The Golem and the Jinni (45 page)

Anna rolled her eyes, and they went out and said their good-byes to the Radzins. “What a beautiful evening,” Anna said to the Golem as they walked, taking no note of the garbage-smelling alleys, the damp and chilling breeze. The Golem smiled, watching her. Tonight she could relax over her sewing, even enjoy it a little. And tomorrow, she could tell the Jinni that everything was better at the bakery. Perhaps, just this once, they wouldn’t even argue.

Anna said, “What are you thinking about?”

“Nothing,” the Golem said. “A friend. Why?”

“I’ve never seen you smile like that. Is this friend a man? Oh, don’t turn shy, Chava! You can’t hide from the world forever, even widows need to live a little! All due respect to your late husband, of course—but would he have wanted you to lie in an empty bed for the rest of your life?”

She tried to imagine Rotfeld’s opinion on the matter. Likely he would have wanted exactly that. “I suppose not,” she muttered, conscious of the lie.

“Then come out and have fun for once.”

She had the sense of the conversation veering out of her control. She laughed, a bit panicked. “Anna, I wouldn’t even know how.”

“I’ll help you,” the girl said, with the grand generosity of the newly happy. “We’ll start tomorrow night. There’s a dance at a casino on Broome Street. I can get you in for free, I know the doorman. I’ll introduce you to my friends, they know all the best men.”

A dance? In an unfamiliar place, surrounded by strangers? “But I’ve never been—I don’t know how to dance.”

“We’ll teach you! There’s nothing to it. If you can walk, you can dance.” She grabbed the Golem’s hands. “Oh,
please
come, Chava. It would mean so much to me. You can meet Irving! He promised me he’ll be there.” She giggled. “I want to dance with him while I can still see my feet!”

Well, perhaps that changed things. Meeting Irving would put to rest any lingering fears about what sort of man he was. As for dancing, perhaps she could plead fatigue, or sore feet. But, wait: what about the Jinni? She’d be meeting him tomorrow! “What time is the dance?”

“Nine o’clock.”

So early? That settled it. The Jinni never arrived before eleven. She could go to the dance hall and meet Irving, and perhaps even dance once or twice if it made Anna happy. And then she’d plead her excuses, and meet the Jinni under her window. “All right,” she said, smiling. “I’ll come.”

“Wonderful!” cried Anna. “Meet me at eight-thirty, at my friends Phyllis and Estelle’s place—” and she gave the address, a tenement on Rivington. “We’ll walk over together, not too early. You never want to be early to a dance, it makes you look too eager. Don’t worry about what to wear, just put on your best shirtwaist, that’s what most of us do. Oh, I’m so excited!” Anna clasped her in a fierce hug, which the Golem returned, amused; and then the girl was off down the street, head high, cloak swinging behind her.

The Golem continued home. It was growing dark, and the street-cart vendors were making their final sales. Near her boardinghouse she passed a man pushing a cart piled high with women’s clothing. There was a sign nailed to the side of the cart:
BEST WOMEN’S FASHIONS,
it said, and then below that, in smaller letters,
PARDON ME I’m mute.
The Golem thought about what Anna had said about shirtwaists. She glanced down at her own tired cuffs, frayed past the point of mending. Her other shirtwaist, she knew, was no better.

She walked up to the man and tapped him on the shoulder. He put down the cart and turned, eyebrows raised.

“Hello,” she said, nervous. “I’m going to a dance tomorrow. Do you have shirtwaists for dancing in?”

He raised one hand, a gesture that said,
say no more.
From his pocket he pulled a cloth tape measure, and mimed for her to hold out her arms. She did so, amused at the expressive precision of his gestures, which left no room for dissembling.
Perhaps we should all learn to be mute
, she thought.

He took her measurements with quick movements, then rolled the tape measure away and put one hand to his chin, considering. Turning back to the pushcart, he rifled through a stack of shirtwaists. With a flourish he pulled one out and held it up. It was certainly no workaday waist. The cream-colored fabric was closely woven, much finer than her own. Sheer ruffles ran up the length of the bodice and behind the high collar; the cuffs were ringed with them as well. It tapered to a midriff so narrow that the Golem wondered how a woman would breathe in it. The man proffered it—
yes
?

“How much?”

He held up four fingers; in his mind she saw three. She stifled a smile. Perhaps some subterfuges were universal, no matter the language.

It was an extravagance, but one she could afford. She opened her wallet, counted out four dollars, and handed them to the peddler. The man’s eyes widened in surprise. He handed her the shirtwaist, and accepted the money with, she saw, some measure of embarrassment. “Thank you,” she said, and went on her way.

She hadn’t made it more than a few steps before the peddler hurried around in front of her and held up his hands:
wait
. From a coat pocket he withdrew two imitation tortoiseshell combs, their heads cut to resemble roses. He reached up and neatened the part in the Golem’s hair, sweeping a few errant strands across the crown of her head. Then he smoothed back the hair to the left of the part and pinned it with a comb, its teeth snug against her scalp. He performed the same maneuver on the right side, giving the hair a half-twist before setting the comb tightly in place. He stepped back, nodded at his work, and walked back to his waiting cart.

“Wait!” the Golem called. “Don’t you want me to pay?”

He shook his head, not even turning, and trundled his pushcart back up the street. She stood there for a few moments, perplexed, and then walked the rest of the way home.

In her room, she slipped out of her old shirtwaist and buttoned up the new one. The reflection in her mirror was wholly startling. The ruffles behind the collar framed her face, accenting the hollows of her cheeks, her wide-set eyes. Her hair, shaped by the combs, spilled in waves to her shoulders. The frilled cuffs softened her hands, turning them slim and elegant. She studied herself for long minutes, pleased but uneasy. A mask or costume would’ve been less unnerving than these small transformations. She’d changed just enough to wonder if she was still herself.

The next day was full of excited whispers and meaningful giggles from Anna, and by the afternoon Mrs. Radzin had caught wind of their plans. On some pretext she maneuvered the Golem into the back room. “You know your own mind, I’m sure,” the woman said. “But be careful, Chavaleh. You’re fond of Anna, I am too, but there’s no need to risk your reputation. And there are other men, better men than you can find at a dance hall. What about the Rabbi’s nephew? Wasn’t he sweet on you? I know he’s poor as a mouse, but money isn’t everything.”

The Golem had had enough. “Mrs. Radzin, please. I don’t intend to ‘risk my reputation,’ certainly not in the way you mean. I’m going with Anna to meet Irving, and see what sort of man he is. Nothing more.”

The woman snorted. “I can tell you what sort of man he is. No better than the rest.” But she released the Golem back to her duties, and confined all further protests to dark looks.

Finally the day ended, and the Golem went home and put on her new shirtwaist. The combs were trickier than she’d thought, but before long she’d arranged her hair to her satisfaction. She went to the address Anna had given her, and the door was thrown open at her knock. “You came!” Anna cried in surprise, as though the Golem hadn’t promised her half a dozen times. She beckoned the Golem inside. “You look so lovely with your hair like that—oh, and let me see your shirtwaist! Beautiful!”

In the parlor two young women stood in their underclothes, sorting through a pile of garments. Their chatter stopped as Anna burst in, trailing the Golem behind her. “Girls, this is Chava. Be nice to her, she’s shy. Chava, this is Phyllis, and that’s Estelle.”

The Golem froze beneath their curious gazes, fighting down sudden panic. How could she have thought she was ready to do this, to pass as a woman among women? What could possibly have possessed her?

But the women smiled at her, welcoming. “Chava, so nice to meet you! Anna’s told us all about you. Come here, help us pick out what to wear,” said one of them—Phyllis? “I think this waist fits me better, but I just adore the buttons on this one.”

“
I’m
wearing that one,” the other girl said.

“It’s too tight on you!”

“It certainly is not!”

Tentatively the Golem joined them, unsure of the etiquette. Should she undress as well? No, they seemed to think it was perfectly natural for her to stand there in hat and boots while they tried on various pieces and then flung them off again. At length they noticed her shirtwaist, and gasped and cooed over it, and begged her to tell them where she’d gotten it. The attention unnerved her, but it was so honestly friendly that she began to relax, even to smile.

All at once she noticed that Anna had disappeared. “Where’s Anna?”

Phyllis and Estelle grew quiet and leaned their heads toward her, concerned and conspiratorial. “In the water closet. She won’t let us see her get dressed,” Estelle said. “I think she’s embarrassed.”

“She’s been crying, too,” Phyllis said. “He was supposed to come calling last night, and he didn’t.”

“But he’s coming tonight, isn’t he?”

The girls glanced at each other; but just then Anna entered in her usual flurry, dressed in a full-skirted suit that fit tightly at the seams. On her head she wore an enormous straw hat, topped by a quivering, somewhat shabby willow-plume.

“Are we ready?” she said brightly. “Then let’s be off!”

The Golem wanted to stay on the periphery of the evening, but on the way to the hall it grew clear that Anna and her friends intended to make her its focus. They clustered around her, peppering her with instructions and advice. “Don’t be too eager, but then don’t be too choosy,” they said. “Don’t dance all night with the first one who asks. And if you dislike the look of a man, say no. Stand your ground if he comes on too fresh.”

“It’s all right,” said Anna, seeing the Golem’s panicked look. “We’ll take it in turns to watch out for you, won’t we?” The girls nodded, giggled, squeezed her arm; and the Golem resigned herself to the evening.

They neared their destination, and were caught up in a crowd of well-dressed young women and men, all funneling toward a nondescript Broome Street door. The Golem could hear music. She felt herself pushed and jostled, in her mind as well as her body. Fortunately the crowd was in a good mood, cheerful and flirtatious; the women exclaimed over one another’s finery while the men joked and sipped from flasks.

A large man sat on a stool next to the door, collecting the admission: fifteen cents for the ladies, a quarter for the men. “That’s Mendel,” Anna said. She waved, and flashed him a dazzling smile. Mendel grinned back, a bit stupefied, and waved them through. “He’s carried a torch for me for years,” Anna whispered.

Through the door was a dark hallway, full of bodies, all pressing forward. For a moment the Golem began to panic, thinking she would crush someone by accident. Then the eager crowd surged behind her—and the Golem was propelled into the most amazing room she’d ever seen. Enormous, high-ceilinged, it swallowed the crowds eagerly. Brass chandeliers hung with cut-glass pendants cast a flickering dazzle on the people below. The walls glittered with gas lamps and candelabra, multiplied by mirrored columns. It looked like a twinkling fairyland that stretched on and on.

The Golem stared, enthralled. Any other time, a crowd of this size might have overwhelmed her; but the sheer unanticipated spectacle, and the uniform high spirits of the dance-goers, tempered her anxiety with something that felt very like delight.

“What do you think?” Estelle nearly had to shout into the Golem’s ear to be heard. “Do you like it?”

The Golem could only nod.

Anna laughed. “I told you so. Now come on, before all the good tables are taken.”

They passed a long wooden bar stocked with bottles and growlers. Beyond were rows of round, cloth-draped tables. Jacketed waiters passed among the tables, to the bar and back again, their trays laden with beer. The rest of the room was an open expanse of wooden parquet, on which men and women were already congregating. The band sat on a raised stage in a corner. A plump man in faded tails stood in front of them, beating the air with a thin baton.

The Golem followed Anna and her friends to a table at the edge of the dance floor. Soon they were inundated with acquaintances, all hugging and laughing and exchanging gossip. Anna, clearly enjoying her role as the Golem’s shepherdess, made sure that everyone was introduced to her. The Golem said hello a dozen times, smiled, learned everyone’s names. She was a bit slow to make small talk, but that was easily forgiven: it was her first dance, and they all remembered what it was like. Someone whispered that she was a widow, and instantly her quiet manner was transmuted to an air of sad, romantic mystery.