Rag Pickers

Always, by the time the humid, breathless, summer night lifted its veil and a quiet, rosy dawn emerged, when some glimmers of soft, opaque light began to filter through the dried muddy, dusty window into Nekhemye’s “commercial” cellar abode—Gele, Nekhemye’s wife was always up by that time, doing the housework, busy as a bee. The pail with its unclean contents that stood all night long in its place by the door was long gone by then. The floor, damaged by constantly leaking water, had already been swept clean, and whatever little furniture they had—the small cupboard with its broken doors, the table and the bench—Gele was wiping them hard with a rag until small pieces of the remaining paint chipped off of the wood. The clay oven had already been heated and a pot of black coffee was boiling on it. On the table lay a small loaf of freshly baked bread with a golden brown, shiny face, waiting to be blessed by Nekhemye.

At the same time Nekhemye would be sliding off the thin, dirty bedcover and getting up from the wobbly, wooden bed that squeaks angrily at the smallest movement; he would pour neglvaser on his hands, go to the window, and there, with eyes closed, facing the sky, say the moyde ani with fervor, just like his father used to do every morning.

Once he is dressed, he goes to a niche of the room to wake up his oldest son, Vigdor, who is stilling snoring heartily on a heap of rags, his bronze-color face covered in sweat.

Vigdor, who helps his father earn a living, digging all day long in village- and city-garbage cans, opens his eyes with a shudder, as if awakened in the middle of a nightmare. He slightly raises his head with its tangled, strange-colored hair, looks at his father for a while, then glances around with a bewildered look in his eyes and dozes off again, snoring, his sweaty face buried in the pile of rags.

But Nekhemye won’t give up. He wakes his son again and again, until Vigdor opens his rheumy eyes once again; he turns his head toward the window, thus breaking the thread of saliva that is flowing from his mouth onto the rags; he swallows the greasy saliva and then asks sleepily:

“How late is it?”

Nekhemye does not answer. He puts the bucket next to Vigdor and gives him a scoop of water. He says:

“Pour the neglvaser and get up.”

Vigdor struggles to untangle himself from the mound of rags; he notices the freshly baked, fragrant bread on the table and starts to throw on his clothes quickly.

Meanwhile, Nekhemye’s wife, the tall Gele, who has to walk around with her head bent all day long on account of the low ceiling, makes the beds, fixes the mound of rags Vigdor just got up from, goes outside and shakes out the two sacks father and son are taking on the road, and then starts to look for more housework. [ . . . ]

Nekhemye already said the Morning Prayer, put down the yellow, patched tallis, washed his hands, and recited the blessing over the bread with great fervor, just like his father used to do. Now Vigdor is saying the Morning Prayer, wearing his father’s tefillin, making mistakes as he reads; he watches with envy how his father eats, so he speeds up, skipping some words.

His mother notices it. She puts a cup of hot coffee on the table for Vigdor and cuts him a few slices of bread.

“At least let him finish the prayer,” says Nekhemye in a tone of mild disapproval.

“You can see how hungry he is,” she is gesturing to her husband so that Vigdor doesn’t notice, as if she were saying, “just let it go this time.”

A little while later father and son are both ready to go. Vigdor is already standing behind the door in the dark entranceway to the cellar, calling his father impatiently in a strange, drawn-out tone:

“Fah-ther! Nu, come on! Fah-ther, yu comin’?”

Nekhemye is still inside, holding his fleshy hand on the naked mezuzah; something is not letting him cross the threshold, as if he had forgotten to take something with him.

Vigdor runs back inside. He throws down the empty sack from his shoulder and shouts angrily:

“Why have you stopped here? Pinkhesl and Abe must have gone out to the village a long time ago. They will take everything before we get there.”

Deep wrinkles appear on Nekhemye’s forehead, which he presses with one hand. His wife, the tall Gele, looks around, helps him search with her eyes, then hesitantly stretches out her long hand, pointing to the window sill where there are a couple of books.

Nekhemye’s dark blue eyes suddenly begin to smile and the wrinkles on his forehead smooth out. He goes to the window, takes a small book that tells the stories of great tsadikim and pious Jews, and hides it in his bosom.

“Nu, Fah-ther, come on!” hearkens him Vigdor.

Then, father and son throw the empty sacks over their shoulders once again.

Nekhemye gives his wife some money so she can cook a soup, takes his muddy walking stick from the corner, and they leave, saying “good day.”

“A good day, a successful day to you, too,” the tall Gele shouts after them.

And now, after their departure, comes Gele’s most difficult task: to wake up the two younger boys and send them on their way—the tall Sroel, whose back is slightly hunched, and the very young, sunbrowned Hershl with his round, brown face like a bread-roll. They spend all day standing around the train station, carrying suitcases and packages for the businessmen who arrive to town, or, in the summer, they ride the wagon drivers’ horses to the river to bathe them.

Now both of them are still asleep in a niche of the room, their heads covered with feathers, under a thin, dirty bedcover which they constantly kick off of them.

Gele leans over the boys, wringing her hands, covers them from time to time, sticks her wrinkled finger under her faded wig; she is treading in one place impatiently, waking the boys:

“Nu, get up already, it is well into the day already.”

The tall Sroel opens one eye, lets out a sleepy “Ha?” and dozes off again.

Gele knows how tired they are. She thinks, “Let them sleep a bit more. They already missed one train anyway.” And she continues to look for work that needs to be done. Wiping the cupboard, swishing the bench, sweeping the floor. Meanwhile she remembers that today is wash day at the rich Goldberg family’s house. She, Gele, will go there, as always, to help her daughter Genendl who has served at their house for a few years now. She wants to get there early, before they start, together with the robust peasant laundrywoman. If she gets there on time, when rich Madame Goldberg is still in bed, and her maid brings out from her bedroom a silver tray with an empty fine porcelain cup and a piece of sweet-smelling pastry. . . . And she—Gele thinks—will breathe in the aroma of the delicious food, and, of course, Madame Goldberg will say to Genendl, pointing at Gele with a half-raised hand:

“Don’t forget, Genendl, that today you need to cook lunch for one extra person.”

And Gele suddenly realizes that she might get there late; she leans over the boys’ bed, touches Sroel’s head and repeats a few times, louder and louder:

“Sroel, get up! People are already rushing to the seven-o’clock train!”

Sroel jumps up from the bed petrified and asks:

“Ha? What? The seven-o’clock train?”

“Yes, yes,” Gele nods her head.

The seven-o’clock train is the most important one for Sroel because it comes directly from Warsaw and brings rich merchants with huge, heavy suitcases. There you can earn good money, and sometimes they even treat you to a drink.

That is why Sroel jumps up so fast and stands the young Hershl on his feet, too, who, with eyes still closed, starts to curse his brother:

“May you be struck by epilepsy!”

It takes only a few minutes for them to put on their black-dyed sackcloth clothes; stuffing some bread into their pockets they are running fast, barefoot, their feet muddy, toward the old train station.

“Today I will not bring you lunch!” shouts Gele after them.

Doing the laundry takes several days at the rich Goldberg family, sometimes a full week.

On these days Gele would leave the cellar very early and get home late, tired to the bone, carrying home from the rich people’s house a package of food that she saved from her own meals for her husband and sons.

Nekhemye and the boys would first feast their eyes, just look at the food, and only then would they start to eat slowly, with restraint, the way one enjoys fine food.

Standing all day long by the washtub, Gele saw this scene in front of her eyes in the soapy bubbly water. Recalling how Nekhemye sucks on a goose bone for half an hour before he chews it with a shining face, she says to her daughter Genendl:

“You know what? I just can’t eat now. Pack up my lunch.

Genendl understands what her mother means by this. She packs up her lunch and makes sure that her mother, too, eats something, separately.

After that Gele carries on with the wash with a calmer mind. She knows every piece of clothing well, remembers whom they each belong to: this blouse with the silk lace belongs to the youngest daughter, the one with the round pink cheeks who plays the piano for hours in the third room. And under this bedcover sleeps Madame Goldberg herself. Gele remembers every piece she washes, and she wishes ten times a day: if only she could give her Nekhemye a clean white shirt like the one she is washing to wear every Friday afternoon.

From time to time thoughts come up in her mind as she leans on the washtub with both hands: she did not sweep the floor well today, everything must be covered in dust; her two sons, Sroel and Hershl, must be sitting in the gutter by the train station now, watching with envy the porters who are gulping down large spoonfuls of soup that their mothers brought them, while they are eating bread and onions that they bought at Avromtshe’s tavern.

But this will only last for a few days, until the Gold-bergs’ wash is done and Gele returns to the cellar to her usual household duties.

The room has been swept. Everything is in order. Sroel and Hershl are eating soup from a pot just like the other porters, and Gele is standing on the side, surrounded by the other women, telling them about the wonders she saw at the Goldbergs.

“Don’t worry, Gele. I already have a match for Genendl”; that’s what Madame Goldberg told her.

And all the women, mothers of grown girls, envy her.