Comrades
a novel by Earl Coleman

Chapter 3

He thought his heart sounded as loud as a banging hammer, but his mother seemed not to hear it at all. She brushed his hair and kissed him on the cheek as usual and he went off with his dime to meet Mikey. The black and blue bruises on his cheek had faded, his ribs no longer hurt. As he left his house he tried to match how a Mohawk would feel with the breathlessness in his chest. Did his father, making plans around their table, feel that his blood was rushing too fast?

He remembered his mother cleaning him up when he came home hurt and torn last Saturday. She had treated him as she had his father and Mottel, washing him with warm and cold water, kissing him, asking about the fight, the full description of the kids. She had hugged him and said he would be her defender always and she could count on him, that he was brave like his papa.

He had always wondered why the policemen had raided his father's meeting and not the ones Mottel took him to. Did they hate his father because he was an Indian? Because they thought he was Jewish? He had read and reread the Leatherstocking Stories and his father's Indian books searching for the answer, but found none. He was sure his father would have known.

A few yards from Mikey's house he thought about the errand. Fifty cents was a lot of money. Even his mother only made two dollars a day when things went well for her. He also knew he couldn't tell her about this adventure. His father had instructed him to be strong and help his mother and his mother had called him her defender. He assured himself it wasn't necessary to give her every single detail of how he was going to help her. To do the errand he'd have to leave the Tremont before the picture ended. He hated that because it was Douglas Fairbanks today, but fifty cents was a lot of money.

Then he was in the basement of Mikey's tenement knocking. He could hear Mikey's father yelling, "So, shmuck, someone's at the door. See who it is." Mikey opened the metal door.

After Joel said hello to Mikey's mother, Mikey's father beckoned to him with his head and he went to him where he sat on the couch. "Yes, Mister Toledo?"

"You know what to do? What time to do it?"

"Yes sir."

"You come here right after and give it to me."

"Yes sir."

"OK. You're a good kid."

At the Tremont Joel tried to fix the precise moment they sat down with their candy in their favorite seats. He'd already asked when the show would be over so he could get a feeling for when he'd have to leave. At first he couldn't pay attention at all, even though he had waited for the serial all week. But then he concentrated, went over his errand again in his mind, and then leaned back, still on edge, to thrill to the "Perils of Pauline," remembering in the back of his head that he had to be on time for his own adventure.

Mikey's father had insisted that Joel was to do the errand absolutely alone even though Mikey wanted to go too. When Joel thought it was the right moment he squeezed Mikey's arm and left the theatre. The building he was going to was very close to the lot where he had found the wood for his bow which he still kept under his bed. Now he had arrows to go with it that he had whittled himself, with chicken feathers that he had got from the butcher stuck into them just like real Indian arrows. He knew the building and he knew the alley next to it which was supposed to lead to the doorway he was looking for, the doorway where there would be a small package wrapped in green paper. He was scared but remembered the tale of his father at five, hunting and surviving alone in the forest. He was ten.

When he got to the building just past the lot he made sure there was no one on the street and ducked into the littered alley which was only three feet wide. He proceeded soundlessly making believe he was walking on dry twigs in a forest. The sun was strong, even though the day was cold. Sunshine filtered down, pinning sharp shadows on the walls, the end of the alley blindingly yellow with a blaze of dazzling light. There were windows that gave onto the alley but they were higher than his head on both sides. He could hear the faint sound of a Victrola above somewhere playing "Who?" He pretended he was tracking rabbits so he had to be extra quiet and extra slow. At the end of the alley the space opened up onto a back courtyard with debris everywhere, garbage cans, scaffolding, tarpaulins. He was to look for a doorway diagonally across from where he came out. He did so, adjusting his eyes to the sun. Then he heard a noise and instantly stepped behind a plank which stood leaning upright against the building on his left. He was hidden in its shadow.

Into the courtyard came a man in work clothes wearing a cap, about the age of Mikey's father, and a policeman. They had approached from a different alley which also came out on the courtyard. The men looked about and relaxed, certain they were alone.

"And where is this treasure, me bucko?"

Joel recognized with a start the policeman from last week and in the same instant saw that there was a package, but it was not in the doorway where Mikey's father had said it would be but was at the very corner of the alley he had used, not two feet from where he stood, and not wrapped in green paper but in plain butcher's paper, a small square bundle tied with string. Was it the right one? He froze himself in the shadow. The two men went to the door where Joel had been told he would find it.

"It's supposed to be here. I heard them say it. Right here in the doorway. Honest."

"You'd not be thinkin' of lyin' to me, would ya? Never kid a kidder me lad."

"Hey. Why would I take you here at all if I didn't think that you and me could do business together? It's supposed to be here. It's after three ain't it? It's supposed to be here." The man stared at the step as if willing the package to appear.

"Maybe it is. Just maybe it's inside," the policeman said. He tried the door to the basement. It opened. "You first," and he pointed the way with his stick, and they both moved into the darkness.

Without a moment's hesitation, Joel stepped from behind the plank, picked up the package which seemed to have no weight, hoped it was the right one, and raced down the alley, soundless in his sneakers, and then walked quite deliberately, thinking slow, walking slow, hoping he didn't run into strange kids or policemen along the way.

At last he was on his own block, in front of Mikey's door. He knocked.

Mikey's mother opened the door and Joel could see that Mr. Toledo was asleep on the couch. "Leave it, leave it," she said.

"No ma'am. He said to bring it to him," Joel answered. He walked to the couch with the package and cleared his throat loudly as he had heard his father do sometimes. Mikey's father woke up and saw the package wrapped in butcher's paper on the floor at his feet.

"Kid! You got it! But -- they changed . . . how did you find it?"

"Someone else was looking for it too."

"Who?"

"A cop and another man."

"A cop? Shit. The bastards. But you did it! God damn!" Joel tried not to be startled by the words. Mikey's father stared at the package shaking his head and then fished a quarter from his pants pocket and put it in Joel's palm. Joel looked at the quarter and looked at Mikey's father who was in his undershirt, the top of his pants unbuttoned. "Good work, kid."

Joel looked at the quarter again and cleared his throat which had constricted. "You said four bits, Mister Toledo."

He tried to make his voice sound low and strong the way his father sounded talking to the men around the dining table, but it came out high anyway.

"C'mon. You're a kid. What kind of four bits?"

"That's what you said," Joel replied, "four bits," not moving, his palm still extended even though his heart beat more rapidly than it had when he was running down the alley.

"OK. OK." He took another quarter from his pocket and held it out. "You did good. What's your name -- Joel? What kind of sissy name is that -- Joel? You're OK kid. You're OK. Next time I need something I ask you first."

Mikey came home just as Joel was leaving. Joel grinned at him and put an arm around his shoulder. Mikey punched him playfully in the muscle and Joel knuckled him back.

"Hey. How did it go?"

Joel smiled in return and winked.

On the street Joel found it difficult not to yell, skip, sing, race. He debated buying a penny's worth of licorice from the candy store as a kind of reward but couldn't bring himself to break into the wholeness of the two quarters and besides it would be supper time soon. He knew he'd have to hide the money. His mind went to his collection of lead soldiers which he kept in a cheese box under the bed, right beside his bow and arrows. He'd make the soldiers protect the money by laying on top of it.

*

Leonard's letter was quite formal for so personal a matter and written on his own stationery, Dr. Leonard Gitomer.

"Dear Rachel (I hope you don't mind my using your first name):

It has been some months now since we met. Perhaps you will recall that you came to my office and I subscribed to the Hebrew American. It took me all this time to track down your address -- I had only the name on the subscription form to go on. I do hope this gets to you since the magazine says you no longer work for them. I hope you have found a better job. You seemed ill-suited to that one.

Although I know that I am intruding into your personal life, I do so because I would truly like to get to know you and I have no other means of accomplishing that except calling upon you in person which you might find even more upsetting.

I have thought of you often during this time. I'm responding to what seemed an intense moment of shared grief and the chord you struck in me. Obviously it reverberates yet.

I would be very pleased to hear from you, even if only to learn that you've landed on your feet.

With sincere admiration,

Leonard Gitomer"

She reread the letter. What a nice man. The words he used. Even his handwriting was strong and open. Yes, he was in her thoughts, his gentleness, the way he reminded her of Sam. She smiled. This was a love letter. At her age. But how could she think of -- love? A love letter? For one thing she had Joel to consider. Could she and Leonard have a "date"? She wasn't a kid any more even though young girls did things today you would never dream of. She folded the letter and put it away with her papers, her pictures of her parents, of Joel on a pony and on a Kiddy Kar, of Sam at the beach hugging Joel. The only man who had ever interested her was Sam. She had "love letters" from nobody. Except this one.

Indeed, Rachel had recalled that afternoon many times. In fact she had begun to look for other work the very next day. She knew that there was no nest egg, that money for rent and food would have to be earned, every penny, or borrowed, which she was not willing to do. She searched for opportunities in vain and had almost decided to stay on at the Hebrew American when she met an insurance salesman alone in a doctor's waiting room, there, as she was, to see the Doctor at the end of his day. He worked for a new insurance company, he said, looking for reps with selling experience of any kind, paying $5 a week against commissions. Three weeks after she had left Doctor Gitomer's office she was an insurance salesman. It always seemed clear to her that Leonard was responsible.

Selling insurance was not as simple as selling subscriptions, and Rachel had to spend weeks mastering rates, premiums, types of insurance, living on the $5 a week the company was willing to advance during the training period. The day she sold her first policy she earned a commission of $27 and for the first time since Sam died she could foresee being able to earn enough money to survive. She began to feel free.

*

She prepared herself for the appointment she had with Doctor Lefkowitz: her forms, a fountain pen full of ink, a small jar for the specimen (a routine she always considered the vilest part of the job, accepting a jar of urine from a man, the jar still warm from his body heat, carrying around his urine in her purse!). The sale of even a $10,000 whole life could pay off a good portion of the Equitable's advance. It was rare that she distrusted someone on sight but it had been that way with Doctor Lefkowitz. He seemed always to be planning something behind his horn-rimmed glasses. His answers were confusing, fuzzy, sometimes contradictory. His mind was always six moves ahead.

This visit was to get his approval of the type of insurance he wanted, his specimen, his signature and the "front money." It was fitting that the day was lovely, the letter from Leonard had come (she realized she always thought of him as Leonard, never as Doctor Gitomer), and she was going to make an important sale. She knew it!

What a nice man Leonard was. Like Sam she thought but steadier than Sam. After all he was older, at least five, six years. A doctor! She was smiling as she put on her coat. She thought of Sam as she went out the door, her dear Sam. She never thought of him laid out in his coffin but always as she had seen him first at the beach. She thought of him that way now.
Doctor Lefkowitz's office was in a detached portion of his house on the Grand Concourse. His nurse asked her to wait in a very small windowless waiting room. She removed her hat and coat but the heat became oppressive and soon she was perspiring. She used the insurance form to fan herself. The room held a couch, an end table, and the side chair in which she sat.

The nurse returned dressed in street clothes. "I'm off," she said. "The Doctor will see you presently."

The heat was becoming intolerable when Doctor Lefkowitz came in, closing the door behind him. He looked to be in his sixties, although she knew he was younger, hunched over somewhat with an aspect that was half-elfin, half-trickster. His gray hair was thin. His jacket was off and no stethoscope hung from his pocket. He began speaking before she could suggest that they move out of this room where she felt she would stifle.

"So, little lady, here we are. A few minutes late. My apologies." He sat on the couch. "So? Now what? Papers? Why don't you come sit next to me so we can see together?" and he patted the couch.

Although Rachel wanted to shift their interview elsewhere, she came to sit beside him and spread the papers out on her lap. He carelessly draped his left arm about her shoulders and leaned forward as though to read the fine print. Rachel felt her clothes sticking to her, his arm like a vise sealing her in. As he studied the document the lamplight shone on his thin gray hair, glinting on the white and pink scalp below. With his right hand he began to trace out whole sentences on the paper in her lap "except that in the event of prior illness..." he let his hand remain in her lap. "What do they mean here, little lady, prior illness -- you could have had an illness at six years old. That's prior. So what do you think they mean -- prior?" He took her hand with his right hand and held it.

Rachel panicked. She had to free herself immediately. How could she do it without losing the sale, without insulting him? Tentatively, she tried to rise but his hands restrained her. If she wanted to get loose, she would have to contest him. "I really must use the bathroom," she said, exerting herself against his hands.

"Look at you. You're blushing. It's OK, little girl, you can leave the room, you don't even need a pass. Come back quickly, we have more to do," and he laughed playfully and pinched her cheek.

She locked the bathroom door and ran the cold water, holding her trembling fingers under the faucet. Her stomach churned and her breath came rapidly. She looked in the mirror and saw that she was flushed, that her hair was disheveled, her face tight, frightened. She ran the cold water on her handkerchief, wrung it out and pressed it against her temples. She washed her face, taking care not to wet her dress, rolled up her sleeves and washed her arms. Her image of Sam came back to her and she almost dissolved, but then set her jaw firmly and dried herself off with the towel that was hanging there. She fixed her hair so that it was neat again. She returned to the doorway of the waiting room and stood there on the sill.

"Feel better now, little lady? We'll look more at these papers," he said, pointing to them fanned out beside him. "I found something else. Come!" He patted the couch.

"Doctor Lefkowitz," she said, without moving, standing solidly there, "I came here to sell you insurance. If you want to buy insurance we'll have to sit down opposite from each other at a proper table and we'll continue. I'll answer any questions you have."

"Kiddie. I was having a little fun. You're a serious little lady -- and moxie you've got. That's OK. So -- we'll go downstairs to my office..." he was rising but she was unnerved once more.

"Listen," she said, trying to sound calm and resolute, "I want to sell you insurance but I will not be trapped in a room with you. If that's how I have to make the sale I'll leave." She held her purse before her as though it harbored a clove of garlic.

"Hey! A leper I'm not. I'm a Doctor." He had now risen from the couch and seemed suddenly angry. "So full of righteousness you are. You know what I do? I look at bodies all day as a business, you understand? I also like to look at bodies not as a business -- for pleasure -- you understand that -- for pleasure. Touch bodies for pleasure. Looking at bodies as a business like I do is a hard business." He stopped, was about to continue and stopped again, then muttered, "I meant nothing. If I frightened you I'm sorry."

Her breathing was still irregular. "OK. Is there a table we can sit at?"

He waved his hand. "In the other part of the house."

She stepped back as he approached the doorway and made sure there were several paces between them, making no bones about it, as he showed her through a connecting door into the main house with its heavy biedermeier and empire pieces and a huge oak table in the spacious foyer. The house was Victorian and dark and he turned on the flambeau sconce lights. "Will this do?" he asked, motioning her to a seat at the oak table.

"Yes. Thank you." He had brought the papers with him and tossed them listlessly on the table. She now laid them out in order. Look at bodies for pleasure? Her body?

"I meant nothing, nothing."

Now she was calmer, standing. "I recommend the whole life. Here's why," and she proceeded to demonstrate, writing the numbers in columns so they could be compared more readily, feeling rattled but confident again, capable. As she went on she could feel that his attention was slipping, his mind wandering. He wasn't focusing on her or the papers she was pointing to. She slowed down, thinking that perhaps she was speaking too rapidly but he still wasn't concentrating. Then he put his hand on hers, stopping her in mid-sentence. She tensed. "Mrs. Levy," he said, "insurance I know. I have forgotten more than you'll learn. Term, whole, comparisons, premiums. You think you're the first insurance man I've seen? C'mon. Insurance men by the dozen have been to visit me. Why not? I'm a Doctor! I have money. So -- why do I find myself underinsured, a man of my means? Because it can't be. But I'll give you a way it could be. You understand?"

"No, Doctor Lefkowitz, I don't understand." She sat down again.

"I have diabetes. About six months." He looked straight at her. "So now no one will insure me."

"Oh, God," Rachel exclaimed, thinking of her sale gone glimmering. She had been so sure, especially after she had escaped from that waiting room. "So the reason you want insurance is not because you don't have any . . ."

"Have any? I have a hundred thousand dollars insurance."

"I see. That was before the diabetes. And now you want more insurance."

"Right. Double. There's a way."

"A way to do what?"

"Get more insurance."

"What's the way?"

"I'll tell you. You have your son you told me about pee in a bottle. A small bottle like the one you carry around. Shmear a little the doctor who has to initial the form. I'll take a hundred thousand dollar policy."

She found herself breathless with the amount, with the danger. "That's fraud, Doctor Lefkowitz. I would have to bribe somebody. I would have to sign my name to the paper."

"Me too, me too. I have to sign." He looked at her, his head cocked, lips pursed as though saying "So?"

"Could I have a cup of tea please?" she asked. "I have to think this through."

Her first thought was that the commission on a one hundred thousand dollar policy was very large. After that, her thoughts became disorderly, unorganized: Isaac, Joel, her debt to the Company, Sam, the sight of his body on the floor -- and Leonard. Hungry people, she railed to herself, should not be forced to make moral decisions. Her mind strayed to the mechanics of getting it done. She tried to wrench her thoughts back to the wickedness of the thing, but instead she saw her debts paid off, clothes for Joel, a little money in the bank. Finally, as he came back with her tea, a single cup and saucer on a tray and a slice of lemon, she could see no argument, only the need to deal with the way to accomplish the deed. She took a sip. "OK, Doctor Lefkowitz, I'll do it."

He nodded his head as if he had been certain of her answer, but did not seem pleased. "So. So you see Mrs. Levy how easy it is to make choices? Fraud, schmaud. Right?" He laughed softly, rubbing his hands together, cracking the knuckles, agitated. "I want to have a little fun, that's no good, maybe even immoral, you won't. This arrangement we're making is not fun, only money, maybe immoral. This you will. Right? Of course right. You're a lady. A little lady. And I'm an old man to you. An old man. So -- right, wrong, that's not it, isn't that right? We all have our own alphabet, hah? Excuse me for a minute." He rose and walked toward a hallway, clearly upset, shaking his head.

She thought she had made order of the jumble but now was confused once more. No, she hadn't wanted him to touch her. Him! Because he was old? Only that? Of course it was wrong to get him a policy. Was it wrong that she wanted to make a big commission, there was such need she had for the money?

He returned, composed once more but no longer ebullient, some water on his hair which he had combed. He sat down across from her and looked directly into her eyes. "There's one more thing I should tell you, Mrs. Levy" he said. "Your commission on this sale will be many hundreds of dollars. You will rebate twenty-five percent of that commission to me when you receive it."

*

She answered Leonard's letter that very evening.

"Dear Leonard:

I was very pleased with your letter. Your perseverence! Also with the sensitivity that I can read in your words.

Your letter came at a special moment. You see, you had an important impact on my life. The events of that day, before and after I left your office are more than I can write about. I now have a job selling insurance.

Today, there was your letter and my good feeling about it. And then there was an incident that shook my faith in myself, the way I think I am, all sorts of feelings and questions that I could not grasp clearly.

In the tumult, I thought of you and your letter. Yes, I do need a friend and I have a feeling that you would be a friend. I feel very weepy suddenly, right now, as I did in your office and I hope you don't come to the conclusion that I can only talk about and think about myself and that I cry all the time.

If you wanted to show up at my door on Tuesday evening, the 15th, at about seven o'clock I would try not to be too upset (you were worried that I might be) and you can have dinner with me and my son, Joel, and maybe we can talk about you.

I hope you will come.

Rachel"

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