harris’s was packed on a Saturday night, plate after plate of ribs and chicken drowning under Harris’s famous brown sauce. Fannie had poured some onto her pinkie and was now insisting that Goldah take a lick.

“Careful there,” Herb said with too much geniality, “that’s a married woman.” The laughter carried them past the second round of drinks and onto a short discourse on the art of barbecue.

“Well of course we’re kosher,” said Herb, “inside the house. Outside it’s beef and chicken and fish. Wasn’t it that way where you grew up?”

Herb was a man who saw his own experiences as everyone else’s. It made him either endearing or a boor. Goldah hadn’t decided which.