The Victim

20

IT was Max. He stood before Leventhal with a rolled newspaper under his arm, his shirt open at the throat, the black hair of his chest coming out, and his soft collar pulled over the collar of his coat, the same way Philip’s had been on the day of the outing. The suit was the double-breasted one he had worn at the funeral. When the door opened, he seemed to hesitate on the landing, and Leventhal cried out in a cracked voice, “Max! Come in, for heaven’s sake.”

“You folks in?” Max asked huskily, still hesitant.

It struck Leventhal that his brother was behaving as if he were about to enter a stranger’s house. He had never been here before.

“Well, I am, that’s sure. I didn’t get a chance to tell you the other day. Mary’s out of town. But come on in.” And he led him over the threshold and turned to the front room, filled with anxiety at his new difficulty. He did not know what to expect from Allbee, what he would say when he learned who Max was. He was already leaning forward inquisitively. Leventhal stood arrested for an instant, incapable of speaking or moving forward. Glancing into the room and seeing Allbee, Max said, apologetically, “Say, you’re busy. I’ll come back later.”

“I’m not,” Leventhal whispered. “Come on.”

“I should have called up first.”

But Leventhal held him by the arm and forced him in.

“This is my brother Max. This is Kirby Allbee.”

“Your brother? I didn’t know you had one.”

“Only one.”

Reticent and somber, Max looked down, perhaps partly to acknowledge his share in their estrangement.

“I don’t know what made me think you were an only child, like me.” Allbee was conversational and bright, and Leventhal wondered what he was preparing and hid his dread in impassivity. He brought up a chair and Max sat down. The points of his dusty shoes were turned inward. The side of his lowered face and his large neck formed one surface, from the curve of his nose to the padded thickness of his shoulder.

“I often used to wish there were two of us,” said Allbee.

“How are things at home, Max?” asked Leventhal.

“Oh,” Max said. “You know…” Leventhal expected him to finish the sentence, but it tailed off.

Allbee seemed to be commenting to himself smilingly on something in the appearance of the two brothers. Leventhal covertly indicated the door with his head. Allbee’s brows curved up questioningly. His whole air said, “Why should I?” Leventhal bent close to him and muttered, “I want to talk to my brother.”

“What’s the matter?” Allbee spoke out loudly.

Sternly Leventhal made the same sign with his head.

But Max had heard. “Did you ask me what was the matter?” he said.

Allbee looked at Leventhal and shrugged, to confess his slip. He did not reply.

“I guess it must show on me,” said Max.

“We had a death in the family recently,” Leventhal said.

“My youngest son.”

An expression went over Allbee’s face that Leventhal could not interpret, a cold wrinkling. “Oh, sorry to hear it. When?”

“Four days ago.”

“You didn’t mention it to me,” Allbee said to Leventhal.

“No,” Leventhal answered flatly, gazing at his brother.

Allbee came forward swiftly in his chair. “Say, was that the boy… the other day?”

“No, not the one that was with me. He means Phil,” Leventhal explained to Max. “I took him to the movies awhile back, and we ran into Mr Allbee.”

“Oh, Phil. Knock wood. That’s my other son you saw.”

“Oh, I see, two children…”

“Are you going?” Leventhal said to him, aside.

“Will you fix it up for me with Shifcart?”

Leventhal fastened his hand on his arm. “Will you go?”

“You said you’d help me.”

“We’ll take it up later.” Leventhal was growing savage with impatience. “Don’t think you can hold me up.”

“I don’t want to interfere with business,” said Max.

“What business! There’s no business.”

Allbee rose and Leventhal went into the hall with him.

“I’ll be back for your answer,” Allbee said. He looked into Leventhal’s face as though he saw something new there. “I’m really surprised. Here this happens to you — your nephew. I’m in the same house and you don’t even say a word about it.”

“What do I want to talk to you about it for?” Before Allbee could speak again, he had shut the door.

“Who is he?” said Max, when Leventhal came back. “A friend?”

“No, just a guy who keeps coming around.”

“He’s peculiar looking..” Max checked himself and then said, “I hope I didn’t butt in on anything.”

“Oh, hell no. I was going to call you up, Max. But I thought I’d better wait awhile.”

“I was kind of expecting you to, since you took an interest and came to the funeral, and all.”

Max addressed him diffidently, a little formally, feeling his way with a queer politeness, almost the politeness of a stranger. Subdued, worn, and plainly, to Leventhal’s eyes, tormented, he was making an effort, nevertheless, to find an appropriate tone, one not too familiar. The blood crowded to Leventhal’s heart guiltily. He wanted to say something to Max about it. He did not know how and he was afraid of creating a still greater difficulty. How should they talk when they had never, since childhood, spent an hour together? And he surmised also that the flat, the contrast between his upholstered chairs and good rugs and the borax furniture in Staten Island, shabby before half the installments were paid, made Max deferential.

“So how are things going?” he said. He thought Max would speak about Elena. He was in fact certain that the main object of his visit was to discuss her with him.

“I guess as good as I can expect.”

“Phil all right?”

“Well, when one kid passes on it’s pretty hard on the othei one.”

“He’ll come around.”

Max said nothing to this, and Leventhal began to think he was debating whether to mention Elena at all, undecided at the last moment, and struggling with himself.

“Yes, kids come around,” Leventhal repeated.

“I wanted to ask you,” said Max. “I want to straighten it up with you about the specialist. He says you gave him ten dollars the first visit.” His hand dropped inside his coat.

“Oh, no.”

But Max opened his wallet and, half rising, laid a ten dollar bill beside the lamp on the desk.

“That’s not necessary.”

“I want to pay you back. Thanks.”

“Now he takes over,” was Leventhal’s unspoken comment. His original vexation with Max revived and he said, a shade coldly, “You’re welcome.”

“Not just for the money,”said Max.”The rest, too.”

Leventhal’s temper got the better of him.

“For doing a small part of what you should have been here to do.”

Max reflected, raising his rough-skinned, large-jawed face with its high-ridged, freckled nose. “Yes,” he said. “I should have been here.” He was submissive, seeming to find nothing in himself with which to resist.

Leventhal could not hold back his next question.

“What does Elena say?”

“About what?”

“About me?”

Max appeared surprised.

“What should she say? All she said was that she wondered why you didn’t come to the house after the funeral. But she doesn’t say much. She’s in bed most of the time, crying.”

Leventhal had edged forward. The lamplight shone into his hair and over his shoulders.

“Does she give you a lot of trouble, Max?”

“Trouble? You’ve got to consider. It’s a rough deal. She cries. That’s pretty natural.”

“You might as well be open with me.”

Max’s surprise grew.

“What’s there not to be open about?”

“If you don’t know, I don’t either. But you’ve got a chance to talk it out, if you want to. I realize we’re not so close. But do you have anyone else to talk to? Maybe you have friends. I didn’t notice many at the funeral.”

Max said uncertainly, “I don’t catch your drift, exactly.”

“I asked if Elena gives you trouble.”

The blood rose darkly in Max’s face under the full mask of his ill-shaven beard. There was a show of fear and bewilderment in his eyes and, reluctantly, he began a motion of denial with his black-nailed hands; he did not finish; he gave it up.

“She’s calming down.”

“What does she say?”

“All kinds of things,” Max said with obvious difficulty, still shunning a direct answer.

But Leventhal did not need a direct answer. He could picture Elena in the brass bed where Mickey had lain, in that terrible room, crying and raging; and Max sitting just as he saw him sitting now, abjectly listening. For what could he do? And Philip had to listen, too. The thought struck into him. But how could the boy be protected? He would have to hear and learn. Leventhal believed what he had said to Max about children coming through. They were mauled in birth and they straightened as they grew because their bones were soft. Mauled again later, they could recover again. She was his mother, so let him see and hear. Was that a cruel view of it? He was full of love for the boy. But it did not do to be soft. Be soft when things were harsh? Not that softness was to be condemned, but there were times when it was only another name for weakness. Softness? Out of the whole creation only man was like that, and he was half harsh.

“Have you had a doctor for her?” he asked.

“What makes you think she needs one?”

“Remember Mamma!”

Max started. “What are you talking about?” he said with a sudden flash of indignation.

“I don’t blame you for not wanting it brought up.”

“Why do you bring Ma into this? Does she remind you of Ma?”

Leventhal hesitated. “Once in a while, she does… But you admit you have trouble with her.”

“What do you expect? She carries on. Sure she carries on. It’s a kid, after all. That hits. But she’ll be all right. She’s getting better already.”

“Max, I don’t think you understand. People go overboard easily. I guess they’re not as strong that way as they used to be and when things get rough they give in. There’s more and more of that all the time. Everybody feels it. I do myself, often. Elena was very queer about the kid and the hospital. — That’s what she yells about, isn’t it? The hospital?” He grew increasingly unsure of himself. “And I thought…”

“I remember Ma pretty often, too, and Hartford, and all. You’re not the only one.”

“No?” Leventhal said. He looked at him searchingly.

“And you’re wrong about Elena.”

“You don’t think I want to be right, do you?”

“The main trouble I’m having with her is that I want to move the family down south. I was looking for a place in Galveston. That was what took so long. I found one and I have a deposit on it. I was going to bring them all down there.”

“That’s good. The best thing you could do. Take Philip out of New York. It’s no place to bring him up.”

“But I can’t talk Elena into it.”

“Why?”

“Maybe I started in too soon after the funeral. But she says she doesn’t want to go.”

“Tell me, is the old woman around much — her mother?”

“Oh, she’s in and out all the time.”

“For God’s sake, throw her out!”

His vehemence astonished Max.

“She doesn’t have anything to do with it.”

“Don’t let her get a hold. Protect yourself against her.”

Max for the first time began to smile.

“She won’t hurt me.”

“I’ll bet she’s telling Elena not to go. How do you know what she tells her? You don’t understand what they’re saying.”

Max’s look changed; he became grave again and his mouth sank at the corners. “I understand a little,” he said. “I guess you think I should have married a Jewish girl.”

“You never heard me say so,” Leventhal answered vigorously. Never.”

“No.”

“You never will. I’m talking about her mother, not Elena. You told me yourself that the old woman hated you, years ago. She’ll do you all the harm she can. Maybe you’re used to the old devil and don’t notice what she’s like any more. But I’ve watched her. It’s as clear as day to me that she thinks the baby’s death was God’s punishment because Elena married you.”

Max started and then his lips stiffened, and there was a submerged flaming of indignation beneath his natural darkness and the added darkness of care. “What kind of talk is that!” he said. “I never heard anything so peculiar in all my life. First you’ve got ideas about Elena and now the old woman.”

“You’ve been away,” said Leventhal. “You don’t know how she’s been acting. She’s poison.”

“Well, you’ve sure turned into a suspicious character.” Max’s face began to soften and he sighed.

“She’s full of hate,” Leventhal insisted.

“Go on, she’s a harmless old woman.”

If he were wrong about Elena, thought Leventhal, if he had overshot the mark and misinterpreted that last look of hers in the chapel, the mistake was a terrible and damaging one; the confusion in himself out of which it had risen was even more terrible. Eventually he had to have a reckoning with himself, when he was calmer and stronger. It was impossible now. But he was right about the old woman, he was sure. “You must get rid of your mother-in-law, Max!” he said with savage earnestness.

“Ah, what are you talking about?” he said rather wearily. “She’s just an old widow, old and cranky. Elena is her only daughter. I can’t tell her to stay away. This week she helped, she kept house and cooked for us. I know she doesn’t like me. So what? A worn-out old woman. I feel sad, sometimes, when I look at her. No, we’ll go to Galveston. Phil will start school there in the fall. He wants to go, and so does Elena. I can talk her into it. She wants to leave New York, only she’s still mixed up. But she’ll come. I’ve got to get back to my job, and we don’t want to be separated again. I don’t see why you’re so disturbed about the old woman. If she’s the worst I’m ever up against…” The large fold of his jacket reached kiltwise almost to his knees on which his hands were set. His unshapely fingers thickened where they should taper and the creases at the joints resembled the threads of flattened screws. “You don’t know Elena when there’s a tight spot,” he resumed. “She’s excitable all in pieces before something happens, but usually when it happens she’s stronger than I am. During the depression when I was laid up, she went out and peddled stuff from door to door.”

“I never heard that you were laid up.”

“Well, I was. And then when we were on relief, she has a brother who’s a hood and he wanted to take me into a kind of racket he had out in Astoria. I could’ve seen a little money, but she said no and went all the way out against it, so it was ‘No’ and we stayed on relief. Another woman would have said, ‘Go ahead.’“

“I see.”

“Afterwards things started to pick up and we thought we could add on to the family. Mickey wasn’t ever a healthy kid like Phil. And then we must have made mistakes, too. But what can you do? It’s not like with God, you know, in the Bible, where he blows his breath into Adam, or whoever. I think I told you that I asked a nurse what room he was in, when I got to the hospital. I went in there and he was lying covered up already. I pulled the sheet off and had a look at him.”

“Those fools!” Leventhal exclaimed. “Not to have somebody posted there.”

Max excused them with a downward wave of the hand. “All the nurses didn’t know. It’s a big place.” He added, consecutively, “I’m going south with the idea of a new start. I paid a deposit and so on. But to tell the truth, I don’t expect much. I feel half burned out already.”

Leventhal felt his heart shaken. “Half burned?” he said. “I’m older than you and I don’t say that.”

Max did not reply. His large trunk was ungainly in the double-breasted jacket.

“There have been times when I felt like that, too,” Leventhal went on. “That’s a feeling that comes and goes.” His brother turned his crude, dark face up to him and his voice died.

They sat together in silence and at last Max stirred and got up. Leventhal went with him to the subway. A heavy mist lay over the street. At the turnstile he dropped two nickels into the slot and Max said over his shoulder, “You don’t have to wait with me.”

But Leventhal pushed through. They stood at the edge of the platform till the grind of the approaching train reached them.

“If you need me for anything…” Leventhal said.

“Thanks.”

“I mean it.”

“Thank you.” He extended his hand. Leventhal clumsily spread his arms wide and clasped him. They felt the concussion of the train, and the streaked face of the lead car with its beam shot toward them in a smolder of dust; the windows ran by. Max returned his embrace. “Call me,” Leventhal said hoarsely in Max’s ear. The crowd swirled around them at the doors. When the train started, he saw Max gripping a strap and bending over the heads of passengers, peering out.

Pulling out a handkerchief, Leventhal wiped his sweat. He began to labor up the long, steel-striped concrete flights, opening his mouth to assist his breathing. Halfway up he stopped, squeezing against the wall to let others past, looking as if the lack of air maddened him. He felt faint with the expansion of his heart.

Then he continued. The mist had gathered to a light rain. At the top of the stairs he saw an umbrella flung open, like a bat in the chill current of air. The bars of the revolving door raced and clinked. Buttoning his coat, he raised the collar, and his eyes moved from the glare of the cars flowing up in the street to the towering lights that stood far ahead, not quite steady in the immense blackness.