The Stories of Bernard Malamud by Bernard Malamud

Author:Bernard Malamud
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Published: 2011-11-14T00:00:00+00:00

Man in the Drawer

A SOFT SHALOM I thought I heard but considering the Slavic cast of the driver’s face it seemed unlikely. He had been eyeing me in his rearview mirror since I had stepped into the taxi and, to tell the truth, I had momentary apprehensions. I’m forty-seven and have recently lost weight but not, I confess, nervousness. It’s my American clothes, I thought at first. One is a recognizable stranger. Unless he had been tailing me to begin with, but how could that be if it was a passing cab I had hailed myself?

The taxi driver sat in his shirt sleeves on a cool June day, not more than 50° Fahrenheit. He was a man in his thirties who looked as if what he ate didn’t fully feed him—in afterthought a discontented type, his face on the tired side, not bad-looking—now that I’d studied him a little, though the head seemed pressed a bit flat by somebody’s heavy hand even though protected by a mat of healthy hair. His face, as I said, veered toward Slavic: broad cheekbones, small firm chin, but he sported a longish nose and a distinctive larynx on a slender hairy neck; a mixed type, it appeared. At any rate, the shalom had seemed to alter his appearance, even the probing eyes. He was dissatisfied for certain this fine June day—his job, fate, appearance—whatever. And a sort of indigenous sadness hung on or around him, coming God knows from where; nor did he seem to mind if who he was, was immediately apparent; not everybody could do that or wanted to. This one showed himself as is. Not too prosperous, I would say, yet no underground man. He sat firm in his seat, all of him driving, a touch frantically. I have an experienced eye for details.

“Israeli?” he asked in a whisper.

“Amerikansky.” I know no Russian, just a few polite words.

He dug into his shirt pocket for a thin pack of cigarettes and swung his arm over the seat, the Volga swerving to avoid a truck making a turn.

“Take care!”

I was thrown sideways—no apologies. Extracting a Bulgarian cigarette I wasn’t eager to smoke—too strong—I handed him his pack. I was considering offering my prosperous American cigarettes in return but didn’t want to affront him.

“Feliks Levitansky,” he said. “How do you do? I am taxi driver.” His accent was strong, verging on fruity, but redeemed by fluency of tongue.

“Ah, you speak English? I sort of thought so.”

“My profession is translator—English, French.” He shrugged sideways.

“Howard Harvitz is my name. I’m here for a short vacation, about three weeks. My wife died not so long ago, and I’m traveling partly to relieve my mind.”

My voice caught, but then I went on to say that if I could manage to dig up some material for a magazine article or two, so much the better.

In sympathy Levitansky raised both hands from the wheel.

“Watch out, for God’s sake!”

“Horovitz?” he asked.

I spelled it for him. “Frankly, it was Harris after I entered college but I changed it back recently.

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