Portraits (83 page)

Again, Henry swallowed hard.

“They’re called
matzo
balls, dear,” Michele told him.

Henry was the only one who was disturbed by Eliot’s gaffes. For Doris, this occasion was deeply satisfying. The hardships she had survived had brought her to this moment. She not only had a family gathered around her but a family that promised to grow. Imagine, she even had a grandchild sleeping upstairs—it was as though the family denied her in her life was now richly compensated for…

As they sat having coffee, Gary said, “We have an announcement to make.”

Doris and Henry looked at him expectantly—Henry thinking, My God, maybe he’s changed his mind and is going to become a doctor…and Doris hoping that this one would be a girl.

“Yes, Gary? What’s the announcement?” Doris prompted.

“Well, this is going to be a bit of a shock to you but…we’re moving to Israel.”

Doris and Henry could only stare for a moment. Then, finding her voice, Doris asked, “Why?”

“For one thing, because there’s a great need for engineers there.”

Before he could go on, Henry said, “What’s the matter, in America they don’t use engineers anymore? What kind of nonsense is this? You’re Americans. How can you go to live in Israel?”

Robin answered, “Dad, the only place you can really be a Jew is in Israel.”

“Why, there’s not enough Jews for you here in the United States?”

“But it’s not the same. We’ve thought this over very carefully, dad. Gary and I want to go live on a kibbutz in the Negev. That’s why we named the baby Mordechai…we knew it even then. There’s a quality of life there that we just don’t have in the United States.”

“I think this whole thing is crazy,” Henry said. “Where would Israel be without the contributions of money from American Jews?”

Gary interjected, “It would have been a lot harder for them, but we weren’t doing anything so noble, dad…If there had been the State of Israel during Hitler’s time, six million Jews wouldn’t have been annihilated…You might as well know the whole truth. We’ve also become Zionists.”

“Zionists!” Henry rasped.

“Yes, dad. I’m not saying that every Jew should be a Zionist, but it happens to be right for us. I’m sorry if you don’t approve, but we have to do what’s best for us, follow through on our own beliefs.”

Doris sat thinking back on all the years and all the worries she’d had over her children. Somehow the Book of Ruth came to mind…“for whither thou goest, I will go…Thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God.” How ashamed she was this evening that she had questioned Gary’s judgment the night he told them about marrying Robin. Well, Israel wasn’t really so far away. Woodside, California, was a lot closer and she hadn’t seen her parents in over twenty years. “I think we should raise our glasses to Robin and Gary for the part they want to play in maintaining our heritage. I love and admire you both very much.”

Gary came around and kissed his mother. She looked very special to him tonight; he knew the conflicts and the pride she was feeling. Then he went to his father, put his arms around him and said, “Dad, thanks for everything. I’m very proud to have a father like you.”

“And I’m proud to be your father,” he said, and he genuinely meant it. He wasn’t really angry with their decision. It was more that he knew how much he would miss them. How much he and Doris both would miss them. My God, what’s wrong…If Gary had married Barbara Levy he’d probably never have moved, would have settled down here. So he marries a
goyisheh maidel
who converts and becomes more Jewish than any of them. She even wants her
country
to be Jewish…

Doris looked on, also thinking of the ironies of life. Her mother and father had come to America from the old country, but papa had divorced himself from the beliefs he had once held so dear. And yet here were Gary and Robin, who had the faith papa had lost and were going to fight to perpetuate it…“Have you decided when you’re leaving?”

“In about two months, I think…Incidentally, you’ll have to address your Chanukah cards to Mordechai Ben Lev.”

Doris laughed. “And what are you going to be, Mr. and Mrs. Gary Ben Lev?”

“No, I’m changing my name to Ari, and Robin’s will be Rahel.”

Eliot picked up his glass and said, “I think we should all drink to Rahel and Ari, keepers of the faith. In the words of my dear friends the Kaufmans,
Mazel tov
and
L’chayim
.”

Michele looked at him lovingly. This extraordinary man seemed to understand it all.

Six months had passed. Doris had waved good-by to two of her children, going off to a new world, and today she and Henry had just arrived at Eliot’s ranch for their daughter’s wedding.

Chang Lee’s wife had prepared a room for the Levins and for the sake of propriety Michele had been moved from Eliot’s room to a room down the hall. If Henry had guessed that this wasn’t the first time Michele was sleeping in Eliot’s home, he gave no indication.

That night they gave a dinner party for Doris and Henry. The Kaufmans were present, along with a number of Eliot’s close friends. At seven-thirty, Eliot’s father arrived. Ben Burns was a tall husky man who lived in a sprawling ranch house at the east end of the property with Juanita, his housekeeper-mistress of twenty years.

Two days later the house was prepared for the wedding. Michele hadn’t told her parents that she was to be married by a rabbi, but when he arrived to perform the ceremony she could see the pleasure and gratitude in their faces. When the rabbi pronounced them man and wife and Eliot embraced his Jewish bride, dressed in violet Chantilly lace, Doris and Henry looked on with tears in their eyes. God was in his heaven, all indeed was right with the world.

That night the newlyweds spent their honeymoon in Eliot’s room, while Doris and Henry were sequestered in their room at the other end of the long hall. As Doris lay awake she thought, Good Lord, how the world had moved on. It seemed only yesterday that Rachel, Lillian and herself were sitting in a Dodge truck on the Fourth of July, going to Alum Rock. She thought about the letter she’d received last week from Rachel, who was living part of the year in New York to be near her son Larry, who had married the daughter of an illustrious banker…Imagine what mama and papa had missed. They not only had grandchildren whom they had never seen, but even a little great-grandson by the name of Mordechai Ben Lev. What a pity to be deprived of such satisfactions because of anger and pride. These joys could have enriched their lives. That’s what families were really all about, growing together and sharing the blessings and sorrows and love…

The wedding breakfast was real Western style, with pancakes, oatmeal, hash browns, eggs, slabs of ham, country-churned butter, biscuits and honey.

Doris, smiling broadly at Eliot, said, “This has got to be the best damn ham I ever tasted.”

“Sorry, Doris, that’s kosher corned beef,” he said.

“Best damn corned beef I ever tasted.” …

As soon as the plane back to San Francisco was airborne, Doris turned to Henry as she put her hand over his. “I think our Michele’s got herself quite a man this time, don’t you, honey?”

“I always said you were smart, Doris, and even if you do outtalk me, you always have the right answers. He sure is quite a man. How they got the rabbi to marry them I’ll never know.”

“Oh, I have a feeling that Eliot can accomplish most anything he puts his mind to.”

“Well, let’s just hope and pray that they have a good life.”

H
ENRY’S HOPES AND PRAYERS
during the next year were more than realized. Michele found life with Eliot as close to heaven as anything on earth could be.

Often she would recall the first week of their marriage, which Eliot considered “the best damn honeymoon” in the world. They had spent the week touring the ranch, but it was impossible to cover the entire seven thousand acres in that little time.

He took her first to the corral, where she sat on the fence and watched him show off his equestrian ability. He called attention to his special tooled saddle, which he used only on very special occasions—like honeymoons. Then he showed her the bunkhouses and introduced her to the cowhands.

The first night of the tour he drove the jeep up to the timberline and came to a halt. “Honey, this is where we’re going to bed down for the night. It’s not going to be
matzo
balls,
gefilte fish
and your mother’s noodle
kugel
, but I make the best damn baked beans and venison you ever tasted…” When they turned in for the night, she was shivering in the cold Nevada air and climbed into her sleeping bag to undress. “Don’t bother with that flannel nightgown,” Eliot said. He got in alongside her, zipped up the bag, and before she knew it she was very warm and cozy. Very.

The first real bath she had on their honeymoon was the night they spent at Ben’s. Juanita was a beautiful woman, of Mexican, Indian and Irish ancestry, and Ben clearly adored her. How could he not? Michele thought. Dinner that night was thick bean soup, roast leg of venison and peach cobbler.

When they got back to the house after the honeymoon it seemed that Eliot thought she still had a few things to learn about the life she’d live with him.

For example—how to ride. “It’ll toughen up your butt,” he said.

But when she sat in the dust after her first spill, she said, “I’m not getting back on that thing—”

“Of course you are, that mare’s damned sensitive.”

“Really, what about my butt?”

“After a few more falls, it won’t be quite so tender. Now, up you go.”

“Eliot, I’d do anything in the world for you, but I’m not going to get up on that—”

Before she could finish the sentence, she was back in the saddle again. By the time autumn came she was an accomplished enough rider to accompany Eliot to the round-up in the northwestern part of the ranch.

If their life took on a pattern, it was one that Michele never found boring. From time to time they spent a weekend in Reno, where Eliot thought he had a little catching up to do at the gaming tables. One night his winnings were so great that he bought drinks for everybody and ended up going to bed drunk as a hoot-owl. The next morning, without any apologies, he said, “I sure had one hell of a time. How about you, lady?”

“Well, I was okay after you simmered down and I was able to get your boots off, but I must admit I was thinking of taking another room.”

“Why?” he asked, nibbling on her ear.

“’Cause you snored.”

“I always do that when I get drunk as a skunk. But drunk or sober, I expect to wake up and find you right alongside of me…”

Once a week she drove into Reno and shopped, had lunch with Fran Kaufman, then was at the ranch in time for dinner. She always bought Eliot some crazy little thing she knew would make him laugh. And he always did.

In December, Michele and Eliot trudged through the snow until they found the perfect Christmas tree. As they took a rest from their efforts to chop it down, Eliot said, “I know it’s a little against your principles, the Christmas tree thing, but I’ll help you light your Chanukah candles and you help me trim the tree. That way we’ll work out the whole damned thing…”

Doris and Henry came to spend Christmas with them, and the uproarious Christmas Eve party included the Kaufmans, Ben and Juanita, and an assortment of Eliot’s relatives. Eliot was especially fond of Aunt Effie, who was a little hard of hearing except when it came to being offered what she’d like to drink.

Eliot also decided that this year there was going to be a Mr. and Mrs. Santa Claus giving out the presents, so after dinner he and Michele went upstairs and changed into their costumes. She put on a gray bouffant wig that came to a topknot, granny glasses, shoes laced to the ankle and a long red skirt with a white ruffled blouse. When she stuck the pillows into her blouse, Eliot came over and took a good handful. “You know something, lady? I wouldn’t mind a bit if I could nosh on those.”

She laughed and danced away from him. “Eliot, you’re crazy.”

“Is that any way to talk to Santa Claus?” Flinging the sack over his back and handing her an enormous basket, the two of them walked back into the livingroom with the record player blasting “Jingle Bells.”

Eliot dusted the fake snow off his shoulders, and suddenly Mrs. Claus was calling out the names.

After everybody had gone to bed, Eliot whispered, “Lady, this was the best damn Christmas I ever had in my whole life.”

She said quietly, “I got a secret to tell you. You’re going to be the best damn father—”

He let out a whoop. “You mean you been holding out on me?”

She answered hesitantly, “Yes, darling, I guess I have.”

Catching the apprehension in her voice, he turned on the lamp and said, “For how long?”

“As long as I could. I’m in my fourth month.”

“Why?” he asked. “Michele, I thought we got rid of all those ghosts. I thought riding that mare would strengthen your butt
and
your courage. Now I’ve got news for you, lady. As of today, and this is an order, you’re going to take it easy. And you’re going to leave the worrying to me. I can be a tough buzzard. You’ve got something that belongs to me and I mean to collect.”

“Oh, Eliot, I love you so much, and I don’t want anything to go wrong for us.”

“Well, you just stop worrying about it and keep thinking about what we’ve got ahead of us. If there’s anybody that ever loved a woman, it sure as hell is me.”

In the months that followed, Eliot did everything he could to reassure her, and made certain that she was not subjected to stress or strain of any kind. He called Doris and told her that he thought it would be good for Michele to have her mother there toward the end of her pregnancy, and so Doris came out in the beginning of May to spend a few weeks with her daughter and son-in-law.

A week before the baby was due, Eliot took a large suite of rooms at the Riverside so that they would be close to the hospital. His timing had been quite accurate. At the Reno Presbyterian Hospital on May 15, 1959, Michele was delivered of a boy. When Eliot saw Steven Burns for the first time, he threw his hat in the air and twirled Doris in his arms. “By God, you’re the best damn looking grandmother in the world.”