From that day forward he attended every funeral, and glanced in at the window.

Yes, he wants her, too! Let it rather be her; he would just as soon, in fact, it would be better so.

He would treat her like a toy, play with her all day, and do everything for her. He would never let her dip a hand in cold water. He would do all the chopping, cooking, baking, and washing, indeed, everything, upon the one condition that she should stand and watch him and smile. When there was time, he would take her and carry her about like a little child. He would rise with the dawn, and, in winter time, soon have the stove lighted; in summer, soon have set the kettle on for morning tea.

He would walk softly, on his toes, and quietly dust her dress and shoes; he would quietly place the clothes beside her bed; and then only go noiselessly and bend over her and look at her, and look at her, till the sun rose, and it was broad day, till the sun shone in at the window--then only wake her with a kiss. That would be a life worth the name!

And a good match, too! _oi! oi!_ Devosheh may have a few gulden, she is saving, but _she_ holds a Parnosseh, as it were, in her hand. Everyone knows that Beril is being burnt up by brandy; the Rofeh says he eats nothing and goes about, heaven defend us, with his inside full of holes.

In a hundred and twenty years to come, Yossil might take over the grave-digging--why not? At first he would feel frightened of the corpses, but one gets used to everything. With _her_ beside him he would feel at home in Gehenna. It is not a nice Parnosseh, but then he would be able to live outside the town, apart, no one could overlook him. That would be a life--Paradise in the burial ground!

But if the lot should fall on "Lapei?" "Lapei" is the nickname of the third orphan girl. When he remembers _her_, he grows cold in every limb.

She is a town orphan, who has been one ever since he can remember--sickly, with a large head, hair that falls out, and somewhat crooked feet. She doesn't walk on her soles, but on her toes, with her heels in the air, and as she walks, she wobbles like a tipsy person. He often meets _her_ in the street; she has no home of her own, but goes from house to house, helping the servants--fetches water for one, wood for another, helps a third to chop up a little resinous fir-wood, carries a bucket, fills a tub. When she has no work, she begs. Once a year she washes the floor of the house-of-study. Where she spends the night, he does not know. Lapei, Lapei! he pictures her to himself and he shudders.

He feels cold all over. She must be forty years old. She has looked so much ever since he can remember.

"Lord of the world!" he cries out in terror, "that would be worse than hanging!" and lifts his terrified eyes imploringly to heaven. On his pale forehead are drops of perspiration as large as peas.

But he is moved to compa.s.sion in his heart. Poor thing! She would certainly also like to be married, she is equally a blind sheep, equally an orphan. She has nothing, either, beyond a G.o.d in heaven. He feels inclined to weep over her lot and his together, and, on second thoughts, he places himself in G.o.d's hands. If G.o.d wills it so, it shall be she!

He throws himself on G.o.d and on Kohol. The one destined by G.o.d and given by Kohol shall be his mate, he will honor her and be true to her, and will be to her a husband like any other, and he will forget the other two.

Then a fresh anxiety rises within him: If the destined one be Lapei, where are they to live? Where can they go? What will they do? She hasn't a penny, and goes about tattered, a draggle-tail, and sells her birthright for a handful of cold potatoes. She takes two gulden for washing the floor of the house-of-study--not enough for dry bread--and he, what can he do? Of what use is he?

Were he not lame, he would be a messenger. He knows no trade, unless (he consoles himself) he became a teacher. All the householders will give wedding-presents, and he will hire a room with the money and start keeping school; he knows quite enough to teach, especially little children. Let come what may if only he has a wife. There are Jews who have uglier wives, and who are worse cripples ... but there they are! A wife is a wife! Only not to live alone and eat "days!"

And he may yet succeed in getting one of the other two, and once more he begins to invent a Paradise. And he smiles on at the mud and the leaden clouds.

Hush! something has occurred to him. If he knew for certain that poor Lapei was fated to die of the pestilence, he would gladly marry her. At least, poor thing, she would have had a husband before she died. If only for a month. Why not? Is she not a Jewish daughter? It wouldn't hurt him, and it would be fair on the part of His blessed Name. He does not wish her death, heaven forbid! On the contrary, he is sorry for her; he feels and knows the meaning of "misery," of being all alone, always all alone.

5

SAVITZKI AND YoSSIL TOGETHER

One day, as Yossil, the beggar-student, was splashing through the mud, lost in thought, he suddenly felt himself caught hold of by the sleeve.

He turned round in a fright and was still more alarmed on seeing before him--Dr. Savitzki.

Savitzki and Yossil had often pa.s.sed each other outside the town, and Yossil had always taken off his torn cap and bowed low before the Christian. Savitzki, the first time, had spat out; the second time, he had thrown out an evil, anti-Semitic look; the third time, he had only glanced into Yossil's face. Later he half smiled--and to-day, for the first time, he had caught him by the sleeve.

They saw in each other's eyes that there was a link between them, that they had a common interest, a common hope, that something bound them together.

Savitzki was now quite alone in the town. At one time, he used to go in to the apothecary, but the latter had lately given him to understand, that he had done him harm; that people had grown afraid, on Savitzki's account, of buying bitter-water and castor oil, the apothecary's great stand-by.

The Christian townspeople had also begun to avoid him; they, too, believed that doctors poison people, and Savitzki was probably no better than the rest.

It was rumored that in some little place or other, a set of tramps had burnt the "barrack" and stoned the doctor. There was occasionally a gleam in the eyes of the townsfolk that boded no good.

Yossil got on without other people, Savitzki longed for someone to speak to. He wondered himself how it was that the lame _Zhidlak's_[45] pitted face seemed so pleasant to him. True, he had a little business with him; it was possible the plague was already there, only people were hiding it. One might be able to learn something from the said _Zhidlak_.

Yossil, on being caught by the sleeve, had given a start; but he soon recovered himself, and did not even notice how quickly Savitzki let go of his dirty coat; he only saw that Savitzki was no longer angry, but smiling.

"Well," inquired Savitzki, in Polish, "no cholera?"

Yossil had once driven out with the town Dayan to a mill to guard wheat for Pa.s.sover, and had there learned a few Polish words. He understood Savitzki's question; the word "cholera," in spite of the fact that it represented all his hopes, gave him a pang "in the seventh rib," his face twitched, but he composed himself and replied: "None, honored sir, none!" And without his being conscious of it, the answer rang sadly.

They soon parted. The day following they met again, advancing toward one another.

Yossil stood aside like a soldier saluting, but without putting his hand to his cap; Savitzki stopped a moment to ask:

"Well, not yet?"

"Not yet, honored sir, not yet!" was Yossil's reply.

The third day they met again and remained longer together.

Savitzki questioned him as to whether there was no talk anywhere of diarrhoea and sickness, cholereen, etc., or any other intestinal trouble.

Yossil could not understand everything Savitzki said, but he made a good shot, concluding that he was being asked about sicknesses of a suspicious nature.

"Nothing, honored sir, nothing!" he kept answering. He knew that so far all was quiet in the town.

"Nothing yet, but it will come!" was Savitzki's consoling observation as he walked away.

A little time pa.s.sed, and they had got into the habit, when they met, of walking a few steps together; Savitzki continued to question and to receive the same reply: "Nothing, sir, nothing," and still he consoled himself and Yossil with: "It will come!"

"It must come!" he declared with a.s.surance, and Yossil translated it into Hebrew: "And although it tarry, I expect it,"[46] and his heart expanded.

He wished the town no harm. Savitzki might wish for a great outbreak of the pestilence, he only desired a little one, a little tiny one. No one was to die, heaven forbid! A few householders should fall ill--nothing more would be necessary. That is all he asks. He does not wish that his greatest enemy should die.

This lasted a month. Savitzki even began to lose patience, and made Yossil a proposal. He felt sure something must be happening, only that people kept it hid. They were afraid of making it known--Jews are so nervous. So he proposed that Yossil should pry, find out, and tell him of only one hidden case, tell him of anything. He would be grateful to him.

Savitzki talked too quick for Yossil and too "high Polish," but he understood that Savitzki wished to make a spy of him and have him betray the Jewish sick.

"No," he thought, "no, Yossil is not going to turn informer!" He is resolved not to let out a word to Savitzki, and yet, in spite of himself, and for politeness' sake, he nodded in affirmation, and Savitzki walked away.

Yossil's determination not to tell tales strengthened, but there was no reason why he should not find out for himself if they were not concealing something, and he began to go in and out among the people a.s.sembled for daily prayer, to see if no one were missing; if he remarked any one's absence, he tried to discover the reason, but it came to nothing. It always turned out to be that the person had risked his life going out into a village to buy stores; or else he had quarrelled with his wife, and was ashamed to come to the house-of-study with a swollen cheek, or he had been to the Rofeh to have a tooth out and they couldn't stop the bleeding; and other such trifles that had no connection with the object of his interest. And every day he was able to report honestly to Savitzki: "Nothing, honored sir, nothing!"

Every day now they waited one for the other, and every day they talked longer together.

Yossil endeavored with all his might to make himself intelligible to Savitzki; he worked his hands and his feet, and Savitzki, who had learnt to understand the gestures, had often to save himself from Yossil's too energetic demonstrations.

Savitzki could not make out what Yossil was after, why he kept at a distance from Kohol, and why, as was clearly to be seen, he also wished for the pestilence--but he had no time to busy himself with the problem--to fathom the mind of a Jew. It was probably a matter of business--perhaps he dealt in linen for winding-sheets. Perhaps he made coffins. But when he remarked that Yossil was growing depressed, that he was less sure than Savitzki that it must come to-morrow, he talked to him freely, gave him courage, and made him confident once more that the community would not escape.

To Savitzki it was clear as daylight that it would come. It was getting nearer and nearer--was it not in all the papers?

Six weeks pa.s.sed. The sharp frosts, for which the community was hoping, had not been, but the pestilence desired by Savitzki and Yossil delayed equally. Even Savitzki began to have his doubts, but encouraging Yossil, he encouraged himself in the matter. It was simply impossible that it should not come. Was there a less clean town anywhere? Where else did people eat so many gherkins, so much raw fruit, and as many onions?

Where were they less well provided with cold water? There were perhaps two or three well-to-do people in the place with metal samovars; three to four houses where they made tea; in the rest they drank pear-drink after the Sholent[47] and old, putrid fish was sold galore.

It must come!