Raisins and almonds - Poisoned Pen Press (UK)

Kerry Greenwood
freshly wiped by one of the silent girls. ‘Here is Mr. Abrahams’
son and a distinguished lady visitor and my house looks like a
cattle market, and he tells me not to trouble myself! Oy, vey, men!’
She dusted the crockery as her daughter put down the tray.
‘Let’s all say hello, shall we?’ asked Simon a little uneasily.
‘Phryne, this is Fanny and this is Helen.’ The two girls shook
hands. They were dark, with curly hair tied up with red ribbons.
Helen, the younger, gave Phryne a mischievous smile which flashed
across her face for a second and lit it like a shooting star. ‘This is
David Kaplan, his brother Abe, and their cousin Solly, they are all
newly arrived here from Poland.’ The three young men, who had
squeezed into the kitchen, all bowed and squeezed out again as Mrs.
Grossman flapped her apron at them as though she was chasing
chickens. ‘Out, out, you’ve been introduced—what’s the matter,
never seen a beautiful lady before, eh?’ They returned reluctantly
to their newspapers, but Phryne could feel their attention.
‘This is Phillip Grossman,’ said Simon, and the young man
in shirtsleeves, who had looked round frantically for his coat and
not found it, offered Phryne the hand with the glass of tea in it,
blushed, and was only saved from destruction at the hands of
his mother—who would not have been happy if he had spilled
it on her hand-embroidered tea-cloth—by Helen, who took the
glass, patted his shoulder and abjured him in a whisper not to
be a schlimazl.
‘What’s the difference between a schlemiel and a schlimazl?’
asked Phryne, sitting down on a hard wooden kitchen chair and
noticing that of all the clean kitchens she had been in this was
undoubtedly the cleanest, and probably the poorest.
‘Ah, well, a schlemiel means well but he is clumsy and foolish
and things don’t work out the way he expects. A schlimazl is
just unlucky. If he made umbrellas it would stop raining. If he
winds a clock, it stops. If he inherited a coffin business people
would stop dying. To him it all happens badly,’ said Simon. ‘Eh,
Mrs. Grossman?’
‘Easier if you give the lady an example. Picture the scene,’
said Mrs. Grossman, spreading her arms. ‘A café. A customer. A