The Children (3 page)

“C'mon over duh stoop,” she said.

They walked over to the stoop, sitting down there again. Shyly, he reached to her hand, hesitated, and then took it. Warm and small, it rested inside of his, and she glanced at him, raising her upper lip.

“Yuh mustn' do dat.”

“Why?”

“It's bad.”

“I don' wanna be bad.”

Calculatively, she looked at him, smiling just a little, her upper lip still raised over her gums. With a precise motion, she drew her dress down over her knees. She turned away; then she looked at him again.

“It's like lookin' at a nakid lady,” she said.

“It ain'.”

“Dincha never see one?”

“What?”

“A nakid lady.”

Ishky stared at her, at her yellow hair and her wonderful blue eyes.

“Wanna see one?”

Ishky was running across the street. She stared at him, unbelievingly, and then she waved her arms over her head.

“G'wan run, yuh dirdy Jew!”

Y
OU SEE
, A that, was Marie, whom I loved then. Maybe I love her now, since that was not too long ago.

But where is the summer day? Everything is gone—except that I am still Ishky; but everything else is gone.

The beautiful song inside of me went. I ran into the hall, where it was dark and comfortable, and I sat down against one wall. Nobody would think of looking for me there, but who would want to look for me? Through the darkness, I stared at my fingers, counting them. One to ten—they were all there. Why did my fingers make so much difference?

But Marie— If I only could tell her some of the things I know, she would not be the way she is; for Marie is beautiful and perfect and fine. If I could tell her of the secret garden.…

I read about the secret garden somewhere, and then I began to look for it. A beautiful garden, where you simply have to be happy. I knew it was somewhere.

Behind our house, there is a yard, surrounded by a high wooden fence. To get into the yard, you go through the cellar, and then up a little flight of wooden steps with an iron railing. You open the cellar door, and you are outside in the sunshine, and in front of you is the fence. And just at the bottom of the fence, a little grass grows. I knew the secret garden was there, though I had never been there.

If I could tell that to Marie—

We could both come and stare at the fence. If you have a secret word, a door in the fence opens, and then you are in the garden. I saw myself walking in the garden with Marie. Of course, there is more sunlight there than anywhere else, and what a picture the sunlight would make of Marie's hair and face! There would be flowers as blue as her eyes and as red as her cheeks.…

But that's dreaming—no more than dreaming, because I'm here alone in the hall, hiding from Marie. And what if Marie should come into the hall here, looking for me? What if she should?

Jews were funny.…

Marie screamed after him, “G'wan, run, yuh dirdy liddle basted, g'wan an' run away!” And then she stopped abruptly, sat down with her hands in her lap, and then she began to cry. She didn't know why she was crying—except that she satisfied some desire inside of her. But she would have to cry a great deal to satisfy it completely.

Still crying, she rose and walked up the block. She crossed the street, and then, quickly, she stopped crying, rubbed her fists into her eyes. Ollie was coming.

Ollie swaggered down the block, his hands in his pockets. She didn't like Ollie, but how can you help admiring Ollie when he swaggers like that?

“Hey, Marie,” he called.

“You lemme alone, you Ollie.”

“Aw, Geesus, Marie, I ain' goin' tuh touchya. Whatsa matter witcha, anyway?”

“Yer allus fresh. You lemme alone, y'hear?”

“Awright.”

Ollie stopped in front of her, his legs spread, his hands still in his pockets. He smiled slyly at her, his handsome face knowing and sure, and then he took a handful of something out of his pocket. Whatever it was, it sparkled and gleamed in the sunlight.

“Whaddya got?”

“Wouldncha like tuh know?”

“Aw, lemme see, Ollie.” She stared eagerly, then threw back her head, laughing. “Jus' immies.”

“Beauties.”

They were red and yellow and blue, and the more she looked at them, the more she wanted them. Slowly, she reached out her hand.

“Git away.”

“Jus' gimme one, Ollie.”

“You git away.”

“Jus' one.”

Ollie seemed to consider. In his role of king, he was not above being benign. First to one side, then to the other, he cocked his head. He swayed back and forth, perched on the balls of his feet. He thrust out his hips, his hands in his pockets.

“Well,” he said finally, “whaddya gonna gimme?”

“I ain' got nuttin'.”

“Wanna come down duh cellar?”

“Nah.”

“I ain' goin' tuh hurtya, hones', Marie.”

“Whaddya gonna do?” She was wary and ill at ease. She knew what Ollie would do. She didn't want the immies, but they were an excuse for what Ollie was going to do. If she did it because she wanted the immies, that would make it all right. Then she wouldn't be bad, and she could say at confession that she had simply traded for immies. But not too quickly—

“How many immies?”

“All yuh wan',” Ollie said.

“Well …”

“Aw, c'mon.”

W
HEN
I went down in the cellar, on my way to the secret garden, I saw her with Ollie. But I guess no matter how much you are hurt, you heal quickly. But if you are hurt too much—what then?

FOUR

N
OW YOU WOULD THINK, WOULDN
'
T YOU, THAT BECAUSE
of this, I, Ishky, would never laugh again. I thought so myself then—until I came out into the warm sunshine. How warm the sunshine is in the summertime, and how good! There is no school, nothing but the whole day in front of you to lazy away, and if you want to do one thing or another, nobody will stop you.

A little spick was running up the street, waving his arms, and screaming, “Aily-baily, a bundle of straw, fartin' is agin' the law!”

“Shuddup,” I yelled. “Shuddup, yuh dumb liddle spick.” I was bigger than he.

Shomake was standing in front of his store. Shomake is as old as I, maybe, and we call him that because his father makes shoes. I don't know what his real name is. Nobody does.

He waved a hand at me. Well, I like Shomake. I waved back.

“Hey, Ishky!”

“Hey, Shomake! Wanna shoot immies?”

“Gotta practice.”

Ishky crossed the street, his eyes lighting up. When he came close to the little shoe repair shop, he smelled the warm aroma of spaghetti, cooking in back. Behind the counter, the old man sat with his head bent over, swinging his hammer; he always swung his hammer like that, always.

“Gonna practice now?”

Shomake nodded his head, looking sorrowfully at Ishky out of oversize brown eyes. His face always appeared to be all eyes, and his skin was brown as a nut.

“Yeah.”

“I'll wait.”

They went into the back room. Out of the sunlight, there was darkness everywhere; the whole block was that way, darkness ringing sunlight. The back room was small, tight; they all lived and cooked and slept there. At the stove, Shomake's mother stood, cooking, and the smells of the spicy cooking made the air in the room so thick that you had an impulse to cut through it with waving arms. Shomake's mother was a black splotch, vaguely indistinct in the manner of grownups. She turned around to smile at them, and Ishky thought that there was something wonderfully strange about her small white face in the dusk.

She said some words to Shomake in Italian, and Shomake answered back. Then he went into the corner and got out his fiddle. Small, bent over in a little circle, Ishky crouched on the bed, while Shomake pinked the strings of his fiddle.

“Whaddya doin'?”

“Toonin'. Dat makes duh sound right.”

“How do yuh know?”

“Jus' listen.”

Ishky wondered how he could see his music, it was so dark there. And he was so small and the fiddle was so large. Ishky waited, trembling a little.

The music whispered into the room, and the skin all over Ishky's body rose in little prickles. He flashed a quick glance at Shomake's mother, who now stood by the stove, very straight, swaying just a little. Then he looked at Shomake.

Shomake swayed, too, with the violin. His bow hand quivered, rose, fell, trembled.

And the music came. If there was a song of that day, of all the other days of childhood on that block, might that have been it? In the little room, black and full of smells, the music came. It came and mixed with the smells—and Ishky heard it.

T
HAT WAS
long ago, or not so long ago, I guess. If I tell this story in three parts, the first part is of the children; in the other parts, the dreams begin to go.

I look at Shomake's mother, whom everybody calls “mudder wop.” That is what they call her. She wears a black skirt and a black blouse, and she never wears anything else. She stands by the stove, and in the dark—which is light enough to show—there is an expression upon her face which I cannot help noticing, even if I don't understand. I see it, and I wonder. I am Ishky, but that will not help me understand what is meant by that expression. How should I know? Still, I am suddenly conscious of my clothes. My shoes are worn through. At the toes, the fingers of my feet poke out. Glancing down, I try to hide that. I try to pull down the toes, to twist them out of sight. But that is no good. Endless things must be hidden, holes in my long black stockings, wisps of hair on my head that need cutting, a loose tooth. I pull at the tooth.

“Oh, Ishky, you little fool, why don't you sit still?”

She stirs the spaghetti, Shomake's mother, with an even, calculated motion, but all the while she is looking at Shomake; and what does she see that gives her that air of majesty?

That is what I want. If I had it, I would be a king like Ollie. But I can't get it. I am just Ishky, quivering all over from the music.

Better for him to stop. Should I scream, “Stop, you fool!” But then, what would they think of me? Isn't it funny that I can't sit for a little while and listen to music?

Spaghetti—spaghetti, and music, and the big wooden spoon goes round and round, mixing. In the music, there is a beach! I read about a beach in a book, and it has palms growing upon it. Tropics, they call it, tropics, tropics, as all the time summertime on the block, with dark rooms round, and spaghetti.

I watch the bow quiver; it dances. Why can't I do that? If I had a violin, like Shomake— Just suppose that for a minute I hold Shomake's fiddle. Will he let me hold it?

Stop—stop—stop, all in time to the music. Won't he ever stop? Now his mother is a queen in my secret garden. No, just an old wop lady. But Ollie takes Marie into the cellar to put his finger inside of her. Does Marie like it? Does Ollie like it? Does Ollie like music?

“Stop, my heart,” she cried in Italian.

“Mother mine, what is it?”

“See how the child sobs on the bed! By all the saints, you have hurt him with your music. Here, my child, my little one, what is there in music that should bring tears? No tears, but gladness. Do you know that music is the soul singing?”

Ishky curled on the bed, crying bitterly. When Shomake's mother bent over him, anxiously, he pushed her away, shook his head. Shomake stood with his fiddle. What had he done? In all his heart, there was no harm meant. Then what had he done?

“Lookit, Ishky, I ain' playin' no more.”

“He gotta in duh cellar.”

In her excitement, she spoke in Italian, fondling Ishky, caressing him, and the soothing movement of her hands quieted his tears.

“What are you saying about a cellar, my child? There is nothing in darkness to hurt you. Is it fear of darkness, here in this room of twilight? Then quiet your fears.”

“I'm awright.”

“No, rest, my little one, and forget about the demons inside of you.”

“Awright.” He didn't know what she was saying, but it was nice to feel her hands smoothing his skin. That, his mother never did. It made him feel like a big cat, curling in the dark, and suddenly he thought of the cat Ollie had swung over his head. Now he was the cat, and he liked the idea of being a cat—just a big cat curling and comfortable in the dark. How long would she stroke him?”

“You like that. Yes, my little one, beatings hurt and soft hands soothe, and we must take the good with the bad. Look, I will sit down beside you. I do not think my cooking will burn.” And to her son:

“Play, my heart.”

She sat down next to him. How funny she smelled, of cooking and of earth-odors. But he didn't mind the smells. And now the fiddle played again.

I, I
SHKY
, think that if I take Shomake and his fiddle, and we go together, we can climb the fence and find the magic garden. The music makes me think of that. I'm ashamed, because I was such an awful baby.