When we entered the house, Milcah showed me the amulets the family had hung. “‘Adam and Eve excluding Lilith’—you remember what I told you about Lilith?” Of course. Lilith fascinated me, partly because they said it was Lilith who had tried to steal my eyes, and an angel had stopped her because of my mother’s prayers. Milcah didn’t believe in Lilith, well, maybe just a little. “So she was in the Garden of Eden, but she probably isn’t in Russia. Not even Lilith would come to Russia if she could go anywhere. We have plenty of our own local demons and not all of them are invisible. Many people still believe, though. See here,” Milcah pointed, “these are the names of the angels Sanvi, Sansanvi and Samangelaf written on the door, to protect the baby, in case the amulets aren’t enough. Maybe half the families still do that, maybe less.”
The featherbed was covered with rags. It was August and still very hot, just midday. Rivka wasn’t more than nineteen years old. Milcah said she had her first child when she was fifteen.
“She very much wants a boy.” Milcah’s eyes wandered and she sighed. “Well, it’s our work to help women have what they want; it’s not so much to ask. I told her she must eat beef then, once a week, but no eggs, from a month after her last pregnancy until she conceived. Fortunately, she can afford to do such a thing. Then I gave her this, milkweed in shnaps, three drops only, every other day, as soon as she knew she’d conceived. So now we’ll find out—maybe it works, maybe it doesn’t.”
Rivka was very dark, with many freckles and moles. She had long legs, I thought, but then I was just twelve and, though used to women naked in the bathhouse, not from this position. The sister, Tsipora, was by her side. Milcah asked many questions: how long since they saw the blood, how many minutes between the pains.
The sister said it was six or seven minutes between each pain. Rivka’s belly was tight, in the shape of a balalaika. Milcah made her sit up and rolled towels for her back. Tsipora stood behind, rubbing her shoulders. Rivka breathed deep into her belly. Milcah made her put her knees up, not too far apart. She spread the woman’s legs.
“Later, when the baby is coming,” Milcah said, “you and Tsipora will each hold one of her feet so she can push against you. There, now, you can see.” She showed me the lips and the hole where urine comes from. “Here, where the baby is coming, is not normally so wide, only at birth. You can feel in yourself how the opening is usually just big enough for a few fingers. The man puts his member here and drops his seed in, like I explained. For him, just a minute. For her, well, now you’ll see. And this one is coming quickly.”
It seemed like hours but even a minute would have been too long to stare up a stranger’s legs. None of my old classmates had ever seen anything like this, I was sure. I got a queasy sensation, from the strong odor of salted fish and excretions the woman had, and from being proud to finally witness this part of my trade. Two hours went by.
Milcah turned to look at me. “You are breathing like the mother. Why?”
“I don’t know,” I said.
“That’s all right then. Both of you, relax, keep taking deep breaths. How long did that one last?” she asked Rivka.
“Too long—oy, here it comes again!” Tsipora wiped her sister’s head with a cloth.
“Come down here now.” Tsipora and I each held a foot with one hand, and rubbed a leg with the other, so the mother shouldn’t get cramps, Milcah said. It seemed like so much to do—what would happen if Milcah were all alone? She would manage, I was sure, but if it were me? Then the woman started crying, puffing, shouting.
“Stop rubbing now, just let her push,” Milcah instructed. “You always watch to make sure she isn’t squeezing too hard. It shouldn’t be desperate; you want it to move like a winter’s current. Have you ever seen the Black Sea? No? In the river, then. Like a wave, you can’t stop it. She shouldn’t wear out too soon or force the baby too hard. ‘No good comes from hurrying.’ See—you can see in? In the back it’s two fingers wide and see how it’s all swollen, like the heel of a loaf of bread? That’s the head, coming down, pushing against the opening. See, here it is—just perfect—but here—you have to watch this skin, how it’s stretching.”
I could see how tight and pale the skin was in the furrow going down to the woman’s behind. When I was little I would sometimes play with the hot wax from Shabbes candles when my mother or Pesah weren’t around. I would mold and stretch it and sometimes the wax would snap. That’s how the woman’s skin looked now.
“Sometimes you have to make a cut, right there,” Milcah said, tracing a line below the opening, “to give the baby more room. Otherwise the skin tears and it’s very hard to heal. This time I think—,” she had a little knife by her hand, she was massaging and looking, “—I think this time not. The first one of hers we had to do it for, but not the second. You’re fine, Rivka, just keep pushing.”
I caught glimpses of the opening from where I stood, holding Rivka’s callused, curled toes. Below her dark hair was the place of mystery, shifting, enlarging. Milcah was busy then, almost forgetting me. The head was coming through.
“This is the hardest part,” she said. “Yell, go ahead,” and the woman gave such an oy-vey I almost dropped her foot. Milcah put her hands on the baby’s head and the head turned sideways.
“This is the way it’s curled up in the womb. You put your hand right away to hold the head, but don’t squeeze or pull by it, you hear?” she said without looking at me. “Even if it seems like it’s taking too long, which, thank God, this is not. You just support and guide it.” One shoulder was out and the baby opened its mouth, gulping, starting to cry.
Then the rest of the tiny body glided out like music, if you didn’t mind the screaming. Fantastic music coming out of a woman’s thighs! The baby was crying, the mother panting and oy-veying, the sister sobbing. If Milcah hadn’t kept talking, I would have started weeping myself.
“Now is when you work fast. Hand me a clean rag.” Milcah wiped the baby’s head, around its eyes and mouth, cleaning away all the mucus. “See? Oy. Well, she’ll have to wait until next time for a little yeshive bokher. Three girls is not so bad, she has plenty of time to make boys, we’ll try tansy next maybe. All right, you see this? Like watery cheese on the baby? Spread it all over, nice and even. It keeps the skin from getting a rash, a present from the mother.” Milcah massaged the tiny body all over. I was thrilled with its littleness, like baby snails I sometimes found, faithful miniatures that gave me a sensation I can only call awe. But then there was no time for awe. The cord was hanging, throbbing, and I had to remember every word Milcah said.
“You make sure the cord hangs free, not wrapped anywhere around the baby. God forbid, the cord should come first, it can be a real problem. Sometimes you can still save the child, but it’s not easy. Now you wait for the cord to lie still before you cut it.”
Milcah handed the infant to me, and I was holding someone entirely new, red, wrinkled, covered with yellowy wax, her face bunched up from pressing against the window of life, the big red and purple cord twined at her belly. I felt dizzy, not because of the intimacy but something else, like a voice coming over my eyes. I saw a room full of animal hides. On one hide, in a circle, nine Shabbes candlesticks, all lit except one, in which the candle had gone out.
“Gutke? Gutke! Here, give me the baby! What are you staring at?”
“I told you that girl is not right,” the sister said in a kind of hiss.
“Of course she is. She’s never seen a birth before, that’s all. Are you all right, child?”
“Oh yes, please forgive me, I—”
“You did nothing wrong. You held the girl fine, as if you were born to hold babies. Now just breathe and watch what I do.”
The cord had stopped pulsing. She made two clamps and cut between them, just so, near the baby’s belly, not too close. The baby was lying on the mother’s rounded stomach, the mother crying and laughing, running her hands over the baby’s fingers and toes.
“Every mother does that,” Milcah whispered to me, “even the ones
who’ve never heard of a baby with missing toes.”
“Oh, Chaim will be so disappointed.”
“And you?”
“My sweet baby, my precious flower. Flora, that’s a nice name for a girl, isn’t it? I had a great-grandmother Flora. Maybe it’s too nice, kayn ayen-hore?”
“Flora is a fine name. Don’t worry. It’s a mitsve to honor the dead.” Milcah smiled; everything was good. But not finished. “She has one more birth to give.” The woman moaned a little, tired, holding her baby against her breast. Then there was another wet sound and the cord wiggled and slid down the mother’s leg. Milcah showed me everything that comes out, the sack the baby was in, the different liquids. She made me smell them, even though I gagged because it was so strong, like putting my whole head into a rotting carcass.
Milcah patted my back. “You’ll get used to it, don’t worry. A strong smell is good. If there’s very little odor, or if you smell something different, like charcoal or anything that smells like metal, watch the mother carefully. In an hour, she should be washed with a tea made from comfrey and shepherd’s purse, especially over the lower parts. The gates of heaven are very close to women when they give birth, and who knows, maybe Lilith too, after all. I will teach you how to read all these things and save the mothers and children whenever you can. Sometimes of course—well, thank God, this is a strong woman and a beautiful girl.”
“Flora will marry a tanner and have nine children, eight of them will live,” a voice spoke. Then I realized it was my own.
“Sha,” Milcah said, as if I had made some terrible mistake.
“You see, what did I tell you? Now it’s predictions.” Tsipora glared.
“My little Flora?” Rivka said. She seemed pleased. “A tanner is respectable. Very good. She can see my grandchildren? A midwife who can see the future, what a thing!”
“She just had a premonition, that’s all. She’s very excited—it’s her first time.”
“Yes,” I said, “I’m sorry, I don’t know what I was saying. I must have been thinking about the new tannery on the cliffs. It doesn’t mean anything.” Milcah nodded at me.
The sister, who wouldn’t look at me anymore, gave Milcah a loaf of bread and a cheese. “I’m sorry, it’s all there is to pay you with.” Milcah nodded graciously.
Finally, when we were on our way home, Milcah wanted to know. “When did you see? As soon as I put the baby in your hands?”
“Yes,” I said, “then. Is there something wrong with me?”
“Oy, Gutke. Maybe you are part Gypsy, like they say. Or,” she considered, “you could be able to hear the bat kol. You know what that is? No, Pesah doesn’t teach you anything but the bathhouse and the table, am I right? The bat kol is a voice of God. Rabbis say they can hear whispers from God, sometimes talking, sometimes lamenting. But the bat kol doesn’t just speak to rabbis. Often it talks about the future, about birth. When I was a girl—,” she stopped and looked at me. “Well, bat kol or Gypsy, you are who you are. The sister is a gossip. If you don’t want people to say you’re a fortune teller, you must be very careful. It’s a thin line we walk. I heard that once all over Europe women were killed if anyone even suspected they were witches—and the Russians always like an excuse to kill a Jew. And Jews—it will be very hard for you to get a husband if this happens to you again and you tell anyone.” She pulled her shawl tight around her shoulders.
“I don’t care about a husband,” I said. “But why
does
it happen to me? Doesn’t everyone sometimes see things that aren’t—that seem—” I felt cold on the back of my neck, though the day was warm. I didn’t understand why everyone thought it was so unusual to know things about people by looking into them. It wasn’t like I heard the voice of an angel, even if Milcah said that’s what it was. I didn’t know that when most people tried to do what I called ‘looking in’ they saw only a brick wall, and if they happened to see more, they immediately turned away.
“Don’t trouble yourself so much, child. ‘The truth has many faces.’ You are good and honest, I know. What makes one hilltop green and another barren? Next time it happens, only tell me.”
After I saw my first birth, I felt that I was a grown woman, separated from other children even more than I had been by having no father. I was allowed to go to the most private, important things that happened in Kishinev. Even Pesah treated me differently, not so much like a little girl. When I was home in the evenings, I still helped at the baths. On the weekday nights the baths were for old women and women who had no children to look after, the youngest wives and unmarried aunts, a few students from the very wealthiest families. After I figured out that only prostitutes came on Mondays, I wondered how the other women knew to stay away. Sometimes I thought there was a secret meeting place where girls were told all the things women needed to know, or maybe the rabbi’s wife explained these matters to her pupils when they were old enough and I had missed that lesson. Pesah insisted that both Feygele and I should work some other place than the bathhouse on Mondays. I would peek around the side of the building at the women who came, but they didn’t seem so dangerous. They just wore brighter cloaks and more rouge.
The new factories were beginning to hire, and working girls started coming to the baths too, fourteen, fifteen years old. They were from the poorest families, the ones who had to let their daughters go out to work where they might be with men and goyim all day, and although nearly every kopeck went to their families, still, they had a little money of their own for the first time.
“The factories might be good for the baths, but they’re bad for Jews,” Pesah told her friend Sadie.
“Isn’t what’s good for you good for a Jew?” Sadie asked, poking Pesah in her ribs.
“You know very well what I mean,” Pesah answered, turning away, playing at being annoyed. But I didn’t know what Pesah meant. Like so many of the bits of conversation I recall, the meanings hidden in childhood only become clear now that I write them down. Most were just small lessons, people trying to prove their virtue to each other, but because I wasn’t supposed to be listening, I made things out to be more important than they were. Maybe that’s why our childhoods seem so big, so resonant, while our adult years slip by like fish in the river Byk.