Children of the Ghetto Part 79

"Thank you. I thought so. Luck that fellow's engaged. Do you know, Esther. I didn't sleep all night."

"No?" said Esther. "You seemed quite well when I saw you."

"So I was, but seeing you again, so unexpectedly, excited me. You have been whirling in my brain ever since. I hadn't thought of you for years--"

"I hadn't thought of you," Esther echoed frankly.

"No, I suppose not," he said, a little ruefully. "But, anyhow, fate has brought us together again. I recognized you the moment I set eyes on you, for all your grand clothes and your swell bouquets. I tell you I was just struck all of a heap; of course, I knew about your luck, but I hadn't realized it. There wasn't any one in the whole theatre who looked the lady more--'pon honor; you'd have no cause to blush in the company of d.u.c.h.esses. In fact I know a d.u.c.h.ess or two who don't look near so refined. I was quite surprised. Do you know, if any one had told me you used to live up in a garret--"

"Oh, please don't recall unpleasant things," interrupted Esther, petulantly, a little shudder going through her, partly at the picture he called up, partly at his grating vulgarity. Her repulsion to him was growing. Why had he developed so disagreeably? She had not disliked him as a boy, and he certainly had not inherited his traits of coa.r.s.eness from his father, whom she still conceived as a courtly old gentleman.

"Oh well, if you don't like it, I won't. I see you're like me; I never think of the Ghetto if I can help it. Well, as I was saying, I haven't had a wink of sleep since I saw you. I lay tossing about, thinking all sorts of things, till I could stand it no longer, and I got up and dressed and walked about the streets and strayed into Covent Garden Market, where the inspiration came upon me to get you this bouquet. For, of course, it was about you that I had been thinking."

"About me?" said Esther, turning pale.

"Yes, of course. Don't make _Schnecks_--you know what I mean. I can't help using the old expression when I look at you; the past seems all come back again. They were happy days, weren't they, Esther, when I used to come up to see you in Royal Street; I think you were a little sweet on me in those days, Esther, and I know I was regular mashed on you."

He looked at her with a fond smile.

"I dare say you were a silly boy," said Esther, coloring uneasily under his gaze. "However, you needn't reproach yourself now."

"Reproach myself, indeed! Never fear that. What I have been reproaching myself with all night is never having looked you up. Somehow, do you know, I kept asking myself whether I hadn't made a fool of myself lately, and I kept thinking things might have been different if--"

"Nonsense, nonsense," interrupted Esther with an embarra.s.sed laugh.

"You've been doing very well, learning to know the world and studying law and mixing with pleasant people."

"Ah, Esther," he said, shaking his head, "it's very good of you to say that. I don't say I've done anything particularly foolish or out of the way. But when a man is alone, he sometimes gets a little reckless and wastes his time, and you know what it is. I've been thinking if I had some one to keep me steady, some one I could respect, it would be the best thing that could happen to me."

"Oh, but surely you ought to have sense enough to take care of yourself.

And there is always your father. Why don't you see more of him?"

"Don't chaff a man when you see he's in earnest. You know what I mean.

It's you I am thinking of."

"Me? Oh well, if you think my friendship can be of any use to you I shall be delighted. Come and see me sometimes and tell me of your struggles."

"You know I don't mean that," he said desperately. "Couldn't we be more than friends? Couldn't we commence again--where we left off"

"How do you mean?" she murmured.

"Why are you so cold to me?" he burst out. "Why do you make it so hard for me to speak? You know I love you, that I fell in love with you all over again last night. I never really forgot you; you were always deep down in my breast. All that I said about steadying me wasn't a lie. I felt that, too. But the real thing I feel is the need of you. I want you to care for me as I care for you. You used to, Esther; you know you did."

"I know nothing of the kind," said Esther, "and I can't understand why a young fellow like you wants to bother his head with such ideas. You've got to make your way in the world--"

"I know, I know; that's why I want you. I didn't tell you the exact truth last night, Esther, but I must really earn some money soon. All that two thousand is used up, and I only get along by squeezing some money out of the old man every now and again. Don't frown; he got a rise of screw three years ago and can well afford it. Now that's what I said to myself last night; if I were engaged, it would be an incentive to earning something."

"For a Jewish young man, you are fearfully unpractical," said Esther, with a forced smile. "Fancy proposing to a girl without even prospects of prospects."

"Oh, but I _have_ got prospects. I tell you I shall make no end of money on the stage."

"Or no beginning," she said, finding the facetious vein easiest.

"No fear. I know I've got as much talent as Bob Andrews (he admits it himself), and _he_ draws his thirty quid a week."

"Wasn't that the man who appeared at the police-court the other day for being drunk and disorderly?"

"Y-e-es," admitted Leonard, a little disconcerted. "He is a very good fellow, but he loses his head when he's in liquor."

"I wonder you can care for society of that sort," said Esther.

"Perhaps you're right. They're not a very refined lot. I tell you what--I'd like to go on the stage, but I'm not mad on it, and if you only say the word I'll give it up. There! And I'll go on with my law studies; honor bright, I will."

"I should, if I were you," she said.

"Yes, but I can't do it without encouragement. Won't you say 'yes'?

Let's strike the bargain. I'll stick to law and you'll stick to me."

She shook her head. "I am afraid I could not promise anything you mean.

As I said before, I shall be always glad to see you. If you do well, no one will rejoice more than I."

"Rejoice! What's the good of that to me? I want you to care for me; I want to took forward to your being my wife."

"Really, I cannot take advantage of a moment of folly like this. You don't know what you're saying. You saw me last night, after many years, and in your gladness at seeing an old friend you flare up and fancy you're in love with me. Why, who ever heard of such foolish haste? Go back to your studies, and in a day or two you will find the flame sinking as rapidly as it leaped up."

"No, no! Nothing of the kind!" His voice was thicker and there was real pa.s.sion in it. She grew dearer to him as the hope of her love receded.

"I couldn't forget you. I care for you awfully. I realized last night that my feeling for you is quite unlike what I have ever felt towards any other girl. Don't say no! Don't send me away despairing. I can hardly realize that you have grown so strange and altered. Surely you oughtn't to put on any side with me. Remember the times we have had together."

"I remember," she said gently. "But I do not want to marry any one: indeed, I don't."

"Then if there is no one else in your thoughts, why shouldn't it be me?

There! I won't press you for an answer now. Only don't say it's out of the question."

"I'm afraid I must."

"No, you mustn't, Esther, you mustn't," he exclaimed excitedly. "Think of what it means for me. You are the only Jewish girl I shall ever care for; and father would be pleased if I were to marry you. You know if I wanted to marry a _Shiksah_ there'd be awful rows. Don't treat me as if I were some outsider with no claim upon you. I believe we should get on splendidly together, you and me. We've been through the same sort of thing in childhood, we should understand each other, and be in sympathy with each other in a way I could never be with another girl and I doubt if you could with another fellow."

The words burst from him like a torrent, with excited foreign-looking gestures. Esther's headache was coming on badly.

"What would be the use of my deceiving you?" she said gently. "I don't think I shall ever marry. I'm sure I could never make you--or any one else--happy. Won't you let me be your friend?"

"Friend!" he echoed bitterly. "I know what it is; I'm poor. I've got no money bags to lay at your feet. You're like all the Jewish girls after all. But I only ask you to wait; I shall have plenty of money by and by.

Who knows what more luck my father might drop in for? There are lots of rich religious cranks. And then I'll work hard, honor bright I will."

"Pray be reasonable," said Esther quietly. "You know you are talking at random. Yesterday this time you had no idea of such a thing. To-day you are all on fire. To-morrow you will forget all about it."

"Never! Never!" he cried. "Haven't I remembered you all these years?

They talk of man's faithlessness and woman's faithfulness. It seems to me, it's all the other way. Women are a deceptive lot."