Matzohball

MATZOHBALL

by

Sol Weinstein

This novel originally appeared in abridged form in the December, 1965 issue of Playboy. This edition reprints the 1966 expanded novel, with new revisions made in 2011 by the author.

© Sol Weinstein 1965, 1966, 2011. All rights reserved.

Smashwords edition.

Published by Combustoica, a prose project of About Comics.

www.Combustoica.com

Rights inquiries? rights@AboutComics.com

Dedications

(This includes the half of the U.S. population not cited in the dedications to Loxfinger *)

* Pocket Books, Inc., 1965, $1.

CELIA LEVINE

In Memory

DON AND SANDY BARNETT

JUDGE PHILLIP FORMAN

SAM AND ANN RABINOWITZ & FAMILY

PAUL GRAY

the "International Humorist’

and

MARK RUSSELL

the Washington Wit

who are sorely needed as regulars on the TV talk shows

ISRAEL (COKE) RUBIN

MICKEY DANER

...had he not loved honor more,

he would have loved it less

RON & CAROL AXE DR. RALPH ROBBINS

... dream doctor, healer of the sick,

the Sandy Koufax of Miami Beach

SANDY KOUFAX

on general principles

DR. DAVID J. SILVERSTEIN

Of Lancaster, Pa., who has taught his Pennsylvania Dutch clientele to know vot good is

RON & JEAN FRIEDMAN

BELOVED UNCLE H. J. SHERMAN

Of Sherm’s Deli, Long Branch, N. J.

BELOVED TANTEH RIVA ROSENBERG

JACK AND DORIS SHERMAN, JACK AND MARY SHERMAN, JACK AND FRANCES ROSENBERG, JACK AND SOPHIE ROSENBERG, JOSH SHERMAN, SHULAMITH AND LEO RUTKOFF & FAMILY, MR. AND MRS. DICK AXE, GAIL COATES, JACK CURTIS OF THE LATIN CASINO, LOU AND RUTH DELIN, JOHN DELBRIDGE, DR. KEN HENRY, AARON LENOFF, STAN AND MINDY LEDERMAN, GIDEON AND ELISHEVA GLAZ, BOB LANE, JAY LAWRENCE, DICK MATHEWS, BOB NESOFF, DON PALMER, MIKE ROSENFELD, DR. JOHN E. TURNER, ALICE HELGESON

ABEL GREEN

to whom Variety is the spice of life (and the bread)

EARL WILSON

and his B.W., B.M.L., T.W.A., R.C.A., M.I.T., etc.

SGT. MICKEY BRANNON, JERRY GAGHAN, RED BENSON, LEON BROWN, FRANK BROOKHOUSER, SANDY OPPENHEIMER, EMIL SLABODA, BIFF HOFFMAN, HERB RAU, LARRY KING, PHYLLIS BATTELLE, JANET CHUSMIR, MIKE McGRADY, THOMAS W. LIPPMAN, YUDEL SUSSMAN, CHARLIE SCOTT, DON SCOTT, FLORENCE (CHOO-CHOO) BLOCK

SYLVIA AND LIPPY EISNER, SCOTT SHUKAT, JANET AND BETTY EISNER, BERNIE SOHN, HARVEY AND HARRIETT BLATT, ALLAN DELIN, BENNIE AND JENNIE LINDENBAUM, SANDRA AND ARNIE SIMON, MILTON LEVINE, BOBBY AND MONA COURTNEY, CAROLE AND ARNIE BERNSTEIN, DORA KAPLAN, EDDIE AND ALICE GREENBERG, RONNIE AND STEVIE GREENBERG, LOUIE AND YETTA CRAVITZ, ROSIE, RICHARD, AND ELYSE RUDOW, SAM AND CEIL CRAVITT, HANNAH AND LENNIE ROTNOFSKY, SAUL AND HELEN ROTNOFSKY, LENNIE AND RUTH MARKOFF, TANTEH EVA LINDENBAUM, SIDNEY AND CHARLOTTE LINDENBAUM, YOUIE AND CHARLOTTE CAPILUPI, MARVIN AND NORMA GATES, PHYLLIS FISHMAN, CY AND MALVINA VOGEL, MARVIN AND MARSHA ROSENBERG, BOB AND JANE AMOROS, FREDDIE AND JOSIE TRAUM, HERB AND RAE STEIN, MEYER AND BESSIE GRUSMARK, ISADORE AND JENNIE KRAKOWER, RABBI AND MRS. WILLIAM FIERVERKER, SID AND RUTH SHUCKER, LEO AND FLORENCE FEINMAN, GENE AND JOYCE KONDASH, MOLLY LEVINE, LENA LEVITSKY, SYLVIA WEINSTOCK, MARTY AND MIRIAM LAIBOW, WALT LAMOND, MARV AND ERICA LAZOFF, MORRIS AND ADRIANNE BERENBAUM, FRED AND NETTIE BERK, GEORGE COHEN, MAX YOUNG, RUTH GOVER, RON AND JUDITH EDELMAN, OWEN LASTER, DENNIS PAGET, ESTELLE RAE ADLER, DOC GREENE, MARK BELTAIRE, SHIRLEY EDER, ED FISHER, BOB GOLDMAN, NORMIE LAYTON, MAX ASNAS, BILL GAINES, AL FELDSTEIN, NICK MEGLIN, JERRY DE FUCCIO, JOHN PUTNAM, LENNIE BRENNER, the boys from MAD MAGAZINE.

MICKEY MANTLE

Who hits ‘em 500 feet

JOE E. LEWIS

Who hasn’t walked, that far in thirty years

And...

NANCY BROWN

Of Plainfield, N. J.

Remember, Mr. Bond, a house divided is a split level.

—M.

Chapter 1: The House of Good Taste

Plain or egg matzoh? asked the gash of a mouth under the thick, neatly trimmed Mandarin moustache.

There was no answer from the bearded patriarch three feet away whose soft brown eyes were riveted to the blue-black metal object in the right hand of the questioner.

Again, my dear, dear Rabbi, I shall put the question to you. Plain or egg? And remember... a single ill-advised motion on your part, and one squeeze of this—the Walther PPK Reuther automatic in the corded right hand dipped in a mocking bow—will transport you instantly to some far-distant Talmudic academy where your sainted predecessors, Rabbis Hillel and Akiba, are doubtlessly waiting to engage you in some wearisome polemic regarding a fine point of Mosaic law.

Again there was no response from the stoop-shouldered clergyman (possibly he was too engrossed in parsing the sentence), but the slightest of tics in the right eyelid did not escape the cold, proficient, Volga-blue ones of the gun wielder, Colonel Sergei Svetlova, owner of the professionally bored voice. Inwardly the stocky Russian seethed with exultation, an emotion betrayed by the pale pinkish tongue which licked at the wet woundlike gash of a mouth. For the colonel was on the verge of pulling off a stunning counterespionage thrust for the KGB, intelligence apparatus of the Soviet Union.

For shame, Rabbi, the colonel bantered. Surely you are a poor representative of Israel’s famed hospitality. A Soviet official interrupts his important routine to pay a courtesy call upon your nation’s esteemed housing exhibit and there is no solicitous hand to proffer a cup of tea, a mouth-watering Israeli sweetmeat. Ah well, no matter, the colonel sighed with resignation. The scion of a Don Cossack learns early in his life to be resourceful. I shall take my own repast, dear Rabbi. Now, what would you suggest? The roof? Possibly a shutter? Or the door, that portal to Jewish learning and understanding? Yes, the door.

Colonel Svetlova’s left hand touched the door lovingly, then dug the nail of the index finger into its silvery exterior and, with a quick deft slash, peeled away a gleaming six-inch whorl. The finger jabbed at the interior. There was a loud snap. With a gouging lunge, the entire left hand came away from the door with a jagged section of white-and-brown-flecked board; bore it to that gash of a mouth. There was a crunch as the teeth of Colonel Svetlova closed upon it; the voice emitted a grunt of satisfaction.

"Plain, I should say, from my limited knowledge of the Judaic tradition. Is it all plain or is there perhaps some egg matzoh in the other sections of this wondrously constructed, prefabricated ranchhouse of yours? Come, come, dear Rabbi. It is fruitless to delay or prevaricate further. The evidence in my hand and mouth should clearly indicate to you that Operation Matzohball is blown. Not only is it blown, but I have bagged, certainly, the world’s most famous ghost in the bargain!"

Chapter 2: Rotten Roger: The First Call

It had been a humdrum day for Colonel Svetlova (a pen name derived from his family’s inordinate fondness for perspiration) in his top-floor office in the dull brown three-story edifice on Ulitza Ouspenskaya, the building talked about only in furtive whispers by the average Russian in the street. With good reason: it is the headquarters of the dreaded KGB.

He had leafed through the overseas cables, sorting through the usual run-of-the-mill stuff filtering in from all over the globe. New York: We have sketchy reports of a new American missile, the IRTBM, which is designed to carry a 10-megaton payload to Moscow, after preliminary stops at 14th Street, Penn Station and Times Square. Jakarta: "The Chinese have bested us in an important psychological battle to ingratiate ourselves with Sukarno. Their gift subscription of Playboy arrived before ours." (That damned slow-witted Major E. B. Yevomat! He would have to pull the major out of his cushy Indonesian assignment. But there was still a chance to recoup. If prima ballerina Tamara Villbebetta would make a hasty trip to the dictator’s private quarters and let him paw de deux....)

Then the call had come... four sentences delivered in a matter-of-fact voice, suggesting that the caller thought as little of betraying his country as he would dispensing weather information.

Shocked, Colonel Svetlova had stood mute for a moment, then allowed an unthinking My God! to escape from his trembling gash. And a tactful, Who does not exist, of course, in the event his secretary, Sergeant Toma Treshkova, might note in her daily report that he had let slip a decadent religious expletive.

An old hand at KGB politics, Svetlova was positive Sergeant Treshkova had been planted in his office by his superior in the section, General Gregori Bolshyeeyit, who would stop at nothing, he knew, to discredit him.

Sergeant Treshkova, he said with ill-concealed annoyance. Let us hear the playback of that telephone call.

The sullen face said, Da, and Sergeant Treshkova, with some effort, extricated her lumpy body from her straight-backed chair and waddled across the room. Svetlova noted with amused disdain her oaken calves encased in the new patterned stockings favored by Western women, and recently introduced into Moscow society. They represented her lone desultory bid for femininity, he realized, but merely transformed those legs into two disgusting rolls of varicosed chickenwire. Her feral odor, that of a newborn sloth, made his nose twitch; he was further revolted by her toadlike expression, the generously pocked complexion, her damp weedy strings of lusterless blonde hair, the pendulous sacklike breasts reminding him of a wheat shipment from Canada, the warts on her nose, eyelids and gums.

As she pushed a doughy finger against the playback button on the huge tape recorder which occupied an entire wall, she whistled through her harelip a snatch of a tune she had been enamored with of late, a melody of American origin entitled I Feel Pretty.

There was the pht-pht-pht of scraping tape, then an almost inaudible beep, which brought a wry smile to the Svetlova gash. It meant, naturally, that his telephone was bugged, the listener quite obviously General Bolshyeeyit. Svetlova knew this to be so from his conversations with Corporal Anna Annatevkah, the general’s long-legged, dark-eyed secretary and Svetlova’s own plant. With Anna’s connivance he had managed to place a miniaturized camera in the flower bowl on Bolshyeeyit’s desk. In the colonel’s secret file were dozens of close-ups of azalea petals, whose value Svetlova could not as yet ascertain. But he threw nothing away.

He forgot all about his internecine warfare with the general when the voice on the tape broke in.

Colonel Svetlova, this is Rotten Roger Colfax with information of the most vital import concerning a plot, instigated against the Soviet Union by the State of Israel, known by the code name ‘Operation Matzohball.’ The model house assembled by Israel for display at the Moscow International Home Show in the Institute of Architecture is made entirely of matzoh—its exterior cloaked by a capitalistic substance known as Reynolds Wrap so that you will be led to believe it is aluminum siding. It is the plan of M 33 and 1/3 to dismantle the house at the conclusion of the show this evening and disseminate pieces of the matzoh to key leaders of Jewish communities throughout the Soviet Union, each particle stamped with the Hebrew words, ‘Take Heart; You Are Not Forgotten’; thus reviving the kinship between the Zionist nation and its brethren here and breeding further discontent with life under your rule. In addition, the man posing as the spiritual advisor of the Israeli delegation at the Home Show is no rabbi but, in fact—

Colonel Svetlova. A word, please.

The last words of the sentence were smothered by the deep bass of a lean hawk-faced man in the uniform of a general who had poked his head into Svetlova’s office: General Bolshyeeyit, commander of the Internal Affairs Section of the External Affairs Division of KGB.

"Da, Comrade General!" barked