Sholem Aleichem - Tevye the Dairyman and Motl the Cantor's Son

“So you’re going to America?”

We said, “We’re certainly not going to Yehupetz.”

Another person from the Ezra asked, “Have you been to the doctor yet?”

“What doctor?”

“Here’s an address. Go first thing to the doctor, and he’ll examine your eyes.”

Hearing the word eyes, my brother Elyahu looked at my mother and turned pale as a sheet.

What frightened him so?

B.

It’s done, thank God. We’ve all been to the doctor except my mother. She’ll go later. My brother Elyahu is afraid — she’s cried too much lately. The doctor examines our eyes and writes something down, signs it, and puts it in an envelope. At first we’re frightened — we think he’s written a prescription for our eyes. We ask him what he wrote. He points to the door, and we assume he is asking us to leave. We go up to the Ezra and show her what the doctor has written.

Fräulein Zaichik opens the envelope and reads the notes. “I can tell you good news,” she says to us. “The doctor says you all have healthy eyes.”

Of course that’s good news! But what are we going to do about our mother? She doesn’t stop crying. We plead with her, “What are you doing to us? Aren’t you afraid, God forbid, the doctor will reject your eyes?”

“That’s why I’m crying!” she replies, and places a compress on her eyes. An emigrant barber gave her the compress. He’s a homely man with terrible teeth but is quite vain. He wears a copper watch on a silver chain and a gold ring on his finger. His nickname isn’t very nice — they call him Beaver! He came to Antwerp with Pessi and her gang. They became acquainted on the train and stole across the border together. They didn’t have the same troubles we did. No one wanted to murder them, and no one stole their bedding, but they still had a horrendous time. In Hamburg, they had to go through a steam bath. What stories they tell of Hamburg! It makes your hair stand on end! Sodom is a paradise compared to Hamburg! People in Hamburg treat emigrants, they said, a lot worse than we do our prisoners. If not for Beaver, Pessi and her family would have died there.

Beaver helped them in their hour of need. He is a nervy person — he stood up to the Germans. The way he told the story was a treat! He spoke to them only in Russian, he said. He knows Russian well, no doubt better than our Pinni. Pinni says that everything Beaver tells us would be fine if it were true. But from the very first Pinni took a dislike to Beaver. He made up a song about him. When Pinni doesn’t like someone, he writes a song about him. If you like, I can repeat it to you:

C.

The barber-surgeon Beaver takes it upon himself to cure my mother’s eyes. Once he’s finished, he says no doctor in the world will find anything wrong with them. He learned how to do it back home. A barber-surgeon is half a doctor. Besides, when he was in Germany, he observed how they cured emigrants’ eyes. They can make blind people see.

Pinni quips that it may be the other way around. Beaver gets angry and buries Pinni in words. He says Pinni is far too clever for America! They don’t like smart alecks in America! America is a country where there’s no time for fooling around. In America you say what you mean, you mean what you say. In America your word is your word. America is built on truth, honesty, righteousness, honor, humanity, compassion, justice, equality, confidence, and faith.

“And on what else?” asks Pinni.

This infuriates Beaver all the more! Too bad they’re interrupted just then. Someone is asking for us outside. Who can it be? We go out — guests! Guests! Guests! Our in-laws have arrived, Yoneh the baker and his whole gang! A new gang! Again there is great joy: my sister-in-law Bruche is kissing her parents, and my brother Elyahu is kissing his father-in-law and mother-in-law. Pinni can’t hold back and also kisses our in-laws.

Beaver joins in and kisses them too. Puzzled, the guests ask, “Who’s this?”

“I’m Beaver,” he explains.

Pinni bursts out laughing. And my mother? She does what she always does — she cries! My brother Elyahu is ready to kill himself. He looks at her and tugs at his beard, but this time he says nothing. These are, after all, relatives, in-laws from the same town. Why shouldn’t she have a good cry?

“How did you steal across the border, and where did they finally welcome you?” we ask our in-laws, and they have tales enough to tell! But I have no patience for their stories. I go off into a corner with Bruche’s little sister Alteh. She’s ten years old now, almost eleven, the same age as Goldele, the poor little girl who was left behind in Antwerp on account of her eyes. I tell Alteh about Goldele and her sick eyes, about my friends Big Motl and Mendl, about the Ezra and Fräulein Zaichik, who writes things down in a book, and about the doctor who examines eyes. I tell her all about Vienna and the Alliance that hates Jews, about Cracow and Lemberg, and how we stole across the border and barely escaped with our lives. I don’t leave anything out.

Alteh listens wide-eyed to everything I say. Then she tells me what happened to them. Her father had long wanted to go to America, but not her mother and the rest of the family. They said that in America you had to work hard, and her mother wasn’t accustomed to that. Her mother had a fur cape that her father had bought in the good years when they still had money. Now that things were bad and the creditors were pestering them, they decided to sell everything and go to America.

But when it came to selling the fur cape, her mother refused, insisting she’d sell everything except the fur cape. Her father pleaded, “Why do you need a fur cape? In America you don’t need a fur cape!” Her mother protested, “What do you mean? How many years did I beg God for a fur cape, and then I finally lived to have one. I have no intention of selling it now.” Day and night all they heard at home was “fur cape.” The whole family took the mother’s side, fighting with the father. It almost led to a divorce between her father and mother, all on account of the fur cape. Who got their way? Of course, her mother! They didn’t sell the fur cape. They brought it with them, wrapping it separately in a package. But by the time they got to the border, it had disappeared.

Alteh tells her story, and that’s all I want to hear — whether they still have the fur cape. When I hear they don’t, I’m pleased. I take Alteh for a walk and show her the city of Antwerp. She is not in the least impressed. She’s seen bigger cities, she says. What do you say to that! I take her to see the inns where the emigrants are staying and introduce her to my friends. Nothing seems to impress her. She looks down on everyone and everything, a proud girl. She was always like that. Later on we go to the Ezra together, our gang and their gang. There we meet our neighbor Pessi and her gang. We also see Goldele. Goldele wants to be friends with Alteh, but Alteh keeps her at arm’s length. Goldele takes me aside and asks me what’s so special about this girl, that she doesn’t consider her good enough to speak to? I tell her that a year ago at my brother’s wedding, people spoke of Alteh as a future bride for me. She blushes deeply, turns away, and wipes her eyes.

D.

Wait till you hear about the calamity that befell us. We take my mother to the doctor to have her eyes examined. He examines her eyes and says nothing. He just writes a note and puts it in an envelope. We take the envelope to the Ezra, but don’t find anyone there except Fräulein Zaichik, the one who writes everything in a book. She greets me with a laugh. She always laughs when she sees me. She sends me regards from Goldele.