Page 105 - The Legacy of Abraham Rothstein - text

A marriage proposition
Also, by that time I was coming up to drafting age, and I had no
chance of getting out of army service except by having myself
crippled, a thing that many did to avoid service, especially at that
period just before the Russo-Japanese War. My sister’s husband had
been taken in the army, leaving her with two children, and now war
was in the offing. I never considered becoming entangled in
matrimony before I was called for the recruiting examination. The
conscription law was very liberal and had many exemptions—in
peacetime: an only son, a first-born son, and the brothers of a son
already in the army, all were exempt from service, if the army had
enough recruits after the physically disabled were eliminated.
Before we went into the restaurant, my father made an effort to
tell me what I could gain by the match. But he saw my angry mood,
and said it was up to me if I did not like it, but at least I should act
like a man and not be rude. I entered between my parents, just as I
would have gone with them to the altar in marriage. The other side
was already assembled at their table drinking coffee, with the
matchmaker dancing around them. We, the other party, sat at another
table. In those cafés they had the daily paper on the table on a
polished stick, so that one could hold it in one hand while drinking
his coffee. I was the first to grab this paper, just before my father
lunged for it. I kept it up as a wall between me and the other party.
When the matchmaker introduced the fat dairywoman and her
husband I just shook my head and sat down and read and read. I
hardly knew what was going on in front of me. They had to walk up
and look at me over the top of the paper. I presumed they did not
like my conduct; I did not act like a person with city manners.
We went home on foot; my father didn’t utter a word the whole
way. Very few words passed between us for months. But I had
fulfilled his command, and did not disgrace him. It was now left to
the matchmaker to get my consent and bring the two parties
together. The girl was glad for me to have been chosen for her; she
used to watch me going by with eager eyes and whisper to her chums
about me, but I would walk even faster, looking straight ahead of me
like a member of the intelligentsia absorbed in mental problems. The
fact was, I did not fancy the girl and, in general, was very shy and
could not think of how one could marry a strange woman. My

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