INTRODUCTION

     This excerpt is from the whole novel SUSANNA, which is loosely based on the life of my great-grandmother Susanna Hada who came to America from Central Europe in the early 1900’s.  The book follows her rise to independence from being the dutiful daughter who enters into an abusive arranged marriage, does the unthinkable for the time, and leaves it with her children, and goes to America with her second husband, a love match. She survives his early death, saves her children once again and goes on to middle-class prosperity all by her own efforts. In Mid-life she meets and marries another man like her second husband who truly admires her moxie. An amazing woman for her time!

CHAPTER 1
 

     The lace flowed like snow drifts in soft curves over the tight crown of her auburn hair. Even two soakings  of starch failed to stiffen the flow as it cascaded down in ripples over her shoulders. No bride in her village had ever had such a fine veil.  She could see through the mesh a speckled world, the arm of her father’s rough woolen coat, the dappled wool of his prayer shawl, bits and pieces of the stand that held the holy books, and next her husband’s fine new suit stiff, black, and uncomfortable.

     Susanna could just see the side of his face and wondered what sort of man he would be. Like all proper women, she had let her family choose for her a man they thought suitable. She could see her sister Sibena’s envious glances as she fidgeted about. She was two years too young to marry, but had thought of nothing else since she was a child. Susanna had prepared with a sense of duty. She carefully embroidered her linens to place in her dowry chest. She spun hundreds of yards of wool and wove a fine blanket for her bed to be. The daughter of a poor scholar, she was not expected to have much to bring to a marriage. Most likely she would make a match with an older man whose first wife had died. A man who needed a mother for his children. But she would be expected to bring a show of her skills in housewifery just the same -- more to honor him than herself.  Her chest held far more than one would expect her to have as she worked hard to fill it. Her father chided her that it expressed an unsuitable amount of pride, but she persisted. She was not going a pauper to any man.

     She remembered the blanket was from wool she had bought by trading eggs to some farmer who had failed to sell it at market. It was so dirty and full of dung people had laughed at her, but she has seen past the burrs and tangles in the fleece and washed it clean. In free moments she had combed and combed the soft wool until it was as fine as any and spun a good yarn. She walked and walked among the hills of the village collecting roots of madder, and stems of broom, and had dyed it in fine reds and yellows. An old women had seen people teasing her for her thrift and poverty. She was too poor to buy a fine blanket. She was too poor to buy dyed yarns form the peddlers. The woman showed her another weed that when fermented would make a deep blue. She plucked the leaves and let them sit in a bucket in the summer heat until the color was free. Some of her blanket was the blue of the summer sky that had looked down upon her while she worked. A memory in wool, it sat deep the chest wrapped in lavender sachets to keep it from the moths. A years work it was her honor and pride.

     "Susanna’s blanket, " her mother spoke with stolid pride. She alone understood. The youngest daughter of a well off farmer, she had been given in marriage to the rabbi. "A way to buy favor with God, "she thought. "A sacrifice. The Pascal Lamb." Her husband was good man who meant well, but she understood that in the arrangement of marriage that it helped a woman to have some things of her own. It gave her some power. The food her family sent in from the country often helped smooth her path as a wife. Her husband could not complain when much of the food he ate came from her people. They had a comfortable relationship. He studied and prayed. She managed the house. He seldom questioned her.

     Susanna could hear her father’s voice in prayer. The visiting cantor sang in reply.  The mesh spangled world seemed to swirl and bend. Her breath was rapid and high. As still as the mountains, as rigid as iron,  her new husband stood next to her. She breathed a sigh.

     And then there was the veil.

     Years before a woman riding a fine coach had come through the village. A child, Susanna had never dared ask the adults why she had come, or why she left so soon, but had seen the most magnificent scarf on her head. It was made of yards of fine lace and twisted over her head, and was wrapped over and over again around her neck and shoulders.  It was as if every snow flake one had ever seen were all joined together with fine stitching, as if some magic spell had saved them from melting in the summer’s heat. Susanna was enchanted. She peered around her mother’s sturdy form and gasped with wonder.

     "Don’t stare," Her mother had shooed her away. Safe inside the tiny house, she had peered out the window still in fascinated awe. The lace covered lady stepped back into the carriage. With a whip crack it drove away the horses hooves kicking dust over the people outside. Like so many things that happen in childhood Susanna never understood why the lady stopped and then went on. Perhaps she had simply been lost.

     Her mother came in and dusted herself off. She shook out her head scarf and tied it securely back on her head.

      "How did the lady make the snow flakes not melt?" she asked.

     Her mother had not understood. She explained they were all over the lady’s head.

     "Oh, the veil," her mother laughed. "I thought you’d gotten a fever." She patted her head tenderly. "Its made of fine yarn called silk. Then its stitched together in a special way. Pretty isn’t it." She sighed.

     "Why don’t you have one Mother? Then I could wear it."

     Her Mother had explained it was far too expensive for a rabbi’s wife, or even a good farmer’s wife like Grandmother to have. Even rich women in the cities have little pieces of lace, it was so special.

     "I will have one just like it, "she stated firmly that day. Her mother laughed and even her gentle father chuckled. But the seed of the idea had been planted. Years later while walking with the water buckets to the village well, she saw a Gypsy woman twisting a  cotton thread around her finger and then stitching many tiny stitches. At first the woman had turned away muttering in her strange speech, but then she turned back and giving her an odd wise look, she let her watch as she made one circle around her tiny finger, and then stitched over and over on top of the thread. Then she made another loop on the next and did the same. After repeating this many times she had a tiny scrap of lace in her hand. She pressed it into Susanna’s hand muttering even more strange words. Susanna bowed in thanks. As she walked away she turned back. The woman watched her go, still standing by her wagon.

      She saved the scrap in her tiny box of special things, and waited until spring when the peddler came to the village. She bargained and begged and finally succeeded in getting one spool of silk thread. Clutching it to her bosom she hurried home.  In secret moments she worked, twisting the thread around her fingers and stitching over and over it. The new tiny scrap grew until it covered her palm. She hid it deep in the pillow and left to do her ever growing part of the household work. She didn’t see her sister watching and she passed through the door. Sibbena ran quickly inside to see what was hidden in the pillow. A candy perhaps? A hidden piece of jewelry? She dug furiously. A scrap of lace. "What could it mean?" she wondered. Perhaps Susanna had an admirer! She ran down the narrow steps to tell on her. Waving the scrap like a flag, she told her parents how she had found it hidden in the pillow.

     Susanna came in from milking the old cow with a half bad udder they had been given in charity.  She stopped and looked at the accusing faces. The bucket slopped milk over the edge onto the floor.

     "Who gave you this?" her father questioned sternly. Her mother starred at her in silent shame.

     "No one," She stammered.  "I made it." She lifted her chin in defiance. "I am making my veil for my wedding."

     Her father looked confused. "No man gave you this?" He seemed to deflate like a bladder loosing air. He sat down puzzled.

     She set down the bucket and walked forward. "I saw a Gypsy woman making lace one day and made some of my own. She gave me a piece so I could see." She turned to fetch the other scrap.

     "Be still!" Her father cried. "You made this yourself?"

     "Yes. I got a spool of silk thread and started to make my own."

     "Like the blanket Yussel," Her mother spoke at last.

     Susanna wilted. She felt like a leaf left to long in the sun of her father’s glare.

     "I just wanted something nice for my wedding."

      They were all silent for a what seemed a very long time. "I will have to study about this matter," he finally said. He got up and went to his books. The women just stared after him. Proper women did not read or write. They did not follow after a man to question his judgment. Her mother sent them up to bed.

     "Perhaps tomorrow you will know." Was all she said.

     As the girls settled down to sleep her sister turned to her.
"I thought you had an admirer."

     "I would never do such a thing." Susanna was horrified." I never even think such things." She turned away in disgust.

     "Some of the other women talk of such things." She whispered.  Snuggling down she fell fast asleep in the girls’ tiny bed. Susanna looked at the beams of the ceiling.

     Not the next day or the next did their father say anything. Her mother was silent about the matter. Days went on. After a great while her father called her to him. He gave her the scrap of lace. "Queen Ester wore a lace veil." That was all he said.

      "Thank you Father," she said. She bowed to him. He did not look up from his reading or even acknowledge she spoke. She stared for a while at his stiff broad shouldered back. He worked among the papers and books she found tantalizingly mysterious. He wrote in the secret symbols she didn’t understand.

      She left in silence.

      After that when she had a few spare moments she worked on her veil. Slowly it grew longer and wider from the center spreading like the petals of a flower.  As the daughter of a poor Rabbi with next to no dowry she could expect quite a wait. As the daughter of a man with no son, her parents could keep her home to work and never let her marry. From the tales the other women told, she was not sure what fate was worse.

     Then not quite a year from the day her veil was discovered,  her mother had a son. She was ten years old  and life changed greatly.

      But the veil grew longer and longer every year.

     So now as her father chanted the wedding prayer, she fingered the silk of the veil and wondered what great sacrifice her mother had made to help her. The night before the ceremony Mother had told her of the strange things men wanted to do to women’s bodies. She told her if she just lay quiet it would soon be over and she might have a child within her. It was wife’s duty after all. And children would give her someone in her life to love her. It made marriage bearable.

     "Why Mother would such a fine thing as children to love you start in such a bad way?"

     Her mother had caressed her hair. She looked seriously into her eyes.

     "Listen. If you feed the baby from the breast you won’t come into season until you stop, or your milk dries up. That way  you can space children. Children too close are what kills most woman. I’m glad I delayed until you were older. Your hips are wide enough now for children. " They both shuddered together . Too often they had buried a woman who had died bleeding in the child bed from too many children. Her Mother hugged her close.

    "Go to sleep."

     And now the cantor finished his song. The cup was broken. Trembling with sudden fear, she turned to look for the first time into the face of her husband.  He was an a widower whose wife and child had died together. Medium in height, he had the strong broad build of most of the farmers in the large valley. He had  brownish auburn hair and unusual blue eyes. He was actually quite handsome. She smiled up at him. He studied her carefully.

     "She’ll do," was all he said. But he seemed pleased. Disappointed at so small praise, she smiled anyway. Dutifully, she followed behind him to the table where her mother – once again with the help of her country family – had made fine feast. As she smiled at the people who had come to celebrate and get a fine meal, she felt a surge of great pride. She looked over at her sister whose eyes glittered with the jealousy she tried so hard to hide. She wanted so much to be a bride and have a fine veil. An odd shiver went through her once again.

     "Cold?" he asked.

      "No. Just excited." She responded not quite untruthfully.

     "I would hate to have another wife die of fever before I even got her home." he said. "My wife died of the chills. The child went with her." He spoke in such an offhand way of such sad things, she was even more disquieted.

     "I’m sorry," was all she could think to say. She nervously played with her food. Her husband ----"How should she address him?" --  was beaming with pleasure at the attention he received from the other men. One man who was very drunk made some comment about getting back on a horse as soon as possible. He made some other remark about riding horses. Father looked horrified, but many other men just laughed. Mother looked modestly at the ground as did the other married women.

     "Do you have a riding horse?" she asked innocently.

     "Not the sort you mean." Was all he said chuckling. He looked at her in a hard way she found unsettling. She turned away and busied herself with her food.

     The celebration was starting to wind down slowing like the wind up toys she has seen peddlers displaying. People yawned tiredly. The joking man made one more rude comment of the couple needing time to miss sleep. Her Father took charge once again and bid the guests goodbye. They retired to her childhood bedroom up the stairs. The family made do below sleeping on the benches, the cleared  table and crowding into her parent’s bed.

     He husband closed the door behind him.

     "How shall I address you? She asked seriously.

      "Anyway I wish," he said. He smelled of wine. He grabbed her by the shoulders and pushed her done on the bed.

     "My dress," she protested feebly.  She felt sick from the rich food. Her head was spinning. She looked at him like a startled deer. She sat up and unpinned her veil tossing it aside.

     " Women and their dresses." He yanked up the front of her skirt and pushed her on her back. She felt like she was smothering under all the cloth of her skirts. She a healthy girl, she started to squirm free seeking air. She gasped. He pushed her back again and yanked open her legs ripping the front of  her pantalets. Pinning her with one hand he pushed into her struggling form. She saw blackness from the pain.

     "Fight," he said, "Fight. Its better when you fight."

     With one hand she clawed at his face tearing his flesh even as he tore hers. He muffled her screams with his huge callused hand. And then everything went dark.

     When she awoke he was laying beside her deep in drunken sleep. Blood crusted the ripped pantalets and was smeared on her dress. She got up and went to the water pitcher and cleaned herself. She knew people needed to see blood on the sheets to believe in the woman’s purity. A huge red stain spread across the sheets. She hoped this was enough.

     She sat on the floor in shock and stared unseeing at the room she had spent her childhood.  Nothing had any meaning. Soon, she was in a stunned slumber.
 

Chapter 2

     She woke. It was still dark and the house was still. He husband was asleep sprawled over the whole bed.  He started awake. "Get up," he demanded. "Get dressed. Come girl."
 
     "My name is Susanna," she responded. She stayed away from his grasp.

     "Your name is what I choose to call you." He said curtly. "Get moving."

     "My family."

     "I’m your family." He pushed past her. "Get dressed or as your husband I will beat you."

      He seemed to tower over her. She saw the thick callused palm of his hand.  He gave her a brutal look she had seen only once when a cart came by with some man being sent to hang for terrible crimes and murders. Somehow her inner sense prompted her to be quiet and wait.  She got dressed. He stood and watched her never leaving her side. She had a terrible feeling he had done this before. She thought of his dead wife.

     "If I displease you so much, we can end the marriage." She felt a tiny moment of hope.

     "The marriage has been consummated. You belong to me now. Do you want to cry out?" He spoke with calm assurance. A strange mirthless smile creased his face. " No one can deny that." He pointed to the bloody sheet and her stained pantalets.

     She bowed her head in mock submission and finished buttoning her shoes. She remembered that a man was required to marry a woman he raped. And most important, that he could never divorce her, as she was considered "ruined." If she cried out now, she could never leave this man. Her mind whirled. She decided to be silent. Maybe he would tire of her and they could end this.

He picked up her small dowry trunk and  bag of clothing. "Beggars can’t be choosers." he said. And once more she had the odd feeling that he had said this before.

     She grabbed the few pieces of clothing and packed them in one small sack. Slowly she tucked her veil inside.  She thought for a fleeting moment about all the hope that had gone into its making . "I just need to get a few more things packed." She turned to block I his view.  She grabbed a few scraps of paper and tucked them inside her bag. She had a secret known only to one other person. Unlike most women and many men, she could read.

     Gathering the last of few things stoic she followed her husband down the narrow steps.

     The few guests stirred from the table. Her young brother woke in his tiny bed near the fire. Her mother always alert jumped from the covers.

     "You must go so soon? Its still dark."

     "We need to get back soon. My father is old and has no one else to help him with the work."

     " A thoughtful son." Her father smiled and looked over at her brother. At eight he was a pale faced sturdy boy destined to be a scholar like her father. Her mother busied herself handing her a sack of food for the journey.

     "Best wishes in your new home." she her smile faded as she saw Susanna’s face. She pulled her aside and whispered in her ear. "I told you not to struggle." she said.  ‘If you are quiet it is over sooner." Susanna’s face was hard. "Your father seldom bother’s me. Now he has a son he never does. Try to have a son as soon as possible." She let her go. Susanna turned quickly in disgust. This was the best help her mother could give her?

And then she saw her sister’s face swollen in jealousy. How she had wanted to be a bride! If only she knew. She started to walk toward her, but her mother stepped between them. "Good luck on your new life!"

     Susanna looked from her beaming father to her mother’s rigid form. She looked one last time at the crowded room. She saw the tiny fireplace with the  narrow beds on either side… the trestle table with the well scrubbed benches... and the narrow steps leading up to the tiny loft bedroom…. Herf fahter’s writing table piled high with the sacred books…  "How could they not have heard?" she thought to herself. She turned and walked out through the door.

     Her husband was waiting by the small cart. A small tired pony was tied to it. She put her small sacks into the back on top of the small dowry trunk. Now that she was away from her family her wounds began to ache with every step. She felt a trickle of blood.

    "We walk," her husband said. The sun had just begun to rise. Some of the neighbors were out in their yards feeding livestock or sweeping the steps. They waved happily at the young couple. Susanna’s sense of unreality grew with each step.  How could people not know? Was she so different? She looked around wildly about to flee. Her husband gabbed her by the wrist. "Here, you ride," he said picking some of the parcels out  of the cart and tossing them over his shoulder. A neighbor beamed approvingly. As if playing a part in a play, her new husband beamed back.

    "What a fine match she made," Susanna heard a neighbor say as they passed by. "He lets her ride while he walks." Susanna thought of how many women she had seen walking as their husband’s rode along, and wondered why she had never noticed before. How well he played the part of the doting husband she thought. No one would ever believe her if she cried out now.

As she rode along the bumpy trail she thought of how she had gotten her brother to teach her to read the mysterious books on her fathers table. When her brother was three, her father had started his education. While her mother and the girls swept, cooked, cleaned, fetched wood and water, and raised the cow and other small livestock her brother sat on her father’s knee and learned the letters of the Hebrew alphabet. He learned quickly. Susanna tried to stand near enough to listen, but her mother swatted her sharply. She got little Yussel to teach her his letters as he learned them by "helping him to practice." They would sit on the hill over looking the small town under a large twisted apple tree. While munching apples, they would recite the letters of the Hebrew alphabet over and over.