Henry Roth - Mercy of a Rude Stream - The Complete Novels

“I’m not your breadwinner. I just want to make a few bucks.”

“How much? Tell me. I’ll present them to you now. What will your earnings amount to?”

“I don’t know.”

“ Noo ? How much do you want?”

He tossed his head violently. “I don’t wanna go, that’s all.”

“Only to thwart me. Is that the reason?” She nodded bitterly. “To make a small sacrifice on this one occasion, he refuses. A small sacrifice, a crumb of consolation for these years he’s made his mother suffer, the tears she’s cried for him. No. I’m condemned to disappointment. Ai, vey, vey!” Mom heaved a deep sigh. “Be sacrificed yourself for the woe you cause me.”

“It’s just a bunch of speeches!” Ira burst out. “It’s nothing. Everybody marches in, then marches out.”

“Then why don’t you let Mom enjoy the speeches and the marching in and out?” Minnie interjected.

“Who asked you to butt in? Take her to your high school graduation.”

“Positively, I’ll take her. What d’you think, I’m like you? That I’m ashamed of my parents from spending all my time around goyim?”

“ Aw, shut up.”

“I’ve never attended a graduation,” Mom declared, pleading. “Even once to see it. Ira, precious, once more, think about it. Relent. For your mother’s sake.”

“Oh, you are a louse.” Minnie glared at her brother.

Enjoying his manifest complacency, Pop adopted the deliberate tone of the seasoned arbiter. “An upstanding youth, Joey Schwartz next door, who has been working for Biolov’s ever since Ira threw up the job — years now, no? — had he been offered such an opportunity as this lout had, the opportunity to attend high school — and to be fostered, to be nurtured until graduation — four whole years — would he not have kneeled before his parents, kissed their hands in gratitude? Would his mother have needed to grovel before him, imploring him to take her to his high school to attend his graduation? What? He would have danced before her on the way. I am willing to wager had it concerned an upstanding youth in this case, a subway train would not have been good enough to convey his parents there, to this Davit Clinton High School. A taxicab, no less. As if it were his nuptials he were attending. A taxicab there”—Pop circled bunched fingers—“a taxicab home. Who knows. He would have skimped and hoarded his earnings to provide his parents with a supper at Ratner’s to spare her the preparing of a meal that day — to dine in style — ah, what is there to say? Even a Moe, a Moisheh, a gruber ying , sent by your good father, Ben Zion, the pious Jew, to work like a goy in the forests above the Dniester River, no? It’s a wonder he didn’t get a hernia.”

“Moe is a mensh. He’s so stout,” Mom retorted pointedly. “A gruber ying he’s not.”

“Then he’s not. But every summer, and how many times in the winter, has he taken the oldsters to spend two weeks or a month in a glatt kosher summer hotel? Since he came back from the war, how many?”

“ Gey mir in der end. A great deal you care, except to relish my torment.” She turned from Pop to assail Ira. “You’re not ashamed? Base youth. Four years ago, four whole years ago, you told me the same thing. Deprived me of a bit of joy with the same pretext: speeches and marching, speeches and marching, nothing more. How do you know? Were you ever there?”

“I know. I don’t have to be there.”

“As long as you could go the next day, and get your diploma.”

“Louse! Mom oughta throw you outta here.” Minnie flared up at her brother. “She ought to throw you out on your ear. Out of the house.”

“Hah!” Pop gloated in agreement. “What have I said all along?”

“Aw, take her to your own graduation.”

“I need you to tell me? To my graduation she’ll go.” Minnie was close to tears. “But you, you, you’re the one that means everything to her. You’re a disgrace, that’s what you are. Take Mom to your graduation.”

“Oh, shut up.”

Her eyes dark with sorrow, Mom rocked from side to side. “He shrinks from his Yiddish mother, that’s the whole trouble, that’s my curse. You’re a Jew yourself, no? And there won’t be other Jewish parents present? I’ll find some niche, some crevice. I’ll hide. No one will notice me, and you need not either. You don’t know me. You don’t have to present me to your friends. Just let me witness. Minnie will lead me there, and home again. As long as I’ve seen my son graduate from high school.”

Alas, my mother. She breaks my heart sixty years too late, Ecclesias.

— Indeed? Pity all mothers of such sons. The whelp treats its dam better than you did yours, my friend. But you’re too late. The grave is a barrier to all amends, all redress.

By that same token, their neglect on my part makes no difference now, does it, Ecclesias?

— Desist. You mar your fable.

“I don’t wanna go.”

“Ai, vey, vey! What do I ask for? A crown? An ovation? No, only this paltry few hours out of all of twelve years to rejoice in. I nurtured him, I suffered for him — him! And yet I may not watch him given distinction, watch him given a high school diploma as other women watch their sons? Gevald! Heart of stone.” Desolate, she regarded him in tearless sorrow.

“I don’t wanna go!” Ira shouted. “I already told you once!”

“Go to hell!” Minnie wept with wrath and frustration. “Please, Mama, don’t aggravate yourself with that stupid bum. He — all he thinks about is himself, himself. Selfish, rotten stinker! Hint , that’s all I can call you. Dirty mutt. You should drop dead.”

“ Megst takeh geyn in der erd ,” Pop added his cutting amen.

Mom kept nodding bitterly, kept nodding, like a Norn or a Parca foreseeing endless woe: “Descend into the pit. The Almighty will repay you for this. And the Almighty pity me for damning my own son.” She slapped her mouth several times. “ Oy, gevald. I intercede, Gotinyoo! Pay no heed to my implorings.”

“He’s listening,” said Pop. “Believe me.”

“ Gey mir oukh in der erd ,” Mom retorted.

“Uh. She’s made her prayer.” Pop folded his Yiddish newspaper. “Why is he that way? Why don’t you ask? Why is your son not like other Jewish children, upright, sensible—”

“I am well acquainted by now with your reasons,” Mom interrupted. “Further store of your wisdom spare me.”

“She doesn’t inquire why her kaddish’l Ira is the way he is.” Pop gnawed away on the bone of contention. “There are countless sons and countless mothers. And millions upon millions of sons strive to please their parents. They carry their parents on their fingertips. Their mothers and fathers on their fingertips. Azoy?” He illustrated, with upturned hands like sconces.

Mom’s face hardened with readiness of scornful reply. “You told me that already. Chaim, go torture the cat instead of me.”

“Such a mother, such a son.”

“And fathers like you should rot.”

“Aha! Utter a true word, and she flares.”

“You see what you do? It’s all your fault,” Minnie upbraided Ira. “A brother like you should go to hell. Shemevdik,” she mocked in Yinglish contracting in mimic cowering. “A neighbor comes to the door, right away he’s got his head down. Or he runs to the other room. That’s what the trouble is, Mom. He’s a stupid shemevdik. A high school graduate already, and he still runs away from somebody who knocks at the door.”

“ Ai, a veytik iz mir ,” Mom lamented. “ Noo, leave him alone finally: an oaf.”