The Marrying of Chani Kaufman (13 page)

‘The girl in the black V-neck jumper – she's facing this way, she's got dark hair, tied back – she's small and thin – '

‘Oh yes, yes – think I've got her. Very nice, Baruch. She's pretty.'

‘Really? Do you think so? Be honest, Vrom – I need to know – can't always trust these stupid specs, y'know. Tell me what you really see and think. You know girls better than me.'

‘I don't but in my humble opinion, I would say she's a very nice looking young lady. Nice hair, too. Not frizzy like all the other girls. Lovely smile too . . . nice legs. Shame about her friend, definitely likes her lokshen pudding. '

‘Right, thank you – very much. That's enough – let me look – quick, they'll finish soon.'

‘My pleasure, Bruch. Go ahead – I'll keep a look-out.'

Avromi vacated the viewing spot. Baruch took another look. She did have nice legs. She had nice everything. Satisfied, he turned to Avromi.

‘But who is she?'

‘Haven't got the foggiest. She looks like a Kaufman, judging by her colouring – they all have that black, straight hair and pale skin. But there are loads of 'em – I think there are eight daughters in that family. So we have to find out which one she is . . .'

‘
Eight
daughters?'

‘Shhh!'

Eight daughters. Baruch knew that if they identified the wrong daughter, all would be lost. He had to find out her name and be certain about it.

Avromi scanned the room.

‘I've got it! We'll ask Shmuel. His older brother Eli married one of the older Kaufman sisters – don't ask me which one – '

And before he could stop him, Avromi had melted into the crowd. He returned with another young man in tow. Avromi was tugging the young man's sleeve and the young man was grinning sheepishly.

‘Hello, I'm Shmuel,' said the young man.

‘Hello, nice to meet you,' said Baruch.

‘Avromi says you've seen one of the Kaufman girls – or at least you think she's a Kaufman.'

Baruch gestured to the gap behind him. Shmuel checked the room and assumed the position. Baruch and Avromi shielded him.

‘Ok, she's the one in the black V-neck.'

‘Got her. Yup – she's a Kaufman . . . I know there are still four living at home and she must be the oldest. There's a Rochel, and then I think a Sophie . . .' Shmuel was counting on his fingers.

‘She must be Chani. Devorah, my sister-in-law, has mentioned her to me before actually. I think, she wanted to suggest – a – a – ' Baruch was staring at him. Sensing the delicacy of the situation, Shmuel moved on.' Yes well, erm, that's Chani Kaufman.

‘Chani. You sure?'

‘Pretty much so.'

‘Chani Kaufman.' He tasted her name.

‘Anything else I can do for you two gentlemen?' said Shmuel.

Baruch surfaced. ‘No – that's great. Thank you so much, Shmuel. You've been a real help – if you ever need the same favour, I'll do my best although I don't know any girls . . . or their names.'

Shmuel grinned. ‘Any time. Good luck with Chani anyway'

‘Thanks. I'll need it.' Baruch looked grim. Mentally he had leapt ahead, anticipating all the obstacles that lay strewn like boulders across his path. Avromi punched him playfully on the shoulder.

‘Getoveryourself, Bruch! Cheer up, it may never happen. May you both live to one hundred and twenty and have hundreds of grandchildren.'

Baruch wasn't sure about the hundreds of grandchildren. At least he knew her name. So now he could begin.

Avromi's mobile trilled in his jacket pocket. He glanced quickly at the screen.

‘'Scuse me, guys, I have to take this,' he said, carving a furrow through the black suits as he slipped out through the service doors, leaving Shmuel and Baruch staring curiously after him.

He entered the hell of the kitchens and caught the eye of the young Hasid who was peering into a steaming cauldron in the name of supervising kashrut. The Hasid – dressed all in black – looked out of place amongst the spotless white aprons and gleaming chrome, but he continued to poke his nose into fridges and pots and did not watch Avromi as he made for the fire escape stairs.

Outside on the metal platform, two waiters were smoking, slouched against the brick wall. They eyed Avromi who gave them a friendly nod as he clattered down to the first level.

‘Hi, you still there?'

‘Yup, still here, still waiting . . . where are you?' Her voice was a little waspish. He said he would call her at four but had been sidetracked by Baruch's girl-spotting adventure.

‘I'm at a wedding – you know you can't call me here.'

‘Well, I thought you said you'd call at four. It's now five.' He could not ignore the hurt in her tone. It was his fault.

‘I know, I know, I'm sorry, I got held up. Anyway, how are you? What are you up to?'

‘I'm good, thanks. Watching telly, tidying my room, in the hope my sweet prince will visit.'

Avromi let out a low laugh. ‘I'll come over tonight but it will be late. I'll slip out during the dancing and catch the train into Euston. But I doubt I'll be there before ten. The dancing will go on til the early hours so my parents won't suspect a thing. Is that ok?'

She sighed. ‘I suppose so. I'll just languish on my silk sheets and eat figs in my underwear.'

Avromi blushed and chuckled again, enjoying her flirtatiousness. He was still uncertain how to handle it. All his usual confidence seemed to dissipate whenever Shola was in the vicinity. She made him feel shy and self-conscious and excited all at once. No other girl had had that effect on him. He barely noticed the young frum maidens from his own community. His eyes passed over them, their dowdy modesty and quiet manners rendering them invisible. Chani had seemed an insipid imitation of womanhood in comparison.

‘Well, I am looking forward to seeing your underwear – I mean with you in it – and feeding you figs.'

Shola giggled. ‘Ok then, my prince, see you later.'

‘Bye.'

He was never sure how to end the conversation. He wanted to use a term of endearment but sweetheart or darling just sounded forced. They were not sweethearts in the purest sense of the word. Avromi sighed, tucked his phone away and trudged back upstairs.

Now was not the time to think about it. He tried to block out the memory of her voice as he pushed back through the kitchen doors. The roar of machinery and the barked orders of the head chef did little to dispel his thoughts of Shola. Through the glass porthole, he glimpsed a heaving sea of black wool. He thought of her silky skin, her laughing eyes and brilliant, pussycat smile. What would she make of this wedding? Of all the men dressed alike? Of the beards? And rabbis attached to them? The separation of the sexes? He dreaded to think.

It did not matter. She would never witness one like it for herself. She was part of his other life, his university self – a delicious, forbidden secret that filled him with delight and horror in equal measures, but one he could not give up. Not now, not yet.

He plunged into the crowd, his heart thudding with the daring thrill of it all, when he spotted Rabbi Weisenhoff sitting alone where he had left him, looking old and forlorn. Guilt crashed over him, causing his ears to burn and his palms to sweat. How could he carry on like this? He felt the habitual disgust creep over him. He felt cheap. Sullied. How could he continue to converse with a rabbi as wonderful and wise as Rabbi Weisenhoff when he had trespassed so sinfully? He did not deserve to shake the rabbi's hand. And he had willfully lied to Baruch, pleading a lack of knowledge when it came to girls. A shudder of shame rippled through him and he shook himself to be rid of it.

Then there was Shola herself. Had he been a true mensch, he would never have got involved, he would not have succumbed. He could not blame her; she was free to do what she liked.

Avromi forced all thoughts of Shola out of his mind and made his way over to the hunched, tired rabbi. He bent over him and spoke loudly into his hairy, waxy ear and helped the rabbi to his feet, steadying him as the old man threatened to stumble. Together they wound their way towards the side exit, leading to the lifts. He would hail a cab for the rabbi and once he had seen him safely inside, he would turn back to his friends and act as if nothing had happened.

He also knew that the guilt would evaporate the minute he stepped out at Euston, only to resurface at gale force when he was alone, making his way home, slipping in to his parents' house like a ganif in the middle of the night.

May 2008 – London

If he wanted to meet the girl he had glimpsed at the wedding, Baruch knew that he would have to talk to his mother, a thing he dreaded. His mother had her own ideas about whom he should meet and marry and her ideas did not correlate with his. He had baulked on previous occasions when she mentioned meeting the shadchan, the local matchmaker, Mrs Gelb­mann. His older brothers had been introduced to their wives through her. He knew what horrors awaited him in the woman's stuffy front parlour, behind the swathes of tightly drawn net curtain. He would be interrogated, weighed up, his details logged and filed away in an ancient giant ring binder, his very being reduced to a couple of pages.

There was no other way. Even when he had seen a girl he liked, he would have to go through the shadchan to meet her. Mrs Gelb­mann knew everyone and only she could ring the girl and suggest the match. If he was serious about meeting Chani Kaufman then he would have to pursue his interest in the way convention demanded. He was engulfed by a vision of a gloating Mrs Gelb­mann clutching her ring binder, her harpy's leer stretching her cracked lips as she crooked a chapped finger at him.

But first he would have to convince his mother that Chani Kaufman was worth meeting. She was not on his mother's list of suitable candidates, carefully selected from the upper echelons of the wealthy and prominent in the community. Doubtless she had never even heard of the Kaufmans.

His mother was on the phone in the lounge. She was lying on the sofa, her feet crossed at the ankles, a cushion supporting her neck. Her heels lay on the floor, their cruel spikes abandoned. The phone rested on her abdomen, rising and falling with her breathing. She twisted its cord between her manicured fingers, her long nails a coral pink.

His mother smiled wearily at him but continued her conversation.

‘I know, Shoshi, there's nothing we can do, we have to sit and wait.'

His mother fell silent. He could hear the urgent click and ripple of words coming faintly from the receiver. Baruch took a seat next to his mother's feet. She waggled them at him and raised her eyebrows. He waited, watching her face.

‘It will all be ok. Listen, it's normal for the first baby to be late. Do you remember my niece Sora-Malka? She was two weeks late and suddenly her contractions started over dinner, and her husband delivered the baby in ten minutes flat on the kitchen floor before the ambulance could even get to them! Baruch HaShem, everything was fine. The paramedics only had to deal with the afterbirth.'

‘Mum . . . Mum . . .' he whispered, pulling gently at her forearm.

‘Shoshi-leh, I have to go now. Baruch's here. He needs to talk to me . . . Yes, I will . . . im yirtzeh HaShem all will be well. Bye, Shoshi, bye, bye . . . yes, I will . . . ok . . . bye.'

His mother grunted as she sat up, replaced the receiver and let out a long sigh. Automatically her hands rose to tidy and check her wig. His mother wore a coppery concoction that fell in loose waves to her shoulders. The hair was thick and shiny and looked effortlessly natural. It suited his mother and he knew that it had cost his father dear.

‘That woman never stops talking! Such a yenta! She sends you her regards by the way. Nu, Baruch? So what can I do for you? How was yeshiva today? Did you daven for Mrs Goldmeyer? She's critically ill now. I heard from her neighbour that they doubt she'll pull through this time. Poor woman.'

It was now or never. ‘Mum, I need to talk to you about a girl.'

His mother's fingers froze. Her eyes widened, sooty fronds of mascara catching. ‘A girl? I thought you weren't ready yet for girls.
Now
my day's getting interesting . . . what girl? Is she one of us? Someone I know? She better be. Do I know the family? Nu? Tell me!' His mother prodded him playfully.

Baruch began hesitantly.' Er, you probably won't have her heard of her, I mean, I don't know the family . . .'

‘Spit it out, Baruch! What's her name?'

‘Chani Kaufman.' There. He had said it.

‘Kaufman . . . Kaufman . . . hmmm . . . I know a Mrs Haufman . . . nope, can't say I've heard of that name . . . are they a Golders family?'

‘Mum, I don't know. I just know her name. I saw her at the Vishnefski wedding – '

‘You saw her? I thought a good Yiddisher boy like my son didn't look at girls . . .' teased Mrs Levy.

‘Well, I was late and I had to sneak through the women's section to get to the mechitzah. It was kind of mortifying – all these women pretending not to see me but they were watching me all the while . . .'

His mother snorted with laughter. ‘They couldn't exactly miss you, could they? So you were creeping through the women's bit like a ganif and then what? Keep going!'

‘I'm trying Mum, but you keep interrupting me.'

‘Ok, ok I'll be quiet already.' His mum made a zipping motion and clamped her mouth shut. Her eyes bulged with expectation.

‘Well, I was trying not to look, honest, Mum, I really was but I couldn't help it because there she was. Just standing with her back to me with her friend – '

‘You saw only the back of her?'

‘
Mum
! Let me finish. I saw only the back of her and well, she looked really nice – '

‘I bet her toches did!'

‘
Mum
!' Baruch shot her an exasperated look.

‘Ok, ok – I'm sorry. Forgive me.' His mother gazed down meekly in mock repentance.

‘So, I noticed her. There was something about her – her hair – I don't know – '

‘What's her hair like?'

‘Shiny and black . . . long, I think. She had it up as far as I remember in one of those, one of those . . . you know how Malka likes to wear her hair?'

‘In a pony tail?'

‘Yes – anyway,' Baruch hurried on fearful of more interference, ‘I just liked how she looked, how she stood. She was slim and sort of delicate. I didn't have time to hang around and wait for her to turn round so when I got to the other side, I found Avromi and another guy called Shmuel and we found a hole in the mechitzah and when all the other men weren't looking we took a peek – '

‘My son was peeking through the mechitzah! Baruch! Well, at least she's skinny and not a shloomp,' Mock angry, his mother was finding it hard to hide her amusement.

‘Mum! Come on, there was no other way, I had to find out who she was and see her face – '

‘Of course. And what was it like, her face? And by the way, was this girl aware that boys were watching her?'

‘Uh, well, her friend caught me staring as I was passing through and I think she told her – '

‘And she continued to stand there and let you look? Very nice, Baruch . . .'

‘It wasn't like that, Mum. It happened really quickly. Anyway, I was where I shouldn't have been. It wasn't her fault.'

‘Her face?' insisted his mother.

‘She's very pretty as far as I could tell. Avromi thought so too, and the other guy – '

‘Nu? Details? Details, Baruch. What colour were her eyes? Nose – how big?'

‘Mum, you're impossible . . . I think she has dark eyes, probably brown. She's pale and well really pretty . . . small-looking. I
don't know.
I just really liked her. And Shmuel knew who she was because his brother married one of her older sisters.'

‘Pale, you say? Sounds like she's Ashkenazi. Baruch HaShem – I don't want a Sefardi daughter-in-law – they're trouble. Who's this Shmuel?'

‘Some guy who was there. He was really nice. A mensch. But I don't know him personally – Avromi knows him.'

He watched his mother as she ruminated over the scanty facts, waiting for her verdict. He sensed it would not be favourable.

‘Baruch, I don't know the family and you know how I feel about families . . . they have to be the right sort. I'm not happy about the fact I've never heard of this girl.'

‘I knew it! The first girl I show any real interest in and there's a problem.'

‘Baruch, you know the rules. Your father and I have to approve of the match. What about the Rosen girl we wanted you to meet? Or Libby Zuckerman? Both of them lovely, haimisher girls – intelligent, pretty, frum, skinny like pickles the pair of them. What more could you want?'

‘I want to choose my own girl. I don't like the Rosens, they're arrogant and as for Libby, I'm not her type – I know I'm not.'

‘Not her type? Look at you, tall, good-looking, a yeshiva bocher, a mensch. You're my son, what's not to like? You've practically grown up with Libby – we've known that family for years. Mrs Zuckerman said she'd be thrilled if you two made a match.'

Disappointed, Baruch stared down at the table. He had known his mother wouldn't approve.

‘Give Chani a chance, Mum – that's unfair. I like her and I want to meet her. Please help me out here,' he muttered.

Mrs Levy relented. ‘Ok, Baruch. I want you to be happy. It's my duty to help you find a wife you like. First I'll tell your father and get his ok on it. Then I'll go to Mrs Gelb­mann and ask her if she knows Chani Kaufman. She may be on her list.'

‘Thanks Mum. I really mean it,' Baruch reached across the table and squeezed his mother's hand.

Mrs Levy smiled ruefully.'On one condition.'

‘Yes? What?'

‘That if she's not the right sort from an acceptable family, you'll move on and agree to meet a more suitable girl?'

‘Ok . But please give this one a chance.' Baruch coaxed.

‘One chance. Once your Dad agrees, I'll call Mrs Gelb­mann and arrange to see her as soon as possible.' His mother stood up and moved towards the phone.

‘Thanks, Mum.' He hugged his mother and kissed her cheek.

He was filled with trepidation and in his heart, he sensed trouble lay ahead.