An Orphan's Tale Read Online Free

waters—and he tried to smile back at Larry. The walls were paneled in a golden-colored wood, and there was a double porcelain sink built into one wall, with glass-doored cabinets above and below it. A large pink water-stained mattress took up about a third of the floor space. There were wooden chairs, three stand-up lamps, the sofa he had seen in the courtyard, an oval Formica table, and cartons of paperback books and comics.
    As always, the others said nothing to Danny, and he said nothing to them. Larry sat at one end of the circle and talked about making plans. He announced that Danny had heard from Mr. Gitelman that the Home was definitely going to close and that all of them would be separated and shipped out to different institutions. He told Danny to tell them that what he said was true and Danny nodded, but he did not move toward the circle.
    While Larry talked about battle plans and defenses and assignments, Danny tried to see pictures of Charlie in his head, but instead he saw a supermarket in Charlie’s neighborhood, where he had stopped two days before, and he saw himself in one of the antitheft mirrors on the ceiling, watching an old Jewish man stuff cans of food into his coat pocket. Danny had looked away at once—had felt, somehow, as if he had done something wrong. When he was in supermarkets, he played a game he called “shopping for Jews”—he tried to guess which customers were Jews by how they looked and what they bought. Women and men who bought no meat were Jews. Those who turned cans around in their hands, looking for a Kosher, were Jews.…
    Two boys rolled around on the mattress, punching and cursing, and Larry yanked one of them by the hair. He glanced at Danny and talked about how the Jews had been outnumbered one hundred to one by the Arabs and had defeated them because they were smarter. He talked about recruiting the Puerto Ricans from the neighborhood to help them when the time came in exchange for letting the Puerto Ricans sneak into the clubhouse as a place to take their girl friends in the winter.
    â€œBut I thought we got this place ready so we could hold out here when the spies attack us!” Steve yelled.
    Larry slapped him on the side of the head.
    â€œBurn the jerk, Larry!” a boy yelled, offering a cigarette. “C’mon, let’s burn the jerk!”
    Then—Danny had not even seen them shift from their positions—Larry was punching and shouting and grabbing, trying to get the boys back under control. Three of them held Steve down on the mattress, threatening to burn his bared stomach with a lit cigarette. Two boys slouched around the room, their right arms swinging limply from their sides, mimicking Dr. Fogel. Two of the younger boys were on top of each other on the new couch, moaning and giggling, a calendar of a naked girl between them. Danny backed to the door and waited. “I didn’t want you to see them like this,” Larry said to him. “It always ends up this way.”
    He wrapped a beer-soaked handkerchief around Danny’s eyes and Danny squirmed slightly, but stopped the instant Larry put pressure on the back of his neck.
    When they were outside in the courtyard Larry spoke to him again. “You’re a real smart boy,” he said. “You tell me what you would do if you were me, okay? You think about that.”
    They walked across the courtyard, then up the stairs, and the stone steps were colder under Danny’s feet than the dirt had been outside. Marty stood guard at the hallway window outside the dormitory. “Nothing to report,” he said.
    â€œYou think about what I said and give me a good answer tomorrow,” Larry whispered to Danny.
    Danny went into the dormitory and got into his bed. There were pillows and rolled-up bundles of clothes under the blankets in the other beds, but it didn’t really matter, he knew. The night watchman, an elderly black man who worked full-time at