Children of the Ghetto

more miracles to the page.''

'You wicked girl!' said her brother, overwhelmed by her audacity. 'Surely you know that all these miracles were false?'

'Why were they false?' persisted Esther.

'Because miracles left off after the Old Testament! There are no miracles now-a-days, are there?'

'No,' admitted Esther.

'Well, then,' he said triumphantly, 'if miracles had gone overlapping into New Testament times we might just as well expect to have them now.'

'But why shouldn't we have them now?'

'Esther, I'm surprised at you. I should like to set Old Four-Eyes on to you. He'd soon tell you why. Religion all happened in the past. God couldn't be always talking to His creatures.'

'I wish I'd lived in the past, when Religion was happening,' said Esther ruefully. 'But why do Christians all reverence this book? I'm sure there are many more millions of them than of Jews!'

'Of course there are, Esther. Good things are scarce. We are so few because we are God's chosen people.'

'But why do I feel good when I read what Jesus said?'

'Because you are so bad,' he answered, in a shocked tone. 'Here, give me the book, I'll burn it.'

'No, no!' said Esther. 'Besides there's no fire.'

'No, hang it,' he said, rubbing his hands. 'Well, it'll never do if you have to fall back on this sort of thing. I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll send you Our Own.'

'Oh, will you, Benjy? That is good of you,' she said joyfully, and was kissing him when Solomon and Isaac came romping in and woke up the grandmother.

'How are you, Solomon?' said Benjamin. 'How are you, my little man,' he added, patting Isaac on his curly head. Solomon was overawed for a moment. Then he said, 'Hullo, Benjy, have you got any spare buttons?'

But Isaac was utterly ignorant who the stranger could be and hung back with his finger in his mouth.

'That's your brother Benjamin, Ikey,' said Solomon.

'Don't want no more brovers,' said Ikey.

'Oh, but I was here before you,' said Benjamin laughing.

'Does oor birfday come before mine, then?'

'Yes, if I remember.'

Isaac looked tauntingly at the door. 'See!' he cried to the absent Sarah. Then turning graciously to Benjamin he said, 'I thant kiss oo, but I'll lat oo teep in my new bed.'

'But you must kiss him,' said Esther, and saw that he did it before she left the room to fetch little Sarah from Mrs. Simons.

When she came back Solomon was letting Benjamin inspect his Plevna peep-show without charge and Moses Ansell was back, too. His eyes were red with weeping, but that was on account of the Maggid. His nose was blue with the chill of the cemetery.

'He was a great man.' he was saying to the grandmother. 'He could lecture for four hours together on any text and he would always manage to get back to the text before the end. Such exegetics, such homiletics! He was greater than the Emperor of Russia. Woe! Woe!'

'Woe! Woe!' echoed the grandmother. 'If women were allowed to go to funerals, I would gladly have, followed him. Why did he come to England? In Poland he would still have been alive. And why did I come to England? Woe! Woe''

Her head dropped back on the pillow and her sighs passed gently into snores. Moses turned again to his eldest born, feeling that he was secondary in importance only to the Maggid, and proud at heart of his genteel English appearance.

'Well, you'll soon be Bar-mitzvah, Benjamin.' he said, with clumsy geniality blent with respect, as he patted his boy's cheeks with his discolored fingers.

Benjamin caught the last two words and nodded his head.

'And then you'll be coming back to us. I suppose they will apprentice you to something.'

'What does he say, Esther?' asked Benjamin, impatiently.

Esther interpreted.

'Apprentice me to something!' he repeated, disgusted. 'Father's ideas are so beastly humble. He would like everybody to dance on him. Why he'd be content to see me a cigar-maker or a presser. Tell him I'm not coming home, that I'm going to win a scholarship and to go to the University.'

Moses's eyes dilated with pride. 'Ah, you will become a Rav,' he said, and lifted up his boy's chin and looked lovingly into the handsome face.

'What's that about a Rav, Esther?' said Benjamin. 'Does he want me to become a Rabbi-Ugh! Tell him I'm going to write books.'

'My blessed boy! A good commentary on the Song of Songs is much needed. Perhaps you will begin by writing that.'

'Oh, it's no use talking to him, Esther. Let him be. Why can't he speak English?'

'He can-but you'd understand even less,' said Esther with a sad smile.

'Well, all I say is it's a beastly disgrace. Look at the years he's been in England-just as long as we have.' Then the humor of the remark dawned upon him and he laughed. 'I suppose he's out of work, as usual,' he added.

Moses's ears pricked up at the syllables 'out-of-work,' which to him was a single word of baneful meaning.

'Yes,' he said in Yiddish. 'But if I only had a few pounds to start with I could work up a splendid business.'

'Wait! He shall have a business,' said Benjamin when Esther interpreted.

'Don't listen to him,' said Esther. 'The Board of Guardians has started him again and again. But he likes to think he is a man of business.'

Meantime Isaac had been busy explaining Benjamin to Sarah, and pointing out the remarkable confirmation of his own views as to birthdays. This will account for Esther's next remark being, 'Now, dears, no fighting to-day. We must celebrate Benjy's return. We ought to kill a fatted calf-like the man in the Bible.'

'What are you talking about, Esther?' said Benjamin suspiciously.

'I'm so sorry, nothing, only foolishness,' said Esther. 'We really must do something to make a holiday of the occasion. Oh, I know; we'll have tea before you go, instead of waiting till supper-time. Perhaps Rachel'll be back from the Park. You haven't seen her yet.'

'No, I can't stay,' said Benjy. 'It'll take me three-quarters of an hour getting to the station. And you've got no fire to make tea with either.'

'Nonsense, Benjy. You seem to have forgotten everything; we've got a loaf and a penn'uth of tea in the cupboard. Solomon, fetch a farthing's worth of boiling water from the Widow Finkelstein.'

At the words 'widow Finkelstein,' the grandmother awoke and sat up.

'No, I'm too tired,' said Solomon. 'Isaac can go.'

'No,' said Isaac. 'Let Estie go.'

Esther took a jug and went to the door.

'Meshe,' said the grandmother. 'Go thou to the Widow Finkelstein.'

'But Esther can go,' said Moses.

'Yes, I'm going,' said Esther.

'Meshe!' repeated the Bube inexorably. 'Go thou to the Widow Finkelstein.'

Moses went.

'Have you said the afternoon prayer, boys?' the old woman asked.

'Yes,' said Solomon. 'While you were asleep.'

'Oh-h-h!' said Esther under her breath. And she looked reproachfully at Solomon.

'Well, didn't you say we must make a holiday to-day?' he whispered back.