The Promise Read Online Free Page B

a rush of sound.
    The three of us were standing right up against the counter now, looking at the old man. The pitchman stood behind him, staring gloomily at the four twenty-dollar bills that lay on the radio.
    “From where are you all?” the old man asked pleasantly in Yiddish.
    “New York,” I told him.
    “From where in New York?”
    “Brooklyn.”
    “Ah,” he said. “Where in Brooklyn do you live?”
    “I live in Williamsburg. Rachel here, and Michael, live in Crown Heights.” I spoke slowly, using my halting Yiddish.
    “In Williamsburg,” he said, and smiled deeply. “With all the Hasidim?”
    “That’s right.”
    “There are many Hasidim?”
    “It’s filled with Hasidim. From the concentration camps.”
    His face darkened. He was silent a moment. Behind him the pitchman shifted uncomfortably on his feet and ran his hand over his black hair.
    “You go to school in Brooklyn?” the old man asked quietly.
    “I go to the Hirsch Yeshiva. For smicha.” “Smicha” is the Hebrew word for Orthodox rabbinic ordination.
    “Smicha?” His deep-socketed eyes widened respectfully. “Very nice. I once studied for smicha, in Russia. And the girl? What is the girl studying?”
    “English literature,” Rachel said. Her eyes were still bright with the look of delight and relief they had taken on at the old man’s first words in Yiddish.
    “English literature.” He echoed the words mechanically.
    “Where in Russia are you from?” Rachel asked in English. She understood Yiddish but could not speak it.
    “Mogilev,” he said. “You have heard of Kishinev?”
    Rachel and I nodded.
    “In Mogilev and Shipola there were pogroms like the pogrom in Kishinev. It was terrible. Terrible. After the pogroms I joined a Zionist youth organization. That was illegal. Did you know that was illegal in Russia?”
    I stared at him. “Yes,” I heard myself say.
    “I ran from the Czarist police and came to America.”
    “Through the underground relay network?” I asked in English.
    He looked at me in surprise. “You know about that,” he said quietly, still speaking Yiddish.
    “That’s how my father came to America. For the same reason.”
    “Thousands came that way,” he said in Yiddish. “Thousands.” He was quiet for a moment. “I found work in a carnival. In Russia I went to a great yeshiva, and in America I work in a carnival.” He shrugged. “One must make a living,” he said sadly. “Here you cannot live off others.” He looked at me. “What does your father do?”
    “He teaches Talmud.”
    “Talmud. Very nice. Where does he teach?”
    “In a yeshiva high school in Crown Heights.”
    “In a high school. Very nice. He is fortunate. And the girl’s father? He is also a teacher?”
    “He’s a professor of English literature at Brooklyn College,” I said. “And her mother is a professor of art at Brooklyn College.”
    “Professors.” He seemed amazed. “And you will tell me the boy’s father is also a professor?”
    I laughed. Michael’s face broke into a proud smile. “He is,” Michael said in Yiddish.
    “He teaches Jewish philosophy at the Zechariah Frankel Seminary,” I said.
    “Have you heard of my father?” Michael asked, still speaking in Yiddish.
    “What is his name?”
    “Abraham Gordon. Professor Abraham Gordon.”
    “I do not think so.”
    “He’s very famous,” Michael said. “Everyone knows about him.”
    The old man shrugged apologetically. “I live and travel with the carnival. I know only the carnival. I do not know what goes on outside. Here and there I hear a little and read a little. But I was not so fortunate as you.” He lapsed into silence. Behind him the pitchman stood very still, staring down at the gleaming radio. The old man was quiet a long time, his eyes moist and sad. He shook his head slowly. “Nu,” he said. “Back to business. You are in goodhands here now.” He had reverted to English. “Schmeiss,” he said, smiling. “See how much you will