Free The Immigrants by Howard Fast Page B

was a simple woman, illiterate, and she made no attempt to learn English. In spite of her husband’s suc cess and growing wealth, she would have no servants in the house. She did her own cleaning and cooking, but now the doctors told her husband that she must spend at least five weeks in bed.
    “But you are my other son, Daniel,” she told him through her tears. “You will always be my son, and when Rosa is older, you will turn to each other.”
    “You get well. Just get well, Maria.”
    “My child was a son,” she moaned. “Daniel, Daniel, he was taken from me before I ever touched him.”
    Outside, in the hospital corridor, Anthony embraced him. Dan was shaken by the depth of the man’s emotion and grief; after all, the child had never lived. “You turn to people you love,” Cassala
     
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    said. “Money—my whole life is money. You are my son, Danny. I lose one son. Not you, Danny.”
    Away for most of the morning, Mark Levy returned to his shop to find his wife, Sarah, close to tears. Her an noyance was out of character. “How can you find any thing here? How can you ever find anything in this mess?” Martha took the cue from her mother and began to wail. “Where were you?” Sarah demanded as she picked up the child and quieted her.
    “I was only gone a few hours. I went to look at the Oregon Queen .”
    “Jenson was in here, shouting at me. He says the oakum you sold him is no good.”
    “He’s crazy.”
    “He dumped it all behind the shop. I gave him his money back.”
    Mark started to say something, then swallowed his words. “Oh, I hate this whole thing,” she cried out. “I hate being a storekeeper.
    I hate it.”
    “You never said that before.”
    “I’m saying it now. Isn’t that enough? I’ll feed Mar tha and get your lunch.”
    “I’m not hungry,” Mark said. He began to prowl around the store, straightening a shelf of goods here and there. “I didn’t know you hated it. It’s Pop’s store. Hell, it’s given us a decent living.
    Chandlering’s not the worst thing in the world.”
    “I’m sorry.” She sat down with the child in her arms and began to weep.
    “Why are you crying? The hell with Jenson. You gave him his money back. He has no kick coming.”
    “I’m not crying over that. Maria Cassala’s child died.”
    “What? Who—Steve or Rosa?”
     
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    “No, the baby. It was stillborn. Danny Lavette was in here and he told me.”
    “Yeah, that’s rotten. But you don’t have to cry over it. It happens.”
    “Yes, it happens.”
    “She’ll have other kids.”
    “She won’t. The doctor says no.” She dried her eyes with her skirt and pressed Martha to her bosom. “I’m just miserable.” She went into the back room with Mar tha, and a few minutes later Mark heard her singing to the child. “If I were only like that,” he thought. “In and out of grief that easily.”
    “Why did you go to look at the Oregon Queen ?” she called out to him.
    “To see if Danny is crazy.”
    “Is he?”
    “No.”
    “I have cold fish for your lunch. Will you eat it?”
    “I’ll eat it,” he said with resignation.
    Feng Wo’s knowledge in a variety of areas was amaz ing. “What would you wear,” Dan asked him, “to take a girl driving? Not a tart. This is a girl with class.”
    Feng Wo thought about it for a moment. “I think, Mr. Lavette, white ducks, a white shirt, and some kind of jacket sweater that buttons down the front. You can buy that at Lords. Maybe those canvas shoes they call sneakers.”
    “Just that? Not flannels?”
    “I worked for such people once. It is true they wear white flannels for their amusements. But you’re a man of the sea. Ducks would be appropriate, I think.”
     
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    But once at Lords, he bought the white flannels and a blue boating jacket with brass buttons. White sneak ers. The shoes were all right, but he felt like a fool in the boating jacket, and at