Not a Nickel to Spare Read online

  Anyway, where was I? Oh yes, Uncle Max got mad because he found out that Benny made some money selling newspapers on the street, and he told Benny to give it to him. But Benny refused, because when his pa gets money he usually just spends it on himself — on alcohol, Benny says, except Benny calls it booze. Benny wants to give the money to his ma so she can buy food for the family, like his older brothers and sisters do when they have any money to spare. Benny has a good heart, even if he is a pest.

  But I guess Uncle Max doesn’t know about that, because he asked Benny if he thought he was better than the rest of the family. He asked Benny if he thought he was a prince or something, keeping all his money to himself like that, and he bowed to him and called him Prince Benjamin the First. Imagine! Anyway, that’s when Benny called Uncle Max a bad name with @*#!*?! in it, and that’s when Uncle Max hit Benny. Maybe Pa is right about Uncle Max.

  After that, Benny got out of there as fast as he could and wandered around in the dark for a long time because he didn’t want to go back home and get hit again, and then finally he came here and slept on the veranda. I felt so sorry for him I gave him my breakfast bagel, and now I am so hungry I could die and it’s still two hours to lunch. Benny is such a nuisance. I wish I didn’t like him so much.

  August 1932

  August 1

  I am in Wasaga Beach! I’m going to be here for an entire week!

  It’s all because of Ma. Sophie’s friend Syd Schein invited Sophie to come with her to the beach. Syd was going to go with another friend who couldn’t come at the last minute because her zayde died and she had to sit shiva, but she’d already paid for the hotel and they wouldn’t give her her money back and she said she was willing to let Sophie go in her place if Sophie paid half the price. Sophie told Syd she couldn’t even afford that, but Syd’s friend was desperate and said Sophie could have the room anyway and just give her whatever she could afford. Sophie wouldn’t tell me what she agreed to pay, but I know it was a lot. And then there’s the bus fare, too. It sounded to me like we just can’t afford it, but Sophie told Ma it was a real bargain and she promised to give Ma all her wages all winter and not keep anything for herself if Ma would let her go. I was really surprised, because Sophie is usually so sensible and she knows we don’t have any money to spare even if Pa is working now. What will we do when winter comes?

  Sophie begged and pleaded until Ma finally agreed to let her go. But Ma said Sophie couldn’t go unless she took me with her. Ma figured there’d be a children’s fare on the bus and the hotel wouldn’t charge Sophie for having a child in the same room, and she was right, but we do have to pay for a cot for me — 25¢ a night.

  Ma is the best mother ever. It’ll be awful spending my whole time with Sophie and being told to stand up straight fifteen times an hour and getting lectures about how I need to learn good manners and long division so I can be a credit to the family. And the cot is very lumpy. But it’s the beach! It’ll be worth it.

  I don’t know how Ma will find the money, though. I hope she doesn’t take in piecework again like she did last winter, because all that sewing gives her terrible headaches. Maybe she’ll get the money from Uncle Bertzik. And what will Pa say when he finds out?

  Just before we left the house, I remembered about the scribbler being under the orange crates, and I rushed down and got it and stuck it in my bag. If anyone found it while I wasn’t there and read what I said about them, I would just die.

  The bus trip seemed to go on forever, but the beach is divine. People drive right onto the sand and park their cars near the water. It’s ever so sophisticated.

  We’re staying at a resort called the Wasaga Inn. It’s very big and very nice, I guess. But as far as I can tell, none of the other people staying here are Jewish. They sure don’t act Jewish — more like glamorous people in movies.

  Also, Sophie told me not to tell anyone here that we’re Jewish. I don’t see why not. I mean, they don’t have a sign out about Jews and dogs, do they? So what’s she worried about anyway? Sophie says she isn’t worried, but we live in Canada, and we should act like Canadians. I don’t see how not saying you’re Jewish makes you a Canadian. But Sophie thinks it does. She even refuses to speak Yiddish anymore, even at home. It makes Pa furious. I wish Sophie and Pa got along better.

  For breakfast this morning, Sophie and Syd ordered bacon and eggs. Bacon is from pigs! It’s trayf! I guess I must have looked shocked that they were having food Jews aren’t allowed to eat, because they started to tease me. They said that only old-fashioned fools keep kosher anymore because it’s just a silly old superstition, and it’s the twentieth century now, and there’s nothing wrong with eating bacon. They said it was delicious even if it did come from a pig and I should have some, too.

  I didn’t want them to think I was a fraidy-cat, so I did order some. But when it came, just looking at it made me gag. Sophie and Syd laughed at me, and Sophie said, “Too bad, more for me,” and ate it all herself. Sophie is so smart and so sophisticated, and with the new haircut she got last month, she looks just like Joan Crawford. Joan Crawford is definitely not my favourite movie star, but she is a movie star. Maybe tomorrow I’ll try to eat bacon again.

  August 2

  We spent all day sitting on the beach. Syd got a terrible sunburn, but Sophie is so dark she just got a good tan and now she looks even more like Joan Crawford. Nothing happened to me, of course, because I kept a towel around my shoulders all day so nobody would laugh at how skinny I am. I did go in the water once, but it was ever so cold and I came right out again. I just sat there and ate the cherries that Sophie brought with her from Toronto and pretended to read my book while Syd and Sophie talked about movie stars and politics and the opera and what to eat to keep slim and all sorts of other things. Syd and Sophie think they know everything.

  Now they’ve gone to the Dardanella. It’s a dance hall, and children aren’t allowed, so they told me I had to stay here in the room all by myself. They get to go out and dance all the new steps they’ve been learning with each other while I have nothing to do but sit here and write and eat more cherries, but I bet it’s better than being in a dance hall and getting stared at by strange men. What would Pa say if he knew? You won’t catch me going to awful places like that when I’m a grown-up.

  August 3

  Sophie is furious with me. Is it my fault I got sick?

  Sophie says it is. She says it was because of all the cherries I ate, but what does she know? Maybe it was and maybe it wasn’t. Besides, she’s the one who brought the cherries, not me. If you ask me, it’s her fault.

  Anyway, my stomach was churning and I lay on the bed and felt awful for hours and hours, except for all the time I was in the toilet room, which was a lot. When Sophie and Syd came back from the dance I told Sophie I was going to die and I apologized for being so mean to her and getting her into trouble with Ma and Pa for killing me with cherries at the beach. But she just gave me a dirty look and asked how many cherries I’d eaten. When I told her, she said, “I might have known,” and made me go to bed. And she hasn’t said a word to me since. She just left me here in the room feeling sick all day while she went to sit on the beach with Syd. She didn’t even say she was happy a while ago when I told her I was feeling a little better. She just ignores me and acts like I’m not here at all.

  I still think it’s her fault.

  August 5

  The sun is still up so it isn’t Shabbes yet. But it will be soon — and Sophie has gone out to the Dardanella again. She’s going to dance on Shabbes, in public! And she didn’t even think about lighting the candles.

  It’s the first Shabbes that I’ve ever been away from home, and I’m going to miss Ma saying the prayers. I could try to say them myself, I guess, but I don’t have any candles. And anyway the cot is too lumpy and I feel worse than I have all day. I want to go home.

  August 6

  I feel much better. But I am never eating cherries ever again.

  While we were s
itting on the beach this afternoon, a man came up to us and said hello to Sophie. I thought she’d just tell him to go away because she’s a nice Jewish girl, not the kind of shameless hussy in movies who wears too much makeup and talks to strangers on the beach. But she didn’t. Even without any makeup on, she said hello right back. She even said his name, which is Steven. What an ugly name.

  It seems that Sophie met this Steven person at the Dardanella the other night. And she even danced with him! And she did it again last night! Imagine, my own sister Sophie, dancing with a man! And she’s not even related to him! If Pa only knew.

  Anyway, Steven sat down with us right on our blanket and he and Sophie talked about all the books they’d read. Steven adores The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck, just like Sophie. I started to read it while Sophie had the copy she borrowed from Syd, but Sophie caught me and told me I was too young for it. I don’t care — it seemed to be all about people starving in China, and nobody was happy, not for a moment. Not like the Five Little Peppers in their cozy Little Brown House. Steven seems kind of nice, I guess, for a man — if you forget about all the freckles and the bright red hair.

  August 7

  It’s hard to believe it’s been a whole week already. We’ll be taking the bus back to Toronto tomorrow, and I didn’t do anything but sit on the beach and read. I’ve read The Five Little Peppers three times now. I bet I could almost recite it word for word with the book closed. I’ll be so happy to get to the library and find another book.

  I’ve also been going to stores and things with Syd. Poor Syd. She has to take me because Sophie has been spending all her time with Steven. I guess Sophie and Steven have a lot in common, even if she looks like Joan Crawford and he looks sort of like what Blackie in the Ella Cinders comic strip would look like if he were a grown-up and had red hair instead of black.

  He talks about boring politics and philosophers and things, just like Sophie. He even likes listening to the opera, and his favourite one on the radio last year was Romeo and Juliet, just like me. It was all in French or Italian or something, but I could tell it was sad and lovely even if I didn’t understand the words.

  But there’s one thing that Sophie and Steven don’t have in common. Steven isn’t Jewish.

  Really! He isn’t! Syd says she thinks Sophie is crazy for even letting him talk to her, and so do I. In my opinion, you should stick to your own kind, like Pa says. I mean, gosh, what if Steven comes from a family that put up one of those No Jews or Dogs signs? I don’t know what Sophie is thinking of. It probably comes from eating all that bacon.

  August 8

  It was nice to go away, but it’s nice to be back home, too. I didn’t realize how much I missed the little ones until Molly and Hindl saw Sophie and me coming down the street and came rushing out the door and gave me a big hug. Molly even coloured a special picture for me of me on the beach with a big sun shining on me. Poor Molly — she must have been so lonely while I was gone. Ma said Molly and Hindl were waiting by the window in the parlour all morning. Usually she doesn’t even let them in there unless it’s Shabbes.

  Ma gave me a big hug, too, and so did Dora, and even Gert said she was glad to see me. She was, too — but it was mostly because Pa made her go to the Fruit Terminal with him to do the accounts because I wasn’t there to do them like I usually do. Gert hates arithmetic, and she’s terrible at it. Now that I’m back, I’m going to have to fix all her mistakes. Pa says it’ll probably take me all day because she made so many. He was just joking, but Gert stopped smiling at me and went back to looking the mean way she usually does. Why do I have to be the smart one?

  Sophie didn’t tell Ma about the cherries. Maybe she’s not so bad after all.

  August 9

  I went to the library to take The Five Little Peppers back, and Miss Pugh, the lady who works in that room, told me the most exciting thing. She says there are more books about the Five Little Peppers! Lots and lots of them! They don’t have them in the library at St. Chris, but I’m going to ask Ma if I can go to Boys and Girls House behind the big library on College Street and see if they have them there. Maybe tomorrow or later this week.

  I had to go with Pa to the Fruit Terminal to work on the accounts (which were a real mess, thanks to Gert). While I was there I spotted the same bunch of little kids I saw there a few times before I went to the beach. They are much younger than me, and their clothes are filthy and full of holes and they have no shoes. They were going through the garbage just like they did the last time I saw them, picking out the wilted lettuce and squashed tomatoes and then running off with it. Pa says they come all the time, and the men at the Terminal just pretend not to notice them because it might be just about the only food they and their families get. The Depression is such an awful thing, and we are so, so lucky. At least we have food and shoes.

  August 11

  I got two more Five Little Peppers books, The Five Little Peppers Midway and The Five Little Peppers Grown Up. I can’t wait to read them.

  And I have a secret! A terrible secret. While I was walking down College Street on my way home from the big library, I saw Sophie getting off the streetcar from downtown, so I ran up to meet her and walk home with her. She didn’t look very happy to see me. She kept looking over her shoulder at the streetcar. I guess she shouldn’t have done that, because it made me look at the streetcar, too, and you’ll never guess what I saw. There was a man with bright red hair and lots of freckles! He was leaning his head against the window and giving Sophie a wave as the streetcar pulled away!

  I’m not really, truly sure, but I think it was that man Steven from Wasaga Beach. I asked Sophie if it was and she said, no, I must be meshugge, of course not. But I bet it was him. I bet Sophie was on a date with him. Sophie on a date, that’s bad enough! But with a shaygetz! Oy. Should I tell Ma and Pa? Sophie didn’t tell about the cherries. I don’t know what to do.

  August 16

  I was thinking about that man on the streetcar all weekend, and I almost decided to tell Ma and Pa. But then yesterday a letter came for Pa and it was from the police! It said the man whose car we ran into last month filed a complaint and we’ll be getting a letter next month about going to court. Imagine, my own father, in court, like a criminal! Pa is always so good. He never did anything bad to anybody in his entire life. Life is so unfair.

  Pa was so upset, and Ma, too. She cried and cried, and he shouted a lot about how nobody respects him like they did in the old country and then he went out to the backyard and smoked about ten cigarettes in a row and wouldn’t talk to anybody.

  Anyway, after we got the letter I decided not to say anything about the man on the streetcar. Ma and Pa already have so much to worry about. It probably wasn’t Steven anyway. That man was probably waving at somebody else, not Sophie. Sophie is too smart to do something like that.

  Benny heard about Pa’s letter from his ma, who heard it from someone on her street who knew the mother of a friend of Gert’s who heard it from Gert, and he came over to tell me it showed he was right about the Nazis. He says he read in one of the Toronto Daily Stars he was selling last week that the Nazis have fourteen million followers in Germany and each and every one of them hates Jews. Their leader is a man called Hitler, and he might even become the chancellor soon. Benny says that’s like being the prime minister here in Canada. Hitler sounds like Hettler, which is the name of the people who have the little store near the corner on Nassau. But I guess this Hitler can’t be Jewish like they are, because Benny said Hitler is a terrible anti-semit and he bets the man in the limousine is one, too, and so are the police and so are all the judges right here in Toronto and everyone knows it.

  I told him he was wrong. I sure hope he is.

  August 21

  This morning, Ma let me climb up into the pear tree in the backyard and pick three — one for me, one for Molly and one for Hindl. I think they taste good even if they are a little bit sour. But I guess Molly doesn’t agree, because I took her and Hindl around the cor
ner to the park, and while I was busy pushing Hindl on the swing, Molly went off by herself across the park and gave her pear to a man who was lying on a bench under some old newspapers. It really surprised me — she’s usually so shy. When I noticed, I had to grab Hindl off the swing and rush over there and drag Molly away, and both girls ended up crying at the top of their voices and so did I. It was very embarrassing.

  On the way home I told Molly she should know better than to talk to strangers — especially ones as filthy and stinky as that man was. But Molly said she didn’t like the pear and anyway, the man looked like he needed it more than she did. That was really sweet of her, but I didn’t let her know I thought so. There are so many hoboes around nowadays, and she has to learn to be more careful.

  Although I have to admit that the man on the bench didn’t look very dangerous. He wasn’t really a man. He couldn’t be much older than Benny. And he was even skinnier than Benny and he looked very weak and sick and he was totally covered in soot. He must be one of those unemployed people Sophie told me about who sneak onto trains to go to a different town and try to find a job. Sophie says there are thousands of them now, riding the rails all over Canada, and nobody will give a job to strangers like them, so they just have to beg for handouts and then get back on the train and try again somewhere else, and they can’t go back home because the people there say they don’t belong there anymore either. Sophie says it serves them right, but it must be awful, being on your own like that. I guess I’m glad Molly gave that boy her pear, even if she shouldn’t have done it.

  The Five Little Peppers Midway is pretty good. I thought it would be about the Peppers going to the Exhibition and riding rides on the midway, but it isn’t, thank goodness. I don’t like the midway. It’s about the Peppers growing up and getting happier and richer.