A Cobbler's Tale Read online

  Apartment Six-E was tucked away down a small alcove at the end of the hallway. Pincus unlocked the door and was knocked back by the overpowering stale stench that greeted him. He glanced over his shoulder at Jakob who signaled with a nod that he should enter the dark and dank space.

  With no windows, the room was pitch black. Pincus heard a short scrape and a flicker of light appeared, as Jakob held up a lit match. He could now see the room was very small. Scattered on the stained wooden floor was an assortment of trash and old clothes.

  “This is it?” Pincus asked, looking at the small ten-by-ten room. “Where do we sleep? Where’s the toilet? There are no windows!” he lamented.

  “Pincus, we’ll figure it out,” Jakob said. “I think I saw a toilet down the hall.”

  Though he was exhausted, Pincus could not sleep that first night. Jakob, on the other hand, feel asleep quickly and snored incessantly. In addition to finding the floor very uncomfortable, the noises from the adjacent rooms and hallways were never-ending. He heard mothers yelling at their children, husbands yelling at their wives, and babies crying inconsolably. Since their room had no windows, the time of day was undeterminable. Eventually, he figured it must be morning when the myriad of voices and sounds outside the door and through the walls sounded like people getting ready for the day.

  He reached over and jostled his friend. “Jakob, wake up.”

  By Pincus’s third wake-up call, Jakob had begun to stir.

  How can he sleep so soundly in this hideous, smelly, noisy place? Pincus wondered.

  A few moments later, Jakob sat up. Pincus had found a light switch that lit up a bulb that dangled off an electrical cord tacked to the ceiling. It buzzed with a low hum. The room looked no better by lamplight than it had the night before. It was small, dark, and dirty, and it smelled worse than steerage.

  “We can’t stay here. This place is terrible.”

  “It’s not so bad for a few days until we can find a better place. Let’s go see Manny and ask him where we can open your shop,” Jakob suggested, trying to sound optimistic.

  Pincus sighed happily as he stepped out into the street and inhaled the fresh morning air. As they walked from Orchard Street to Delancey, they passed Yonah Schimmel’s Knishery. The smell coming from the open front door of this bakery reminded Pincus how hungry he was.

  “Jakob, let’s buy a knish,” Pincus said.

  “Yes, great idea,” Jakob agreed.

  Walking into the crowded bakery, they saw a dazzling, mouthwatering display of freshly baked, large, round knishes. They each handed the boy behind the counter five cents.

  Pincus bit into the dumpling of dough stuffed with potato. “This is wonderful,” he said.

  Jakob said nothing, but demolished the knish in two enormous bites.

  Pincus and Jakob sat in two flimsy chairs, separated from Manny by a large wooden desk littered with papers, empty coffee mugs, and uneaten leftovers. Manny seemed less friendly than he had been the day before.

  “You two are back already. Is there something wrong with your room?” Manny asked, obviously perturbed.

  Pincus jumped at the question, “Actually yes, there is—”

  “No, what Pincus means,” Jakob interrupted, “is that the room is fine, but we’d like to find a place that maybe has beds and a window, if that’s possible.”

  “I see,” Manny said curtly. “Anything else you two need?”

  “Well, yes, we need a place for my cobbler shop,” Pincus said. “We don’t want handouts. We have money for rent. Can you help us?”

  Manny looked at the men and shook his head. “Pincus, why don’t you wait downstairs, let me speak to Jakob for a few minutes.”

  Manny turned and faced Jakob, who sat comfortably in a swivel chair with one leg crossed over the other.

  “So, Jakob, you are an interesting fellow. You bring me my card from Mr. Gorpatsch,” he said while displaying the card between two fingers.

  Jakob nodded slightly.

  “I imagine that Mr. Gorpatsch was impressed with you, which is why he gave this to you.”

  “Yes, I think he was impressed,” Jakob said cheerfully.

  “Do you know what I do, Jakob?”

  Jakob shook his head.

  “I am a banker of sorts. Let’s say a banker without a bank,” he said, using his arms to display his unkempt office.

  “Okay,” Jakob said, glancing around the place.

  “I lend people money. You probably know what I am talking about, don’t you, Jakob?”

  “I think so. You lend money with very high interest, and when they can’t pay, you send very persuasive people to collect.”

  “I’m impressed that you know about such a business.”

  “I did similar work in Warsaw,” Jakob confessed.

  “That’s what I thought. If you work for me doing collections, I’ll set you two up in a better apartment and give your ornery friend a storefront. You’ll work with Pincus. People won’t be suspicious of you, and we can use the shop as a place to drop off payments,” Manny said with a smirk and a raised eyebrow.

  “I might be interested,” Jakob said, not ready to commit.

  “I appreciate your caution. Tell me about your work experience in Warsaw.”

  Without mentioning the name of Benjamin Fein, he told Manny about his years in the so-called “banking business,” and gave him an account of his basic routine.

  The first visit was a friendly reminder that the loan was about to become due. Usually, most paid on time, and he had a drop-off location in the back of a butcher shop behind the trash that collected the rotting cutoffs of meat that the butcher would accumulate throughout the day. This was a great spot to hide money, as no one would be snooping around.

  Then there were the late payers. Jakob told how he would begin to ratchet up the pressure. Of course the interest rate would start to increase, and the threats of physical harm would creep into the conversation. As a large, muscular, and imposing man, his words had an impact, and most paid.

  But still there were the ones who refused or couldn’t repay their loans. This, Jakob explained, would be most unfortunate because he would need to inflict some more persuasive ways to collect his money. He offered some examples of breaking bones, cutting off fingers or toes or both, and even threatening other members of the deadbeat’s family with similar injuries.

  “So you know the business,” Manny said with a smile, as Jakob finished his verbal resume.

  “I can see why Mr. Gorpatsch offered you my card. He is very skilled at recognizing talent. So what do you say, Jakob? I can offer you a place to live, a place to work, and a chance to make some good money. Not so bad since you only arrived in America yesterday.”

  Jakob darted down the stairs and out onto the sidewalk, where Pincus stood waiting for him. Any doubts he had getting his life started in America were gone. With his arms spread wide, he hugged Pincus and shouted, “The American dream!”

  CHAPTER 11

  CLARA GIVES BIRTH

  Childbirth is easy for my daughter. She has wide hips,” Sadie announced proudly to the midwife, who had just assisted in the birth of her new granddaughter, Anna, which took a mere twenty minutes.

  “Mom, can you stop boasting about my wide hips?” Clara said before turning her attention to the midwife cleaning her baby girl.

  Clara could barely lift her head off the pillows propped up behind her. Even with her mother’s help, between caring for three children, running a household, and overseeing a business, she had been exhausted these past two months, since Pincus had departed for America. And she had just given birth!

  Fortunately, the cobbler shop was doing well. She was grateful that they had found Shmuel, the youngest son of Mendel Beck, Pincus’s only friend in Krzywcza. Shmuel didn’t have the aptitude for being a Torah scholar like his father, so learning a trade provided him a valuable opportunity to make a living, and it helped ease Clara’s burdens as well.

  Now that she had
the baby, Clara would make a point to stop by the shop at least once a week, instead of her previous daily visits to see how he was doing. She liked Shmuel and trusted him. She was still required to count the receipts, pay the bills, pay Shmuel his salary, and take home what was left. It was just one more major responsibility that had fallen on her shoulders. But this was something she liked doing, and she would discuss ways to improve the business at her weekly visits with Shmuel. One of the first improvements she made was to have Shmuel bring some order to the shop.

  “This place needs a good cleaning,” she’d told him on his first day. Together they had spent a few hours throwing away years of accumulated trash that Pincus had collected or simply ignored. She’d instructed Shmuel to keep the storefront clear of clutter. “When a customer walks in they need to see a neat, well-organized place.”

  She had a head for commerce. The years of working for her father in his weaving business had proved to be both helpful and enjoyable.

  Sadie complained that she was spending too much time at the shop and not enough time at home, and even more disturbing was that she was being talked about in the village. Clara told her that she didn’t care about gossip and she enjoyed making changes and seeing positive results.

  Clara liked being active. It was unusual for the children to see their mother lying in bed at all. Every night when they went to sleep, Clara was still busy catching up with the housework, and when they arose in the morning she was already up and about, preparing for the day, her life full to the point of bursting.

  Every few weeks her mother would start with the endless nagging questions about Pincus. “When do you think he will come back?” she would ask.

  “Pincus says a year. Finding a home and a place for a business won’t be easy,” she found herself repeating to her mother.

  “I don’t understand why he left you,” Sadie complained. She didn’t understand the growing problem of political and religious persecution the Jews were facing. Clara, on the other hand, knew that it would be best to leave their homeland.

  “It’s best for the sake of the children,” she reassured her mother.

  Clara had lived with anti-Semitism her entire life. She could recall from childhood her father being harassed many times by local government officials over some minor issue with his textile business. The men in the gray uniforms wearing funny hats with badges sewn onto them had made sure that her family knew they were not welcome in the village—the same village their family had known and lived in for generations.

  She remembered each and every moment she first looked into the eyes of her newborn children. The birth of her oldest, Jennie, was over eleven years ago, but she could still feel the overwhelming emotion of that moment. Then came Moshe and Hymie, her two little boys, she thought as she gazed into Anna’s clear blue eyes. That was the name she and Pincus had selected, based on the first letter of her grandmother’s name, Ahuva. Clara remembered her grandmother telling her that her name meant beloved.

  Any joy she felt breastfeeding Anna vanished instantly once her mother started up again with her complaining.

  “Do you really think Pincus will be able to start a new business in America? Where will you live? Do you think he found a nice place? Will it be big enough for the family?”

  Clara wanted to scream. She didn’t have answers for her mother’s relentless questions. But it was true that so much of their future depended on Pincus. He had a tall task ahead of him.

  Will he be successful in America? she wondered. I do believe in him, she reassured herself.

  CHAPTER 12

  THE COBBLER SHOP

  Pincus paced the sidewalk in front of 210 Delancey Street. So this is the Lower East Side, he thought as he observed the vibrant Jewish community. Signs and announcements in Yiddish advertising special deals in local stores lined the street.

  Stepping off the curb and onto the cobblestones, he maneuvered his way around the many pushcarts selling an assortment of things. He was amazed at the variety of items for sale. One pushcart offered the most wonderful ripe bananas while another sold pretzels loaded with salt crystals that sparkled in the bright sunlight. A plump woman wrapped in a white apron had repurposed a baby carriage as a pushcart, which she had loaded up with red apples. Pincus felt his stomach growl with hunger.

  He carefully crossed the street as horse-drawn wagons made their way down the boulevard. Just as he was about to reach the other side, he stepped into a steamy pile of horse dung. His right shoe was thoroughly covered with manure. Quickly he hopped to the curb on his clean foot and then realized that he only was on the center mall of Delancey Street. There was an entire second lane for the traffic going in the opposite direction. The mall itself served as a small park with trees and grassy areas and benches. He immediately sat down on one, found a cloth in his pocket, and cleaned off his shoe.

  Children were playing along the mall, and men and woman sat on the other benches. Some, he noticed, were watching him and were apparently amused at his predicament. He was quick to offer a snarl to anyone who cared to make eye contact. Sure, make fun of the cobbler with his shit-covered shoe, he lamented.

  Tossing the cloth away, he gathered his wits and once again took in his new surroundings. Delancey Street was a wide boulevard, as he could see, yet it seemed small. Perhaps, Pincus thought, it was because of the hundreds of people living within the confines of the tall buildings that lined the street.

  Allowing his gaze to go beyond the facades of the apartments and storefronts, he could make out activity through the open windows and imagined the intimacies of so many Jews making a new life in America. He thought of Clara. Could she and the children thrive here? Certainly, the opportunities seemed plentiful.

  The sight of families walking together caused him to wonder how many other men had left their wives and children behind in order to first secure a new life. What if I made a mistake? This thought frightened him so much that he pushed it forcefully to the back of his mind.

  The condition of his shoe suddenly became a welcome distraction. He decided to return to the room that he shared with Jakob, where he could properly clean his shoe and give it a good polish from the bag of tools and supplies he had brought with him from home.

  As he made his way back across Delancey, the front doors of number 210 swung open with a pounding force that nearly tore it off its hinges, and out popped Jakob.

  “Pincus, we’re all set. In a few days, we’ll have a new place to live with a window and a toilet, and there’s more good news.” He paused to hand Pincus a key. “We have a place for your cobbler shop, too.”

  Pincus looked at the key, which was attached to a block of wood with 95 LUDLOW burned into it.

  “I know Ludlow Street,” he said enthusiastically and pointed. “There, it’s the next corner.” Too excited to be slowed down by details, Pincus was nearly in a full run.

  “Slow down, you don’t even know where you are going,” pleaded Jakob.

  “Yes, Ludlow is right here,” Pincus yelled as he rounded the corner.

  By the time Jakob caught up, Pincus was standing in front of 95 Ludlow Street. The empty store was squeezed in between a tobacco shop on the left and an optometrist on the right.

  Pincus took one step to the landing and inserted the large metal key into the keyhole. The old door swung open on its rusty hinges, and he stepped inside. As the sunlight streamed into the dark, dusty space, Pincus could see what had once been a news-stand and bookstore. Old pages from the Yiddish newspaper, The Forward, were scattered on dark wooden shelves and spilled across the dirty tiled floor. A few random books remained from the previous shopkeeper.

  “This will be perfect!” Pincus announced. “Let’s get to work.”

  CHAPTER 13

  THE LANDSMAN SOCIETY

  It took nearly a full day for Pincus just to clear the garbage from his new shop. Occasionally he would pause to read a headline or an article from The Forward dated several months earlier. He learned in a story ab
out the Lower East Side that there were now over half a million Jews living there, supported by over 500 synagogues. Many of these were places of worship hastily organized in cramped tenement apartments.

  As he was washing the years of dirt off the storefront window, Jakob walked in and said, “Come with me.”

  “Why, where are we going?”

  “Just come, I’ll show you.”

  Pincus put down the dirt-covered rag and followed Jakob out the front door and into the door right next to their entrance.

  Jakob led Pincus up four flights of stairs and opened the door to an empty apartment.

  “Welcome to our new home,” he said, sweeping his arm wide.

  This was indeed an improvement over where they had slept the past three nights. Although it was still a one-room apartment, Pincus was very pleased with the fresh air breezing past him from the single window that also offered a great view of Ludlow Street.

  Pincus and Jakob spent the next few days building shelves and a wall that would separate the entrance of the store from the workplace in the back.

  This is how my father set up his cobbler shop, Pincus thought proudly, as he arranged the tools of the trade in precise order. I wish he were alive to see how I’ve made it to America.

  “What are you doing?” Jakob asked as he watched Pincus placing small piles of salt in the corners of the room.

  “Keeping away evil spirits. They like to hide in the corners,” Pincus said emphatically.

  Looking around at their progress, Pincus said, “We need a sign for the front of the shop. I saw a sign maker over on Orchard. I’ll stop by this afternoon and see how he can help us.”

  Orchard Street was a short walk from the store. As Pincus entered the store, the proprietor greeted him warmly.