22
There was an unfamiliar car in my driveway when I arrived home, which I eyed warily. Ruth being home with any kind of worker had not gone well so far. But it was better than the fire department, I supposed.
Unless that was Mr. Waterman’s car.
Ugh, I thought. Hopefully just a solicitor. Ruth is the type who would let a Jehovah’s Witness in. Granted, she’d wind up convincing him to convert to Judaism.
With a sigh, I opened the front door and went inside, only to find Mrs. Kline inspecting every single item on my dining room sideboard as if she were in a museum where people were allowed to touch the exhibits.
“How curious,” she said, picking up a gravy boat and examining it.
“How curious that Jews use gravy, just like gentiles?” I asked.
She jumped a mile, throwing the gravy boat into the air. Ruth caught it with a practiced ease that made me think this wasn’t the first of my belongings to take flight this afternoon.
“Well, yes,” she said, holding a hand to her heart. “You gave me quite a fright.”
Why don’t you go to the hospital about it? I thought. But I gave her a half smile, the most I could muster at finding her in my home.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I just didn’t expect to find a patient inspecting my wedding china.”
“I didn’t know Jews used china.” She quickly turned to Ruth. “Although yes, I know about your penchant for Chinese food. I suppose we can try that next week.”
“We use silver too.” She opened her mouth, but I cut her off. “To eat. Not to dismember Christian babies. That’s called a blood libel. It’s never been real.”
She looked to Ruth, who nodded. “I’ve learned so much today. No holes in your sheets either.”
My mouth dropped open at the idea that she had inspected my bed linens. “Now you—” I said, but Ruth stopped me by replacing the gravy boat and putting a hand on my arm.
“Louise was curious. But—” She looked at her wristwatch. “Oh dear. The children will be home from school soon. I’m afraid I need to send you home,” she said to Mrs. Kline. “I’ll call you about a bridge game, and we can go for Chinese next week. Wait until you try dim sum!”
“It’s a date,” Mrs. Kline said. She shook Ruth’s hand and nodded at me. “Ruth. Mrs. Feldman.”
Ruth walked her to the door, while I straightened the gravy boat, seething. As soon as I heard the door shut and Ruth’s footsteps returning, I turned to face her. “How could you bring that woman into my house?”
Ruth crossed her arms. “That woman went from the most raging anti-Semite you’ve ever seen to being willing to eat at a Jewish deli. Give me a month, and she’ll be donating to the United Jewish Appeal.”
I closed my eyes and counted to ten. “I don’t want strangers in my bedroom.”
“She wasn’t in your bedroom. I showed her the linen closet when she asked about holes in the sheets.”
I shook my head and exhaled audibly. “I don’t know where they get these insane ideas.”
“Tzitzit,” Ruth said, referring to a fringed, poncho-like garment that orthodox men wore under their shirts, with a hole cut out for the head. “That’s what my mother said. Someone saw tzitzit hanging on a clothesline and thought that was a bedsheet for ... relations.”
For a moment, I stared at Ruth, not comprehending, and then I began to laugh.
“What’s so funny?” she asked.
“The size of the hole,” I said, then I clapped my hand over my mouth.
She waggled her eyebrows. “Well, that would explain why they hate us, then, if they think our men are that ... well endowed.”
I couldn’t help it. I doubled over with laughter, Ruth joining in. “I’m going to go get the children,” I said when I finally composed myself.
“Remind them to keep their horns covered in case Louise is driving by the school,” Ruth called.
“Goodbye, Ruth.” I shook my head, but I was still chuckling. And as much as I didn’t want Mrs. Kline in my home, I did respect that Ruth had disarmed her so easily.
“No, no, no,” I said as Ruth came downstairs wearing a dowdy suit. “That won’t do.”
“Why not?” she asked, holding out the fabric of the skirt. “It’s a business meeting.”
“It’s a—well, O’Donnell’s is a nice restaurant. You should wear a dress.”
“I’ve been to O’Donnell’s,” Ruth said. “This is just fine.”
“For lunch, maybe,” I said. “When’s the last time you went for dinner?” She looked uncertain.
“I have dresses,” she said. “But I don’t want Morty to get the wrong idea.”
“Ruth,” I said, putting an arm around her shoulder and guiding her toward the stairs.
“It’s 1963. Women can be just as powerful in a dress as in a suit.
Look at Jackie Kennedy. No one takes her less seriously when she dresses for dinner.
She didn’t wear a suit when she had dinner at Buckingham Palace. ”
“I’m hardly Jackie Kennedy, and no one is confusing Morty Moskowitz for Prince Philip, Barbara.”
I waved a hand in the air. “You know what I mean. Go on. Wearing a dress out to dinner won’t kill you.”
She reluctantly climbed the stairs, returning in a dress that was at least a decade old but flattering nonetheless. “Better?” she asked.
“Much,” I said. Though if this date didn’t work out, I was going to have to take her shopping—likely on my dime—for some clothes that were made during the Kennedy administration.
“Actually, wait,” I said, running up the stairs.
I hadn’t worn my new hat yet, but it was a perfect match for the trim on Ruth’s dress and was just the touch needed to modernize her outfit.
“Wear this with it,” I said, handing her the hat.
Ruth examined it. “It still has a tag on it.”
“Where do I have to go in a nice hat? You can borrow it for the evening.”
She put it on her head and went to the mirror by the front door to examine her reflection. “It is flattering,” she said. “Not everyone can wear this shade of pink.”
I blinked, wondering if that was a dig at my skin tone, but shook it off. I knew the hat looked better on me, even if she didn’t. I smiled tightly and removed the tag, hoping my new hat made it home in one piece.
At five forty on the dot, there was a knock at the door.
Bobby went running to answer it, trailed by Pepper, stopping short and staring at Mr. Moskowitz before turning heel and running upstairs.
“I didn’t do it,” he yelled down. “Whatever he’s mad about, I didn’t do it!
” Pepper growled and barked at the intruder.
Mr. Moskowitz was holding a bouquet of grocery store carnations but looked irritated. “If that’s what he says when he sees me, the young man is guilty of something .” He looked down at Pepper. “Quiet, pisher .”
“The only thing he’s guilty of is being scared of you, with good reason,” Ruth countered, and I suppressed a smile as she defended my son. She scooped Pepper up and handed her to me, whispering, “Dogs know a good one when they see one. And they can smell a rotten egg.”
She turned back to Mr. Moskowitz. “Are those for me? Or do you just like holding them?”
He held them out. “They’re for you,” he said. “You look very nice, Ruth.”
She took the flowers, handing them off to Susie and telling her to put them in water. “I suppose we should get this over with,” she said. “Should I drive? I heard you’re not—”
“Mr. Moskowitz is fine to drive,” I said, cutting her off. If she let him know that I had said he wasn’t comfortable driving at night, this evening was going to be over before it started.
“Shall we?” he asked, holding out an elbow. Ruth looked at it but didn’t take it. Instead she picked up her handbag from the table in the hall and walked out before him.
“Is Grandma on a date?” Susie asked me, her eyes wide.
“She is,” I said. “She just doesn’t know it yet.”
Susie made a face. “Couldn’t she find someone better than Old Man Moskowitz?”
“Mr. Moskowitz,” I corrected, even though I called him that in my head as well. “And you should have seen them the other day. They got on famously. Now go play with your brother while I make our dinner.”
It was so nice having a meal with just my children. No one complained about the food or brought up atrocities that had been committed against the Jews of Europe. Just eating, talking about our days, and enjoying each other’s company.
I let the kids go play in the backyard with Pepper after they finished eating, and I cleared the table and pulled out bowls to give them ice cream for dessert.
The days were getting longer as spring progressed, and the simple joy of it still being light out at six thirty made me smile as I watched them from the kitchen window.
Then the front door opened, startling me as it slammed shut just as suddenly. It hadn’t occurred to me to lock it. I snatched a frying pan off the stove, then went into the hall, prepared to fight off whatever invader had entered my home.
But it was Ruth, forcefully smashing her bag onto the hall table and kicking off her low heels.
I lowered the frying pan, and she looked up at me. “That—that—that cad!” she exclaimed as she removed my hat. “I have half a mind to fling every single dropping Pepper leaves from now on at his front door. The chutzpah of that shmuck!”
“What happened?” I asked, alarmed, but also pulling my hat from her trembling hands before she crushed it. Was he secretly a bottom pincher like Dr. Howe? Or worse?
“He couldn’t care less about the Jewish community. He tried to kiss me, that’s what! Me! A respectable widow!”
A wave of guilt rose and crested inside me. That was my fault. I lied to both of them about the setup. But neither would have gone if I hadn’t. That wasn’t a lie exactly. Was it?
“Then he took you home?”
Ruth shook her head and wiggled her right ankle at me. “No. I kicked him and got in a cab.” She pointed a thumb over her shoulder. “The driver is still out there. You’d better go pay him.”
“Me?”
“Barbara Feldman,” she said in a tone that made me want to go hide under the bed like my kids did when I took the same tone with them. “Do you think I was born yesterday? I know he didn’t want to talk about the JCC.”
We stared at each other for what felt like a long time. Then finally, I moved toward the stairs. “I’ll get my wallet.”