The Collected Stories

it rolled and flew about like an imp. Suddenly through the downpour I saw a woman beckoning to me from the porch of a house. Her mouth moved, but the wind carried her voice away. She signaled me to come over and find protection from the wild elements. I found myself facing a fancy house with a gabled roof, columns, an ornate door. I walked onto the porch, dropped my suitcase (books and manuscripts can be as heavy as stones), wiped my face with a handkerchief, and was able to see the woman more clearly: a brunette who seemed to me in her thirties, with an olive complexion, black eyes, and classic features. There was something European about her. Her eyebrows were thick. There was no sign of cosmetics on her face. She wore a coat and a beret that reminded me of Poland. She spoke to me in English, but when I answered her and she heard my accent she shifted to Yiddish.
    “Who are you looking for? I saw you walking in the rain with that heavy suitcase, and I thought I might …”
    I told her I had come to rent a room and she smiled, not without irony.
    “Is this the way you look for a room? Carrying your luggage? Please come inside. I have a house full of rooms that are to let.”
    She led me into a parlor, the like of which I had seen only in the movies—Oriental rugs, gold-framed pictures, and an elaborate staircase with carvings and a red velvet bannister. Had I entered an ancient palace? The woman was saying, “Isn’t that odd? I’ve just opened the house this minute. It’s been closed for the winter. The weather turned warm and I decided perhaps it’s time. As a rule, the season here begins in late May or early June.”
    “Why is the house closed in the winter?” I asked.
    “There’s no steam. It’s an old building—seventy or eighty years old. It can be heated, but the system is complicated. The heat comes through here.” She indicated a brass grate in the floor.
    I now realized it was much colder inside than outside. There was a staleness in the air characteristic of places that have been without sun for a long time. We stood silent for a moment. Then she asked, “Are you wanting to move in immediately? The electricity isn’t turned on yet and the telephone hasn’t been connected. Usually boarders come to make arrangements, pay a deposit, and move in when the weather has become really warm.”
    “I gave up my room in the city.”
    The woman looked at me inquisitively and after some hesitation said, “I could swear I’ve seen your picture in the newspaper.”
    “Yes, they printed my photograph last week.”
    “Are you Warshawsky?”
    “That’s me.”
    “God in Heaven!”
    Darkness had fallen and Esther Royskes lit a candle in a copper candlestick. We were sitting in the kitchen eating supper, like man and wife. She had already told me her whole story: the trouble her ex-husband, a Communist poet, gave her; how she finally divorced him; and how he ran away with his lover to California and left Esther to take care of their two little girls. Two years ago, she had rented this house with the hope that she could earn a living from it, but it did not bring her enough income. People waited until after the Fourth of July and tried to get bargains. Last year, a number of her rooms remained empty.
    I put my hand into my pocket, took out the seventy-eight dollars, and offered to give her a down payment, but she protested. “No, you are not going to do that!”
    “Why not?”
    “First, you have to see what you are taking. It is damp and dark here. You may, God forbid, get a cold. And where will you eat? I would gladly cook for you, but since you tell me you plan to become a vegetarian it may be difficult.”
    “I will eat in Coney Island.”
    “You will ruin your stomach. All you get there is hot dogs. A man who packs his valise and comes to Sea Gate without any forethought is not practical. It’s a miracle that brought you to me.”
    “Yes, it is a miracle.”
    Her black eyes gazed at me half mockingly, and I knew that this was the beginning of a serious relationship. She seemed to be aware of it, too. She spoke to me of things that are usually not told to a stranger. The shadows cast on her face by the candlelight reminded me of a charcoal sketch on a canvas. She said, “Last week I was lying in bed reading your story in the paper. The girls were asleep, but I love to read at night. Who writes about ghosts nowadays, I wondered, and in a Yiddish newspaper to boot! You may not believe me but I