Arnold Zable - Cafe Scheherazade

"Thank you, my beautiful girl." he says, with a wink. "Isn't she a krasavetze, a true beauty?"

He unfolds a serviette, and sings:

"Farria. Farria. Farria. Farria.

Far-ri-ya-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha."

We sit in Scheherazade's alcove, at the window table, midafternoon on a hot autumn day. Its light penetrates the back room where Masha and Avram are entertaining friends. It seeps into the kitchen where the yeast hardens in electric ovens and pans sizzle on leaping flames; it creeps into the back lane where last night's leftovers lie fermenting in rubbish bins. It is a naked light, hard and hot. But here, in the alcove, it is airconditioned, cool.

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We sit at a round table, a perfect fit, with ample room. We can stretch and yawn and swivel about. It is an ideal viewing place, surrounded by plate-glass frontage and glass doors enclosed in wooden frames. Window reflections obscure us from the view of those who pass by on the pavement outside.

"Ah, what a wonderful meshugas." says Yossel. "What a mekhaiye it is to sit and watch. What a pure delight. This is why I have always loved cafes on busy streets."

A man hurries past, holding his spectacles in one hand, a briefcase in the other, in a permanent state of readiness. A teenage couple, in school uniform, stroll by hand-in-hand. A woman in a black suit, white ribbon in her hair clatters past on white high heels, with a white poodle in tow. The poodle's head sprouts a black bow.

"Now that, my dear Martin, is the way to dress." says Yossel. He swivels his head from side to side. "Ah, what an exquisite girl, the one in the low-cut red blouse. What a krasavetze. Look at the way she glides by. What a mekhaiye. Red is the best colour for such an aristocrat.

"I do not like being alone." he adds a moment later, "to sit at home in my apartment. I was born surrounded by people. I have always delighted in crowds. My foolish child, I am a Krochmalna boy. I love life. I want to enjoy myself, to use my allotted time.

"And I love people. Especially girls. Look at the princess in the leather shorts. Ah, such rounded hips; such sheine fisslakh, such beautiful legs."

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Yossel sinks his teeth into the schnitzel. "Scheherazade is a schnitzel gan eiden." he says, "a schnitzel paradise. It has the best. And every variety. My favourite is the chicken. But, if you wish, you can have veal schnitzel, a Parisian schnitzel, a Wiener schnitzel. Or you can order your own, the way you once had it, over there, homemade, in der alter velt."

He pauses for another ample bite. "And they are honest schnitzels, saturated with oil, swimming in juice, with big portions, and no skimping. Look how it fills the whole plate; it even sticks out over the side. My dear Martin, one thing I know, when there is food, don't be shy. Who knows if you will ever enjoy another meal. Here, have a bite."

"I am a vegetarian." I say.

"You are a fool." he replies. "In nature it is eat or be eaten.

This is what I learnt on Krochmalna Street. This is what I discovered, all over again, in Vilna and Vladivostok, in Kobe and

Shanghai. This is what I have seen in every city I have passed through in this meshugene velt. So, don't worry. Have a bite. It won't hurt."

Yossel too made the journey from Vilna to the east as a Sugihara

Jew. But he and Zalman travelled separately. Except for their meetings in Wolfke's they lived very different lives. They had not known each other in Warsaw where they grew up in neighbourhoods far apart. Yossel was schooled in the run-down tenements of pre-war Krochmalna Street, where the dividing line between society and underworld was thin. This is where he first learnt to live by his wits, to sniff the air and know what was what.

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Like so many others, Yossel had fled Warsaw in September 1939.

Vilna was a place to draw breath, a footstep beyond the newly drawn borders that divided the Nazi-occupied west from the Soviet east.

"My foolish child, Vilna was a poor city. There was not enough fuel to make a fire. We would buy a kettle full of hot water and drop in a sweet as sugar. We slept in houses of prayer, in corridors and foyers. We slept in apartments, ten to a room. I lay down wherever I could and, when I woke up, I went out and sniffed the air I have always relied on my nose. It has never let me down.

"My nose led me to Wolfke's. Perhaps it was the aroma of food. In

Wolfke's you could buy the best cholent in Vilna, a delicious stew of onions, potatoes and beans, barley and beef. And their chopped liver was exquisite! With mashed boiled eggs, as smooth as pate. Such a delicacy. A true delight.

"I knew this could not last long. Soon we were living on crusts of bread. But in Wolfke's I made contacts. I began to deal on the black market. I bought and sold currency, tobacco, anything that came my way. One thing led to another and I found myself in a shop selling nuts and bolts, screws and tacks, nails and knickknacks.

"I got to know the woman who ran the shop. She was called Dvora, a biblical name. She looked like the women of those times. She was beautiful. I fell in love with her at first sight. I have often fallen in love at first sight. Why waste time? Life is short.

"Dvora had an agent who supplied her with goods, a 134

Lithuanian. He sold us diamonds at fifty dollars a carat. I smuggled them from Vilna, to the most elegant hotel in Kovno, where a German buyer paid double the price. Dvora became my sweetheart. We made a lot of money.

Yossel speaks Yiddish in a Warsaw dialect I strain to understand.

The elegance of his clothes belies his Krochmalna Street roots.

This was the secret to his success, he tells me-to dress elegantly. Good dress came before food.

"People liked me." he says. "This was the great thing, to be well dressed and have charm. This is why people trust you, why people buy from you. First you establish a liking for each other, then you do business."

Yossel is on the cusp of ninety, yet the charm is still evident.

It is not a calculated charm, but rather the boyish charm of a gambler.

"I have always taken risks. I was willing to step out into the world. Whenever I saw a window I looked through it. If I saw an open door, I was not shy. Whenever I saw a cafe, I stepped in.

"I wanted to leave Vilna, get out of Europe, sail to the ends of the earth. I could see it was all crumbling. Meanwhile I needed money. With money you can help yourself, and help others. Without money, you are gornisht, nothing. This is what I learnt from the boys of Krochmalna. This is what we schemed about in the basement cafe in the Polonia hotel. Do you think we had a choice?

"In Vilna I made money. In Vilna I lost money. I was arrested

135 three times. Three times I managed to wriggle free. Our contacts in the diamond business dried up. The Nazis, may they rot in gehennim, were perilously close. I could smell the approaching fean I sniffed the air and I could sense what was what. It was time to get out.

"We heard that there was a way via the Baltic. A fisherman would smuggle us over to Sweden. Then we heard that Germans and

Lithuanians were intercepting those who were trying to escape, and shooting them on the spot. Wherever we turned there was a trap.

"Then in Wolfke's the talk turned to a man called Sugihara. May he sit with full honours by God's right side! May his feet be forever massaged by angels and cherubim. He was a true tzaddik. A saint!

"My dear Martin, of course I met him in person. First, I had to obtain a pass to Curaçao, a Dutch colony. I am sure Zalman has told you about this. He knows every little detail. He still reads books about it.

"I took the train from Vilna to Kovno and dashed to the office of the Dutch consul, Mr Zwartendyk. I never forget a name. He was a businessman. He sold radios and lightbulbs but I was in too much of a hurry to talk and do deals. I ran straight to Sugihara's. I joined the many hundreds gathered outside his Kovno home. I hopped about as if standing on pins. I sweated and jostled along with the impatient crowd. And Sugihara welcomed us all. He was a true tzaddik! A man of pure gold! He stamped whatever we put under his nose.