"Into bed right now!" Ms. Crow cried shrilly.
"But I'm hungry," wailed little Hindy.
Ms. Crow glared at Hindy and repeated her command more
toughly this time. Ms. Crow was the house mother in a New
York based refugee orphanage. Never having experienced the
emotion called love herself, she couldn't bring forth any
for her charges. She ruled with an iron fist and made sure
everyone knew who was the undisputed boss.
A whimpering Hindy dashed past Ms. Crow and up the stairs
before she was grabbed by the scruff of her neck and given a
sound spanking. It was the routine punishment for anyone who
dared break any of the one thousand house rules. The
children under the age of nine quickly got into pajamas and
neatly placed their shoes under the chair next to each bed.
Each child received a bed quilt and pillow of their own.
Everything else was shared communal style. It was a year
after W. W. II and clothes were not available in abundance.
The housemother distributed clean clothes to each child
according to size. The government allotted ample amounts of
food, but Ms. Crow didn't see that a young child would know
how much food was enough. "You must learn to be happy with
what you have!" she taught them in her perverted way. "Why,
just a short while ago, many people didn't have any food at
all and you complain?" With stern accusing eyes she would
look the child up and down until the unhappy creature would
have been happy to disappear under the wornout linoleum.
After a few such exchanges, most children learned to make
peace with their lot.
Hindy, however, at age five, was not old enough to
understand the ramifications of such philosophical teachings
and continued weeping under her pillow to stifle the sound.
She was lucky enough to have her older sister, Blimtche,
living together with her in the orphanage, and counted
heavily on Blimtche's ability to help her straighten out any
rough spots as they came along.
Blimtche was a kindhearted girl who would comfort the other
small children as well. "Who is On Duty tonight?" came Ms.
Crow's loud voice. She never went upstairs to tuck in the
children by herself. Each one of the older girls was "on
duty" a different night when it was her job to see that the
children went to sleep without a fuss. Whenever Ms. Crow
felt slight compunctions about the setup, she would reassure
herself that her feet were overstrained by running after
those ungrateful rascals all day.
Now, with a very, very audible sigh, she pulled over the
footstool to the couch and put her feet up. Tonight was
Blimtche's turn as O.D. Nobody else was allowed upstairs at
the younger children's bedtime. The reasoning behind it was
that the younger children wouldn't be able to fall asleep
with people coming and going into their rooms. Deep down,
Ms. Crow knew that this was just a pretext; really, she
didn't want the children to have any time to discuss their
grievances with each other, since this would undermine her
authority. Blimtche raced upstairs and headed for her
sister's bed. "What is it, Hindy?" she asked tenderly. Her
heart ached for her younger sister who couldn't recall the
image of their own gentle mother. At least, she had
recollections of easier times. "Hindy, do you hear me? I'm
going to bring you an apple. Please stop crying." Hindy
stopped whimpering and was hicupping by now. She peeked out
from under the pillow and gave a tearful smile to her sister
and squeezed her hand gratefully. Hindy trusted her sister
implicitly and knew she would manage to bring the promised
apple even against the greatest odds. You had to be very
determined to try and get an apple when it wasn't snack
time. Ms. Crow kept the fruit bowl out in full view on the
kitchen table where she was able to keep her bird's eye
vigil against anyone having the courage to be hungry when
she didn't say so. It was situated at an angle that Ms. Crow
could see from her seat on the living room couch.
Visitors, like the women from the Red Cross, assumed that
food which was kept in view of the children was probably
available to them to help themselves. They were wrong. But
Blimtche would do anything for her younger sister, even risk
the wrath of the angry Crow. She went back downstairs to the
fleishige dishes and with a flourished swish of the
dishtowel, managed to upset the fruit bowl so that apples
were rolling all over on the otherwise spotlessly clean
kitchen floor.
The immediately expected reaction didn't surprise
Blimtche.
"Why are you so clumsy? Why did you have to swing the
dishtowel in such a carefree way? Can't you be more serious
about the work, more careful in the way you do things? Why
can't you foresee the consequence of your actions
beforehand? Don't you have eyes? If you didn't need to use
them, they wouldn't have been given to you in the first
place!"
Blimtche wasn't listening to the litany. She could probably
have rattled off the whole list of complaints by heart or a
plausible variation thereof. "And make sure you pick up
every last apple from the floor. If I find a single apple
behind the pantry tomorrow, you forfeit your privileges for
the next two days," finished Ms. Crow from her perch in the
living room.
The other two girls busy with their chores in the kitchen
didn't dare help Blimtche pick up the stray fruits. Esther
and Rivky knew that acts of solidarity were immediately
surpressed in this place.
As she went about picking up the apples, Blimtche deftly
dropped one into her apron pocket and then proceeded to
restack them prettily in the bowl, making sure that no
absence could be detected.
"Blimtche," came the very order she was waiting for, "run
upstairs now and check if anyone is whispering." She
strutted up the stairs like a cultured young lady, to please
Ms. Crow who was a stickler for posture and deportment, but
as soon as she was past the landing and safely out of sight
of the housemother, she made a dash for Hindy's room.
"Let's make a brocha together," she said, handing her
sister this rare, luscious treat. After making the rounds
and patting the four other children and tucking in their
covers, Blimtche went back down to report that everyone was
quiet.
Getting dressed in the morning was an experience as well.
Though most of their classmates at school also wore clothes
from the Salvation Army outlets, Ms. Crow had a knack for
picking out the ugliest jumpers, the most pimpled pullovers
and the thickest long cotton stockings. When the weather got
cold, Ms. Crow would find vintage oversized nightgowns of
the 1900s and cut off part of the sleeves to create hats and
scarves. "I refuse to wear this," eight-year-old Fraidy
protested bravely the first time. "I don't want everyone
laughing at me in school!"
"Your choice, Fraidy," Ms. Crow said crisply, her arms
jutting at a sharp angle from her hips. "Either you go to
school with this or else the big black truant officer will
come and get you!" she ended triumphantly.
Fraidy knew she'd be better off going to school and finding
a strategic spot somewhere where she could remove the
ignonimous head gear and hide it in the dark depths of her
big black brief case cum school bag. Everyone was afraid of
the big black truant officer.
On the way home from school, Fraidy would step into an alley
before turning the corner and put on the hat 'n scarf in a
way Ms. Crow would approve.
*
Years passed, the children were married off and went on with
their own private lives. Blimtche married a wonderful young
man who had a hard time making a living in the city. They
decided to move to a recently established community in the
suburbs where they found themselves a simple, small country
style house which was affordable and had a basement where
Reuvain started a home business. Much to the family's
delight, the venture turned out to be more successful than
they had imagined and before long, the downstairs was too
small for managing their large enterprise. The office had to
be moved to the main business section of town. By the time
the first fiscal year came to an end, Reuvain had a small
fortune in his bank account.
"It sure feels good to be able to stretch a bit," he mused
one afternoon, as he rose from his swivel chair. He walked
over the big bay window and reminisced at the quick
transformation from struggling young man to a rich
fellow.
In a heightened mood of elation, he got into his car and
headed for home. "Funny, I never noticed how pretty this
town really is." As he turned into his street, he was
surprised to see that he didn't actually know his own
street, either. For the property right next to his house
seemed to have turned into a blossoming orchard overnight!
Reuvain knew that was highly unlikely. He realized that he
had been so busy worrying about parnossa for his
family that he had never observed his pastoral
surroundings.
A great feeling of thankfulness for all of his blessings
overcame him and he decided to do something concrete to
express it. Reuvain was aware that all of his blessings were
directly connected to his wife and her perennial good deeds.
He decided to show his appreciation by buying the apple
orchard next to their property as a surprise gift.
A few weeks later, on a beautiful Sunday morning when the
family was having lunch together, Reuvain presented Blimtche
with a yellow manilla envelope. In it was a deed to the
apple orchard. As she untied the red ribbon, her attention
was diverted by a loud flapping at the open window. Turning
her head to see the cause of the commotion, she saw a big
black crow drop a shiny red apple on the window sill before
flying off...
