Rebbitzen Basha Blaustein shrugged. “Like he doesn’t have enough to do! So I can ask him to give a call to Halpern, that he shouldn’t dare throw Shaindele out.”

“That would be a big mitzvah. But what are we going to do about the Bobelger? Leah threatened their rebbe! Once the attack dogs are sent out, only the rebbe can call them back.”

“If you want to beat a dog, you find a stick!”

“Emes, Basha. But how?”

“What we need to figure out is why the Bobelger want to protect this Grub. I can’t believe no one else has ever complained. So why do they keep sending their young girls to him? They are so frum, so careful. Five minutes their girls talk to a boy, they’re already dragging them under the chuppah.”

“Did you ever think, Basha, that the Rebbe himself just doesn’t know?”

“What?”

“Think about it. The Bobelger Rebbe is almost ninety years old. No one sees him, talks to him, except his nephew and a few of the big machers with the money who support him and Bobelger institutions. Even when the Rebbe sends out new rulings, people never see him, only the nephew and the machers. Maybe one of them has some connection with Grub.”

“I think I once heard one of the machers’ sons is married to one of Grub’s daughters. Or maybe it’s the nephew’s daughter, or his sister? Anyway, he’s a relative.”

“Oy, you could be right, Basha!”

“So who knows what’s really going on there, who’s really in charge? And even if people could get through to the old rebbe, get around the nephew and the machers, who’s going to tell the Bobelger Rebbe the truth? They’d be terrified to be called yentas, talebearers, liars, accused of loshon hara and rechilus. They’d have to risk being thrown out of the Hasidus.”

“What we need is a very choshuva rav that everyone respects, that even the nephew and the machers wouldn’t dare to turn away. Only such a person could go to the Bobelger Rebbe himself and tell him the truth about Grub. That would be the end of this. A word from the Rebbe, and Grub would be out, and my family’s good name would be saved.”

“But who is important enough and well-respected enough to walk in to see the Bobelger Rebbe from today to tomorrow?” Basha scoffed. “And who would want to get in the middle of such a tzimmes?”

“Who?” Fruma Esther’s mind was blank. But then, like a gift from heaven, a brilliant flash of clarity lit up her brain, sending her the obvious solution and the answer to her prayers.

31

MORE THAN A FRIEND

The first call came in as soon as she’d arrived home after dropping off the kids.