The Rise of David Levinsky Part 67

She was born in New York and had graduated at a public grammar-school and English was the only language which she spoke like one born to speak it, and yet her Yiddish greeting was precisely what it would have been had she been born and bred in Antomir

Her "Good holiday, dad. Good holiday, Dave!" went straight to my heart

"Well, I've brought him to you, haven't I? Are you pleased?" her father said, with affectionate grimness, in Yiddish

"Oh, you're a dandy dad. You're just sweet," she returned, in English, putting up her red lips as if he were her baby. And this, too, went to my heart

When her father had gone to have his shoes changed for slippers and before her mother came down from her bedroom, where she was apparently dressing for supper, f.a.n.n.y slipped her arm around me and I kissed her lips and eyes

A chuckle rang out somewhere near by. Standing in the doorway of the back parlor, Mefisto-like, was Mary, f.a.n.n.y's twelve-year-old sister

"Shame!" she said, gloatingly

"The nasty thing!" f.a.n.n.y exclaimed, half gaily, half in anger

"You're nasty yourself," returned Mary, making faces at her sister

"Shut up or I'll knock your head off."

"Stop quarreling, kids," I intervened. Then, addressing myself to Mary, "Can you spell 'eavesdropping'?"

Mary laughed

"Never mind laughing," I insisted. "Do you know what eavesdropping means? Is it a nice thing to do? Anyhow, when you're as big as f.a.n.n.y and you have a sweetheart, won't you let him kiss you?" As I said this I took f.a.n.n.y's hand tenderly

"She has sweethearts already," said f.a.n.n.y. "She is running around with three boys."

"I ain't," Mary protested, pouting.

"Well, three sweethearts means no sweetheart at all," I remarked

f.a.n.n.y and I went into the front parlor, a vast, high-ceiled room, as large as the average four-room flat in the "modern apartment-house" that had recently been completed on the next block. It was drearily too large for the habits of the East Side of my time, depressingly out of keeping with its sense of home. It had lanky pink-and-gold furniture and a heavy bright carpet, all of which had a forbidding effect. It was as though the chairs and the sofa had been placed there, not for use, but for storage. Nor was there enough furniture to give the room an air of being inhabited, the six pink-and-gold pieces and the marble-topped center-table losing themselves in s.p.a.ces full of gaudy desolation

"She's awful saucy," said f.a.n.n.y.

I caught her in my arms. "I have not three sweethearts. I have only one, and that's a real one," I cooed

"Only one? Really and truly?" she demanded, playfully. She gathered me to her plump bosom, planting a deep, slow, sensuous kiss on my lips

I cast a side-glance to ascertain if Mary was not spying upon us

"Don't be uneasy," f.a.n.n.y whispered. "She won't dare. We can kiss all we want."

I thought she was putting it in a rather matter-of-fact way, but I kissed her with pa.s.sion, all the same

"Dearest! If you knew how happy I am," I murmured

"Are you really? Oh, I don't believe you," she jested, self-sufficiently.

"You're just pretending, that's all. Let me kiss your sweet mouthie again."

She did, and then, breaking away at the sound of her mother's lumbering steps, she threw out her bosom with an upward jerk, a trick she had which I disliked

Ten minutes later the whole family, myself included, were seated around a large oval table in the bas.e.m.e.nt dining-room. Besides the members already known to the reader, there was f.a.n.n.y's mother, a corpulent woman with a fat, diabetic face and large, listless eyes, and f.a.n.n.y's brother, Rubie, a boy with intense features, one year younger than Mary. Rubie was the youngest of five children, the oldest two, daughters, being married

Mr. Kaplan was in his skull-cap, while I wore my dark-brown derby.

Everything in this house was strictly orthodox and as old-fas.h.i.+oned as the American environment would permit

That there was not a trace of leavened bread in the house, its place being taken by thin, flat, unleavened "matzos," and that the repast included "matzo b.a.l.l.s," wine, mead, and other accessories of a Pa.s.sover meal, is a matter of course

Mr. Kaplan was wrapped up in his family, and on this occasion, though he presided with conscious dignity, he was in one of his best domestic moods, talkative, and affectionately facetious. The children were the real masters of his house

Watching his wife nag Rubie because he would not accept another matzo ball, Mr. Kaplan said: "Don't worry, Malkah. Your matzo b.a.l.l.s are delicious, even if your 'only son' won't do justice to them.

Aren't they, David?"

"They certainly are," I answered. "What is more, they have the genuine Antomir taste to them."

"Hear that, f.a.n.n.y?" Mr. Kaplan said to my betrothed. "You had better learn to make matzo b.a.l.l.s exactly like these. He likes everything that smells of Antomir, you know." "That's all right,"

said Malkah. "f.a.n.n.y is a good housekeeper. May I have as good a year."

"It's a good thing you say it," her husband jested. "Else David might break the engagement."

"Let him," said f.a.n.n.y, with a jerk of her bosom and a theatrical glance at me. "I really don't know how to make matzo b.a.l.l.s, and Pa.s.sover is nearly over, so there's no time for mamma to show me how to do it."

"I'll do so next year," her mother said, with an affectionate smile that kindled life in her diabetic eyes. "The two of you will then have to pa.s.s Pa.s.sover with us."

"I accept the invitation at once," I said

"Provided you attend the seder, too," remarked Kaplan, referring to the elaborate and picturesque ceremony attending the first two suppers of the great festival

I had been expected to partake of those ceremonial repasts on the first and second nights of this Pa.s.sover, but had been unavoidably kept away from the city. Kaplan had resented it, and even now, as he spoke of the next year's seder, there was reproach in his voice.

"I will, I will," I said, ardently.

"One mustn't do business on a seder night. It isn't right."

"Give it to him, pa!" f.a.n.n.y cut in.

"I am not joking," Kaplan persisted. "One has got to be a Jew.

Excuse me, David, for speaking like that, but you re going to be as good as a son of mine and I have a right to talk to you in this way."

"Why, of course, you have!" I answered, with filial docility

His lecture bored me, but it did me good, too. It was sweet to hear myself called "as good as a son" by this man of Talmudic education who was at the same time a man of substance and of excellent family

The chicken was served. My intended wife ate voraciously, biting l.u.s.tily and chewing with gusto. The sight of it jarred on me somewhat, but I overruled myself. "It's all right," I thought. "She's a healthy girl. She'll make me a strong mate, and she'll bear me healthy children."

I had a temptation to take her in my arms and kiss her. "I am not in love with her, and yet I am so happy," I thought. "Oh, love isn't essential to happiness. Not at all. Our old generation is right."