The Magic Barrel
Bernard Malamud
Her face deeply moved him. Why, he could at first not say. It gave him the impression of youth—spring flowers, yet age—a sense of having been used to the bone, wasted; this came from the eyes, which were hauntingly familiar, yet absolutely strange. He had a vivid impression that he had met her before, but try as he might he could not place her although he could almost recall her name, as if he had read it in her own handwriting. No, this couldn’t be; he would have remembered her. It was not, he affirmed, that she had an extraordinary beauty—no, though her face was attractive enough; it was that something about her moved him. Feature for feature, even some of the ladies of the photographs could do better; but she leaped forth to his heart—had lived, or wanted to—more than just wanted, perhaps regretted how she had lived—had somehow deeply suffered: It could be seen in the depths of those reluctant eyes, and from the way the light enclosed and shone from her, and within her, opening realms of possibility: This was her own. Her he desired. His head ached and eyes narrowed with the intensity of his gazing, then as if an obscure fog had blown up in the mind, he experienced fear of her and was aware that he had received an impression, somehow, of evil. He shuddered, saying softly, it is thus with us all. Leo brewed some tea in a small pot and sat sipping it without sugar, to calm himself. But before he had finished drinking, again with excitement he examined the face and found it good: good for Leo Finkle. Only such a one could understand him and help him seek whatever he was seeking. She might, perhaps, love him. How she had happened to be among the discards in Salzman’s barrel he could never guess, but he knew he must urgently go find her.
Leo rushed downstairs, grabbed up the Bronx telephone book, and searched for Salzman’s home address. He was not listed, nor was his office. Neither was he in the Manhattan book. But Leo remembered having written down the address on a slip of paper after he had read Salzman’s advertisement in the “personals” column of the Forward. He ran up to his room and tore through his papers, without luck. It was exasperating. Just when he needed the matchmaker he was nowhere to be found. Fortunately Leo remembered to look in his wallet. There on a card he found his name written and a Bronx address. No phone number was listed, the reason—Leo now recalled—he had originally communicated with Salzman by letter. He got on his coat, put a hat on over his skullcap and hurried to the subway station. All the way to the far end of the Bronx he sat on the edge of his seat. He was more than once tempted to take out the picture and see if the girl’s face was as he remembered it, but he refrained, allowing the snapshot to remain in his inside coat pocket, content to have her so close. When the train pulled into the station he was waiting at the door and bolted out. He quickly located the street Salzman had advertised.
The building he sought was less than a block from the subway, but it was not an office building, nor even a loft, nor a store in which one could rent office space. It was a very old tenement house. Leo found Salzman’s name in pencil on a soiled tag under the bell and climbed three dark flights to his apartment. When he knocked, the door was opened by a thin, asthmatic, gray-haired woman, in felt slippers.
Yes?” she said, expecting nothing. She listened without listening. He could have sworn he had seen her, too, before but knew it was an illusion.
“Salzman—does he live here? Pinye Salzman,” he said, “the matchmaker?”
She stared at him a long minute. “Of course.”
He felt embarrassed. “Is he in?”
“No.” Her mouth, though left open, offered nothing more.
“The matter is urgent. Can you tell me where his office is?”
“In the air.” She pointed upward.
“You mean he has no office?” Leo asked.
“In his socks.”
He peered into the apartment. It was sunless and dingy, one large room divided by a half-open curtain, beyond which he could see a sagging metal bed. The near side of the room was crowded with rickety chairs, old bureaus, a three-legged table, racks of cooking utensils, and all the apparatus of a kitchen. But there was no sign of Salzman or his magic barrel, probably also a figment of the imagination. An odor of frying fish made Leo weak to the knees.
“Where is he?” he insisted. “I’ve got to see your husband.”
At length she answered, “So who knows where he is? Every time he thinks a new thought he runs to a different place. Go home, he will find you.”
“Tell him Leo Finkle.”
She gave no sign she had heard.
He walked downstairs, depressed.
But Salzman, breathless, stood waiting at his door.
Leo was astounded and overjoyed. “How did you get here before me?”
“I rushed.”
“Come inside.”
They entered. Leo fixed tea, and a sardine sandwich for Salzman. As they were drinking he reached behind him for the packet of pictures and handed them to the marriage broker.
Salzman put down his glass and said expectantly, “You found somebody you like?”
“Not among these.”
The marriage broker turned away.
“Here is the one I want.” Leo held forth the snapshot.
Salzman slipped on his glasses and took the picture into his trembling hand. He turned ghastly and let out a groan.
“What’s the matter?” cried Leo.
“Excuse me. Was an accident this picture. She isn’t for you.”
Salzman frantically shoved the manila packet into his portfolio. He thrust the snapshot into his pocket and fled down the stairs.
Leo, after momentary paralysis, gave chase and cornered the marriage broker in the vestibule. The landlady made hysterical outcries but neither of them listened.
“Give me back the picture, Salzman.”
“No.” The pain in his eyes was terrible.
“Tell me who she is then.”
“This I can’t tell you. Excuse me.”
He made to depart, but Leo, forgetting himself, seized the matchmaker by his tight coat and shook him frenziedly.
“Please,” sighed Salzman. “Please.”
Leo ashamedly let him go. “Tell me who she is,” he begged. “It’s very important for me to know.”
“She is not for you. She is a wild one—wild, without shame. This is not a bride for a rabbi.”
“What do you mean wild?”
“Like an animal. Like a dog. For her to be poor was a sin. This is why to me she is dead now.”
“In God’s name, what do you mean?”
“Her I can’t introduce to you,” Salzman cried.
“Why are you so excited?”
“Why, he asks,” Salzman said, bursting into tears. “This is my baby, my Stella, she should burn in hell.”
Leo was informed by letter that she would meet him on a certain corner, and she was there one spring night, waiting under a street lamp. He appeared, carrying a small bouquet of violets and rosebuds. Stella stood by the lamppost, smoking. She wore white with red shoes, which fitted his expectations, although in a troubled moment he had imagined the dress red, and only the shoes white. She waited uneasily and shyly. From afar he saw that her eyes—clearly her father’s—were filled with desperate innocence. He pictured, in her, his own redemption. Violins and lit candles revolved in the sky. Leo ran forward with flowers outthrust.
Around the corner, Salzman, leaning against a wall, chanted prayers for the dead.
Making Meanings
The Magic Barrel
1. What do you think caused Stella’s father to regard her as dead?
2. Finkle confesses to Lily “...I came to God not because I loved Him, but because I did not.” How would you explain this paradox, or seeming contradiction?
3. Why do you think Finkle pictures in Stella his own redemption? What does he want to be redeemed from?
4. Summarize what you think Finkle has learned about love and about himself by the end of the story. Has he changed in an important way?
5. What do you think of the scene with Finkle and Stella near the end of the story? Do you think Salzman arranged a marriage for Finkle after all?
6. Does Malamud end the story on a positive or a negative note? How would you explain the last sentence of the story: “Around the corner, Salzman, leaning against a wall, chanted prayers for the dead”?
7. Explain the story’s title.
8. What do you think will happen to Leo and Stella once they learn more about each other? Will they marry? Will they drift apart? Consult your Quickwrite notes for ideas.