Children of the Ghetto Part 20

"No."

"I won her eleven pounds on the lotter_ee_."

"How nice," said Mrs. Hyams, a little fluttered.

"I would let you have half a ticket for two pounds."

"I haven't the money."

"Vell, dirty-six s.h.i.+llings! Dere! I have to pay dat myself."

"I would if I could, but I can't."

"But you can have an eighth for nine s.h.i.+llings."

Mrs. Hyams shook her head hopelessly.

"How is your son Daniel?" Sugarman asked.

"Pretty well, thank you. How is your wife?"

"Tank Gawd!"

"And your Bessie?"

"Tank Gawd! Is your Daniel in?"

"Yes."

"Tank Gawd! I mean, can I see him?"

"It won't do any good."

"No, not dat," said Sugarman. "I should like to ask him to de Confirmation myself."

"Daniel!" called Mrs. Hyams.

He came from the back yard in rolled-up s.h.i.+rt-sleeves, soap-suds drying on his arms. He was a pleasant-faced, flaxen-haired young fellow, the junior of Miriam by eighteen months. There was will in the lower part of the face and tenderness in the eyes.

"Good morning, sir," said Sugarman. "My Ebenezer is _Barmitzvah_ next _Shabbos_ week; vill you do me the honor to drop in wid your moder and fader after _Shool_?"

Daniel crimsoned suddenly. He had "No" on his lips, but suppressed it and ultimately articulated it in some polite periphrasis. His mother noticed the crimson. On a blonde face it tells.

"Don't say dat," said Sugarman. "I expect to open dirteen bottles of lemonade. I have lent your good moder's corkscrew."

"I shall be pleased to send Ebenezer a little present, but I can't come, I really can't. You must excuse me." Daniel turned away.

"Vell," said Sugarman, anxious to a.s.sure him he bore no malice. "If you send a present I reckon it de same as if you come."

"That's all right," said Daniel with strained heartiness.

Sugarman tucked Nehemiah under his arm but lingered on the threshold. He did not know how to broach the subject. But the inspiration came.

"Do you know I have summonsed Morris Kerlinski?"

"No," said Daniel. "What for?"

"He owes me dirty s.h.i.+llings. I found him a very fine maiden, but, now he is married, he says it was only worth a suvran. He offered it me but I vouldn't take it. A poor man he vas, too, and got ten pun from a marriage portion society."

"Is it worth while bringing a scandal on the community for the sake of ten s.h.i.+llings? It will be in all the papers, and _Shadchan_ will be spelt shatcan, shodkin, shatkin, chodcan, shotgun, and goodness knows what else."

"Yes, but it isn't ten s.h.i.+llings," said Sugarman. "It's dirty s.h.i.+llings."

"But you say he offered you a sovereign."

"So he did. He arranged for two pun ten. I took the suvran--but not in full payment."

"You ought to settle it before the Beth-din," said Daniel vehemently, "or get some Jew to arbitrate. You make the Jews a laughing-stock. It is true all marriages depend on money," he added bitterly, "only it is the fas.h.i.+on of police court reporters to pretend the custom is limited to the Jews."

"Vell, I did go to Reb Shemuel," said Sugarman "I dought he'd be the very man to arbitrate."

"Why?" asked Daniel.

"Vy? Hasn't he been a _Shadchan_ himself? From who else shall we look for sympaty?"

"I see," said Daniel smiling a little. "And apparently you got none."

"No," said Sugarman, growing wroth at the recollection. "He said ve are not in Poland."

"Quite true."

"Yes, but I gave him an answer he didn't like," said Sugarman. "I said, and ven ve are not in Poland mustn't ve keep _none_ of our religion?"

His tone changed from indignation to insinuation.

"Vy vill you not let me get _you_ a vife, Mr. Hyams? I have several extra fine maidens in my eye. Come now, don't look so angry. How much commission vill you give me if I find you a maiden vid a hundred pound?"

"The maiden!" thundered Daniel. Then it dawned upon him that he had said a humorous thing and he laughed. There was merriment as well as mysticism in Daniel's blue eyes.

But Sugarman went away, down-hearted. Love is blind, and even marriage-brokers may be myopic. Most people not concerned knew that Daniel Hyams was "sweet on" Sugarman's Bessie. And it was so. Daniel loved Bessie, and Bessie loved Daniel. Only Bessie did not speak because she was a woman and Daniel did not speak because he was a man. They were a quiet family--the Hyamses. They all bore their crosses in a silence unbroken even at home. Miriam herself, the least reticent, did not give the impression that she could not have husbands for the winking. Her demands were so high--that was all. Daniel was proud of her and her position and her cleverness and was confident she would marry as well as she dressed. He did not expect her to contribute towards the expenses of the household--though she did--for he felt he had broad shoulders. He bore his father and mother on those shoulders, semi-invalids both. In the bold bad years of shameless poverty, Hyams had been a wandering metropolitan glazier, but this open degradation became intolerable as Miriam's prospects improved. It was partly for her sake that Daniel ultimately supported his parents in idleness and refrained from speaking to Bessie. For he was only an employe in a fancy-goods warehouse, and on forty-five s.h.i.+llings a week you cannot keep up two respectable establishments.

Bessie was a bonnie girl and could not in the nature of things be long uncaught. There was a certain night on which Daniel did not sleep--hardly a white night as our French neighbors say; a tear-stained night rather. In the morning he was resolved to deny himself Bessie.

Peace would be his instead. If it did not come immediately he knew it was on the way. For once before he had struggled and been so rewarded.

That was in his eighteenth year when he awoke to the glories of free thought, and knew himself a victim to the Moloch of the Sabbath, to which fathers sacrifice their children. The proprietor of the fancy goods was a Jew, and moreover closed on Sat.u.r.days. But for this anachronism of keeping Sat.u.r.day holy when you had Sunday also to laze on, Daniel felt a hundred higher careers would have been open to him.

Later, when free thought waned (it was after Daniel had met Bessie), although he never returned to his father's narrowness, he found the abhorred Sabbath sanctifying his life. It made life a conscious voluntary sacrifice to an ideal, and the reward was a touch of consecration once a week. Daniel could not have described these things, nor did he speak of them, which was a pity. Once and once only in the ferment of free thought he had uncorked his soul, and it had run over with much froth, and thenceforward old Mendel Hyams and Beenah, his wife, opposed more furrowed foreheads to a world too strong for them. If Daniel had taken back his words and told them he was happier for the ruin they had made of his prospects, their gait might not have been so listless. But he was a silent man.

"You will go to Sugarman's, mother," he said now. "You and father. Don't mind that I'm not going. I have another appointment for the afternoon."

It was a superfluous lie for so silent a man.