"You bad, abominable boy," yelled the melamed, "you do not learn your lessons, and you throw your book upon the floor. Did you not read that the school of Shamai says, 'To bless first the day and then the wine?'"
Here a loud and sarcastic voice from the window called out;
"Reb Moshe, that poor child has never seen wine in his life, and suffers hunger and flogging every day; it is not easy for him to remember whether to bless first the day and then the wine."
But Reb Moshe did not hear that speech, because both his hands were busy belabouring the head and shoulders of his pupil, who, without crying out, tried to avoid the blows by ducking on the floor.
Suddenly a pair of strong hands pushed the melamed aside, and he, losing his footing, fell down, carrying with him the rickety table.
"Reb Moshe!" called out the same sarcastic and angry voice.
"Is this not an Israelitish child that you wreak your spite upon it?
Is it not a poor man's child and our brother?"
His face burning with indignation, he bent down, and raising the child in his arms, turned towards the door.
"Reb Moshe, you drive all intelligence out of the children's heads, kill all the feeling in their hearts; I heard them laughing when you beat Lejbele."
Saying this, he disappeared with the child in his arms.
Only then did Reb Moshe awaken from the stupefaction into which the sudden assault had plunged him, and disengaging his burly frame from under the table, he shouted:
"Assassin! murderer!" and turning towards his scholars, yelled: "Get hold of him! stone him!"
But he addressed empty benches; the books lay scattered about and the seats turned upside down. The scholars, seeing their master prostrate under the table, and one of their companions rescued by main force, had all rushed, partly from fright and partly from a wish for liberty, through the door and dispersed about the town like a flight of birds released from a cage.
The school was empty and the court deserted, except for a few grave looking men who stood in the portico of the Bet-ha-Kahol, and towards them rushed the frantic melamed, panting and tearing his hair. Meir in the meanwhile went swiftly on, with the child in his arms, whose tears fell thick and fast; but the eyes which looked through the tears at Meir were no longer the tears of an idiot.
"Morejne!" whispered Lejbele.
"Morejne!" he repeated, in a still lower voice, "how good you are!"
At the corner of the little street where the tailor lived, Meir put the child down.
"There," he said, pointing at Shmul's house, "go home now."
The child stiffened, put his hands into his sleeves, and remained motionless. Meir smiled and looked into his face:
"Are you afraid?"
"I am afraid," said the motionless boy.
Instead of returning as he had intended, the young man went towards Shmul's hut, followed at a distance by Lejbele. The day was almost over, and so was work in the little street. The pale and ragged inhabitants crowded before their thresholds.
Scarcely had Meir penetrated into the street, where he became aware of a great change in the attitude of the people towards him.
Formerly, the grandson of Saul had been greeted effusively on all sides; they had come to him with their complaints, sometimes asked for advice; others had greeted him from their windows with loud voices.
Now scarcely anybody seemed to notice him. The men looked away; the women glanced at him with curiosity, whispered to each other, and pointed their fingers at him. One of the woodcutters with whom he had worked at his grandfather's looked at him sadly and withdrew into his hut. Meir shrugged his shoulders impatiently.
"What is it all about?" he thought. "What wrong have I done to them?"
Strange it seemed to him also that the tailor did not rush out to meet him with his usual effusive flatteries and complainings; nevertheless he entered the dwelling. Lejbele remained outside, crouching near the wall.
The young man had to bend his head in order to enter the low doorway leading into the dark entrance where two goats were dimly visible, thence to the room where the air, in spite of the open window, felt heavy and oppressive. A thin woman with a wrinkled face passed him on the threshold. It was Shmul's wife, who carried a piece of brown bread to the child outside, Lejbele's supper when he came home from school.
The whole family were eating a similar supper, with the exception of the elder and grown-up people, who seasoned their bread with pinches of chopped raw onion, of which a small quantity was lying on a battered plate. Besides Lejbele, there were two younger boys sitting on the floor, a two-year-old child crawled about on all fours, and a baby a few months old was suspended in a cradle near the ceiling, and rocked by one of the elder girls. Another girl was busy with the goats, and a third was feeding a blind old woman, Shmul's mother. She broke the bread in pieces, sprinkled onion upon it, and put it into the grandmother's hand, sometimes into her mouth. The blind mother was the only one in the family who possessed a bed; the others slept on the floor or upon the hard benches. She looked well cared for, the crossover on her shoulders was clean and whole, and on her head she had a quilted cap of black satin, profusely trimmed.
The grand-daughter seemed quite absorbed in task of feeding the old woman. She patted wrinkled hand encouragingly when she perceived difficulty in masticating the hard food.
As in the prosperous household of Saul, so in the dirty hut of the tailor, Shmul, the mother occupied the first place, and was the object of general care and reverence. Such a thing as a son, be he rich or poor, neglecting those who gave him life, is never seen in Israel. "Like the branches of a tree, we all sprang from her," said the head of the house of Ezofowich.
The tailor, Shmul, could not express his feelings like Saul, but when his mother lost her sight, he tore his long, curly hair in despair, fasted with his whole family for three days, and with the money thus saved bought an old bedstead, which he put together with his own hands against the wall; and when Sarah Ezofowich, Ber's wife, gave him an order to sew a black satin dress for her, he cut a goodish piece from the material to make a quilted cap for his mother.
When Shmul saw Meir coming into the room, he jumped up, bending his flexible body in two; but he did not kiss his hand as usual, or call out joyfully:
"Ai! what a visitor, what a welcome visitor! Morejne!", he exclaimed, "I have heard of what you have done. The children from school came running past, and said you had knocked the melamed under the table and rescued my Lejbele from his powerful hands. You did it out of kindness, but it was a rash deed, Morejne, and a sinful one, and will bring me into great trouble. Reb Moshe will not take Lejbele back, nor receive any of my other boys, and they will remain stupid and ignorant. Ai! Ai! Morejne, you have brought trouble upon me and upon yourself with your kindly heart."
"Do not trouble about me, Shmul; never mind about what I have brought upon myself, but take pity upon your child, and at least do not whip him at home; he suffers enough at school."
"And what if he suffers?" exclaimed Shmul. "His fathers went to school, and I went there and suffered the same; it cannot be helped; it is necessary."
"And have you never thought, Shmul, that things might be different?"
questioned Meir gently.
Shmul's eyes flashed.
"Morejne!" he exclaimed, "do not utter sinful words under my roof. My hut is a poor one, but, thanks to the Lord, we keep the law and obey the elders. The tailor Shmul is very poor, and by the work of his hands supports his wife, eight children, and his blind mother. But he is poor before the Lord, and before the people, because faithfully he keeps the covenant and the Sabbath, eats nothing that is unclean, says all his prayers, crying aloud before the Lord. He does not keep friendship with the Goims (aliens) as the Lord protects and loves only the Israelites, and they only possess a soul. Thus lives the tailor Shmul, even as his fathers lived before him."
When the flexible and fiery Shmul had finished, Meir asked very gently:
"And were your fathers happy? and you, Shmul, are you happy?"
This question brought before the tailor's eyes a vision of all his sufferings.
"Ai! Ai! Let not my worst enemy be as happy as I am. The skin sticks to my bones, and my heart is full of pain."
A deep sigh, from the corner of the room, seemed to re-echo the tailor's sorrowful outburst.
Meir turned round, and seeing a big shadowy figure in the corner, asked, "Who is that?"
Shmul nodded his head plaintively and waved his hands.
"It is the carrier, Johel, come to see me. We have known each other a long time."
At the same time a tall, heavy man came into the light, and approached the two. Johel was powerfully built, but he looked broken down and troubled. His jacket, without sleeves, was dirty and ragged, his bare feet cut and bruised, the fiery red hair matted, and the mouth swollen. There was something defiant in his looks, and yet he seemed as if he could not look anybody straight in the face. He went near the table to take a pinch of onion to season the bread he was holding in his hand.
"Meir," he said, "you are an old acquaintance. I drove your uncle Raphael when he went to fetch you, a poor little orphan, and I drove you and him to Szybow."
"I have seen you since," said Meir. "You were a decent carrier then, and had four horses."
The inmate of the poorhouse smiled.