Authors: Naomi Ragen

Women's Minyan (9 page)

BOOK: Women's Minyan

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ETA
and
TOVAH
: [
stuttering, appalled. Jail?
] Sorry. We just came to borrow some vinegar. Oil. For the compote. Potato kugel.

SHEINHOFF
: This is what you want, Chana? That they be brought to you by force, in a police car? Do you want to shame
and
frighten them to death?

CHANA
: It’s not what I want. But what other choice is she leaving me? [
she dials.
] “Police?”

GITTE LEAH
: Stop it! (
Takes the phone and slams it down
.) Stop it already. All right. (
She takes the Bible
) For the good of the family, not like you, to get rid of the Cossacks, I, Gitte Leah, take a sacred oath to listen honestly to Chana and to decide righteously. (
Kisses the Bible and lays it down.
) And after the humiliations you’ve put us through—your own sister. your own mother!—don’t dream of crawling back to us for help when you finally land where you deserve—in the gutter.

CHANA
: Shut up! I’m not your house slave anymore, Gitte Leah. You’ve sworn to listen, so listen! Now, it’s my turn to speak.

FRUME
: Nu! So talk already, so we can get this over and done with.

GITTE LEAH
: Today, if it’s not too much to ask. The rest of us have lives to get back to.

SHAINE RUTH
: [
quietly, to
SHEINHOFF
.]
Mameh
Goldie, did you take your oath?

BLUMA
: Of course she did!

CHANA
: [
to
SHEINHOFF
.] Shaine Ruth is right. We forgot about you [
holds out the Bible
].

SHEINHOFF
: [
takes Bible reluctantly, shaking her head
.] Chanaleh, why don’t you listen to me? Let the wounds heal, I tell you, instead of scraping away at them, causing more pain. If you insist on doing this your way, who knows where it will end…

As
SHEINHOFF
speaks, the
SHOUTS
outside increase. The women’s attention is diverted.
SHAINE RUTH
goes to the window.

SHAINE RUTH
: Look at that woman! She’s gone
meshugah.
To fight her way through all those men. They’ll kill her!

WOMEN
and
CHANA
hurry to the window. Now their backs are to
SHEINHOFF
,
who stares indecisively at the Bible, then puts it down without taking the oath. Outside, the tumult increases, shouts of
“Pritzah! Zonah!
and
Sotah!”
are heard.

SHAINE RUTH
: [
at window.
] It’s Zehava! She’s gotten through! She’s coming upstairs!

CHANA
is the first to run to the front door.
WOMEN
mill around helplessly. In the melee, no one notices
SHEINHOFF
has not sworn her oath.

Scene five

CHANA
opens the door. Enter
ZEHAVA
, disheveled and injured. The
WOMEN
cringe from her, distancing themselves.

CHANA
:
Rebono shel olam
(Lord of the Universe)! Zehava! [
taking care of her.
] Criminals!

ZEHAVA
: What about you? All Meah Shearim is talking about what they are going to do to you. I couldn’t sit home. I just couldn’t.

CHANA
: [
bitterly.
] I’m all right.

ZEHAVA
: Why didn’t you call? I didn’t know what to think when you took so long. It’s hard for you to say good-bye to the children…

CHANA
: Zehava…[
on the verge of tears
.] They’ve hidden them.

ZEHAVA
hugs
CHANA
. The
WOMEN
are scandalized, misinterpreting this supportive gesture as something sexual.
FRUME
covers
SHAINE RUTH
’s
eyes.

FRUME
: [
to
CHANA
and
ZEHAVA
.] May God strike you both dead, you shameless creatures!

CHANA
: Remember her, Zehava? Madame Kashman.

ZEHAVA
: Of course, your mother. Shalom [
extends her hand
.].

FRUME
: [
spits and turns away.
] You came here to flaunt your perversions…

CHANA
: [
cutting her off
.] What?! Perversions!? Girls! Go bring some antiseptic and bandages.

Exit
BLUMA
and
SHAINE RUTH
.
CHANA
seats
ZEHAVA
and treats her wounds.

GITTE LEAH
: Don’t play the saint with us. A woman who loves another woman. We’re not so innocent here, we know what you are—Latvians! (
mispronunciation of “lesbians”.
)

ZEHAVA
: [
defiant
.] Yes, I love Chana. She is my sister, my mother, my friend. As long as I live, I will never desert her the way you have.

GITTE LEAH
insulted, exits.

ZEHAVA
: [
mockingly
.] Who started these rumors? Eta? Tovah?

ETA
and
TOVAH
: [
reluctantly.
] Hello Zehava, how are you?

FRUME
: [
looking daggers at
ETA
and
TOVAH
.] You are also friends of this degenerate?

ETA
: God Forbid!

TOVAH
: We’re practically strangers.

ETA
: [
to
FRUME
.] She used to join us when Chana gave us classes on a woman’s role in the family.

TOVAH
: We don’t know anything about her.

ETA
: Only that she has ten children, and one of them is autistic, and her parents forced her to marry a man twenty years older who beat her and she’s had dozens of miscarriages and was just about ready to kill herself when….

TOVAH
: Shhh! [
elbows her.
] Chana brought her.

ETA
: It was Chana’s doing. She knows her.

BLUMA
and
SHAINE RUTH
enter with first-aid.
CHANA
takes care of
ZEHAVA
’s
wounds.

ZEHAVA
: [
with derision to
TOVAH
and
ETA
.] Such dishrags!

CHANA
: [
as she dabs Zehava’s wounds.
] They can’t even imagine a real friendship between women; that one woman would stand by another even when she’s being shunned, would take her in when she’s homeless, would take the blows meant for her on her own body….

ETA
: [
to
TOVAH
,
in a whisper
.] The Modesty Patrol, two years ago, did you forget? They broke into the house, beat her,
farshteyst?
Broke her hand—

TOVAH
:—and her leg!

FRUME
: Her head they should have broken…

ZEHAVA
: Believe me they tried, Mrs. Kashman. They came to take Chana back to her husband by force, but “the poor things,” they only found me. One beat me with a bat but still I wouldn’t tell them anything. The second one would have killed me if I hadn’t sat down on him until the police came. Thank God for blessing me with a healthy appetite and something to show for it. I’d do anything for her….

ETA
: Of course you would, because you and she [
waggling two fingers at her, to indicate their sexual relations
.]

TOVAH
: Exactly.

CHANA
: [
while taking care of
ZEHAVA
.] Didn’t I say it? They don’t trust friendship, just wicked gossip. A whisper here, a raised eyebrow there…It’s enough to explode an entire life of good deeds. They do it in the synagogue during the Torah reading, or waiting for their turn to purify themselves in the ritual baths….

TOVAH
: [
with righteous denial
.] Gossip, in my ritual baths…?

CHANA
: [
cynically.
] I know, I know. You don’t permit gossip.

ETA
: [
defensively
.] Someone from the yeshiva said Rav Aaron himself saw you dressed like a slut walking down Ben Yehuda street…

CHANA
: So, our saintly Rabbi, our uncle, was standing out on street corners staring at women?

FRUME
: [
to
BLUMA
and
SHAINE RUTH
.] Girls! Stop up your ears!

CHANA
: No one ever saw me dressed immodestly. When I was fifteen years old, I gave myself permission to be anything I wanted, and I
chose
to be a religious woman because I loved God. [
pointing to window.
] And no wheeler-dealer who calls himself a Rabbi can change that!

ZEHAVA
: It doesn’t surprise me that the men are behind all these rumors. [
getting up to leave.
] They’re terrified we women will band together and give each other strength. So, to keep us weak, they make us suspicious of one another. They enforce marriage and divorce laws that keep us chained like prisoners to men we despise. A man doesn’t need a gun to kill a wife. He can squeeze the life out of her drop by drop…. [
heavy silence
.] Come, let’s go Chana. From them [
contemptuously.
] you’ll get nothing. [
her wounds are dressed. She turns to leave.
]

CHANA
: I can’t. Not yet.

ZEHAVA
: Why? Your children aren’t even here.