A Ritchie Boy Page 6
With identity badges affixed to their outerwear, Lila, Bart, and Eli stepped into a large ground-floor room. They were told to leave their belongings there, that they would undergo a review process. Explanations got repeated in English, German, and Italian. In a wave of panic, Lila addressed the American official in German, asking if the suitcases would be safe. She repeated her question, more calmly, in English.
He nodded. “Absolutely.” As if responding to the apprehension in her eyes, he added, “You needn’t worry.”
Fingers pointed up a winding staircase; the sound of footsteps surrounded her as she led the ascent to the registry room for medical and legal evaluations. The waiting area had long metal rails that seemed to facilitate an orderly procession. Several older immigrants left the queue to rest on wooden benches.
Her jaw dropped as she entered the grand hall. She’d never seen an indoor space this enormous. The noise of thousands of voices bounced off the vaulted ceilings.
Compared to their time sitting and waiting, the medical exam took but seconds—a rapid head-to-toe scan. Lila was told to continue through the maze of metal rails toward the far end of the chamber for her legal inspection. When she finally heard her name called, she marched forward and found herself face-to-face with a uniformed inspector seated on a stool behind a high desk.
“Where were you born?”
“Vienna.”
“Are you married?”
Lila turned and pointed to Bart and Eli. “There. My husband sits with our son.”
The officer motioned for the two to join her, and he paused before he addressed all of them. “What is your occupation, Mr. Stoff?”
Lila hesitated, not used to speaking for her husband. “My husband had a small business and will be looking for work. I teach English. Our son is a … He will be enrolled in school.”
“Have any of you ever been convicted of a crime?”
“No.”
“How much money do you have?”
“I … I don’t know. Very little.”
“What is your destination?”
“New York City.” Lila paused, then added, “For now.”
He stamped papers and handed them to her. “Walk down the left aisle.” He pointed to the stairs and then called out the next name.
She took off briskly, almost gleeful to have this interrogation behind them. At the top of the stairs, she scanned the first floor of the building. There was a post office, a ticketing booth for the railways, and a separate room to change money. Blackboards posted the exchange rate for a variety of currencies. She noticed several people holding up signs. She had been instructed to connect with the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society. A social worker would meet them and, she had been assured, have the keys to their living quarters. HIAS would cover the cost of the apartment along with modest living expenses for the next three months as they decided their future.
Whoops and yelps of joy broke through her absorption. The ground floor had turned into some kind of meeting place where family and friends connected with loved ones. As she scoured the scene, her alarm returned. She couldn’t see the suitcases. They weren’t where she’d placed them when they arrived. Lila’s eyes darted from one area to another until she spotted a great mountain of luggage sectioned off with tape. Heaving a sigh of relief, she felt Bart’s arm on her shoulder. Bart and Eli nudged her along, and as they picked their way down the stairs, she grew lightheaded. The long journey was finally over.
“Lila!”
When she heard her name, Lila twisted her head toward the familiar voice. She recognized Zelda instantly, her chestnut hair now in a bun, her oval face thinner but beaming with a broad grin. She took in Giorgio’s black curls, her eyes filling before she nearly tripped over luggage in her path. The Munis swooped her up into their arms.
“My God!” Lila tried to speak through her sobs. “Twelve years and we’re finally together.” She pulled away to take in first Zelda then Giorgio before she clasped them again. “Our angels.”
Bart and Eli stood awkwardly several steps behind Lila. She turned and grabbed Eli’s arm and pulled him forward. “You remember my Eli? He was three when you left for America.”
Zelda’s eyes teared as she reached up to kiss Eli’s cheek. Giorgio wrapped his arms around Lila and Eli at once. Bart stepped forward murmuring, “Danke, danke, danke,” as he took Giorgio’s outstretched hand and gave Zelda a squeeze. For several blissful moments, the five were entangled.
“But I am not your sponsor, dear Bart,” Zelda murmured. “I was merely the small vessel who found the large ship.”
Eli looked puzzled. “What do you mean?”
“Zelda’s referring to the man … an important New York businessman. She actually got him to vouch for us, to sign for our affidavits.” Lila held her son’s gaze, realizing that in the anxious scurry of those last days in Vienna, with Eli preoccupied himself, she had not thought or found the time to speak about the American businessman. “This John Brandeis, he’s our angel as well.”
“But why—”
“Excuse me, excuse me. Are you the Stoffs?” Lila turned her head, this time toward an unfamiliar voice, bewildered at being fingered amid this boisterous throng. She found herself facing a blue sign with large bold letters in white: HIAS. She squinted to read the words in smaller print: “Welcome The Refugee.”
THE SCENE AS THEY exited the inspection hall kept flashing through Lila’s mind, though it was now a full month ago. Lucy Shorr, the HIAS representative, had transported the three and their belongings to where they now temporarily resided: a low-rise tenement on Orchard Street, just a dozen blocks from Zelda and Giorgio’s apartment.
With its brick face and fire escape, their building looked like every other lining this street. Here they lived among other immigrants, surrounded by bargain shops, lingerie stores, bars, Jewish-owned haberdasheries, and the smells from kosher and Chinese restaurants. Signs with Hebrew lettering filled the windows. The nearby Laundromat promoted cleaned suits for a dollar. The tailor offered pressing along with repairs. Sidewalk peddlers, cigarettes hanging out of their mouths, held out bags of fresh cauliflower, celery stalks, and zucchini for passersby. Bedsheets hung from iron balconies. Street workers sat on curbs, fanning themselves with their caps. Women covered themselves in dark shawls despite the heat. For some Eastern Europeans coming from shtetls, Lila understood how the Lower East Side could feel comforting with its familiar, old-world flavor. But she came from a city of operas and waltzes, art galleries and stunning architecture. She reminded herself these were provisional accommodations, and they were safe here.
She’d tried to make the stark apartment into a home for them, placing her watercolors on the walls, displaying the family pictures and collection of books. She positioned the frame holding her mother’s image prominently on the single credenza in the living room, the crack now reaching diagonally from top to bottom.
Today, Bart planned to meet with a HIAS specialist about job prospects. Lila pressed him not to make any commitments. She had been willing to give New York a try and crammed their days with activities, despite her reservations about making the city their permanent home. She and Bart had met friends of the Munis and had several dinners together, but Lila didn’t feel they fit in. They’d spent their first weekend on Coney Island on a beach packed with bathers as far as the eye could see. The southern shore of Long Island reminded her of the chaotic beach scene in Trieste, except here she had faced a sea of scant swimsuits donned by women who appeared insouciant while she felt self-conscious. Weeks later, the three attended a Brooklyn Dodgers game at Ebbets Field. Eli pointed out the patches worn by the players, promoting the 1939 World’s Fair to be held in New York. Lacking an understanding of baseball and disconnected from the shouts and cheers, all Lila had noticed was a mass of mostly men’s heads, their straw boaters and derbies clouding the bleachers.
Then, last Sunday, they’d caught an early train from Grand Central to visit Bart’s first cousin in New Rochelle
. The station swarmed with people, the din of their voices disorienting as it competed with the sounds of pigeons flapping against the arched ceiling. Sunlight flooded through windows in the vaulted main room of the terminal, illuminating the central concourse and its long row of ticket booths. A kind man at the information kiosk guided them to the right window, then to the stairs that led to the platforms. When the ride along the north shore of Long Island Sound took them past the Bronx, Eli enthusiastically identified Yankee Stadium and the zoo. Lila took pleasure in his exuberance yet wished she could be more hopeful about what lay in front of them. As they moved farther from the city, the landscape opened up and grew greener and she finally loosened up, happy to escape the hustle of the urban ghetto. But despite the comfort of being amongst relatives, she’d felt even more displaced in Westchester County, missing her own family.
So now, Lila gave Bart a quick kiss and reminded him he was only exploring job possibilities in the unlikely event they stayed. They still had two months to decide, two months before they needed to position themselves to be self-sufficient. She felt cheerful this early fall morning as she left their apartment with Eli, the air crisp, a cerulean sky above. The two passed a teeming marketplace of peddlers, their side-by-side pushcarts filled with vegetables, fruits, chickens, and breads lining the curbs on the way to the Delancey and Essex Streets subway.
Today Eli was taking her on a tour of Midtown Manhattan. He had insisted. Times Square was their first destination. “It’s the heart of the world,” Eli said with some authority. As they threaded their way through the crowds, bold billboards caught Lila’s attention. THE NEW CHEVROLET 1938: The Car That Is Complete ran next to ads for Bromo-Seltzer and Calvert Whiskies. The Times Building, Loew’s State Theatre, Hotel Astor, and Gaiety Theatre were conspicuous across the wide street. A garish poster promoted a live burlesque show with the image of scantily dressed women in a dance line. Here, too, Lila had a bad taste in her mouth. How crass it all was—nothing like her beloved Vienna.
Suddenly a passerby jostled her without a word of apology. Eli prodded her forward, and they zigzagged from one street to another. Lila observed the wider avenues and sidewalks and the taller buildings in limestone as they walked eastward. Eli noted the near-complete construction of a skyscraper complex being built by a wealthy businessman named Rockefeller. She was impressed with her son’s grasp of facts and ease navigating the urban jumble and told him so.
“Mama, I wonder. Does this John Brandeis work somewhere around here?”
Eli’s question caught Lila by surprise. “I—I don’t know.” She hadn’t considered this man as an actual person they could seek out and didn’t know if that was even appropriate. “Sometimes, people do noble acts without expecting … without wanting anything in return. We are the beneficiaries of this man’s good will and generosity of spirit.”
“So, we can’t find out where he works and go thank him?”
“Not now, Eli. We can think about how we might express our appreciation someday, okay?”
They walked ahead silently for a few blocks. As they passed Radio City Music Hall, Eli resumed his descriptive hyperbole. “This is the largest theater in the world!” Lila wasn’t sure if this was her son’s interpretation or a description from the New York City pocket guide he carried along with him: “‘From these modern skyscrapers, you can see all of New York!’” he read. Lila was more interested in following her nose to the aroma of roasted chestnuts.
By noon, they stood at the foot of the Chrysler Building at the corner of Forty-Second and Lexington, its metallic sheen and art deco style gaining Lila’s full scrutiny. The day remained cloudless and she craned her neck, squinting to admire the silver spire flashing in the sun. She didn’t care that this elegant edifice “used to be the world’s tallest building,” another fact Eli drew from his guide. He took the elevator to the Chrysler observation deck on the seventy-first floor, as she stood amid mostly men hovering around cars that filled the lobby, smoothing their hands along the elongated shiny black metal hoods, pointing to the whitewall tires. Lila thought it strange to see automobiles inside a building. She gawked at the admiring crowd, barely noticing Eli walking toward her.
Uneasy with the heights of New York skyscrapers, Lila also remained at ground level at their next and final stop: the Empire State Building. Eli set off to climb the 102 stories to the top. A rite of passage, he’d called it. Seeking fresh air, she pushed through the brass door and waited for a streetcar to pass before crossing for another view of the landmark building.
Men’s voices caught her attention, and she stole a sidelong glance at two workers sitting along a ledge of a building under construction, eating sandwiches on what must have been their lunch break.
“You ever listen to that priest on the radio?”
“That Coughlin guy?”
“Yeah, I been hearing his broadcasts every week.”
A small boy ran past Lila, his mother shouting after him, blocking the conversation Lila hadn’t meant to listen in on. She gingerly stepped closer to the men.
“He says those Jew bankers caused the Depression. Some international conspiracy.”
“He said that?”
“Somethin’ like that. There’s a lot more of ’em around this city, that’s for sure. ’specially downtown. Pretty pushy folk, if you ask me.”
“Yeah, lots of foreigners. I’d like to send them Jews back where they came from.”
Lila stood frozen, her back to the men so they couldn’t see the anger surely coloring her face and neck. She felt like she had the first time Eli was attacked on his way home from school: when she went to greet him and saw his clothes torn, a bruise on his forehead. He had been kicked and verbally taunted right in their neighborhood. She wanted to harm these men, just like she’d wanted to find Eli’s tormentors and slap them senseless, but instead she darted across the street. Blinded by her fury, she ran in the path of an oncoming car. It screeched to a stop, honking at her as she fled back into the Empire State Building.
Eli was just exiting the elevator. “Mama, you look like you saw a ghost.” His face darkened, and he put his hands on her shoulders. “Are you all right?”
Lila shook her head as if expelling a swarm of gnats from her hair. “I’m fine. I crossed the street and got in the way of a car. Just wasn’t paying attention.”
“THERE ARE MORE IMMIGRANTS pouring into New York by the hour,” Lila said as she set a bowl of vegetables and a pitcher of water on the worn oak table for dinner. She couldn’t hide her fretfulness. It was nearly October, darkness already setting in at six o’clock. But their small apartment was always underlit, having only two windows, one in the bedroom above the sewing machine Lila got on sale and used to earn extra spending money. The other window, here in the dining room, faced another building.
“Du bist … again, how you say … ruhig?” In the short time they’d been in New York, Bart’s comprehension had improved, and he picked up new words in English every day. Lila insisted they were in America and should speak the language of their new country.
“Restless. Yes. I am restless.” Her diction was perfect. After all, English was what she taught before she was summarily dismissed from her school as anti-Semitism began infusing the country.
“We’ve been hier—was? Zwei months?” Bart ran his hand over his bald scalp.
“I don’t see opportunities here, Bart. Not for you, and certainly not for Eli.” Lila spooned several clumps of mashed potatoes onto Eli’s plate. “I contacted HIAS and asked them about smaller cities where there’s a university. Somewhere we can assimilate.” Unspoken was her hope that people outside of New York would be more accepting. That they could live in a neighborhood with real homes, with trees in the backyards like she’d seen in New Rochelle. Where Eli could get a college education.
Bart reached for the platter of brisket, a luxury she allowed sparingly on their stipend, although she really wanted to splurge on veal for Wiener Schnitzel. He paused to gaze across t
he table at Lila. “Ah. Du hast been busy. Was … what … you finden?”
“They gave me a list of cities in the Midwest—St. Louis, Chicago, Columbus. I think Chicago is too big.”
“I vote for Columbus.” Eli put down his fork and wiped his mouth with his napkin. “Remember that Negro man, Jesse Owens? He’s the one who showed Hitler that the Aryans aren’t always the best. During the ’36 Olympics—”
“I’m not sure what you’re getting at, Eli.” Lila made a mental note to bring out her homemade Viennese butter cookies.
“He was a student at Ohio State University. That’s in Columbus.”
Lila and Bart exchanged glances. She saw a twinkle of pride in Bart’s eyes and could barely hold back a grin. “Well, der Sohn, I guess we need to find out a little more about Columbus, Ohio, then.”
IN LESS THAN TWO weeks, arrangements were finalized for their move. After a day of last-minute errands ending with a makeshift dinner of leftovers, Lila gathered some newspapers, eased herself into the living room armchair, and clicked on the floor lamp. She opened the New York Times and was drawn to an article about FDR’s static immigration policy, unraveling her thread of hope of getting her mother out of Vienna. She glanced over at the worn credenza, now covered with an embroidery she’d sewn, her eyes settling on Mutti’s face, gazing out at her from behind the fractured glass.
It was in ’26 that Lila had taken this portrait with her new Leica. She’d spent the savings from her teaching job on a camera to record Eli’s childhood. She remembered the exact day—March 9—because it fell on Eli’s third birthday and she thought it good practice to first shoot subjects who might sit still. The sparkle in Mutti’s eyes and her winsome smile were for Eli and Vati, playing outside the frame of the picture. The day was unseasonably warm and sunny, still winter but pleasant enough to enjoy a walk—really a chase—in Stadtpark. Austria’s economy had stabilized. The Great Depression hadn’t yet arrived. Her life was happy: Bart’s small business was growing, Eli was a daily delight, her parents were healthy. Studying the photograph now, she saw how well she’d captured Mutti’s essence—her hair salt-and-pepper at sixty-five, her expression tender, the tilt in her chin exuding a grace and confidence.