Shimon: You want a job that brings in money even when nobody else is making any? That might one day make you a rich macher while your brothers are still smoking papyros in the cemetery?
(knocks at the door of Reb Goldberg. Reb Goldberg opens it before Shimon even finishes knocking.)
Goldberg: Nu? We're doin' a L'Chaim!
Shimon: Alright... L'chaim...
Goldberg: Here, dawh, take these glessen schnopps.
Shimon: What's the simcheh?
Goldberg: Hashem's justice.
Shimon: Hashem's justice?
Goldberg: God is just, and God is merciful. Amen. (swallows schnopps) Trink! Trink!
(Shimon and Yehuda drink)
Yehuda: Shouldn't we make a brocheh?
Goldberg: We'll do it over the next gless. Here, I got Vodka too. We're gonna get good und shikkered.
Shimon: Is this a happy getrunken or a sad?
Goldberg: It's the happiest day of my life in nineteen years!
Shimon: Well mazel tov then, what's the occasion?
Goldberg: Your future!
Shimon: Our future?
Goldberg: Well, your future, but if your brother here becomes as good an assistant as you, it'll be his future too cuz gleyb mir this is too much business for one guy.
(long pause)
Shimon: Reb Goldberg, I don't know what to...
Goldberg: Nu, Yehuda, you gonna wish Shimi a Mazel Tov yet?
Yehuda: Em... Mazel tov.
Goldberg: See those documents on the desk? Later when I'm good and shikkered and don't care that I'm doing this for a sixteen year old pisher, Shimmi and I are gonna sign this document making a partner out of the best assistant I ever had, and I've had a bunch, making him my heir who gets this business and this house.
Shimon: Reb Goldberg!
Goldberg; Nu? Who else am I gonna give this to? Thirty-five yar these beyner have been walking every day, back and forth, ahin und zuruck: Bransk, Wysokie, Bielsk, Chiechanowiec, Zambrow, Choroczsz, Bialystok... Last time I traveled much farther than Bialystok I was a year or two older than you. And kinder I don't got much time left. I'm gonna be here two more years to show you everything I know. (pours three shotglasses) Then I'm gonna retire and spend the rest of my time walking ahin and zuruck through Yerushalayim. Here, take a trinken Vodka. Boyruch atoh hashem elokeinu melech haoylom, boreh peri hagawfen. (them: Awmeyn) Boyruch atoh hashem elokeinu melech haoylom, shehecheyawnu v'kiyimawnu v'higiyawnu lawzman hawzeh! (them: Awmeyn!) Come on Yehuda! All the mashkeh down the hatch! Can I call you Yudaleh? You've done something important for me now, I feel like I can give you a more casual name.
Yehuda: If you're eventually giving me what you're giving Shimon you can call me any name you want.
(Goldberg laughs)
Goldberg: Well, let's see if you're as smart as Shimon. (already pouring more shots)
Yehuda: Well if Shimon is that smart then you should call me the Tsar!
Goldberg: Well, Tsar Yudaleh, let's make a l'chaim. For your future and Shimi's!
All of them: L'Chaim!
(they all drink)
Goldberg: (already pouring another for everybody) All these years I've had to take these trinks alone but this is like I've got zuns again.
Shimon: Well I don't know why I'm surprised, but all this time Reb Goldberg you've never talked about zuns or even that you once were married.
Goldberg: (pours more) Let's not talk about that until an ander few trinks.
Shimon: I'm not sure we can handle this much...
Goldberg: Yingeh yids like you need to build up your stomachs. Trinks like this are how you get things done in this business.
Yehuda: Oooohhhh!
Goldberg: Something I ge-said?
Yehuda: Well... Not really.
Goldberg: You wondered how anybody with a conscience can do this business. It's is a wicked business. It's necessary, but you don't see the things we see without it getting to you. But when you're a moneylender who collects, vodka and schnopps are your best friends. You gotta get money from people twice your size. You gotta get money from people who've lost everything. You gotta meet in sketchy taverns with ganawvim and merderers and have eyes in the back of your keppe so you don't get stabbed. You're gonna get punched every week. Emes. These teeth are made from dead prisoners and they're my fourth set. You're gonna get called names a lot worse than Zhid every day. You're gonna ask how a decent person does what we do on every walk you take. But you see how poor people are here? If we didn't do the job we do, people in Bransk would be twice as poor. (pours drinks) Yids come to me all the time, but I charge them 70% what I charge der goyim. So here, an ander trink, to the zuns of Bransk who will live on your help. L'chaim!
Shimon and Yehuda: L'Chaim!
Goldberg: Now there are four types of Jews. You see'em every day from kheyder. The wise Jews, the wicked Jews, the simple Jews, and the Jews who don't know how to ask shit. The wise Jews, they become the Rabbanim, they become kheyder teachers, they become sofers and dayans and khazzins and shammoses. They often have very hard lives, but they're the reason the rest of us live on. All the rest of us do everything we do so they can leyn for us. So here's one, (pours another three) to the khakhamim!
Shimon and Yehuda: (a little drunk) L'Chaim!
Goldberg: So then, zikher, there are the simple ones. The naarisher amoretzes who don't understand bupkes in kheyder. We need them too and they got a right to work like everybody else. They all work in schmattes and chayes. If they're lucky they become butchers, but they're usually tailors and peddlers... And they always pay back! (pours another three) So to the tawmim.
Shimon and Yehuda: (more drunk) L'Chaim!
Goldberg: And now, to the ones who dont' know how to ask. They were khaleryehs when you knew'em in school, and they stay khaleryes their whole lives.They're Jews who become homeless schnorrers and shlemazels and shnorrers and shikkers. They'll be asking you for money every day, and you should always keep a few coins in your pockets just for them. They're the ones who tell everybody about you, and the word of mouth from schmendriks like them gives you more business than all the goyisher machers in Bialystok. (pours another three) So to the eyno yodeah lishol.
Shimon and Yehuda: (still more drunk) L'Chaim!
Goldberg: And then there are the wicked Jews. Like you and me mein zuns. The kids who understood everything they were reading in Kheyder but didn't care and whose fingers have permanent scars from where the keyder teacher broke them.
Yehuda: Well the real rawsheh in our family is Ashe...
Shimon: Yudaleh!
Goldberg: (amused) Well then maybe he's the one I should be training, but Shimon pishes ice. He's rawsheh enough. You'll understand soon Yudaleh. The rawshehs of the world are the reason so many Jews die, and rawshehs like us are the reason Jews stay alive. And that reminds me... you're gonna meet all kinds of interesting shiksas on the roads, get to know them as well as you can and pay'em well for what they give you, not just cuz they're fun, but because they're the ones who are gonna tip you off about when you need to sneak out and where to hide.
Shimon: You never told me any of that.
Goldberg: That's cuz we never got shikkered before.
Shimon: You never asked me to.
Goldberg: You were always bagrisen to my liquor, but you always seemed too interested in the work.
Shimon: Well.... (seems a little nauseous)
Goldberg: (Walks to other side of room) You're gonna brekhn in a few minutes, make sure you throw up in this, (walks back with chamber pot). After today, save the liquor for when you hit the road. I'll bet you darfed it today.
Shimon: About that...
Goldberg: I waited this long to give you an assignment like this because there's no way a zextsn yar alt was ready for it, and wouldn't get through it without his brother with him.
Shimon: You've given me even more hearts-rending assignments than daws.
Goldberg: Not assignments that can turn as hitsik as that one...
Yehuda: That guy couldn't possibly turn violent.
Goldberg: The address was 240 Mieczkewiczka?
Shimon: Yeh.
Goldberg: Henrik Nowak?
Shimon: Zikher.
Goldberg: I haven't seen him violent in a long time, but I gave you that knife in the bag for a reason. You're obviously the closest thing I have to a zun and I don't want anything should happen.
Shimon: Did anything bad happen with your zuns?
Goldberg: They're in a much better place now.
Yehuda: Amerikeh?
Goldberg: Neyn.
Yehuda: Palestine?
Goldberg: They're all with Hashem now. It'll be twenty years at Pesach.
Shimon: Reb Goldberg, I didn't want to assume but es tut mir zeyer leid...
Goldberg: (interrupting) 1881 pogroms, like everybody else. And don't you tell me how sorry you are. We all lost people that year, I lost a few more, but this, here, is like I got zuns again.
Shimon: Well thank you so much Reb Goldberg, I hope we can live up your naches.
Goldberg: You will! (pours another) My generation had to get it from the goyim so that your generation wouldn't have to. Your time is gonna be different for Jews. No one's gonna make us eat drek anymore. Not the Bransker, not the Poles, not even the Russians. To your generation!
All: L'Chaim!
Shimon: Reb Goldberg do you do you really think our generation will be different?
Goldberg: Ikh veyst! I know it! Hashem can't let us suffer like that without giving us something better. It took a little while, but after Khmielnitsky and Shabbetai Zevi, Jews thought they were gonna get killed forever, but then everything calmed down for a while. Jews began to learn the Kaballeh and learn that all this, all these tzures, all these tearn, they're have a funt and a purpose. And more importantly, you have a purpose!
Yehuda: What's our funt?
Goldberg: Your funt is to make money!
Yehuda: I should have seen that coming...
Goldberg: Who do you think is gonna make everything in this town go? That Bransker shul doesn't remodel itself. Who do you think Rabbi Schkop always went to to keep it going? And which family do you think always gave the Rebbe credit with no money down?
Yehuda: Well... I'm guessing it was your father considering that the letters over the aron hakodesh say it's the Ephraim Goldberg Memorial Ark...
Goldberg: My father's name was Schlomo, Ephraim was my son.
Yehuda: Oy... I'm so sorry.
Goldberg: I told you not to apologize!
Yehuda: Oy. I'm sor... oy...
Goldberg: Miriam and I had twin sons: Ephraim and Menashe. They were both small like their father, but they looked nothing alike and they had exactly opposite personalities. Menashe was smart, but he didn't give a drek about kheyder or lernen and would always kamf back. Your father would beat the shit out of him and I'd just laugh cuz he did my job for me... But your father always told me that Ephraim was the most brilliant talmid he ever had. He always did what he was told, he always helped his Mameh, he always prayed, he always read. I loved Menashe, even if he was a vilde chayeh, but everybody loved Ephraim. When they were alive I always figured I'd be done by now and home with the eyniklakh while Menashe was doin all this. Meanwhile, Ephraim would be the Bransker rebbe and between the two of them Bransk could become a city as important as Bialystok. But that's not how Hashem works. (pours more drinks) Here, let's toast, to Menashe and Ephraim, the two best boys in the world!
Simon: L'Chaim
Yehuda: And Sh'koyach (they drink).
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