Will Thomas - Some Danger Involved

Racket's cab was not out front this morning, so we hailed a hansom in Elephant and Castle. Our destination, Barker told me, was the Jews' Free School in Spitalfields, just around the corner from the Lane. We had an appointment there for a tour.

"Mr. Pokrzywa has been a cipher for too long," he said. "Today is the day we unmask him."

Sir Moses had paved the way for our entrance, and we were to be given a tour of the place by one of the teachers. I was expecting another stern patriarch to lead us around but was relieved to find the teacher about my own age, not much older than his pupils. His was a comical face, with a shock of thick, black curls, and a profile that was mostly nose and very little chin. He was a thin, scholarly, casual fellow, the kind that has a hard time keeping his clothes in order, and when he wasn't waving his long, sensitive hands in the air like palm fronds, he was stuffing them in his pockets.

"Israel Zangwill, gentlemen," he said to us, shaking our hands in succession. "Welcome to the largest and best school in Europe. I'm so glad you've come. If you hadn't, I would have been forced to endure first-period gymnastics, which is too much like Bethlehem Asylum for my taste. Come this way." He set a brisk pace down the hall.

"The Jews' Free School was founded in 1732. We feel it is one of the most important educational institutions in Europe. Close to a third of all Jewish children in London have come through these doors, myself included. We are bursting at the seams at the moment. We have close to four thousand students."

"Four thousand, you say?" I asked.

"Yes, and sometimes, it feels as if they were all in my class. Of course, many of them arrive here the first day not speaking a word of English, nor do their parents, and they have nothing but the shirts on their backs, which were handed down from their fathers or brothers. To use a Gentile term, we must 'baptize' them into English, immerse them so thoroughly that they are drowning in it. It is no help that they speak not a word of it at home. Normally, however, the children in these families are stair-stepped in age, and within a few years, the children are all speaking English to each other, and so it gets a foothold in their homes. Then they act as translators for the adults. That, coupled with the family's constant need to fill out one government form or another, eventually produces a family that at least somewhat speaks English."

"But that doesn't help you now," Barker stated. I noticed a smile peeking from under his mustache. This fellow amused him.

"Oy, are you telling me! Four thousand children, and none of them the same! We've got Chootes and Latvians, Poles and Spaniards, Estonians and Portuguese. This little fellow was expelled by the tsar a month ago, and Mr. Butter-doesn't-melt-in-my-silver-spoon over there, his family came here from Lisbon in 1652. And we're supposed to stamp 'good Anglo-Jew' on all their foreheads, teach them English and the basics of hygiene, and try to make good little law-abiding Englishmen out of them. And, of course, every one of these little monsters has a mother convinced he is the Messiah, and wouldn't we please give him just a little bit more attention than that other boy, whom we all know is just a bit dull? Ah, here we are. The cafeteria. All kosher prepared, of course."

He led us into a large, sunlit room full of tables. Hebrew children lined each one, elbow to elbow, eating quickly and quietly. Remarkably quietly, considering that there were more than a hundred pupils in the room. The children looked rather thin, as a rule, but none was barefoot, and all seemed very clean. I'd pictured a kind of Dickensian boarding school before I arrived, but I was very wrong. The food, though unrecognizable to me, smelled wholesome, and there was a lot of it. Meat patties of some sort, rolls, cauliflower, and even a cherry tart.

"Why are they eating so early in the day?" I asked. It was just barely nine.

"Your Christ, I believe, performed a miracle by feeding the four thousand. We must perform that miracle every day, and out of just one tiny kitchen. Unfortunately, this is the only meal some of them will have today. Their parents will save the few scraps they can collect for the other children in the family. Small wonder they try to claim their four-year-old is five, in order to get him on the roll. Now, if you will step this way, we will view the gymnasium, the bane of my existence."

We passed down another corridor into the gymnasium. The room appeared to be very organized; three or four classes were going on simultaneously. Students in outfits not unlike sailor suits were tumbling on the mats in one area, tossing a medicine ball around a circle in another, and lined up to use the hanging rings on a third. The teacher, I noticed, looked rather harried.

"Organized chaos, I call it," Zangwill remarked, running a hand through his impossible curls. "Again, I thank you for getting me out of this."

"Have you been told the reason for our visit here today?" Cyrus Barker asked.

"Our headmaster is not very forthcoming, as a rule."

"We are investigating the death of Mr. Pokrzywa. Did you know him?"

"Louis? Of course. Are you gentlemen detectives?"

Barker made a sour face. He did not like the word. "We are enquiry agents, yes. How well did you know him?"

"Rather well. We lived in the same boardinghouse. He hadn't been in the country a great many years, but he was a wonder with languages. He taught Hebrew and Greek."

"What kind of fellow was he?"

"He was quiet. Reserved. He was formal in his English, but if you spoke Yiddish to him, he'd open up a little. I knew him as well as anyone."

"Did he have any enemies, or was he involved in anything dangerous?"

"Not at all. Far be it from him. I don't know how this could have happened."

"Did you or anyone notice his resemblance to, shall we say, the stereotypical version of Jesus Christ?"

"Oh, certainly, we chaffed him about it. Of course, there were dozens of fellows here in the East End who could pass that description, but he was close enough to receive comments. I've always wondered if he was a little vain about it. His hair was rather long by London standards, and I suspect the headmaster may have wanted him to cut it, aside from the side curls, of course. Louis was very orthodox, otherwise."

"Were there any women in his life?" Barker continued.

"He was a handsome fellow, and there were always intrigues around him. The matchmakers and prospective mothers-in-law were hounding his steps. He was asked to dinner by so many families, he was the best-fed man in the East End. I don't know if he had a sweetheart, but I doubt he led a monk's existence, if you'll forgive the expression, sholem aleichem."

"Aleichem sholem," Barker responded automatically.

"You know your Yiddish, Mr. Barker. Anyway, I believe he was the sort of fellow to keep his private life private, which is generally a good idea, murders notwithstanding."

"Where are his rooms?"

"Number forty-three, Wilkes Street. First floor, back."

"Ah, yes. The chevra in Whitechapel. Not the best address."

"You're telling me. I was born in the area. For a Jew, ghettoes are the same everywhere."

"What more can you tell us, Mr. Zangwill? We're trying to understand what sort of fellow he was."

Zangwill took in a deep breath and blew it out, his dark, expressive eyes searching for words. "Serious. He didn't have much of a sense of humor. Mystical. He read the Kabala, and the Talmud, of course. He was a first-rate debater on points of law. He had a passion for Maimonides and quoted him often. He was not really one of the fellows, a bit of a stuffed shirt, if you'll forgive the expression."

"Did he talk about his youth and how he came to England?"

"Not a word. We knew about his impressive escape from the pogroms in Russia, but he didn't like to talk about his personal affairs. He was something of a mystery. His own roommate, Ira Moskowitz, once told me he couldn't make head nor tails of him."