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The Rise of David Levinsky
Abraham Cahan
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eBook - ePub
The Rise of David Levinsky
Abraham Cahan
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Acclaimed by literary critic Carl Van Doren as `the most important of all immigrant novels,` The Rise of David Levinsky takes place amid America's biggest and most diverse Yiddish-speaking community during the early 20th century. David Levinsky, a young Hasidic Jew struggling to master the Talmud, seeks his fortune amid the teeming streets of New York's Lower East Side. All the energy formerly focused on his religious studies now turns in the direction of rising to the top of the business world, where he discovers the high price of assimilation. Author Abraham Cahan founded and edited the Jewish Daily Forward, the world's most widely read Yiddish paper, and his direct experience contributes mightily to the authenticity of this monumental work.
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LiteratureSous-sujet
North American Literary CollectionsBOOK IX
DORA
CHAPTER I
âHOW ABOUT it?â Mrs. Chaikin said to me, ominously.
âAbout what? What do you mean, Mrs. Chaikin?â
âOh, you know what I mean. It is no use playing the fool and trying to make a fool of me.â
The conversation was held in our deserted shop on an afternoon. The three sewing-machines, the cutting-table, and the pressing-table looked desolate. She spoke in an undertone, almost in a whisper, lest the secret of her husbandâs relations with me should leak out and reach his employers. She had been guarding that secret all along, but now, that our undertaking had apparently collapsed, she was particularly uneasy about it.
âI donât believe that store in the West has failed at all. In fact, I know it has not. Somebody told me all about it.â
This was her method of cross-examining me. I read her a clipping containing the news of the bankruptcy, but as she could not read it herself, she only sneered. I reasoned with her, I pleaded, I swore; but she kept sneering or nodding her head mournfully.
âI donât believe you. I donât believe you,â she finally said, shutting her eyes with a gesture of despair and exhaustion. âDo I believe a dog when it barks? Neither do I believe you. I curse the day when I first met you. It was the black year that brought you to us.â She fell to wringing her hands and moaning: âWoe is me! Woe is me!â
Finally she tiptoed out of the room and down the stairs.
In my despair I longed for somebody to whom I could unbosom myself. I thought of Meyer Nodelman. A self-made man and one who had begun manufacturing almost penniless like myself, he seemed to be just the man I needed. A thought glimmered through my mind, âAnd who knows but he may come to my rescue?â
I was going to call at his warehouse, but upon second thought I realized that the seat of his cold self-interest would scarcely be a favorable setting for the interview and that I must try to entrap him in the humanizing atmosphere of his motherâs home for the purpose.
The next time I saw him at his motherâs I took him up to my little attic and laid my tribulations before him. I told him the whole story, almost without embellishments, omitting nothing but Chaikinâs name.
âIs it all true?â he interrupted me at one point.
I swore that it was, and went on. At the end I offered to prove it all to his satisfaction.
âYou donât need to prove it to me,â he replied. âWhat do I care?â Then, suddenly, casting off his reserve, he blurted out: âLook here, young fellow! If you think I am going to lend you money you are only wasting time, for I am not.â
âAnd why not?â I asked, boldly, with studied dignity.
âWhy not! You better tell me why yes,â he chuckled. âYou have a lot of spunk. That you certainly have, and you ought to make a good business man, but I wonât loan you money, for all that.â
âWerenât you once hard up yourself, Mr. Nodelman? You have made a success of it, and now it would only be right that you should help another fellow get up in the world. You wonât lose a cent by it, either. I take an oath on it.â
âYou canât have an oath cashed in a bank, can you?â
âWhy did that commission merchant take a chance? If a Gentile is willing to help a Jew, and one whom he had never seen before, you should not hesitate, either.â
âWell, there is no use talking about it,â was his final decision.
The following day I received a letter from him, inviting me to his office.
His warehouse occupied a vast loft on a little street off Broadway. Arrived there, I had to pass several men, all in their shirt-sleeves, who were attacking mountains of cloth with long, narrow knives. One of these directed me to a remote window, in front of which I presently found Nodelman lecturing a man who wore a tape-measure around his neck.
Nodelman kept me waiting, without offering me a seat, a good half-hour. He was in his shirt-sleeves, like the others, yet he looked far more dignified than I had ever seen him look before. It was as though the environment of his little kingdom had made another man of him.
Finally, he left the man with the tape-measure and silently led me into his little private office, a narrow strip of partitioned-off space at the other end of the loft.
When we were seated and the partition door was shut he said, with grave mien, âWell,â and fell silent again.
I gazed at him patiently.
âWell,â he repeated, âI have thought it over.â And again he paused. At last he burst out: âI do want to help you, young fellow. You didnât expect it, did you? I do want to help you. And do you know why? Because otherwise you wonât pay that Gentile and I donât want a good-hearted Gentile to think that Jews are a bad lot. Thatâs number one. Number two is this: If you think Meyer Nodelman is a hog, you donât know Meyer Nodelman. Number three: I rather liked the way you talked yesterday. I said to myself, said I: âAn educated fellow who can talk like that will be all right. He ought to be given a lift, for most educated people are damn fools.â Well, Iâll tell you what I am willing to do for you. Iâll get you the goods for that order of yours, not for thirty days, but for sixty. What do you think of that? Now is Nodelman a hog or is he not? But thatâs as far as I am willing to go. I can only get you the goods for that Third Avenue order. See? But that wonât be enough to help you out of your scrape, not enough for you to pay that good Gentile on time.â
He engaged in some mental arithmetic by means of which he reached the conclusion that I should need an additional four hundred dollars, and he wound up by an ultimatum: he would not furnish me the goods until I had produced that amount.
âLook here, young fellow,â he added; âsince you were smart enough to get that Gentile and Meyer Nodelman to help you out, it ought not to be a hard job for you to get a third fellow to take an interest in you. Do you remember what I told you about those credit faces? I think you have got one.â
âI have an honest heart, too,â I said, with a smile.
âYour heart I canât get into, so I donât know. See? Maybe there is a rogue hiding there and maybe there isnât. But your face and your talk certainly are all right. They ought to be able to get you some more cash. And if they donât, then they donât deserve that I should help you out, either. See?â He chuckled in appreciation of his own syllogism.
âItâs a nice piece of Talmud reasoning,â I complimented him, with an enthusiastic laugh. âBut, seriously, Mr. Nodelman, I shall pay you every cent. You run absolutely no risk.â
I pleaded with him to grant me the accommodation unconditionally. I tried to convince him that I should contrive to do without the additional cash. But he was obdurate, and at last I took my leave.
âWait a moment! Whatâs your hurry? Are you afraid youâll be a couple of minutes longer becoming a millionaire? There is something I want to ask you.â
âWhat is it, Mr. Nodelman?â
âHow about your studying to be a doctor-philosopher?â he asked, archly.
âOh, well, one can attend to business and find time for books, too,â I answered.
I came away in a new transport of expectations and in a new agony of despair at once. On the whole, however, my spirits were greatly buoyed up. Encouraged by the result of taking Nodelman into my confidence, I decided to try a similar heart-to-heart talk on Max Margolis, better known to the reader as Maximum Max. He had some money.
I had seen very little of him in the past two years, having stumbled upon him in the street but two or three times. But upon each of these occasions he had stopped me and inquired about my affairs with genuine interest. He was fond of me. I had no doubt about it. And he was so good-natured. Our last chance meeting antedated my new venture by at least six months, and he was not likely to have any knowledge of it. I felt that he would be sincerely glad to hear of it and I hoped that he would be inclined to help me launch it. Anyhow, he seemed to be my last resort, and I was determined to make my appeal to him as effective as I knew how.
As he had always seen me shabbily clad, I decided to overwhelm him with a new suit of clothes. I needed one, at any rate.
After some seeking and inquiring, I found him in a Bowery furniture-store, one of the several places from which he supplied his instalment customers. It was about 10 oâclock in the morning.
âThere is something I want to consult you about, Max,â I said. âSomething awfully important to me. Youâre the only man I know who could advise me and in whom I can confide,â I added, with an implication of great intimacy and affection. âItâs a business scheme, Max. I have a chance to make lots of money.â
The conversation was held in a dusky passage of the labyrinthine store, a narrow lane running between two barricades of furniture.
âWhat is that? A business scheme?â he asked, in a preoccupied tone of voice and straining his eyes to look me over. âYou are dressed up, I see. Quite prosperous, arenât you?â
As we emerged into the glare of the Bowery he scrutinized my suit once again. I quailed. I now felt that to have come in such a screamingly new suit was a fatal mistake. I cursed myself for an idiot of a smart Aleck. But he spoke to me with his usual cordiality and my spirits rose again. However, he seemed to be busy, and so I asked him to set an hour when he could see me at leisure. We made an appointment for 3 oâclock in the afternoon. I was to meet him at the same furniture-store; but upon second thought, and with another glance at my new clothes, he said, jovially:
âWhy, you are rigged out like a regular monarch! It is quite an honor to invite you to the house. Come up, will you? And, as I wonât have to go out to meet you, you can make it 2 oâclock, or half past.â
CHAPTER II
Max occupied the top floor of an old private house on Henry Street, a small ârailroadâ apartment of two large, bright roomsâa living-room and a kitchenâwith two small, dark bedrooms between them. The ceiling was low and the air somewhat tainted with the odor of mold and dampness. I found Max in the general living-room, which was also a dining-room, a fat boy of three on his lap and a slender, pale girl of eight on a chair close by. His wife, a slender young woman with a fine white complexion and serious black eyes, was clearing away the lunch things.
âMrs. Margolis, Mr. Levinsky,â he introduced us. âPlainly speaking, this is my wifey and this is a friend of mine.â
As she was leaving the room for the kitchen he called after her, âDvorah! Dora! make some tea, will you?â
She craned her neck and gave him a look of resentment. âItâs a good thing you are telling me that,â she said. âOtherwise I shouldnât know what I have got to do, should I?â
When she had disappeared he explained to me that he variously addressed her by the Yiddish or English form of her name.
âWe are plain Yiddish folk,â he generalized, good-humoredly.
A few minutes later, as Mrs. Margolis placed a glass of Russian tea before me, he drew her to him and pinched her white cheek.
âWhat do you think of my wifey, Levinsky?â
She smiledâa grave, deprecating smileâand took to pottering about the house.
âAnd what do you think of these little customers?â he went on. âLucy, examine mamma in spelling. Quick! Dora, be a good girl, sit down and let Levinsky see how educated you are.â (âEducatedâ he said in English, with the accent on the âa.â)
âWhat do you want?â his wife protested, softly. âMr. Levinsky wants to see you on business, and here you are bothering him with all sorts of nonsense.â
âNever mind his business. It wonât run away. Sit down, I say. It wonât take long.â
She yielded. Casting bashful side-glances at nobody in particular, she seated herself opposite Lucy.
âWell?â she said, with a little laugh.
I thought her eyes looked too serious, almost angry. âInsane people have eyes of this kind,â I said to myself. I also made a mental note of her clear, fresh, delicate complexion. Otherwise she did not interest me in the least, and I mutely prayed Heaven to take her out of the room.
âHow do you spell âgreatâ?â the little girl demanded.
âG-r-e-a-tâgreat,â her mother answered, with a smile.
âBook?â
âB-o-o-kâbook. Oh, give me some harder words.â
âLaughter.â
âL-a-u-g-h-t-e-râlaughter.â
âIs that correct?â Margolis turned to me, all beaming. âI wish I could do as much. And nobody has taught her, either. She has learned it all by herself. Little Lucy is the only teacher she ever had. But she will soon be ahead of her. Wonât she, Lucy?â
âIâm afraid I am ahead of her already,â Mrs. Margolis said, gaily, yet flushed with excitement.
âYou are not!â Lucy protested, with a good-natured pout.
âShut up, bad girl you,â her mother retorted, again with a bashful side-glance.
âIs that the way you talk to your mamma?â Max intervened. âIâll tell your teacher.â
I was on pins and needles to be alone with him and to get down to the object of my visit.
Finally he said, brusquely: âWell, we have had enough of that. Leave us alone, Dora. Go to the parlor and take the kids along.â
She obeyed.
When he heard of my venture he was interested. He often interrupted me with boisterous expressions of admiration for my subterfuges as well as for the plan as a whole. With all his boisterousness, however, there was an air of caution about him, as if he scented danger. When I finally said that all depended upon my raising four hundred dollars his face clouded.
âI see, I see,â he murmured, with sudden estrangement. âI see. I see.â
âDonât lose courage,â I said to myself. âNodelman was exactly like that at first. Go right ahead.â
I portrayed my business prospects in the most alluring colors and gave Max to understand that if âsomebodyâ advanced me the four hundred dollars he would be sure to get it back in thirty days plus any interest he might name.
âIt would be terrible if I had to let it all go to pieces on account of such a thing,â I concluded.
There was a moment of very awkward silence. It was broken by Max.
âItâs really too bad. What are you going to do about it?â he said. âWhere can you get such a âsomebodyâ?â
âI donât know. Thatâs why I came to consult you. I thought you might suggest some way. It would be a pity if I had to give it all up on account of four hundred dollars.â
âIndeed it would. It would be terrible. Still, four hundred dollars is not four hundred cents. I wish I were a rich man. I should lend it to you at once. You know I should.â
âI should pay you every cent of it, Max.â
âYou say it as if I had money. You know I have not.â
What I did know was that he had, and he knew that I did.
He took to analyzing the situation and offering me advice. Why not go to that kindly Gentile, the commission merchant, make a clean breast of it, and obtain an extension of time? Why not apply to some money-lender? Why not make a vigorous appeal to Nodelman? He seemed to be an obliging fellow, so if I pressed him a little harder he might give me the cash as well as the goods.
I was impelled to retort that advice was cheap, and he apparently read my thoughts.
Presently he said, with genuine ardor: âI tell you what, Levinsky. Why not try to get your old landlady to open her stocking? From what you have told me, she ought not to be a hard nut ...