Wednesday the Rabbi got wet

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

It was Marcus Aptaker's first day out of bed. It was demonstrable progress, and he was naturally euphoric.

"Oh, you're sitting up, Marcus," Rose greeted him. "Did the doctor say you could?"

"For meals and a little while afterward," he said with smug satisfaction. "Tomorrow for a little longer, and in a couple of days I'll be allowed to walk around the bed. I could be out of here in a week, but of course I'll be confined to the house for a while."

"That's nice, Marcus."

Her reaction seemed to lack the warmth and enthusiasm he expected. In fact, as he studied her, she appeared unusually subdued. "Is something wrong?" he asked.

"Wrong? Of course not."

"Tell me, Rose. What's happened? Did something happen at the store?"

"That's all you ever think of is the store." "Then there is something wrong, arnold?"

She could not contain herself any longer. "Oh Marcus, he's seeing a girl,” she announced tragically.

"So?"

"But it's serious, he wants to get married."

"Well, that's normal, he's twenty-eight. It's time he got married, maybe the responsibility will settle him."

"Oh, it will settle him all right," she said bitterly. "She has a child, a five-year-old boy."

"A widow?" he asked cautiously. "Worse, Marcus. Divorced!" "I see, an older woman maybe?"

"No," she admitted. "She must be Arnold's age, she went to high school with him."

"So she's from Barnard's Crossing. Do we know her?" he asked.

She delivered the clincher. "She's Kaplan's daughter."

"Kaplan?"

"The president of the temple who wrote you the letter."

"Then at least we know she's from a good family," he said reasonably. "I don't know him personally, but the chances are they wouldn't make a man president of a synagogue if he weren't a decent person."

"It doesn't bother you? Here you're in the hospital because of him, and it doesn't bother you that your son wants to marry his daughter?"

"You'd like me to be bothered. Rose?" he asked quizzically. "He wrote the letter because the board of directors voted it. I'm sure it was nothing personal. How could it be when he doesn't even know me?"

"And that the girl is divorced and has a son?" she persisted, he shook his head sadly. "It's not like it used to be, Rose.

Nowadays, it doesn't mean anything. Half the marriages end in divorce. Your own sister's daughter got divorced, and she has two kids."

"But she's a nice girl and her husband was impossible."

"So maybe this girl is a nice girl, and maybe her husband was impossible."

"If she were a nice girl, she wouldn't agree to marry him after just a week."

He shrugged his shoulders. "That's the way young people are these days. Once they make up their minds, they go ahead. Who knows? Maybe it's better that way. Your niece went around for over a year before she even announced her engagement, and then after the two kids, she decided he was impossible. So you can make a mistake even if you wait."

"But—"

"When Arnold comes here tonight, I'll talk to him," her husband said. "I'll ask him about the girl, about her child, what his plans are. If I like what I hear, I'll try to help him."

"What do you mean you'll help him?"

"If he's serious, if he wants to settle down. I'll work out some arrangement for him to take over the store."