The Foreigner Part 24

"Ho, ho," said Rosenblatt, "it is all the same, sweetheart and wife. They are both much the better for a stick now and then.

You are not the kind of man to stand beggar before a portionless Slovak girl, a young man handsome, clever, well-to-do. You do not need thus to humble yourself. Go in, my son, with more courage and with bolder tactics. I will gladly help you."

As a first result of Rosenblatt's encouraging advice, Samuel recovered much of his self-a.s.surance, which had been rudely shattered, and therefore much of his good humour. As a further result, he determined upon a more vigorous policy in his wooing.

He would humble himself no more. He would find means to bring this girl to her place, namely, at his feet.

The arrival of a Saint's day brought Samuel an opportunity to inaugurate his new policy. The foreign colony was rigidly devoted to its religious duties. Nothing could induce a Galician to engage in his ordinary avocation upon any day set apart as sacred by his Church. In the morning such of the colony as adhered to the Greek Church, went _en ma.s.se_ to the quaint little church which had come to be erected and which had been consecrated by a travelling Archbishop, and there with reverent devotion joined in wors.h.i.+p, using the elaborate service of the Greek rite. The religious duties over, they proceeded still further to celebrate the day in a somewhat riotous manner.

With the growth of the colony new houses had been erected which far outshone Paulina's in magnificence, but Paulina's still continued to be a social centre chiefly through Rosenblatt's influence. For no man was more skilled than he in the art of promoting sociability as an investment. There was still the full complement of boarders filling the main room and the bas.e.m.e.nt, and these formed a nucleus around which the social life of a large part of the colony loved to gather.

It was a cold evening in February. The mercury had run down till it had almost disappeared in the bulb and Winnipeg was having a taste of forty below. Through this exhilarating air Kalman was hurrying home as fast as his st.u.r.dy legs could take him. His fingers were numb handling the coins received from the sale of his papers, but the boy cared nothing for that. He had had a good afternoon and evening; for with the Winnipeg men the colder the night the warmer their hearts, and these fierce February days were harvest days for the hardy newsboys crying their wares upon the streets. So the sharp cold only made Kalman run the faster. Above him twinkled the stars, under his feet sparkled the snow, the keen air filled his lungs with ozone that sent his blood leaping through his veins.

A new zest was added to his life to-night, for as he ran he remembered that it was a feast day and that at his home there would be good eating and dance and song. As he ran he planned how he would avoid Rosenblatt and get past him into Paulina's room, where he would be safe, and where, he knew, good things saved from the feast for him by his sister would be waiting him. To her he would entrust all his cents above what was due to Rosenblatt, and with her they would be safe. For by neither threatening nor wheedling could Rosenblatt extract from her what was entrusted to her care, as he could from the slow-witted Paulina.

Keenly sensitive to the radiant beauty of the sparkling night, filled with the pleasurable antic.i.p.ation of the feast before him, vibrating in every nerve with the mere joy of living his vigorous young life, Kalman ran along at full speed, singing now and then in breathless s.n.a.t.c.hes a wild song of the Hungarian plains. Turning a sharp corner near his home, he almost overran a little girl.

"Kalman!" she cried with a joyous note in her voice.

"h.e.l.lo! Elizabeth Ketzel, what do you want?" answered the boy, pulling up panting.

"Will you be singing to-night?" asked the little girl timidly.

"Sure, I will," replied the lad, who had already mastered in the school of the streets the intricacies of the Canadian vernacular.

"I wish I could come and listen."

"It is no place for little girls," said Kalman brusquely; then noting the shadow upon the face of the child, he added, "Perhaps you can come to the back window and Irma will let you in."

"I'll be sure to come," said Elizabeth to herself, for Kalman was off again like the wind.

Paulina's house was overflowing with riotous festivity. Avoiding the front door, Kalman ran to the back of the house, and making entrance through the window, there waited for his sister. Soon she came in.

"Oh, Kalman!" she cried, throwing her arms about him and kissing him, "such a feast as I have saved for you! And you are cold. Your poor fingers are frozen."

"Not a bit of it, Irma," said the boy--they always spoke in Russian, these two, ever since the departure of their father--"but I am hungry, oh! so hungry!"

Already Irma was flying about the room, drawing from holes and corners the bits she had saved from the feast for her brother.

She spread them on the bed before him.

"But first," she cried, "I shall bring to the window the hot stew.

Paulina," the children always so spoke of her, "has kept it hot for you," and she darted through the door.

After what seemed to Kalman a very long time indeed, she appeared at the window with a covered dish of steaming stew.

"What kept you?" said her brother impatiently; "I am starved."

"That nasty, hateful, little Sprink," she said. "Here, help me through." She looked flushed and angry, her "burnin' brown eyes"

s.h.i.+ning like blazing coals.

"What is the matter?" said Kalman, when he had a moment's leisure to observe her.

"He is very rough and rude," said the girl, "and he is a little pig."

Kalman nodded and waited. He had no time for mere words.

"And he tried to kiss me just now," she continued indignantly.

"Well, that's nothing," said Kalman; "they all want to do that."

"Not for months, Kalman," protested Irma, "and never again, and especially that little Sprink. Never! Never!"

As Kalman looked at her erect little figure and her flushed face, it dawned on him that a change had come to his little sister.

He paused in his eating.

"Irma," he said, "what have you done to yourself? Is it your hair that you have been putting up on your head? No, it is not your hair. You are not the same. You are--" he paused to consider, "yes, that's it. You are a lady."

The anger died out of Irma's brown eyes and flushed face. A soft and tender and mysterious light suffused her countenance.

"No, I am not a lady," she said, "but you remember what father said. Our mother was a lady, and I am going to be one."

Almost never had the children spoken of their mother. The subject was at once too sacred and too terrible for common speech. Kalman laid down his spoon.

"I remember," he said after a few moments' silence. A shadow lay upon his face. "She was a lady, and she died in the snow."

His voice sank to a whisper. "Wasn't it awful, Irma?"

"Yes, Kalman dear," said his sister, sitting down beside him and putting her arms about his neck, "but she had no pain, and she was not afraid."

"No," said the boy with a ring in his voice, "she was not afraid; nor was father afraid either." He rose from his meal.

"Why, Kalman," exclaimed his sister, "you are not half done your feast. There are such lots of nice things yet."

"I can't eat, Irma, when I think of that--of that man. I choke here," pointing to his throat.

"Well, well, we won't think of him to-night. Some day very soon, we shall be free from him. Sit down and eat."

But the boy remained standing, his face overcast with a fierce frown.

"Some day," he muttered, more to himself than to his sister, "I shall kill him."

"Not to-day, at any rate, Kalman," said his sister, brightening up. "Let us forget it to-night. Look at this pie. It is from Mrs. Fitzpatrick, and this pudding."

The boy allowed his look to linger upon the dainties. He was a healthy boy and very hungry. As he looked his appet.i.te returned.

He shook himself as if throwing off a burden.

"No, not to-night," he said; "I am not going to stop my feast for him."

"No, indeed," cried Irma. "Come quick and finish your feast.

Oh, what eating we have had, and then what dancing! And they all want to dance with me," she continued,--"Jacob and Henry and Nicholas, and they are all nice except that horrid little Sprink."

"Did you not dance with him?"