The Boston Girl(51)
He was a lawyer for the National Child Labor Committee and he’d been traveling around the country trying to pass the amendment against child labor. Aaron Metsky wasn’t there to convince Miss Chevalier’s friends about the need; those women supported everything they thought would help poor people, and keeping girls out of factories and sweatshops was one of their regular causes. He was there to report about how the campaign was going, but the news wasn’t good.
He had just gotten back from two weeks in the South, where states had been voting the amendment down one after another. They saw it as a plot by northerners to keep them poor and weak. He said, “They’re still fighting the Civil War down there.”
But even in the North, farmers, the Catholic Church, and even the anti-Prohibition people were all siding with the mill owners. They kept saying that the law was a communist plot to take children away from their parents.
Aaron shook his head. “When people find out where I come from, they say if Massachusetts voted this down, what makes you think it’s going to happen in Alabama or Mississippi? To tell you the truth, I don’t have a good answer for them.”
The social worker behind me jumped up and shook her finger at him. “I’ll give you your answer: Bert Forster, a fourteen-year-old boy who lost all the fingers on his right hand from working in the Connecticut tobacco fields. Or Selma Trudeau over at the Florence Crittenton Home, who had a baby at fifteen because some man promised to marry her and take her away from the Lawrence mills.”
The German doctor said that child labor could cause great harm later in life, too: deafness from loud machines, lung diseases from cotton dust, and nervous exhaustion that could lead to insanity and even suicide.
They were talking about my sisters. Betty was probably twelve when she came to America, Celia was maybe ten, and they went to work right off the boat. They got jobs wherever Papa went, which meant they worked in a candy factory and a shoe factory. When he became a presser, they learned how to use a sewing machine and worked in one sweatshop after another. Levine’s was better than most because there was a bathroom and he didn’t lock them in all day, but I remember how unbearable it was in the summer.
I wondered, did working as a little girl kill whatever strength Celia had been born with?
Betty was made out of stronger stuff, but she got away from factory work as soon as she could, and I knew she’d sooner cut off her arm than let any of her children work like she had. Betty and Levine wouldn’t even let Jake sell newspapers after school. “Let him play with a ball,” Betty said. “Let him be a little boy.”
It was different by the time I was born. Pretty much all the children in my neighborhood went to school at least until they were thirteen or fourteen, and a lot graduated from high school. Some of the bigger boys sold newspapers and I’m sure lots of little kids worked nights and weekends making paper flowers or sewing piecework at home, but it wasn’t as bad as factory work.
—
The discussion around me heated up. Miss Chevalier was standing up, pounding her fist on the palm of her hand. “The arguments against this law are outrageous. You hear things like ‘A mother could be arrested for asking her seventeen-year-old daughter to wash the dishes.’
“How in God’s name is protecting the young anything but just?”
Aaron didn’t seem to be listening; he was staring at Rita, who was sitting next to me. She poked me in the ribs and whispered, “My brother can’t keep his eyes off you.”
I looked again and realized that she was right; he was looking at me. When he saw that I was looking back, he smiled. Then I smiled. How could I not? He was smart. He had a nice way with words. He was Jewish. And he was good-looking.
Aaron seemed so perfect, I giggled. But then I remembered what rotten luck I had with men and went to get myself another cup of coffee.
After Aaron finished his speech, everyone rushed up to him with questions and advice. I waited for a while to see if he would come talk to me but I lost my nerve and left. I was halfway down the block and sorry I hadn’t been a little more patient—or brave—when I heard someone call my name.
Aaron was running with his suitcase in one hand, his coat in the other, and a dopey smile on his face. “It’s Addie, right? Rita didn’t get your last name. I’m Aaron Metsky, her brother.”
I said, “It’s Baum.”
“What is?”
“My name.”
“Baum?” he said.
I laughed, he laughed. Then he asked if he could take me to supper, but only if I was hungry, or maybe I was already busy. Or was someone waiting for me? A fiancé? Or did I think it was too early to eat? Did I know what time it was?
He was adorable. But he kept on talking and talking, so I put out my hand and said, “Nice to meet you.”
His hand was warm and he didn’t let go of mine. We stood there grinning at each other like we’d hit the jackpot. Finally, I said, “Where do you want to eat?”
He asked if I liked Chinese food.
I said I’d give it a try. Did you know there was a time before all Jews loved Chinese food?
It was quite a long walk to the restaurant, but it went by in a flash. I had never had a conversation like that with a man. Not that it was profound or personal; it was just easy. We went from one topic to another, we interrupted each other, and we laughed.
Aaron used to tell people he fell in love with me at first sight, which sounded ridiculous the first hundred times I heard him say it.