Yiddish Tales Part 48

Chayyim resolves to speak to him this time even more leisurely and independently, not to cringe before him.

Chayyim could already see Loibe-Bares' house in the distance. He coughed till his throat was clear, stroked his beard down, and looked at his coat.

"Still a very good coat!" he said aloud, as though trying to persuade himself that the coat was still good, so that he might feel more courage and more proper pride.

But when he got to Loibe-Bares' big house, when the eight large windows looking onto the street flashed into his eyes, the windows being brightly illuminated from within, his heart gave a flutter.

"Oi, Lord of the World, help!" came of its own accord to his lips. Then he felt ashamed, and caught himself up, "Ett, nonsense!"

As he pushed the door open, the "prayer" escaped him once more, "Help, mighty G.o.d! or it will be the death of me!"

Loibe-Bares was seated at a large table covered with a clean white table-cloth, and drinking while he talked cheerfully with his household.

"There's a Jew come, Tate!" called out a boy of twelve, on seeing Chayyim standing by the door.

"So there is!" called out a second little boy, still more merrily, fixing Chayyim with his large, black, mischievous eyes.

All the rest of those at table began looking at Chayyim, and he thought every moment that he must fall of a heap onto the floor.

"It will look very bad if I fall," he said to himself, made a step forward, and, without saying good evening, stammered out:

"I just happened to be pa.s.sing, you understand, and I saw you sitting--so I knew you were at home--well, I thought one ought to call--neighbors--"

"Well, welcome, welcome!" said Loibe-Bares, smiling. "You've come at the right moment. Sit down."

A stone rolled off Chayyim's heart at this reply, and, with a glance at the two little boys, he quietly took a seat.

"Leah, give Reb Chayyim a gla.s.s of tea," commanded Loibe-Bares.

"Quite a kind man!" thought Chayyim. "May the Almighty come to his aid!"

He gave his host a grateful look, and would gladly have fallen onto the Gevir's thick neck, and kissed him.

"Well, and what are you about?" inquired his host.

"Thanks be to G.o.d, one lives!"

The maid handed him a gla.s.s of tea. He said, "Thank you," and then was sorry: it is not the proper thing to thank a servant. He grew red and bit his lips.

"Have some jelly with it!" Loibe-Bares suggested.

"An excellent man, an excellent man!" thought Chayyim, astonished. "He is sure to lend."

"You deal in something?" asked Loibe-Bares.

"Why, yes," answered Chayyim. "One's little bit of business, thank Heaven, is no worse than other people's!"

"What price are oats fetching now?" it occurred to the Gevir to ask.

Oats had fallen of late, but it seemed better to Chayyim to say that they had risen.

"They have risen very much!" he declared in a mercantile tone of voice.

"Well, and have you some oats ready?" inquired the Gevir further.

"I've got a nice lot of oats, and they didn't cost me much, either. I got them quite cheap," replied Chayyim, with more warmth, forgetting, while he spoke, that he hadn't had an ear of oats in his granary for weeks.

"And you are thinking of doing a little speculating?" asked Loibe-Bares.

"Are you not in need of any money?"

"Thanks be to G.o.d," replied Chayyim, proudly, "I have never yet been in need of money."

"Why did I say that?" he thought then, in terror at his own words. "How am I going to ask for a loan now?" and Chayyim wanted to back the cart a little, only Loibe-Bares prevented him by saying:

"So I understand you make a good thing of it, you are quite a wealthy man."

"My wealth be to my enemies!" Chayyim wanted to draw back, but after a glance at Loibe-Bares' shining face, at the blue jar with the jelly, he answered proudly:

"Thank Heaven, I have nothing to complain of!"

"There goes your charitable loan!" The thought came like a kick in the back of his head. "Why are you boasting like that? Tell him you want twenty-five rubles for Ulas--that he must save you, that you are in despair, that--"

But Chayyim fell deeper and deeper into a contented and happy way of talking, praised his business more and more, and conversed with the Gevir as with an equal.

But he soon began to feel he was one too many, that he should not have sat there so long, or have talked in that way. It would have been better to have talked about the fair, about a loan. Now it is too late:

"I have no need of money!" and Chayyim gave a despairing look at Loibe-Bares' cheerful face, at the two little boys who sat opposite and watched him with sly, mischievous eyes, and who whispered knowingly to each other, and then smiled more knowingly still!

A cold perspiration covered him. He rose from his chair.

"You are going already?" observed Loibe-Bares, politely.

"Now perhaps I could ask him!" It flashed across Chayyim's mind that he might yet save himself, but, stealing a glance at the two boys with the roguish eyes that watched him so slyly, he replied with dignity:

"I must! Business! There is no time!" and it seems to him, as he goes toward the door, that the two little boys with the mischievous eyes are putting out their tongues after him, and that Loibe-Bares himself smiles and says, "Stick your tongues out further, further still!"

Chayyim's shoulders seem to burn, and he makes haste to get out of the house.

THE TWO BROTHERS

It is three months since Yainkele and Berele--two brothers, the first fourteen years old, the second sixteen--have been at the college that stands in the town of X--, five German miles from their birthplace Dalissovke, after which they are called the "Dalissovkers."

Yainkele is a slight, pale boy, with black eyes that peep slyly from beneath the two black eyebrows. Berele is taller and stouter than Yainkele, his eyes are lighter, and his glance is more defiant, as though he would say, "Let me alone, I shall laugh at you all yet!"