The Wet Nurse's Tale by Erica Eisdorfer Page B

favor for a woman who’d never yet seen me before but who looked at me and thought me safe enough. To her, I simply looked like another woman from the district, in my neat sprigged frock and my covered head and my smile. I seemed to her to be a woman as would know how to hold a baby and keep it quiet. Which I was.
    The service went on a bit, but not as long as some I’ve been to. I remarked to myself that as people left the building, they seemed as busy as ever. They did not have the peaceful expression on their faces that Christians have when they leave church. I thought this to be odd. But when I thought more, it seemed to me that often I have seen a peaceful expression turn to anger as fast as a whip cracks, and so the look on the face might mean less than what it seems to be.
    “Mrs. Rose,” was what I heard as I made my way down the steps of the temple.
    I felt startled near out of my skin. I felt like I’d been caught robbing. I’m sure I blushed scarlet. “Mr. Abrams,” said I so I almost couldn’t hear myself, I said it so low. I was that ashamed.
    “And how do you do? How is your tooth?”
    “How can it be, when it’s not any longer in my mouth?” said I, trying to banter. “You took it, so you ought to know.”
    He laughed, bless him, and then he introduced me to the lady on his arm. “This is my sister, Henrietta. Hen, this is Mrs. Rose.” We bobbed at each other but I was still too embarrassed to look up much. I thought that I was lying not to tell that I wasn’t a missus, but I also couldn’t imagine the purpose it’d serve to set him right. So I didn’t.
    “Mrs. Rose,” said he, “how’ve you come to our service here? I have not seen you here before, I think?”
    “No, sir,” I said, low again. “You have not. I was in your part of town here, where I come sometimes to do some trade.” And then, as if I was a puppet in a Punch and Judy show and someone’s hand was in my back to move me, I said, “I felt drawn to come here, for I though I was raised in a Christian home, I am of your blood.”
    They gaped and I am afraid I did as well. I cannot say what made me do it. Twas such a lie! But I was afraid of being caught in a place where I did not belong, you see, and thus the fib came forth. And as well, as I had sat with the women of the district, and watched them talk and pray and scold their children, I had noted something else: a resemblance between them and me. Often, in a place—in church or the market or the street—I thought that I seemed darker of hair and complexion than other women. But there, sitting in the Hebrew temple, I thought I looked quite at home, though I might not have felt it.
    “I confess,” said Mr. Abrams, “I am amazed. I have never heard such a story. How did this happen to you? Where did you . . .”
    But his sister stopped him with a hand on his arm. “Harry, leave off your inquiry!” she said. “You will frighten Mrs. Rose away!” Then to me, “I’m sure you didn’t understand much this evening. Did you not find it tiresome?”
    “Oh no,” said I. “I quite enjoyed myself. It was strange to me, it’s true, but it was different.”
    Mr. Abrams laughed. “Some would call ‘strange’ and ‘different’ both to be bad things. I see that you do not.”
    This confused me so I said nothing. But I did look up and smile and they smiled back.
    “Mrs. Rose,” said Miss Abrams, “must you return to . . . well, where is it that you go to?”
    “I’m a nurse for a family in Compton,” said I, “but I’m having my half-day.”
    “Well then,” said she, “come with us to have some supper. Our mother will have cooked a lovely Sabbath supper and she always prefers to feed more than just us. Do come.”
    “We will not bite, if that’s your fear,” said Mr. Abrams. “Neither will you eat anything you’d rather not.” He smiled when he said it, and I knew he referred to the fairy tales we hear where the Jews are can nibals, like.
    His sister