Children of the Ghetto Part 19

"Don't be a little fool, Esther! A tiny fly has just flown into my eye--poor little thing! He hurts me and does himself no good."

"Let me see, Debby," said Esther. "Perhaps I shall be in time to save him."

"No, don't trouble."

"Don't be so cruel, Debby. You're as bad as Solomon, who pulls off flies' wings to see if they can fly without them."

"He's dead now. Go on with 'Lady Ann's Rival;' we've been wasting the whole afternoon talking. Take my advice, Esther, and don't stuff your head with ideas about young men. You're too young. Now, dear, I'm ready.

Go on."

"Where was I? Oh yes. 'Lord Eversmonde folded the fair young form to his manly bosom and pressed kiss after kiss upon her ripe young lips, which responded pa.s.sionately to his own. At last she recovered herself and cried reproachfully, Oh Sigismund, why do you persist in coming here, when the Duke forbids it?' Oh, do you know, Debby, father said the other day I oughtn't to come here?"

"Oh no, you must," cried Debby impulsively. "I couldn't part with you now."

"Father says people say you are not good," said Esther candidly.

Debby breathed painfully. "Well!" she whispered.

"But I said people were liars. You _are_ good!"

"Oh, Esther, Esther!" sobbed Debby, kissing the earnest little face with a vehemence that surprised the child.

"I think father only said that," Esther went on, "because he fancies I neglect Sarah and Isaac when he's at _Shool_ and they quarrel so about their birthdays when they're together. But they don't slap one another hard. I'll tell you what! Suppose I bring Sarah down here!"

"Well, but won't she cry and be miserable here, if you read, and with no Isaac to play with?"

"Oh no," said Esther confidently. "She'll keep Bobby company."

Bobby took kindly to little Sarah also. He knew no other dogs and in such circ.u.mstances a sensible animal falls back on human beings. He had first met Debby herself quite casually and the two lonely beings took to each other. Before that meeting Dutch Debby was subject to wild temptations. Once she half starved herself and put aside ninepence a week for almost three months and purchased one-eighth of a lottery ticket from Sugarman the _Shadchan_, who recognized her existence for the occasion. The fortune did not come off.

Debby saw less and less of Esther as the months crept on again towards winter, for the little girl feared her hostess might feel constrained to offer her food, and the children required more soothing. Esther would say very little about her home life, though Debby got to know a great deal about her school-mates and her teacher.

One summer evening after Esther had pa.s.sed into the hands of Miss Miriam Hyams she came to Dutch Debby with a grave face and said: "Oh, Debby.

Miss Hyams is not a heroine."

"No?" said Debby, amused. "You were so charmed with her at first."

"Yes, she is very pretty and her hats are lovely. But she is not a heroine."

"Why, what's happened?"

"You know what lovely weather it's been all day?"

"Yes."

"Well, this morning all in the middle of the Scripture lesson, she said to us, 'What a pity, girls, we've got to stay cooped up here this bright weather'--you know she chats to us so nicely--'in some schools they have half-holidays on Wednesday afternoons in the summer. Wouldn't it be nice if we could have them and be out in the suns.h.i.+ne in Victoria Park?'

'Hoo, yes, teacher, wouldn't that be jolly?' we all cried. Then teacher said: 'Well, why not ask the Head Mistress for a holiday this afternoon? You're the highest standard in the school--I dare say if you ask for it, the whole school will get a holiday. Who will be spokes-woman?' Then all the girls said I must be because I was the first girl in the cla.s.s and sounded all my h's, and when the Head Mistress came into the room I up and curtseyed and asked her if we could have a holiday this afternoon on account of the beautiful suns.h.i.+ne. Then the Head Mistress put on her eye-gla.s.ses and her face grew black and the suns.h.i.+ne seemed to go out of the room. And she said 'What! After all the holidays we have here, a month at New Year and a fortnight at Pa.s.sover, and all the fast-days! I am surprised that you girls should be so lazy and idle and ask for more. Why don't you take example by your teacher?

Look at Miss Hyams." We all looked at Miss Hyams, but she was looking for some papers in her desk. 'Look how Miss Hyams works!' said the Head Mistress. '_She_ never grumbles, _she_ never asks for a holiday!' We all looked again at Miss Hyams, but she hadn't yet found the papers. There was an awful silence; you could have heard a pin drop. There wasn't a single cough or rustle of a dress. Then the Head Mistress turned to me and she said: 'And you, Esther Ansell, whom I always thought so highly of, I'm surprised at your being the ringleader in such a disgraceful request. You ought to know better. I shall bear it in mind, Esther Ansell.' With that she sailed out, stiff and straight as a poker, and the door closed behind her with a bang."

"Well, and what did Miss Hyams say then?" asked Debby, deeply interested.

"She said: 'Selina Green, and what did Moses do when the Children of Israel grumbled for water?' She just went on with the Scripture lesson, as if nothing had happened."

"I should tell the Head Mistress who sent me on," cried Debby indignantly.

"Oh, no," said Esther shaking her head. "That would be mean. It's a matter for her own conscience. Oh, but I do wish," she concluded, "we had had a holiday. It would have been so lovely out in the Park."

Victoria Park was _the_ Park to the Ghetto. A couple of miles off, far enough to make a visit to it an excursion, it was a perpetual blessing to the Ghetto. On rare Sunday afternoons the Ansell family minus the _Bube_ toiled there and back _en ma.s.se_, Moses carrying Isaac and Sarah by turns upon his shoulder. Esther loved the Park in all weathers, but best of all in the summer, when the great lake was bright and busy with boats, and the birds twittered in the leafy trees and the lobelias and calceolarias were woven into wonderful patterns by the gardeners. Then she would throw herself down on the thick gra.s.s and look up in mystic rapture at the brooding blue sky and forget to read the book she had brought with her, while the other children chased one another about in savage delight. Only once on a Sat.u.r.day afternoon when her father was not with them, did she get Dutch Debby to break through her retired habits and accompany them, and then it was not summer but late autumn.

There was an indefinable melancholy about the sere landscape. Russet refuse strewed the paths and the gaunt trees waved fleshless arms in the breeze. The November haze rose from the moist ground and dulled the blue of heaven with smoky clouds amid which the sun, a red sailless boat, floated at anchor among golden and crimson furrows and glimmering far-dotted fleeces. The small lake was slimy, reflecting the trees on its borders as a network of dirty branches. A solitary swan ruffled its plumes and elongated its throat, doubled in quivering outlines beneath the muddy surface. All at once the splash of oars was heard and the sluggish waters were stirred by the pa.s.sage of a boat in which a heroic young man was rowing a no less heroic young woman.

Dutch Debby burst into tears and went home. After that she fell back entirely on Bobby and Esther and the _London Journal_ and never even saved up nine s.h.i.+llings again.

CHAPTER X.

A SILENT FAMILY.

Sugarman the _Shadchan_ arrived one evening a few days before Purim at the tiny two-storied house in which Esther's teacher lived, with little Nehemiah tucked under his arm. Nehemiah wore shoes and short red socks.

The rest of his legs was bare. Sugarman always carried him so as to demonstrate this fact. Sugarman himself was rigged out in a handsome manner, and the day not being holy, his blue bandanna peeped out from his left coat-tail, instead of being tied round his trouser band.

"Good morning, marm," he said cheerfully.

"Good morning, Sugarman," said Mrs. Hyams.

She was a little careworn old woman of sixty with white hair. Had she been more pious her hair would never have turned gray. But Miriam had long since put her veto on her mother's black wig. Mrs. Hyams was a meek, weak person and submitted in silence to the outrage on her deepest instincts. Old Hyams was stronger, but not strong enough. He, too, was a silent person.

"P'raps you're surprised," said Sugarman, "to get a call from me in my sealskin vest-coat. But de fact is, marm, I put it on to call on a lady.

I only dropped in here on my vay."

"Won't you take a chair?" said Mrs. Hyams. She spoke English painfully and slowly, having been schooled by Miriam.

"No, I'm not tired. But I vill put Nechemyah down on one, if you permit.

Dere! Sit still or I _potch_ you! P'raps you could lend me your corkscrew."

"With pleasure," said Mrs. Hyams.

"I dank you. You see my boy, Ebenezer, is _Barmitzvah_ next _Shabbos_ a veek, and I may not be pa.s.sing again. You vill come?"

"I don't know," said Mrs. Hyams hesitatingly. She was not certain whether Miriam considered Sugarman on their visiting list.

"Don't say dat, I expect to open dirteen bottles of lemonade! You must come, you and Mr. Hyams and the whole family."

"Thank you. I will tell Miriam and Daniel and my husband."

"Dat's right. Nechemyah, don't dance on de good lady's chair. Did you hear, Mrs. Hyams, of Mrs. Jonas's luck?"