The fact is, I often feel very depressed, the tears fall from my eyes on the tobacco leaves that I am cutting, and I don't sleep well at night. Sometimes there is a noise in my ears, and my head aches whole days together—and there is no better remedy for all this than to take paper, pen, and ink, and write a letter to my dear Hannah.
My precious wife, I cannot keep anything from you. I have to tell you everything: I am still reading the Mishnah—I have got no Talmud yet. And do you know why? Because I have had to make another outlay.
You know that it is everywhere the same world. Although here they cry without stopping, "Liberty! liberty!" it isn't worth an onion. Here, too, they dislike Jews. They are, if possible, more contemptuous of their appearance. There are no dogs that bark at them in the street and tear their skirts, but there are plenty of hooligans here also. As soon as they catch sight of a "capote"[127]there is a cry: "Jew, Jew!" which is the same asZhidd[128]with us. And they throw stones and mud—there is no lack of mud here, either. So what could I do? I did what all the Jews do here—I tucked away my ear-locks behind my ears, and I bought (to be paid for by degrees—a custom they have) "German" clothes. There was an end to the money. And you, too, Hannah'li, when you come, will have to dress differently, for a custom stultifies a law—and it is their custom.
And as to your writing that you don't like Genendil, I cannot see why. What ails you at her? It is not for me to set other people right. Besides, I am sure she only does it all for Parnosseh. She is as modest by natureas any other Jewish daughter. All day long, while Leeb the reader and I are at the factory, she cooks and washes and sweeps out the rooms. It is only in the evening that she goes with her father totheirplaces of amusement, where she sings and plays and dances before the public. I sit by myself at home, read Torah, and write to you. Towards midnight they come home, we drink tea together, and we go to bed.
And as to your saying, you think Genendil stole the spoon which was afterwards missing—that is nonsense!
Genendil may not be very pious as regards the faith, but she would never think of touching other people's property. For goodness' sake, don't ever let her hear of it. She treats me like her own child, and is always asking me if I don't need a clean shirt or a glass of tea.
She is really and truly a good girl. She gives all her earnings to her father, and treats him in a way he doesn't deserve, although at times he comes home very cheerful and talks nineteen to the dozen.
And Leeb the reader has told me that he is collecting a dowry for her, and that, as soon as he has the first thousand dollars, he will find her a bridegroom and marry her according to the law of Moses and of Israel, and she will not have to strain her throat for the public any more. I don't know if he really means it—but I hope so. God grant he may succeed and rid her of the ugly Parnosseh.
Genendil was there when he said this and blushed for shame, as a Jewish girl should do; so she is evidently agreed.
I implore you, dearest Hannah, to put away calumny and evil-speaking. That is not right, it only does forgossips in a small town. And you, Hannah dear, must come to America. Here the women are different—less flighty, more serious, and as occupied as the men.
To return to the subject, your Shmùel Mösheh is no tailor or shoemaker, to throw over his wife for another woman. You mustn't imagine such a thing! It is an insult! You know that your words pierce my heart like knives, and if Leeb the reader and his daughter knew of it, they would forsake me, and I should be left alone in a desert! It would be a calamity, for I don't know the language, only a few words, and I should be quite helpless.
And now I beg of you, my dear Hannah, I beg very much, take the child's hand and guide it across the paper, so that it may write me something—let me see at least a mark or two it has made! Lord of the world, how often I get away into a corner and have a good cry! And why? Because I was not found worthy to teach my child the Law! And as if I were not suffering enough, there come your letters and strew salt on my wounds. Look here, to-day Leeb the reader asked me, and Genendil, too (here she is called Sophie), nodded her head, to go with them and hear her sing and see her dance, and I wouldn't. Leeb the reader said, "Foolish Chossid!"Sheturned up her nose. But I don't care! I shall go my own ways and not a hair's breadth will I turn aside!
Keep well, you and our child. Such is the wish of your husband
SHMÙELMÖSHEH.
Please don't let on about the clothes! Not a soul in our town must know of it, or I would be ashamed to lift my eyes.
S. M.
——
To my worthy wife Mistress Hannah:
I have written ten letters without mentioning Genendil's name. I have not even mentioned her father, Leeb the reader. After a great deal of trouble, I have gone into another lodging, at a Shochet's, and haven't seen her for weeks, and yet you go on writing nothing but Genendil and Genendil, and Sophie and Sophie! And what is it you want of her? What? May I be well, and may you be well, and may it be granted us to meet again in peace, with the child, as surely as I saw Sophie come into the factory to see her father—and the director himself went up to her and began to talk to her and to pay her compliments; and although I did not understand what he said, I know he meant no good by it. And he wanted to stroke her cheek. Well, what do you think? She gave him such a slap across the hand that I was dumbfounded! And you should have seen the way she turned away from him and went out! I was just delighted.
So you see that, in spite of everything, Genendil is a good girl, and that you are unjust to her. You tell me I shall be caught like a fish in a net and such-like rubbish. I swear to you, as it were by the Torah on the Day of Atonement, that it is a lie; that for your sake I have gone away from her and avoid her as far as possible. If we do meet, I answer a hundred words with a nod. Once more: Upon my faith, you are unjust to her! Heaven forbid, you sin before God! But that is nothing, I would have passed it over as usual, only it has ledto something so dreadful, that, God help us! I would rather the earth had swallowed me up than that I had lived to endure the shame.
Last week I was taken poorly while at work; I grew giddy and fainted. When I came to myself, I was in bed in my own room. Beside the bed stood a doctor. He said it was a fever. I was laid up for ten days. And Leeb the reader never left me the whole time, and nursed me as if I had been his own child. Afterward, when I had recovered full consciousness, I learnt that while I lay in the fever, Sophie used to come in, too, and visit me—and it was just then there came one of your post-cards in which you pour out upon her the bitterness of your heart—they most certainly read it, because I was lying in a fever.
And while you were writing your ugly words and calumnies, they, so to say, were risking their lives for me—they sent for doctors, made up my bed and re-made it, gave me medicine, and even pawned a few of their treasures, so that help should be there. They even brought me a bottle of wine. I never touched a drop, upon my word! but they meant it well. Besides that they measured the height of the fever three times a day with a little glass tube—the doctors here order it to be done. And who told me all this? The butcher and his wife. Had it not been for Leeb the reader and Sophie, you would be a widow. And at the very same time, you write such foolish things.Phê, it is a shame! I really don't know how you are to come to America, how you are to live in America! I hope, dear Hannah'li, that you will throw off this foolishness, and not darken my life with any more such letters.
I often don't sleep at night. I imagine I see you plainly sitting at the table writing to me. You write and scratch out, and write and scratch out, and I see the letter, but I cannot read the words at the distance, and it grieves me very much that I cannot read the letter so far off. And you take the pen and put it into the child's hand—the child is in your lap—and guide its fingers!
And you see, my dear wife, that I send you five dollars every week, that I manage with very little. And I have only three shirts altogether. I cannot ask Sophie to buy me any, and the Shochet's wife has given birth to a baby, and is not yet about again. The circumcision, please God, will be to-morrow. Yes—but that is not to the point. What I mean is, be reasonable, for your own sake, and for the sake of me, your husband
SHMÙELMÖSHEH.
A postscript, written sideways down the whole length of the letter:
I have this minute received another letter from you. And now, my Hannah'li, I tell you once and for all, it is enough to make one's hair stand on end, and hardly to be believed! You write that you may as well let your hair grow and talk with gentlemen, that you also can dance and sing—and that you will go to the Rebbe's and get him to send a "special death" to both of us.
What do you mean? What words are these?
Lord of the world, what has come to you?
I think and think, till I don't knowwhatto think! This is my advice: Put away your evil-speaking and calumniesand curses! They are not for such as you! And I tell you simply this, that if you do not soon write the letter a good Jewess ought to write, I shall send and fetch the child away without you—do you hear? Otherwise—I shall throw myself into the sea. It is enough, heaven forbid, to drive one mad!
Your husbandS. M.
Two letters which Hannah received from her relative in Lublin, and one from her brother.
To my friend, the excellent lady and esteemed and worthy woman, Mistress Hannah:
Dear Hannah, you were a whole fool and half a prophet, when you wrote me a second letter. Because the first one fell into the hands of my husband, and he put it into his pocket and forgot to give it me. Such is his little way—he cares for nothing except eating and drinking. But when I got the second letter, it occurred to me to look in his pocket, and whoso seeks, finds.
Hannah'li Krön, I felt, reading your bitter words, as if I were being struck on the head with an axe. I was stunned with grief. But I soon composed myself and thought, for instance: If my scatterbrain of a husband ran away to America—well? I should just let him run, and pay the piper into the bargain!
Now think: my whole Parnosseh, as you know, istar,[129]and I don't requirehisassistance! Indeed, I can't stand his coming into the shop, with the airs he gives himself!
If the customer is a woman, he won't answer her, the Chossid! Won't take the money from her hand, and if it's a man, likely as not he asks too little! If he takes the money, they palm off false coins on him. And if he is so kind, once in a while, as to take up a piece of chalk, and make out a bill for me, it is a bill! May they add up my sins, in the other world, as he adds up my wares!
And as to your husband not having left you a divorce, I am not so very surprised; my husband has no such easy time of it, and yet he doesn't divorce me, and why should he? Does he want for anything? He has a nice lodging, and when he comes home, supper is ready and the bed made at the proper time, and every Sabbath he gets a clean white shirt! Many's the time I've begged and prayed of him to go to all devils—not he! Do you think he'd budge an inch? And when I scold him and throw things at his head, he gets into a corner, makes a pitiful face, brings crocodile tears into his eyes, and I am so foolish as to relent, I give him food and drink, and off he goes.
And as to what you say about your lawsuit, you know, sister Hannah, I have quite a celebrated lawyer, because, for my sins, I have a never-ending case against cooks, the hussies! I assure you, Hannah'li, servants such as we have in Lublin are not to be found anywhere! How shall I describe them? Always swilling and stuffing—and they steal anything they can lay hands on, and run away before the quarter is out; and then they lodge a complaint against me, because I haven't paid them a quarter's wages, and in court, nowadays, they don't make a particle of difference between a servant-girl and a mistress, and I have to stand with her side by side! I mayn't open my mouth to say a word, otherwise the judge rings a bell and imposes a fine up to three rubles. So I never go into court alone, but have engaged an excellent lawyer, whose mouth drops sulphur and pitch, and he sees me through.
He once told me himself that the judge had frequently wished to imprison me on some ridiculous pretext, such as tearing a girl's hair or giving her a slap! But he cannot do it, because my advocate has all the law-books in his head, knows all the laws, every single one, chooses out the best for me, and flings them in the judge's face, so that he sits there like a dummy and, willy-nilly, has to write "Acquitted!"
And no sooner had I read your letter, and found the first one in my husband's pocket, than I hastened to my lawyer, and he received me most politely, and asked me to be seated on the plush sofa.
I told him your whole story from Aleph to Taw, down to every detail; and he listened attentively to it all, although the anteroom was crowded with people waiting. He listened and walked up and down the room.
Then he sighed and said that according to the laws a daughter had equal rights with a son and should inherit a share! So far, good! But there is the following hitch: A wife cannot summons anyone without herhusband's knowledge, because she is under his jurisdiction, and must be given power of attorney by him.
And when I told him that you, unhappily, were a grass-widow, that your husband had deserted you, and that, in my opinion, you were free to do as you pleased, he planted himself in front of me and shook his head—that meant: By no means!
And he went to a book-case, took out one book after the other, looked in, put it down, looked in and put it down, and so on with any number of books, little and big and bigger. One, heaven forgive me, was as fat as a pig. And in this one he apparently found what he was in search of, for he stood over it a long time.
And then he told me, that if, after five years from the date of your desertion, you bring him a paper from the justice of your town to certify that your husband has not once shown himself in those five years, he, the lawyer, will put in a plea for you in court, and the court will give you permission to summons your brother.
This is what he said—I give it you word for word.
I offered him a ruble, and he made a wry face—evidently, not enough; but he took it. Send me the ruble, Hannah'li Krön, as soon as you can, for trade is slack, and tar is a drug in the market.
To return to the matter in hand:
It is what I always said and I say it again: the holy Torah (andtheirlaw, lehavdîl, of course, also) has handed us over to the mercy of bandits! A man, a dummy, a bolster, can divorce his wife when he likes, either in person or by proxy; and a worthy woman, like myself, for instance, cannot get rid of an idler like mine for love or money!
If we go together to a family gathering, he is stuffed with fish and meat and all good things, and I—get a cup of chicory and milk!
When he sits in the booth at Tabernacles, one has to send him the best of everything, and I live on bones!
I share the three weeks, nine days, and all the fasts, but the Rejoicing of the Law ishis!
He goes to a Rebbe, and they give him honey with apples! And what will Paradise, when it comes to that, mean forme? I shall be the idiot's footstool! He will sit in a grandfather's chair, and I shall be his footstool!
In this world he is a feeble creature and is afraid of me, but how it will be in the other world, don't ask me! I tell you plainly, if he gives me the least shove with his foot, the Almighty alone knows what will happen!
To return: What would you get by a divorce? Believe me, all dogs have the same face! Not one of them is worth a dreier! You know my sister Miriam suffered through her husband ten years before she could obtain a divorce, and then she had to leave him her money and her clothes—in a word, all she had! A nice thing, wasn't it?
She married again and was out of the frying-pan into the fire: another idler to feed! She wanted a second divorce, he was satisfied, but she couldn't afford to pay for it!
In short, dear Hannah, our mother Eve sinned and we suffer for it! And we always shall suffer! For there is no escape from a husband, even in the grave.
We have been sold to be servants and slaves in the other world, too! So it was aforetime, so it is now, and so it will be in the future world! One has to suffer! For what is to be done, if the Almighty wills it so?
Therefore, dear Hannah, have faith in God, blessed is He! Keep well and forget your husband, who has probably forgotten you. That is always the way when they go to America.
At first they write honeyed letters and send money; then, less and less; then they write and send money once a year—then, once in seven years—they don't need their wives out there, they have other women, better, livelier!
May I be forgiven for saying so, but in Lublin, in the Jewish quarter, there isn't a house without a grass-widow! Wash your hands of him, I tell you, and forget! Imagine yourself a real widow or a divorced woman! Turn your attention to the onions. May His blessed Name send you success in business and preserve you whichever way you turn. Such is the wish of your relative.
(The signature is undecipherable.)
I beg of you to send me the ruble as soon as possible, because my husband, gorger and tippler that he is, is angry with me for having given it.
(The same undecipherable signature.)
——
To my sister Hannah:
First, my dear sister, I let you know that we are all well, except my wife, Eva Gütel, who (not of you be itsaid!) is never free from cough for an instant, and who, no sooner is the wedding over, must go to Warsaw to consult a doctor.
I send you enclosed an invitation to the wedding. Mind you come and enjoy yourself! Only do not, for mercy's sake, spoil my daughter's happiness, and keep all contentions till the wedding is over.
You need not feel called upon to bring any present. If, however, you are troubled about appearances, you are sure to find something in the house that will do. I shall not take it amiss. Blood is thicker than water and a sister is a sister.
And as to what you say about having no clothes to come in, that is nonsense. You can borrow a dress of some one or other either there or here.
And as to what you say about not being able to comfort yourself for the child that has died—you know, dear sister, "He gave and He hath taken away!"
Children are a pledge from God, and if God wishes to take back the deposit, we must not even brood over it and try to think why. God forbid!
And as to your being afraid of your husband finding out that the child is dead and breaking with you altogether, that is another useless anticipation. Believe me, sister, it is quite foolish, because if it is true, as people say, that Shmùel Mösheh is Shmùel Mösheh no longer—he is treading other paths—it will be all the same, child or no child. He doesn't want you and you cannot hold to him!
And if, as I trust, that is all an invention, a calumny, and if, as I firmly believe, Shmùel Mösheh is still ShmùelMösheh, the learned and pious Jew, then you have nothing to fear! On the contrary, with half the expense it will be much easier to have you out to join him, and you will live in peace and plenty.
And as to your having had no news of him for so long, is it a wonder? I believe it is across the sea! How many ships, preserve us, are wrecked on the way; how many postmen lose their lives on such an errand! And perhaps the ships have to pass the spot where, as the Book of the Covenant says, the waters stand on an heap, and there is peril of death. Thank His dear Name that your Shmùel Mösheh crossed in safety! I consider this fleeing to lands beyond the sea a disgrace and a shame, it is a sign of want of trust, because he who trusts knows that God helps whom He will, and he shrinks from endangering both body and soul. For they say that America is as dangerous to the soul as the sea to the body. They say, people throw off their Jewishness on board ship as soon as the sea gives them a toss. They soon begin to eat bread baked by Gentiles, forbidden food, to dress German fashion, women wear wigs, even, it has been said, their own hair. And the proof that America is dangerous to the soul is that there is not one "good Jew" in all America! And I cannot imagine how one would exist there, where one could get advice in questions of Parnosseh, or if one were ill, or anything else happened to one. I tell you that the man who goes into Satan's domain of his own accord is responsible for his soul, for he is like a foolish bird flying into a net. And particularly a learned Jew, because the greater the man, the greater the danger, the more is the Evil One set onhis destruction, and decoys him with either riches or beautiful women; the Evil One has tools for the work at hand.
And, therefore, my advice to you is, so long as you do not know what is happening there, forget! If you earn your livelihood with the onions, well and good, and if, heaven forbid, you cannot, I can give you other advice. If you come to the wedding, I will make it all right between you and my wife. We are, after all, one family, and you know that my wife, Eva Gütel, is really very good-natured; she is sure to forgive you, and when all is smooth again and she goes to Warsaw, after the wedding, then you will remain here and be house-mistress. And when, please God, she comes back cured, she will still find a place for you at the table and a bed in the house. Times are bad, but a sister is a sister, and one cuts the herring into thinner slices.
But beside all that we have a mighty God—shall He not be able to feed one of His creatures?—and that a woman!
Nonsense!
And, for goodness' sake, come to the wedding in time, so that you may be able to lend Eva Gütel a hand. It is no more than one has a right to ask a sister-in-law. You would not wish, as things are nowadays, to have us hire extra help? Only, be sure and let everything I have said to you about the future remain between ourselves. Eva Gütel is not to know what I have written to you. The thing ought to come of itself, quite of itself. You know, Eva Gütel does not like one to interfere in domestic concerns—and I am sure, the thingwillarrangeitself. A woman is a woman even if she wears a top-hat.
That is why I write to you when Eva Gütel is not at home. She has gone to engage the Badchan[130]and the musician; I shall not even tell her I sent you an invitation: let her imagine you were so good and so right-thinking as to come of your own accord! And may He whose Name is blessed comfort you together with all that mourn in Israel, and spread the wings of His compassion over all abandoned women. Amen, may it seem good in His sight.
Sister Hannah, whether you stay where you are or remain with us for good, come to the wedding! You simplymust! And you shall not repent it! It will be a fine wedding! It may be that he himself, may his days and years increase, will be present. It will cost me a fortune, but it is worth it! You see that such a wedding is not to be missed?
From me, your brotherMENACHEMMENDIL.
My wife Eva Gütel has just come in from market and—a token that heaven wills it so—she tells me that I am not to hide my letter from her, that she bears you no grudge. She advises you to sell the onions, buy a dress, and come to the wedding looking like other people, as befits the bride's aunt.
She also says that no present is necessary, and that one can trade in onions here, too.
I repeat that my wife Eva Gütel is both kind-hearted and wise, and that, if you will only not be obstinate, everything will come right.
You will see!
Your brotherM. M.
An unfinished letter from Hannah to her husband.
Good luck to you, my dear, faithful husband, good luck to you!
Here's good news from us, and may I ever hear the like from you. Amen, may it be His will! We are, indeed, as you say, united for all time, in this world and the other!
I let you know, first, dear husband, that my brother Menachem Mendil and his wife Eva Gütel (may they live to see the days of the Messiah!) forgave me everything, and sent for me in a lucky hour to their daughter's wedding—Beile-Sasha's wedding.
It was a very fine one, fine as fine can be! Praise God that I was found worthy to see it! There was every kind of meat, birds and beef; and fish—just fish, and stuffed fish—and all sorts of other dishes, beside wine and brandy—something of everything.
And the whole thing was such a success—so elegant! And I myself cooked the meat, stuffed the fish, made the stew, sent up the dinner, and also saw to the marketing beforehand.
I was house-mistress! I was waitress! I did not go merely to enjoy myself!
I sold my stock of onions, made myself a dress of sorts, and went to my relations, agreeably to their wish, a whole week before the wedding; because there was no one to do the work; the bride was taken up with her clothes, she spent the time with the tailor, the shoemaker, and even the jeweller up to the very last minute.
And poor Eva Gütel, my sister-in-law, has a cough. And they say her liver is not what it should be.
So I was everybody—beforethe wedding andafterthe wedding, only not at the wedding, during which I felt very tired and done up. I sat in a corner and cried for joy, because I had been counted worthy to marry my brother's child, and—because she had such an elegant wedding! And I was not turned out in a hurry when it was over, either.
Directly after it, my sister-in-law, health and strength to her, started to consult a doctor in Lublin as to which doctor she ought to see in Warsaw.
Then she left for Warsaw and went the round of all the celebrated doctors. Thence she travelled to some other place to drink the waters—mineral waters they are called—and during the whole six months of her absence, I was mistress of the house.
May the Almighty remember it to them for good and reward them!
There was no cook—I did the cooking. And I drank delight out of it as from a well!
In the first place, I had no time for thinking and brooding, and was thereby saved from going mad, or even melancholy! And where, indeed, should I have found it?
Business, thank heaven, was brisk. The public-house is always full and the counter strewn with the gold and silver of Jews and Gentiles, lehavdîl.
And my sister-in-law Eva Gütel's stuffed fish are celebrated for miles round, and there the people sit and eat and drink.
And if ever Ibeganto think, andwantedto think, Beile-Sasha, long life to her, soon reminded me of where I was! And she has sharp eyes, bless her, nothing escapes them!
And so it went merrily on—and I was so overjoyed at being house-mistress there that once I spat blood—but only once.
Menachem Mendil saw it, and he told me to be sure and behave as if nothing had happened, because, if people knew of it, they would avoid his house. Yössil the inn-keeper over the way would soon cry: Consumption! and there would be an end of it, and grass growing down our side of the street.
But Beile-Sasha is the cleverer of the two, she soon discovered that it was not consumption, but that I had swallowed a fish-bone, and it scratched my throat, and so, that I should not suffocate, she gave me a blow between the shoulders to loosen it, and, all for love's sake, such a blow that the fish-bone went down—onlymybones ached a bit.
But all's well that ends well—and Eva Gütel has come back from drinking the waters!
She has come back, thank God, in the best of health and spirits—a sight for sore eyes!—and she has brought presents, the most beautiful presents, for herself, for herhusband, for her daughter and her son-in-law—lovely things! But there was nothing for me; she said that I, heaven forbid, was no servant to be given presents and wages. Had I not been house-mistress?
Had not Eva Gütel herself told me fifty times that I was mistress, and could do as I liked?
And no sooner was Eva Gütel back, than she discovered that Menachem Mendil had not been near the Rebbe the whole time, and she wrung her fingers till the bones cracked, and immediately sent me out to the market-place to hire a conveyance.
Menachem Mendil drove to the holy man that same day.
And next morning, Eva Gütel gave me some good advice, which was to make up my bundle and go—because she was there again and had Beile-Sasha to help her. I should be fifth wheel to the cart and might go mad from having nothing to do. She advised me to go back whence I came or to stay in the place and do as I thought best. She would not be responsible, either way.
I had slept my last night in her house.
The next one I spent walking the streets with my bundle under my arm.
You see, my dear husband, that I am doing very well. You need send me no more money, as you used to do. You had better give it to Leeb the reader to buy you a Talmud, or to Genendil-Sophie to buy you some shirts. And mind she tries them on you herself, to see how they fit—is it not America?
You see, my dear, good husband, I harbor no more unjust suspicions. I never say now that Genendil stoleeither the spoon or my husband. I know it is not her fault, and I am convinced that His blessed Name only meant to do us a kindness when He brought you and Leeb the reader together on the ship, so that he should take care of you—it is all just as you wrote. There is only one thing that will never be as you think. You may jump out of your skin, but you will never send for the child, to take it away from me to America. Because our child, for your sake and for that of your pious forefathers, has been gone this long time; it has been hidden somewhere in the burial ground, in a little room without a door, without a window. You may cry to heaven, but you shall not know where its little bones lie! No tombstone, nothing to mark it—nothing at all! Go, look for the wind in the fields!
Askerah[131]has taken it under her wing.
And since you have such a wonderful memory, and remember everything I said and everything I did, I will tell you a story which you may recollect. It is a story about a shawl I did not know what to do with. Should I put it on and run for the doctor for the child, or stop up the broken pane with it to keep the snow from blowing in, or wrap it round the child, because the poor thing was suffocating with its throat? And it was cold, bitterly cold. I ran to and fro several times, from the window to the cradle, to the door, and back from the door to the window—I tell you, I ran! I think, my dear husband, you will not forget that moment, because, as you say, we are bound one to the other, you to me and both of us to the child, and now the child is not there, we two may as wellgo, too. Well, what will Genendil say? To tell the truth, I have decided to let my hair grow and dress as they dress in America, and do you know that, beside this, I have a sweet voice and can chant all the prayers, and now, since I have been at my brother Menachem Mendil's, I have heard drunken peasants sing all sorts of songs—and I have learned them and I sing every whit as well as Genendil, if not better; and at night, when I slept under the open sky, the Queen of Sheba came and taught me to dance—and a whole night long I danced with the Queen of Sheba in the eye of the moon.
And you, my dear Shmùel Mösheh, have made a bad bargain, for I am better than Genendil. Because I remember quite well that she had two moles, one on the left ear and one on the right cheek—and rather a crooked nose. And I, you know, have a perfectly clear skin, without a mole anywhere. You thought that only Genendil could sing and dance every Friday night, and let her hair grow, that other people were not up to that! But I am not angry with you, heaven forbid! Hold to her! It is enough for me to have the child's grave. I shall go and build myself a little house there, and sit in it through the night till the cock crows. I shall talk to the child, very low and softly, about his father Shmùel Mösheh, and that will delight him! And if you come yourself, or send anyone, to fetch the child, I shall scratch out his eyes with my nails, because the child is mine, not Genendil's—may her name and her remembrance perish, and may you and she.....
———
The letter is unfinished; it was found together with the other letters in the pocket of the mad Hannah.
Once upon a time there was a pond. It had a corner to itself, and lay quite apart from the rest of the field where beasts were wont to graze and herd-boys to fling stones.
A high bank, set with briars, screened it from the wind, and it had a slimy, shiny green covering, in which the breeze tore a hole once in twelve months. In the pond there dwelt (according to the order of nature) a colony of quite small worms which fed on still smaller ones.
The pond was neither long nor wide, not even deep, and if the little worms could neither discover a bottom nor swim to shore, they had only the thick slime and the water-weeds and the fallen twigs to thank for it.
The geography of the pond was in its infancy.
Conceit, on the other hand, flourished, and fancy had it all her own way beneath the green covering—and the two together sat spinning and weaving.
And they wove between them a legend of the beginning of things, a truly worm-like tradition.
The pond is the great sea, and the four streams of Paradise flow into it. Hiddekel brings gold (that is the slime in which they find their nourishment), and the other three bring flowers (the water-weeds among which they play hide-and-seek on holidays), pearls (frog-pawn),and corals (the little orange fungi on the rotting twigs).
The green cover, the slimy cap on the surface of the pond, is the heaven stretched out over the ocean, a special heaven for their own particular world. Fragments of egg-shell, which have fallen into it, play the part of stars, and a rotten pumpkin does duty for the sun.
The chance stones flung into the pond by the herd-boys are, of course, hailstones flung by heaven at the head of sinners!
And when their heaven opened, and a few beams of the real sun penetrated to a wormy brain, then they believed in hell!
But life in the pond was a pleasant thing!
People were satisfied with themselves and with one another.
When one lives in the great sea, one is as good as a fish oneself.
One worm would call another "Tench," "Pike;" "Crocodile" and "Leviathan" would be engraved on tombstones.
"Roach" was the greatest insult, and "Haddock" not to be forgiven, even on the Day of Atonement.
Meanwhile, astronomy, poetry, and philosophy blossomed like the rose!
The bits of egg-shell were counted over and over again, till everyone was convinced of the absurdity of the attempt.
Romantic poets harped on the Heavenly Academy in a thousand different keys.
Patriots were likened to the stars, stars to ladies' eyes, and the ladies themselves to Paradise—or else to Purgatory! Philosophy transferred the souls of the pious to the rotten pumpkin.
In short, nothing was wanting!
Life had all the colors of the rainbow. In due time a code of law was framed with hundreds of commentaries, they introduced a thousand rules and regulations, and if a worm had the slightest desire to make a change, he had but to remember what the world would think, blush, regret, and do penance!
Once, however, there was a catastrophe! It was caused by a herd of swine. Dreadful feet crashed through the heaven, stamped down the slime, bruised the corals, made havoc of the flowers, and plunged the entire little "world" back into chaos.
Some of the worms were asleep under the slime (and worms sleep fast and long).
These escaped.
When they rose out of the mud, the heavens had already swum together again and united; but whole heaps of squeezed, squashed, and suffocated worms were lying about unburied, witnesses in death of the past awful event!
"What has happened?" was the cry, and search was made for some living soul who should know the cause of the calamity.
But such a living soul was not easy to find!
It is no light thing to survive a heaven!
Those who were not stamped upon had died of fright, and those who were not killed by fright had died of a broken heart.
The remainder committed suicide. Without a heaven, what is life?
One had survived, but, when he had declared to them that the heaven they now saw was a new heaven, fresh, as it were, from the shop, and that the former heaven had been trodden in of beasts; when he asserted that a worm-heaven is not eternal—that only the universal heaven is, perhaps, eternal—then they saw clearly that his mind had become deranged.
He was assisted with the deepest compassion, and conveyed to an asylum for lunatics.
My top-coat was already in my hand, and yet I could not decide: to go, or not to go—to give my lesson! O, it is so unpleasant outside, such horrible weather!—a mile's trudge—and then what?
"Once more: pakád, pakádti"[132]—once more: the old house-master, who has got through his sixty and odd years of life without knowing any grammar; who has been ten times to Leipzig, two or three times to Dantzig; who once all but landed in Constantinople—and who cannot understand such waste of money: Grammar, indeed? A fine bargain!
Then the young house-master, who allows that it is far more practical to wear ear-locks, a fur-cap, and a braided kaftan, to consult with a "good Jew," and not to know any grammar ... not that he is otherwise than orthodox himself ... but he is obliged, as a merchant, to mix with men, to wear a hat and a stiff shirt; to permit his wife to visit the theatre; his daughter, to read books; and to engage a tutor for his son....
"My father, of course, knows best! But one must move with the times!" He cannot make up his mind to be left in the lurch by the times! "I only beg of you," he said to me, "don't make an unbeliever of the boy! I will give you," he said, "as much as would payfor a whole lot of grammar, if you willnotteach him that the earth goes round the sun!"
And I promised that he should never hear it from, me, because—because this was my only lesson, and I had a sick mother at home!
To go, or not to go?
The whole family will be present to watch me when I give my lesson.
Shealso?
She sits in the background, always deep in a book; now and again she lifts her long, silken lashes, and a little brightness is diffused through the room; but so seldom, so seldom!
And what is to come of it?
Nothing evercancome of it, except heart-ache.
"Listen!" My mother's weak voice from the bed recalls me to myself. "The Feldscher says, if only I had a pair of warm, woollen socks, I might creep about the room a little!"
That, of course, decides it.
Except for the lady of the house, who has gone to the play, as usual without the knowledge of her father-in-law, I find the whole family assembled round the pinchbeck samovar. The young house-master acknowledges my greeting with a negligent "a good year to you!" and goes on turning over in his palm a pack of playing cards. Doubtless he expects company.
The old house-master, in a peaked cap and a voluminous Turkish dressing-gown, does not consider it worth while to remove from his lips the long pipe withits amber mouthpiece, or to lift his eyes from off his well-worn book of devotions. He merely gives me a nod, and once more sinks his attention in the portion appointed for Chanukah.
Shealso is intent on her reading, onlyherbook, as usual, is a novel.
My arrival makes a disagreeable impression on my pupil.
"O, I say!" and he springs up from his seat at the table, and lowers his black-ringed, little head defiantly, "lessons to-day?"
"Why not?" smiles his father.
"But it's Chanukah!" answers the boy, tapping the floor with his foot, and pointing to the first light, which has been placed in the window, behind the curtain, and fastened to a bit of wood.
"Quite right!" growls the old gentleman.
"Well, well," says the younger one, with indifference, "you must excuse him for once!"
I have an idea thatshehas become suddenly paler, that she bends lower over her book.
I wish them all good night, but the young house-master will not let me go.
"You must stay to tea!"
"And to 'rascals with poppy-seed!'"[133]cries my pupil, joyfully. He is quite willing to be friends, so long as there is no question of "pakád, pakádti."
I am diffident as to accepting, but the boy seizes my hand, and, with a roguish smile on his restless features, he places a chair for me opposite to his sister's.
Has he observed anything? Onmyside, of course, I mean....
Sheis always abstracted and lost in her reading. Very likely she looks upon me as an idler, or even worse ... she does not know that I have a sick mother at home!
"It will soon be time for you to dress!" exclaims her father, impatiently.
"Soon, very soon, Tatishe!" she answers hastily, and her pale cheeks take a tinge of color.
The young house-master abandons himself once more to his reflections; my pupil sends a top spinning across the table; the old man lays down his book, and stretches out a hand for his tea.
Involuntarily I glance at the Chanukah light opposite to me in the window.
It burns so sadly, so low, as if ashamed in the presence of the great, silvered lamp hanging over the dining-table, and lighting so brilliantly the elegant tea-service.
I feel more depressed than ever, and do not observe that she is offering me a glass of tea.
"With lemon?" her melancholy voice rouses me.
"Perhaps you prefer milk?" says her father.
"Look out! the milk is smoked!" cries my pupil, warningly.
An exclamation escapes her:
"How can you be so ...!"
Silence once more. Nothing but a sound of sipping and a clink of spoons. Suddenly my pupil is moved to inquire:
"After all, teacher, whatisChanukah?"
"Ask the rabbi to-morrow in school!" says the old man, impatiently.
"Eh!" is the prompt reply, "I should think a tutor knew better than a rabbi!"
The old man casts an angry glance at his son, as if to say: "Do you see?"
"Iwant to know about Chanukah, too!" she exclaims softly.
"Well, well," says the young house-master to me, "let us hear your version of Chanukah by all means!"
"It happened," I begin, "in the days when the Greeks oppressed us in the land of Israel. The Greeks—" But the old man interrupts me with a sour look:
"In the Benedictions it says: 'The wicked Kingdom of Javan.'"
"It comes to the same thing," observes his son, "whatwecall Javan,theycall Greeks."
"The Greeks," I resume, "oppressed us terribly! It was our darkest hour. As a nation, we were threatened with extinction. After a few ill-starred risings, the life seemed to be crushed out of us, the last gleam of hope had faded. Although in our own country, we were trodden under foot like worms."
The young house-master has long ceased to pay me any attention. His ear is turned to the door; he is intent on listening for the arrival of a guest.
But the old house-master fixes me with his eye, and, when I have a second time used the word "oppressed," he can no longer contain himself:
"A man should be explicit! 'Oppressed'—what does that convey to me? They forced us to break the Sabbath; they forbade us to keep our festivals, to study the Law, even to practice circumcision."
"You play 'Preference'?" inquires the younger gentleman, suddenly, "or perhaps even poker?"
Once more there is silence, and I continue: "The misfortune was aggravated by the fact that the nobility and the wealthy began to feel ashamed of their own people, and to adopt Greek ways of living. They used to frequent the gymnasiums."
She and the old gentleman look at me in astonishment.[134]
"In the gymnasiums of those days," I hasten to add, "there was no studying—they used to practice gymnastics, naked, men and women together—"
The two pairs of eyes lower their gaze, but the young house-master raises his with a flash.
"Whatdid you say?"
I make no reply, but go on to speak of the theatres where men fought wild beasts and oxen, and of other Greek manners and customs which must have been contrary to Jewish tradition.
"The Greeks thought nothing of all this; they were bent on effacing every trace of independent national existence. They set up an altar in the street with an 'Avodeh zoroh,'[135]and commanded us to sacrifice to it."
"What is that?" she asks in Polish.
I explain; and the old man adds excitedly:
"And a swine, too! We were to sacrifice a swine to it!"
"And there was found a Jew to approach the altar with an offering.
"But that same day, the old Maccabeus, with his five sons, had come down from the hills, and before the Greek soldiers could intervene, the miserable apostate was lying in his blood, and the altar was torn down. In one second the rebellion was ablaze. The Maccabees, with a handful of men, drove out the far more numerous Greek garrisons. The people were set free!
"It is that victory we celebrate with our poor, little illumination, with our Chanukah lights."
"What?" and the old man, trembling with rage, springs out of his chair. "Thatis the Chanukah light? Come here, wretched boy!" he screams to his grandson, who, instead of obeying, shrinks from him in terror.
The old man brings his fist down on the table, so that the glasses ring again.
"It means—when we had driven out the unclean sons of Javan, there was only one little cruse of holy olive-oil left...."
But a fit of coughing stops his breath, and his son hastens up, and assists him into the next room.
I wish to leave, but she detains me.
"You are against assimilation, then?" she asks.
"To assimilate," I reply, "is to consume, to eat, to digest. We assimilate beef and bread, and others wish to assimilateus—to eat us up like bread and meat."
She is silent for a few seconds, and then she asks anxiously:
"But will there always, always be wars and dissensions between the nations?"
"O no!" I answer, "one point theymustall agree—in the end."
"And that is?"
"Humanity. When each is free to follow his own bent, then they will all agree."
She is lost in thought, she has more to say, but there comes a tap at the door—
"Mamma!" she exclaims under her breath, and escapes, after giving me her hand—for the first time!
———
On the next day but one, while I was still in bed, I received a letter by the postman.
The envelope bore the name of her father's firm: "Jacob Berenholz."
My heart beat like a sledge-hammer. Inside there were only ten rubles—my pay for the month that was not yet complete.
Good-bye, lesson!
(Told by a "man" on a "committee")
"Give me five kopeks for a night's shelter!"
"No!" I answer sharply and walk away. He runs after me with a look of canine entreaty in his burning eyes, he kisses my sleeve—in vain!
"I cannot afford to give so much every day...."
The poor, I reflect, as I leave the soup-kitchen, eat their fill quickly....
The first time I saw the dirty, wizened little face with the sunken eyes, darkly-burning, sorrowful, and yet intelligent eyes, it went to my heart.
I had not even heard his request before an impulse seized me and a groschen flew out of my pocket into his thin little hands. I remember quite well that my hand acted of its own accord, without waiting to ask my heart for its pity, or my reason whether with a pension of forty-one rubles, sixty-six kopeks a month, I could afford to give five kopeks in charity.
His entreaty was an electric spark that fired every limb in my body and every cell in every limb, and my reason was not informed of the fresh outlay till later, when the little boy, with a hop, skip, and a jump, had left the soup-kitchen.
Busy with my own and other people's affairs, I soon forgot the little boy.
And yet not altogether. Somewhere inside my head, and without my knowing anything about it, there must have been held a meeting of practical thoughts.
Because the very next evening, when the little boy stopped me again, the same little boy with the broken, quavering accents, and asked me once more for a night's shelter and bed, the following considerations rose up from somewhere, ready prepared, to the surface of my mind:
A boy seven or eight years old ought not to beg—he ought not to hang about soup-kitchens; feeding on scraps, before the plates are collected and removed, would make a vagabond of him, a beggar—he would never come to any good if he went on like that.
My hand had found its way into my pocket, butIcaught it there and held it fast.
Had I been "pious," I should have reasoned thus: "Is the merit I shall acquire really worth five kopeks? Should I not gain just as much by repeating the evening prayers? or by giving a hoarse groan during their recital?"
Not being "pious," I thought only of the boy's good: "My five kopeks will only do him harm and make a hopeless beggar of him." And I gave them to him after all!
My hand forced its way out of my pocket, and this time I did not even try to hold it back. Something pained me in the region of my heart, and the tears were not far from my eyes. Once more the little boy ran joyfully out of the soup-kitchen, my heart grew light, and I felt a smile on my face. The third time it lasted longer—much longer.
I had calculated betimes that my means willnotallow of my giving every day in charity. Of course, it is a pleasure to see the poor little wretch jump for joy, to notice the gleam of light in his young eyes, to know that, thanks to your five kopeks, he willnotpass the night in the street, but in the "refuge," where he will be warm, and where, to-morrow morning, he will get a glass of tea and a roll. All that is a pleasure, certainly, but it is one that I, with my income, cannot allow myself—it is out of the question.
Of course, I did not say all that to the little boy, I merely gave him some good advice. I told him that if he begged he would come to a bad end—that every man (and he also must some day grow into a man) is in honor obliged to work—work is holy, and he who seeks work, finds, and such-like wise things out of books, that could not make up to the little boy for the night-refuge, that could not so much as screen him till daylight from the rain and the snow.
And all the while there he stood and kissed my sleeve, and lifted his eyes to mine, on the watch for some gleam of pity to prove that his words were not as peas thrown against a wall.
And I felt all the time that he was not watching in vain, that my cold reasonings were growing warmer, that his beseeching, dog-like eyes had a power I could not withstand, and that I must shortly surrender with my whole battery of reproofs and warnings.
So I resolved as follows: I will give him something, and then tell him once and for all that he is not to beg any more, tell him sharply and decidedly, so that he may remember.
I had not enough in coppers, so I changed a silver coin and gave him five kopeks.
"There—but you are not to come begging from me again, do you hear?"
Whence the "from me?"
As far as I knew, I had no such words in my mind, anyway I certainly did not intend to say them, and perhaps I would gladly have given a few kopeks not to have done so! I felt a sudden chill at my heart, as if I had torn away a bit of covering and left a part of it naked. But it was all over like a flash. My stern face, the hard metallic ring of my voice, my outstretched right hand and outward-pointing left foot had done their work.
I had a great attraction for that little boy! He stood there as if on hot coals, he wanted to run off so as to get earlier to the lodging house, and yet he stayed on and listened, growing paler and paler, while a tear trembled on his childish lashes.
"There! and now don't beg any more," I wound up, "do you hear? This is to be the very last time."
The little boy drew a deep breath and ran away.
To-day, to-day I have given him nothing—I will not break my word. I will know nothing of "evasions,"[136]a given word is precious. One must be firm, otherwise there would be an end to everything.
I think over again what I have just been saying, and feel quite pleased with myself. Icannotafford to give five kopeks in charity every day, and yet that was not the reason. It was the boy's own good I was thinking of, indeed,the good of all! What is the use of unsystematic charity—and how can there be system without a strict rule?
With the little boy I had spoken simple Yiddish, with myself, somewhat more learnedly. As I left the soup-kitchen, I reflected: The worst microbe in the body of the community is begging. The man who will not work has no right to eat, and so on.
I had no sooner shut the door of the soup-kitchen behind me than my feet sank deep into the mud, I ran my head against a wall, and then plunged into the dark night. There was a dreadful wind blowing, the flames of the gas lamps trembled as with cold, and their flickering shine was reflected a thousandfold in the puddles in the street, so that the eyes were dazzled. It wails plaintively, as though a thousand souls were praying for Tikun,[137]or a thousand little boys for five kopeks for a night's shelter.... Bother that little boy!...
It would be a sin to drive a dog into the street on such a night, and yet the poor little boy will have to sleep out of doors.
But what canIdo?
I have given him something three times—does that go for nothing?
Let somebody else give him five kopeks for once!
I have done quite enough, coming out to the soup-kitchen in this weather, with my sick chest and a cough, and without a fur coat. Were I "pious," it would have been self-interest on my part. I should have done it with a view to acquiring merit, I should havehastened home, turned into bed, and gone to sleep, so that my soul might quickly fly to heaven and enter the good deed to her account.
The good deed is the "credit," and the "debit" a fat slice of Leviathan.
I, when I went to the soup-kitchen, had no reward in view, it was my kind nature that prompted me.
As I walked and praised myself thus, my heart felt warm again. If other people had been praising me, I must needs have been ashamed, and motioned them away with my hand, but I can listen to myself without blushing, and I should perhaps have gone on praising myself and have discovered other amiable traits in my character, had I not stepped with my half-soles—heaven knows, I had worn away the other half on the road to the soup-kitchen—stepped with my half-soles right into the mud.
"Those who are engaged in a religious mission come to no hurt!..." but that is probably on the way out. On the way home, when the newly-created angel is hastening heavenward, one may break one's neck.
My feet are wet, and I feel chilled all through. I know to a certainty that I shall catch cold, that I have caught cold already. Presently I shall be coughing my heart out, and I feel a sting in my chest. A terror comes over me. It is not long since I spent four weeks in bed.
"It's not a thing to do," I say to myself by way of reproach; "no, certainly not! It's all very well as far asyouare concerned, but what about your wife and child? What right have you to imperil their support?"
If the phrase had been a printed one, and I the reader of it with my pencil in my hand, I should have known what to do—but the phrase was my own.
I feel more and more chilled, and home is distant, and my goloshes are full of water, cold and heavy. The windows of a confectioner gleam brightly in front of me—it is the worst in all Warsaw—their tea is shocking—but since there is no choice!
I rush across the street and plunge into a warm mist. I order a glass of tea and take up a comic paper.
The first illustrated joke that caught my eye was like a reflection of the state of things outside. The joke was called: "Which has too much?"
The weather in the picture is the weather out of doors.
Two persons are advancing toward each other on the pavement. From one side comes a stout, middle-aged woman, well-nourished, in a silk dress, a satin cloak, and a white hat with feathers. She must have started on her walk, or to make a visit, in fine weather, and now she has been caught by the rain. Her face is one of dismay. She dreads the rain and the wind, if not for herself, at least for her hat. She hastens—drops of perspiration appear on her white forehead—she hastens, but her steps are unsteady: both her hands are taken up. In the left she holds the end of her silken train, already spattered with mud, and in the right, a tiny silk parasol that scarcely covers the feathered hat on her head. Sheonlyrequires a larger umbrella. To make up for that she has enough and to spare of everything else, her face is free from care, it tells only of an abundance of all good things.
Coming to meet her is a little girl, all skin and bone. She has perhaps long and beautiful hair, but no time to attend to it. It is matted and ruffled, and the windtears round and round and seizes whole locks with which he whips her narrow shoulders. She wears a thin, tattered frock, and the wind clings round her, seeking a hole through which to steal into her puny body.
On her feet she wears a pair of top boots—of mud. She also walks unsteadily, first, because she is meeting the wind, and, secondly, becauseherhands, too, are taken up.
In her left one she carries a pair of big boots, a man's boots (her father's most likely), taking them to be mended. I need not suppose that they are going to the inn to be pawned for a bottle of brandy, because of the split soles.
Her father has probably come home tired out with his work, her mother is cooking the supper, and she, the eldest daughter, has been sent out with the boots. They must be ready by to-morrow morning early—she hurries along—she knows that if her father does not get his boots by to-morrow, there will be no fire in the oven all day. She pants—the great boots are too heavy for such a little child. But the weight in her right hand is heavier, for she carries an immense journeyman's umbrella—and she carries it proudly—her father has trusted her with it!
The child needs a lot of things: in winter, warmth—winter and summer, clothing, and all the year round, enough to eat. By way of compensation, there is excess in the size of her umbrella. I am sure that at this moment the rich lady with the parasol envies her.
The little half-starved girl with the merry, roguisheyes, although the wind threatens to upset her every minute, smiles at me from out the picture:
There, you see, we have our pleasures, too!
As to that lady, I am laughing at her!
On paying for my unfinished glass of tea, however, I am again reminded of my little beggar boy.
He has no umbrella at all, no home awaits him, not even one with dry potatoes without butter, no little bit of a bed at the foot of father's or mother's.
Even the unhappy lady would not find anything to envy him for.
What made me think of him again? Aha, I remember! It flashed across me that for the ten kopeks which I paid for the scarcely-tasted tea, the poor little boy would have had a half-portion of soup or a piece of bread and a corner to sleep in. Why did I order the tea? At home the samovar is steaming, somebody sits waiting for me with a "ready" smile, on the table there is something to eat.
I was ashamed not to order tea. Well, there is something in that, I say to console myself.
There is an even stronger wind blowing outside than before. It tears at the roofs as if it were an anti-Semite, and the roofs, Jews.
But the roofs are of iron, and they are at home.
It descends with fury on the lamps in the street, but they remain erect like hero-sages at the time of the Inquisition.
It sweeps down on the pavement, but the flags are set deep in the earth, and the earth does not let go of her dwellers so easily. Then he raises himself in anger up,up into the height, but the heavens are far, and the stars look down with indifference—or amusement.
The passers in the street bend and bow themselves and huddle together to take up as little room as possible, turn round to catch their breath, and pursue their certain way.
But the poor, helpless little boy, I think of him with terror, what will become ofhim?
All my philosophy has deserted me, and all my pity is awake.
If it weremychild? If I thought my own flesh and blood were in the grip of this wind? Ifmychild were roaming the streets to-night? If, even supposing that later on he had managed to beg a groschen, he were going, in this hurricane, toward Praga[138]—over the Vistula, over the bridge?
And just because he isnotmine, is he any the less deserving? Does he feel the wind less, shiver the less with cold, becausehisparents are lying somewhere in a grave under a tombstone? I lose all inclination to go home. I feel as if I had no right to a warm room, to the boiling samovar, to the soft bed and, above all, to the smile of those who are awaiting me.
It seems to me that "murderer" or some such word must be written on my forehead, that I have no business to be seen by anyone.
And once more I begin to think about "piousness."
"Why the devil am not I 'pious'?" I mutter. "Why need I have been the worse for believing that the One who dwells high above all the stars, high above theheavens, never lets our world out of His sight for a single instant? That not for a single instant will He forget the little boy? Why need he lie so heavy on my heart? Why cannot I leave him frankly and freely to the great heart of the universe? He would trouble me no more, I should feel him safe under the great eye of the cosmos—the eye, which, should it withdraw itself for an instant, leaves whole worlds a prey to the devil; the eye which, so long as it is open, assures to the least worm its maintenance and its right? As it is, I, with my sick chest, and my wet feet, and in this weather, must go back to the soup-kitchen andlookfor that little boy. It is a disgrace and a shame!"
Wherein the shame and the disgrace consisted, why and before whom I felt ashamed, to this day I do not know. And yet, on account of the shame and the disgrace, I did not take the shortest way back to the soup-kitchen, but I went round by several streets.
At last I arrived.
The first room, the dining-room, was empty.
The Gehenna of day-time is cooling down, the steam rises higher and higher from the damp floor, and creates a new "heaven" and a new "firmament" between the waters below (from off the feet of the poor people) and the waters above (the drops formed by the vapor). Here and there the drops come raining through.
Thanks to a little window, I can see into the kitchen.
The drowsy cook with the untidy head leans with her left hand on the great kettle and lifts the big soup-spoon lazily to her mouth.