The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz (41 page)

“You don’t so-say,” Duddy said.

“He’s angry at you, Duddy, and when the Boy Wonder gets –”

“I know. He eats bread and it comes out toasted. I’m angrier but.”

Simcha sat silent and severe in the front of the car.

“Why didn’t you pick a farm for yourself?” Duddy asked.

“I don’t want a farm here.”

“Why?”

“The girl came to see me last week.”

“What girl?”

“Your girl.”

“I haven’t got a girl.”

“Yvette came to see me.”

“You don’t have to worry,” Max said. “He’s all washed up with her. A good thing too. Mixed –”

“Will you not interrupt, please?”

“She told me what you did,” Simcha said. “And I don’t want a farm here.”

“So you couldn’t even wait to hear my side of the story? Is that right?”

“I can see what you have planned for me, Duddel. You’ll be good to me. You’d give me everything I wanted. And that would settle your conscience when you went out to swindle others.”

“Will you all get into the car, please?” Duddy slammed the door. “Nobody’s ever interested in my side of the story. I’m all alone,” he said, pulling savagely at the gearshift.

“The boy’s fits are getting worse and worse.”

“I didn’t give him epilepsy.”

“What’s going on?” Max asked.

“Would you have rather I married a
shiksa, Zeyda?”

“Don’t twist. Not with me.”

“You don’t twist either. You don’t want a farm. You never have. You’re scared stiff of the country and you want to die in that stinky old shoe repair shop.”

Simcha took a deep breath.

“A man without land is nothing. That’s what you always told me. Well, I’m somebody. A real somebody.”

“Why do we have to quarrel,” Max said. “We’re one family.”

“You couldn’t even go to see Uncle Benjy before he died. Naw, not you. You’re just too goddam proud to live. You –”

Simcha looked resolutely out of the window.

“I’m sorry,” Duddy said.

“You see, Paw. He’s sorry. Kiss and make up,” Max said.

Eventually they reached the highway.

“I’m sorry,
Zeyda
. I … Please?”

But Simcha still stared out of the window. Duddy parked in front of Lou’s Bagel & Lox Bar. And Simcha wouldn’t get out of the car.

“We won’t be long,” Duddy said. But inside he couldn’t eat. “Here, Lennie,” he said. “Take him a coffee.”

“Forget it,” Max said. “He gets like that. I know from long experience.”

“Shettup, please.”

“Time heals,” Max said.

“Will you shettup, please.”

Lennie returned with the coffee. “Would you believe it,” he said. “He’s crying. I thought I’d never live to see the day …”

Duddy bolted out of the store. He did not pause to look into the car, but hurried past it and around the block. He began to run. The land is yours, he thought, and nothing they do or say or feel can take it away from you. You pay a price.

Yvette wasn’t at the house. Neither was Virgil. He found them in the park. Yvette saw him coming and motioned him back, behind a tree, before Virgil could see him. Then, after she’d whispered something to Virgil, she came to join him.

“Seeing you again,” she said, “might be enough to bring on another fit.”

Duddy swallowed, he wiped his hand through his hair, he didn’t speak. He looked exasperated.

“Now tell me quickly what you want,” she said. “I’ve got nothing to say to you.”

“Maybe. Maybe that’s so. But I’ve got plenty to say to you, sister. Why for two cents I’d wring your goddam neck. Why did you go to my grandfather? Of all the people in the world he’s the only one –”

“That’s exactly why I went.”

Duddy made a fist. He shook it.

“I told him about the check. I told him everything. I wanted to hurt you as badly as I could.”

“Gee, thanks. Thanks a lot.”

“Please go.”

“Look I did it all for us. Do you think I enjoyed forging the check? Am I a thief?”

“I don’t know what you are any more. I don’t care, either.”

“I had to act quickly, Yvette. I had to think for all of us. What I did was … well, unorthodox. That’s the word I’m looking for. But you know, like they say, he who hesitates – Don’t you understand? It’s mine now. At last the land is mine, Yvette. All of it.”

She tried to walk away. He stopped her.

“I’m going to pay him back. I swear it, Yvette.”

“We don’t want your money. If we wanted it we could sue you. All we want from you is to be left alone. Can you understand that?”

“He’ll get every last cent of his money back whether he likes it or not. And that’s not all, either. I’m going to build him a pretty white house. Just like I said. So help me God I will.”

“We don’t want to see you again, Duddy. Ever, I mean.”

“Oh, where do you get this ‘we’ crap suddenly? We-we-we. Listen –”

“Are you finished?”

“– you listen, Yvette. You are looking at the man who is going to build a town where only bugs and bullshit was before. I’m going to create jobs. Jeez, I’m a public benefactor. But you’ve got to have faith in me, Yvette. You’ve got to help. Give me time.”

“You can have all the time in the world, Duddy. But I don’t ever want to see you again.”

“I don’t ever want to see you again,” he said, mimicking her voice. “Quack-quack-quack. What do you think this is? Some dumb movie?”

“I’m serious, Duddy.”

He gave her an anguished look, started to say something, held back, swallowed, shook his fist, and said, his voice filled with wrath,
“I have to do everything alone. I can see that now. I can trust nobody.”

“We betrayed you, I suppose.”

“Yes. You did.”

He had spoken with such quiet and certainty that she began to doubt herself.

“You’ll come crawling,” he said.

“I want you to know something.
I’d
sue you. I’d even get Irwin Shubert to take the case. But Virgil won’t let me. He doesn’t even want to hear about it any more.”

“You hate me,” Duddy said. “Is that possible?”

“I think you’re rotten. I wish you were dead.”

“You don’t understand, Yvette. Why can’t I make you understand? Listen, Yvette, I –”

But she turned away from him.

“You’ll come crawling,” he shouted after her, “crawling on your hands and knees,” and he walked off.

When Duddy finally returned to the store his father’s back was to him. Max sat at a table piled high with sandwiches and surrounded by strangers. “Even as a kid,” he said, sucking a sugar cube, “way back there before he had begun to make his mark, my boy was a troublemaker. He was born on the wrong side of the tracks with a rusty spoon in his mouth, so to speak, and the spark of rebellion in him. A motherless boy,” he said, pounding the table, “but one who thrived on adversity, like Maxim Gorki or Eddie Cantor, if you’re familiar with their histories. You could see from the day of his birth that he was slated for fame and fortune. A comer. Why I remember when he was still at F.F.H.S. they had a teacher there, an anti-Semite of the anti-Semites, a lush-head, and my boy was the one who led the fight against him and drove him out of the school. Just a skinny little fart he was at the time, a St. Urbain Street boy, and he led a fearless campaign against this bastard MacPherson …”

The strangers looked up at Duddy and smiled.

“That’s him,” Max said.

Duddy retreated. He raised his hands in protest.

“My brother,” Lennie said. “Hey, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” Duddy said. “I’m fine.”

“Can’t you ever smile?” Max said, turning to the strangers with a chuckle. “Would it cost you something to give us a little smile?”

“I’m not driving back with you,” Duddy said gruffly. “You take the
zeyda
home. I’m going by bus.”

“Why?”

“Never mind why. Christ almighty. Just give me the money for my fare. I’m flat broke.”

“That’s a laugh,” Max said, turning to the others again. “Isn’t that a laugh. He’s broke.”

Duddy’s cheeks burned red.

“Are you O.K.?” Lennie asked. “You look sick, Duddy.”

“I’m fine. Just give me the money, please.”

“Aw, I know what it is. You can’t hide anything from the old man. I’ll bring in the
zeyda
and you’ll kiss and make up.”

“In a minute,” Duddy said, “I’m going to explode. I’m going to hit somebody so hard –”

“Easy,” Lennie said.

Max smiled at the strangers. “It’s been a big day for him. Red letter stuff. And you’ve never seen a nervier kid.”

Duddy started for his father, but the waiter got in his way. “Mr. Kravitz?” He smiled shyly at Duddy, holding out the bill. “Are you the Mr. Kravitz who just bought all that land round Lac St. Pierre?”

“Yeah. Em, I haven’t any cash on me. Daddy, can you …?”

“That’s all right, sir. We’ll mark it.”

And suddenly Duddy did smile. He laughed. He grabbed Max, hugged him, and spun him around. “You see,” he said, his voice filled with marvel. “You see.”