Albert arrived in Hamburg on a warm day late in June. He was dusty,
hungry, tired. Travel by chaise to Hamburg was very fatiguing. And to
add to his discomfiture when he reached his uncle’s town he found the
shutters closed and the doors boarded, the family having departed for
their summer home. Why had not his uncle given him specific instructions
how to get to him? He was vexed and stormed at the coachman. A neighbor
finally furnished his uncle’s business address. Everybody knew the
location of Leopold Zorn’s bank.
Albert’s irritation increased at finding Uncle Leopold away.
“Was I not expected?” he demanded.
The pompous man, whom he addressed, smiled—haughtily, Albert
thought—and turned away from him as if he were a tailor’s apprentice
delivering a garment.
“Aaron, Herr Zorn’s nephew is over there,” the pompous man called—“that
boy with the valise at the door—”
“That boy with the valise at the door!” Albert felt wroth enough to turn
around and go back home with the same chaise. Huh! that boy with the
valise at the door.
Presently his anger turned to laughter. A short, broad, middle-aged man,
with sunken cheeks which were rounded by a growth of a beard streaked
with gray, approached him. He seemed to lurch forward, rubbed his right
hand against his greenish coat, and extended the usual greetings to him.
His was a short, fat little hand, moist and clinging.
“Yes, my child,” he addressed Albert patronizingly, though not
unrespectfully, smacking his lips after every few words as if feeling
the taste of his utterance—“Yes, my child, your esteemed uncle has
given me instructions to look after your wants. Ah, that uncle of
yours,—a heart of gold!—yes, my child, pure gold, sifted gold—gold,
as the Bible says, that comes from Ophir. God grant that we have a few
more the likes of him; yes, my child, pure gold without a speck of
dross. ‘Aaron,’ says he to me—‘Aaron Hirsch,’ says he, ‘my nephew will
drop in one of these days during my absence and I want you to take good
care of him and find him respectable lodgings.’ ‘Herr Banquier,’ says I
to him, ‘you need not worry on that score, Aaron Hirsch will take good
care of his benefactor’s nephew.’ Indeed, my child, I have just the
place for you—yes, sir, just the place—the very best place—in fact.
The widow Rodbertus on the Grosse Bleichenstrasse has a room overlooking
a garden with two large windows. No back-hall bedroom for the nephew of
the great banker, says I to myself.” Aaron laughed unctuously. “And it
is not far from here either. Just a step as we say in Hamburg. Let me
have the valise—it’s too heavy for you. I can carry it with my little
finger.”
Aaron’s speech grew in fluency as they proceeded on the way to Widow
Rodbertus, though “his little finger” had soon grown tired and he was
forced to rest his valise on the sidewalk now and then.
He plodded on, his speech uninterrupted in spite of the encumbrance.
“You see, I am a trusted clerk in your esteemed uncle’s bank,” he said
when they had reached Grosse Bleichenstrasse and, lowering his voice, he
added, “but as a side line I sell lottery tickets. S—sh! Your esteemed
uncle warned me not to sell any tickets to anyone in his employ or to
any of the bank’s customers.”
“There is honor among thieves—hey? Only one robbery at a time,” Albert
struck in.
Aaron suddenly let the valise drop to the pavement, and, with his hands
at his sides, burst into convulsive laughter.
“That’s a good one—I must tell it to your esteemed uncle.” Then
reverting to a more serious tone he said cautiously, “I sold your father
the very first lottery ticket he ever purchased—ask him if I tell you a
lie. And he came within three numbers of the Grand Prize. Just think of
it—within three numbers! If the man drawing the lottery had just moved
his hand a tiny bit further down—just a wee, wee bit—your father would
have been the recipient of two hundred thousand marks! And do you think
I’d have asked your father for a single _pfennig_ for having been his
good angel—no, no, not a _pfennig_, not a _groschen_, not even a
thank-you! No, my child, not Aaron Hirsch! I wouldn’t have asked your
good father for a pinch of snuff.”
But they were soon inside, Aaron introducing the young man to Widow
Rodbertus as the nephew of the “great banker” and Madame Rodbertus to
Albert as the kindest soul that ever drew breath.