Sholem Aleichem - Tevye the Dairyman and the Railroad Stories

“So you’re giving me three days, are you?” I said, seeing it was a lost cause. “Well, for each of them I wish you a whole year of as much happiness as you’ve brought me. May God pay you back with interest for being the bearer of such good tidings.” And I proceeded to give him a good tongue-lashing, as only Tevye can do. What did I have to lose? Had I been twenty years younger, and still had my Golde — had I been, that is, the Tevye I once was — oho, I wouldn’t have taken it lying down: why, I would have settled his hash in a minute! But the way things stood … mah onu umeh khayeynu —just take a look at me now: I’m a shadow of myself, a walking corpse, a decrepit shell of a man! Dear Lord God, I thought, wouldn’t You like to play one of Your jokes on a Brodsky or a Rothschild for a change? Why doesn’t anyone give them a lesson in Lekh-Lekho? They could use it more than me. In the first place, it’s high time they too had a taste of what it’s like to be a Jew. And secondly, let them see for once in their lives what a great God we have watching over us …

In a word, it was one big waste of breath. There’s no arguing with God, and you can’t tell Him how to run this world of His. When He says li hashomayim veli ha’orets , I’m boss of heaven and earth, all you can do is listen. No sooner said than done with Him!.. So I went inside and told my daughter Tsaytl, “Tsaytl, we’re moving to town. Enough of this country life. It’s time to look for greener pastures … You get busy packing the linens, the samovar, and everything else, and I’ll take care of selling the house. We’ve just gotten a written order to be out of here in three days and find another roof for our heads.”

My daughter burst out crying, and as soon as they saw her, the children began howling so loudly that you might have thought it was the day of mourning for the Temple. That was already too much for me, and I let it all out on her. “What do you want from my life?” I asked her. “What in the world are you wailing for, like an old cantor on Yom Kippur? Do you think I’m God’s only child? Do you think He owes me special consideration? Do you think there aren’t lots of other Jews who are being expelled just like us? You should have heard what the policeman told me. Would you believe that even a town like Anatevka has been declared a village, glory be, so that the Jews can be kicked out of it too? Since when am I less of a Jew than they are?”

I was sure that would cheer her up, but my Tsaytl is only a woman. “How are we going to move in such a hurry?” she asked. “Where will we ever find a town to live in?”

“Don’t be a sillyhead,” I said. “When God came to our great-great-great-grandfather, I mean to Father Abraham, and told him lekh-lekho meyartsekho , get thee out of thy land, did Abraham ask Him where to? God told him exactly where to, el ha’orets asher arekko —which means in plain language, hit the road! We’ll go where all the other Jews go — that is, where our two feet take us. What’s good enough for them is good enough for us. What makes you think you’re more privileged than your sister Beilke the millionairess? If sweating for a living with her Podhotzur in America isn’t beneath her dignity, neither is this beneath yours … Thank the good Lord that we at least have something to fall back on. There’s some money that I saved over the years, there’s what we got for the horse and cows, and there’s what we’ll get for the house. Every little bit helps — why, we ought to be counting our blessings! Even if we didn’t have a penny to our name, we’d still be better off than Mendel Beilis …”

In a word, after managing to convince her that it was pointless to be obstinate and that, if a policeman comes along with an eviction order, it’s only sporting to sign without being piggish about it, I went off to the village to see Ivan Paparilo, an ox of a man who had been dying to have my house for years. Naturally, I didn’t breathe a word of what had happened — any way you look at it, a Jew is still smarter than a goy. “You must have heard, Ivan, old man,” I said to him, “that I’m about to say goodbye to you all.”

“How come?” asks Ivan.

“I’m moving to town,” I say. “I want to be among Jews. I’m not such a young man any more — why, I might kick off any day …”

“But you can kick off right here,” says Ivan. “Who’s stopping you?”

“I believe I’ll leave that to you to do,” I say, thanking him all the same for his kind offer. “You can even have my turn. I myself would rather die among my own. I just thought, though, that you might like to buy my house and garden. I wouldn’t dream of selling them to anyone else, but for you I’ll make an exception.”

“How much do you want for them?” he asks.

“How much will you give me?” I say.

Well, we haggled a bit back and forth, I driving the price up by a ruble and he knocking it down by two, until at last we shook hands on it. I made sure he paid a good chunk in advance so that he couldn’t back out — I tell you, a Jew is smarter than a goy! — and, the whole shebang sold in one day for hard cash, although for a song, of course, off I went to hire a wagon for what little we had left in the house. And now listen, Pan Sholem Aleichem, to what can happen in this world. Just bear with me a little longer, because I don’t want to keep you, and it won’t take but a minute or two.

It was time for the last goodbyes. The house looked more like a ruin than a home. The bare walls seemed to have tears running down them, and there were bundles all over the floor. The cat sat on the mantel above the stove looking like a little orphan … I tell you, it made me so sad that I had a lump in my throat; if I hadn’t been ashamed to be seen by my own daughter, I would have sat down and sobbed like a child. Why, I had grown up in this place, I had died a thousand deaths in it, and suddenly, out of nowhere— lekh-lekho! Say what you will, it was a depressing situation. But Tevye is no woman. And so I pulled myself together, kept my chin up, and called to my daughter, “Tsaytl, where are you? Come here for a minute.”

Tsaytl came out of the other room, all red-eyed and runny-nosed. Aha, I thought, she’s been weeping like an old woman at a funeral again! I tell you, it’s no joke with these females; tears are cheap with them, they cry before you even know it. “You little ninny!” I said to her. “What are you crying for this time? Can’t you see how foolish you’re being? Why, just think of Mendel Beilis …”

She wouldn’t listen to me, though. “Papa,” she said, “you don’t even know why I’m crying.”

“Of course I do,” I said. “How could I not know? You’re crying for the house. You were born here, you grew up here — it’s upsetting. Believe me, even if I weren’t Tevye, even if I were someone else, I would still kiss these bare walls and empty shelves, I would get down on my knees and kiss the ground! It hurts me to part with every nook and cranny as much as it hurts you, you silly thing, you. Why, just look at that cat sitting like an orphan over the stove. It’s only a dumb animal, it can’t talk — but how can you help feeling sorry for it, being left all alone without a master …”

“Papa,” she says. “There’s someone you should be feeling even sorrier for.”

“Why, who’s that?” I say.

“It’s the one person,” says my Tsaytl, “who’ll be left behind like a stone by the roadside when we’re gone.”

I had no idea who she meant. “What person?” I asked. “What stone? What are you yattering about?”

“Papa,” she said, “I’m not yattering. I’m talking about our Chava.”

I swear to you, hearing that name was like being dowsed with boiling water or clubbed on the head! I turned to my daughter in a fury and said, “What the devil does Chava have to do with this? I thought I told you that I never wanted to hear her mentioned again!”