"It's a Midrash![114] When the children of Israel had crossed the Red Sea, and the water had covered up and drowned Pharaoh and all his host, then the angels began to sing songs, seraphim and ophanim flew into all the seven heavens with hymns and glad tidings, all the stars and planets danced and sang, and the celestial bodies--you can guess what rejoicings! But the Creator put an end to them. A Voice issued from the Throne:

"'My children are being drowned in the sea, and you rejoice and sing?'

"Because G.o.d created even Pharaoh and all his host, even the devil himself, and it is written: 'His tender mercies are over all His works.'"

"Certainly!" sighs Reb Zerach.

He says nothing more for a while, and then asks:

"And if it _is_ a Midrash, what has he added to it to deserve praise?"

Reb Shachneh stands still, and says gravely:

"First, Belzer fool, no one has the duty to be original; there is no chronological order in the Law--the new is old, the old is new.

Secondly, he showed us why we recite the Haggadah, even the plagues in the Haggadah, to a mournful "Sinni" tune, a tune that is steeped in grief.

"Thirdly, he translated the precept: _Al tismach Yisroel el Gil ko-Ammim_: Materialist, rejoice not in a coa.r.s.e way--you are no boor!

Revenge is not for Jews."

XVIII

THE PIKE[115]

In honor of the feast-day, live fish have been bought.

Two large pike are lying in a great, green gla.s.s bowl filled with water, and a little further off, in one of blackened earthenware, two or three small carp. These are no sea-folk, but they come out of a fairly wide river, and they are straightened for room in the bowls.

The poor little carp, in the one of black glaze, have been aware of its confines for some time past.

They have lain for a good hour by the clock, wondering what sort of a prison this may be.

And there is plenty of leisure for thinking. It may be long before the cook comes home from market with good things for the feast-day long enough for even a carp to have an idea.

But the pike in the gla.s.s bowl have not taken in the situation yet. Time after time they swim out strongly and bang their heads against the hard gla.s.s.

Pike have iron heads but dull wits. The two captive heroes have received each a hundred knocks from every part of the bowl, but they have not yet realized that all is closed to them.

They _feel_ the walls, but the weak pike-eyes do not _see_ them.

The gla.s.s is green--it is just like river water--and yet there is no getting out.

"It is witchcraft!" says one pike to the other.

The other agrees with him.

"To-morrow there is an auction. The other bidders have bewitched us."

"Some crayfish or frog has done this."

It is only a short time since the net drew them out of the water. When they got into the air they had fainted, to recover consciousness inside a barrel of which the lid had been hammered down.

"How the days are drawing in!" they had observed both at once.

There was very little room in the barrel, scarcely sufficient to turn in, and hardly water enough for anyone to breathe. What with having fainted before, and now this difficulty in breathing, they had fallen into a doze, and had dreamt of all sorts of things, of the fair, and even of the opera and the ballet. But the dream-angel never showed them any kind of barrel.

They heard nothing, not even the opening of the barrel and the hubbub of the market.

Neither perceived they the trembling of the scales in which they oscillated whilst the cook haggled over them with the fish-wife--or remarked the click-clack of the pointer that spoke their doom.

They slept still more soundly in the cook's basket, starting into life again only in the bowl, beneath the rush of cold water. And now, after doing unwilling penance for an hour against the gla.s.s, they have only just hit upon witchcraft.

"What are we to do?" says one to the other.

The carp know themselves to be in prison.

They, too, have had experience of a long night, and awoke in a bowl.

"Someone," say they, "had palmed off counterfeit bank-notes on us!"

It will be proved, they are sure, if only one could get hold of someone who will take the matter up properly.

They give a little leap into the air, catch sight of the pike, and fall back more dead than alive.

"They are going to eat us!" they say, trembling. Not until they realize that the pike are likewise in prison do they feel somewhat rea.s.sured.

"They, they certainly have been pa.s.sing counterfeit notes, too!" says one carp to the other.

"Yes, and therein lies our salvation. _They_ will not keep silence, and, with G.o.d's help, we shall all be set free together."

"And they will see us, and, with G.o.d's help, will eat us up!"

And the carp nestle closer against the bowl.

They can just see a tub full of onions on the kitchen floor.

"If we signed the contract, we might receive a golden order," observes one of the pike.

"Please G.o.d, we shall be decorated yet," answers the other. "It is a case of witchcraft, but--"

"But what?"

"There is one thing."