The People by Bernard Malamud

Author:Bernard Malamud
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Published: 2011-11-09T05:00:00+00:00

1943

Benefit Performance

MAURICE ROSENFELD was conscious of himself as he took the key from his pocket and inserted it into the door of his small apartment. The Jewish actor saw his graying hair, the thick black eyebrows, the hunch of disappointment in his shoulders, and the sardonic grimness of his face accentuated by the twisted line of the lips. Rosenfeld turned the key in the lock, aware that he was playing his role well. Tragedy in the twisting of a key, he thought.

“Who’s there?” said a voice from inside the apartment.

Surprised, Rosenfeld pushed open the door and saw that it was his daughter who had called out. Sophie was lying in her bed, which became the couch when it was folded together, and her bedroom became the living room. There was one other room, a small one, where Rosenfeld and his wife slept, and an alcove for the kitchen. When her father was working and came home late after the performance, Sophie would set up three screens around her bed so that she would not be awakened by the light which he put on while heating up some milk for himself before going to bed. The screens served another purpose. Whenever Sophie and her father quarreled, she set them up and let him rant outside. Deprived of her presence, he became silent and sulked. She sat on her sofa, reading a magazine by the light of her own lamp and blessing the screens for giving her privacy and preserving her dignity.

The screens were stacked up in the corner, and Rosenfeld was surprised to see his daughter in bed.

“What’s the matter?” he said.

“I’m not well,” she answered.

“Where’s Momma?”

“She went to work.”

“Today she’s working?”

“She had half a day off. She’s working from five to ten.”

Rosenfeld looked around. The table in the alcove was not set and it was nearly suppertime.

“She left me to eat, something?”

“No, she thought you were going to eat with Markowitz. Is there anything doing?”

“No,” he said bitterly, “nothing is doing. The Jewish theayter is deep in hell. Since the war, the Jews stay home. Everybody else goes out for a good time to forget their troubles, but Jews stay home and worry. Second Avenue is like a tomb.”

“What did Markowitz want to see you for?” Sophie asked.

“A benefit, something. I should act in a benefit for Isaac Levin.”

“Don’t worry,” she said, “you had a good season last year.”

“I’m too young to live on memories,” he said.

Sophie had no answer to that.

“If you want me to make you something, I’ll get up,” she said.

He walked into the kitchen and looked into the pots on the gas range.

“No, I’ll make for myself. Here is some potatoes and carrots left over. I’ll warm them up.”

“Warm up the hamburger in the oven. Momma made one for me, but I couldn’t eat it.”

Rosenfeld pulled down the door of the broiler and glanced distastefully at the hamburger on the wire grill. “No, it burns me my stomach when I eat chopmeat,” he said, closing the broiler door.

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