Chicken Dreaming Corn

A Dream of Water

A Dream ofWater he days leading up to Easter, 1918, were busy for the store, with mothers buying union suits to pack for their boys going off to the Army, and farmhandsfromToulminville or docksworkers from Maysville coming in for awell-priced, churchgoing coat and tie. Upstairs in the kitchen, Miriam and Lillian put away the dishes and brought out the Passoverplateware, and the first and second night seders were festive and long. Morris, after closing the store early at the start of the holiday, resumed regularhours in time for their big saleweekend. GOOD FRIDAY SPECIALS,Morris printed on aplacard. He had refused to takethe sign down evenafter being confronted by alady from the Church of Christ Disciples who railed that the Jews, "having crucified Christ, should not nowprofit from His murder!" Pablo Pastor, clutching David's chubby hand, had stood between Morris and the woman,proclaiming that when Christ returned the Kleinmans would be among the twelvethousand souls from each of the twelvetribes marked with the seal of Heaven."Thank you, Mr. Pastor,"Morris said after the woman stomped away."After this life, who knows? In this one weshould at least makea good living." Three months after Davidhadbeenborn, the Pastorshad moved into a second-floor apartment at the back of Fosko Soda,across from the Cathedral. The men who satbefore their storesinrockers 3* T A Dreamof Water 33 became Pablo's customers; nightly, they puffed their worries into the damp Gulf Coastsky. That the Pastors had chosen to name their boy after the infant that Miriam had lost seemed strange, atfirst.When they had asked Morris to be the godfather,he declined. Therabbi told him thiswas not allowed. Morris was relieved. Miriam's face had been long for manyweeksafter losing her own David.It wasnot until MardiGras day, with Hannah tangling herself up in a bright spool of serpentine thrown from a masked rider on a silver-plumed horse, that a smile had finally crossed her face. But there was no sight even of the Pastors this Easter morning: the town was serene, ten thousand Mobilians tucked in churches, singing Hallelujahsto their risen Lord.ByPieme's Glassand Fowler's Watches shuttered in Easter quiet, by Bienville Square where the only motion wasa sailor snoring on a bench, the Kleinmans made their way to the 10 A.M. ferry. They reached the Bay Queen, finding it nearlyempty for this first morning run. Abe and Herman hung over the dockhand who loosed the ferry from its moorings; topside, like an aristocrat, Miriam stretched out on a folding chair. Morris pushed his face into the wind, watching the towns like glimmering threads on the opposite shore—Daphne, Montrose, and Fairhope. He closed his eyesasa steamship moved through the channel, its wakelifting the ferry in a gentle roll. He had first felt this bay—rising and falling, rocking, gently rocking—in a dream. Could he have been only a fewyears older than Abe,his birthday son? He felt Shayna Blema's hand like the wind now touching him and flying away, impossible to hold. He'd hitched a ride that next morning on the back of a livestockwagon to the farm outside of Piatra Neamt where the tall gray man with one stray eyewelcomed him with a nod to sacksin the corner. Barley and oats: he smelled the grain bags, felt the great, lumpy bodies of them slung over his shoulder like Chaim captured in a game of chase and hoisted onto his back. In his hips, he retraced 34 CHICKEN DREAMING CORN the path from the barn to the store with its cellar leading down to the stockpile of grain; down the steps past the bats' wings folded like black poppies, down to the hole where the sacks waited to be dragged up like dead bodies. After he lugged the sacksup theywere picked over by Andru Antonescu who came in for feed for the horses who plowed his potato fields, or by his brother Alexandra who carted away grain for his distillery, working overtime to meet the demand now that Papa's was closed. In the store Eminescu introduced him as "the Jew,"and when one pig farmer threatened to thrash him for ripping a sack, Eminescu confronted the farmer, saying,"You gain nothing from our Lordby striking a poor Hebrewboy."When Morris started to thank him, Eminescu gazedback with one stray eyeand nodded abruptly to the barn. "Go, eat, it...