ELIAS speaks of “day-break”; but it can not accurately be said that the
day broke at all that morning. The blackness of the night slowly
faded into a dismal, lifeless drab. It rained. The wind blew from the
north-east. Under it, the branches of the trees, across in the park,
swayed strenuously to and fro. The sparrows, with sadly bedraggled
plumage, huddled together upon the window-sills, and raised their voices
in noisy disputation, as if thereby seeking to screw their courage up,
and not mind the%sorry weather. The milkman's wagon came rattling down
the street. The milkman wore a rubber overcoat. His war-whoop sounded
less spirited, less defiant, than its wont.
By and by Elias looked at his watch. It was getting along toward seven
o'clock. Just then somebody rapped upon his studio door. Elias's
nerves must indeed have been in a bad way. He started, paled, trembled,
recovered himself, and called out, “Come in.”
It was the rabbi.
“Good morning, Elias,” the rabbi said.
“Good morning,” responded Elias, with a none too hospitable inflection.
“So, you haven't been abed? You've been sitting up all night?” the rabbi
questioned.
“How do you know that?” was Elias's counter-question.
“I looked for you in your bedroom, and saw that your bed had not been
slept in.”
“Oh.”
After a pause, “What have you been doing, up alone all night?” the rabbi
asked.
“Lots of things. A man on the eve of his marriage has plenty to do.”
The rabbi stood still for a little while, glancing around the room. Then
he sat down. At which, Elias rose.
“If you'll excuse me,” he said, “I'll go down stairs. I haven't taken my
bath yet.”
“Have you said your prayers yet?” inquired the rabbi.
But Elias was already beyond ear-shot in the hall.
When, perhaps a quarter hour later, Elias, emerging from his bath,
entered his bedroom, he discovered the rabbi established there at the
window.
Wheeling about, and facing his nephew, “You didn't answer my question,”
the rabbi said.
“What question?”
“I asked whether you had said your prayers this morning.”
“Oh.”
“Well, have you?”
“No.”
“Perhaps lately you have got out of the habit of saying your
prayers--yes?”
Elias made no reply. He appeared not to have heard. He was busy
fastening the buttons into a shirt-bosom.
“I'll wait till you've finished dressing,” said the rabbi.
He went to the window, and stood looking out.
The rabbi's presence troubled Elias exceedingly. But, he thought,
considering every thing, the least he could do would be to put up with
it as graciously as possible and not grumble. “What do you want with
me, any how?” it was his impulse to demand. But he held his tongue, and
proceeded with his toilet.
When at last he had tied his cravat and buttoned his coat, “Are you
ready now to come down stairs with me?” the rabbi began.
“What for?”
“Several things. Are you ready? Will you come?”
“Oh, I suppose so,” Elias answered, and followed the old man from the
room.
To himself: “I don't care what he does or says. It may be annoying, but
it can't do any serious harm. To-day is the last day; and I'll let
him him have his own way in every thing, no matter how absurd and
exasperating it may be. I'll keep my temper and treat him respectfully,
no matter how hard he may try me.”
They had reached the front hall of the house. The rabbi put his hand
upon the knob of the front parlor door.
“Oh,” Elias exclaimed, drawing back, “are you going in there?”
“Yes.”
Calling to mind his resolution, Elias gulped down his unwillingness, and
said, “Oh, well; all right.” But it cost him an effort to do so.
Even during his mother's life-time, the front parlor had been but very
seldom used. Since her death, it had not been used at all. Indeed, since
the day of her funeral, now nearly three years gone by, Elias had not
crossed its threshold. The blinds and windows were kept permanently
closed, save when, once a week, the servants entered to sweep and dust.
Now the rabbi pushed open the door, and, stepping aside, signalled Elias
to pass in. Elias obeyed. The rabbi followed.
It was dark inside. Only a few pallid rays of daylight leaked through
at the edges of the curtains. The air was cold and at the same time
oppressive--laden with that stuffy, musty odor, which always pervades
an uninhabited, shut-up room. At first, Elias could scarcely see an
arm's-length before his face; but, as his eyesight gradually accustomed
itself to the obscurity, he was able to make out the forms of the
furniture, and to discern upon the walls sundry large black patches
which he knew to be pictures.
The rabbi struck a match.
“Take it,” he said to Elias, “and light the gas; I'm not tall enough.”
Elias did as he was bidden.
The gas-burner, from disuse, had got clogged with dust. It shot a long,
slim tongue of flame up into the air, and gave off a shrill, continuous
whistle. Every now and then the flame had a convulsion, the whistle
dropped a note or two; then both returned to their original conditions.
For a New York dwelling-house, it was a spacious room, this parlor;
say, in width twenty feet, by forty in depth. The chairs and sofas,
scrupulously wrapped in linen, were ranged along the walls. Over the
carpet, completely covering it, stretched a broad sheet of grayish
crash. The piano wore a rubber jacket, and had its legs swathed in
newspapers. The books in the bookcases--books of the decorative, rather
than of the readable order, for the most part--were locked up behind
glass doors. The tall mirror, between the windows, shone through a
veil of pink mosquito-netting. Supplies of the same material had been
stretched across all the pictures.
In front of one of these pictures--that which hung above the
mantel-piece--the rabbi now paused, and, raising his arm, pointed to it,
in silence.
It was the portrait of a gentleman, full length, life-size, done in
oils. The gentleman rested one hand upon a pile of ponderous, calf-bound
volumes--law-books, or medical works, they looked like--that towered
aloft from the floor. In his other hand, he held an unrolled scroll of
parchment, upon which big black Hebrew characters were inscribed.
Of artistic value the picture had little, or none at all; but it had
another sort of value: it was a portrait of Elias's father.
The rabbi pointed to it in silence. Elias thought the rabbi's proceeding
a little theatrical; but he made no comment.
By and by the rabbi lowered his arm, and faced about. Having done which,
he raised his other arm, and this time brought his index finger to bear
upon a portrait of Elias's mother.
Theatrical, certainly; disagreeably so, too; Elias thought.
At this point there befell an interruption which had somewhat the effect
of an anti-climax. The breakfast-bell rang.
“Well,” said the rabbi, “let's go to breakfast.”
Elias turned off the gas. They left the parlor, and went down stairs to
the dining-room.
There, having taken their places at the table, the rabbi extracted a
handkerchief from his pocket, and with it covered his head. Elias did
likewise. Whereupon the rabbi chanted the usual grace before meat. At
its conclusion, both he and Elias replaced their handkerchiefs in their
pockets, and the maid-servant brought the coffee.
For a while neither nephew nor uncle spoke.
At last, “What are you thinking about, Elias?” the rabbi asked.
“I was thinking, if you wish to know,” Elias answered, “of my great
happiness--of the fact that to-day the lady whom I love is to become my
wife.”
“Ah, so? It doesn't seem to improve your appetite,” returned the rabbi.
“You're not eating especially well.”
He made Elias the object of a curious, meditative glance; then pursued:
“Don't misunderstand me, Elias. It isn't at all my aim to dissuade you
from this marriage. That, as I told you last night, would be a work of
supererogation. But I _should_ like to ask you just a single question.
Suppose your mother were still alive, would you entertain for an instant
the idea of marrying a Christian?”
“I don't know?”
“You don't know?”
“Well, probably not.”
“Good. That is what I thought. And now, let me ask you one question
more. Is it your opinion that, simply because your mother has died, you
are absolved from all obligations toward her, and are at liberty to act
in a way, which, if she were still with us, it would break her heart to
have you act in? Is that your opinion?”
Elias did not reply. He colored up, however, and bit his lip.
The rabbi waited a moment, then queried, “Well?”
“Well, what?”
“You don't answer.”
“I don't mean to answer. It isn't a fair question,” said Elias.
The rabbi gave a short, contemptuous laugh.
Again for a while neither of them spoke. Elias was uncomfortably
conscious that the rabbi's eyes were fixed upon his face. He stood it as
long as he could. Then, abruptly, he got up.
“Please excuse me,” he said, “I have something to do up-stairs.”
With which he left the room.
He went to his studio and locked the door behind him. He had told the
rabbi that he had something to do. But the truth was that he had nothing
to do, except to kill time as best he could until the hour should arrive
for him to start for Sixty-third Street. He had arranged not to call
upon Christine at all that day. He thought it would be more considerate
to leave her alone with her father. Now, the day stretched out like an
eternity before his imagination. Would it ever wear away?
It occurred to him that it might not be a bad plan to get some sleep,
if he could; so he retired to his bedroom, and threw himself all dressed
upon his bed.
Pretty soon he heard a rap upon the door.
“Who is it?” he demanded.
“I,” the rabbi's voice responded. .
“He'll end by driving me mad,” thought Elias. “What do you want?” he
asked aloud.
“I want to see you.”
“Well, I'm busy.”
“I shan't interfere with your business.”
“I'm going to sleep.”
“I shan't prevent you from sleeping.”
Elias said nothing further. The rabbi came in. “I only wanted to sit
with you. It is better that I should be on hand,” explained the rabbi,
and sat down near the window.
Elias closed his eyes and tried hard to sleep. But he could not sleep.
It is doubtful whether, in view of his approaching wedding, he could
have slept, under the most soothing circumstances. Under the actual
circumstances, it was like trying to sleep while some one is sticking
pins into you. Elias strove to be philosophical. “Why should I allow his
mere presence to irritate me as it does?” he asked himself. Whatever the
correct answer to this inquiry may have been, the fact remained that the
rabbi's mere presence did irritate him to an excessive degree. He
bore it for a few minutes silently. At length, flinging his philosophy
overboard, he jumped up from his bed, and announced vehemently, “Well,
I'm going out.”
“Ah,” said the rabbi, quietly, “I'll go with you.”
“Thanks,” replied Elias, “but I prefer to go alone.”
“I'm sorry,” said the rabbi; “but it is my duty.”
“What's your duty?”
“It is my duty not to let you leave my sight today.”
At this Elias lost his self-control.
“In heaven's name,” he blurted out, “do--do you mean to say that you're
going to stick to me like this all day?”
“I should fail in my duty toward you, if I did not.”
“Well then, do you--do you know what you'll do?” cried Elias, in a loud,
infuriated voice.
“No; what?” questioned the rabbi, composedly.
“Good God! You--you'll drive me out of my senses. You make me feel as
though my head would split open. You--you--” His voice choked in his
throat. His face had become burning red.
“Look out,” said the rabbi. “You'll burst a blood-vessel, if you carry
on like that.”
“Well, then, for mercy's sake, leave me alone. Go down stairs about your
business. Leave me here to attend to mine.”
The rabbi did not speak. He made no move to obey.
“Don't you hear?” Elias cried.
“Yes.”
“Well, why don't you go?”
“I have told you. It is my duty to stay.”
“God help me, if you weren't an old man, and my uncle, I--I'd--” Elias
faltered. His clenched fists completed the sentence.
“Put me out? But I _am_ an old man, and your uncle; and so you won't,
eh?” rejoined the rabbi, with maddening coolness.
“You must forgive me,” said Elias, recovering a little his
self-possession. “I ought not to have threatened you. I didn't mean to.
But you don't know how you make me suffer. You don't know what torture
it is.”
“Oh, that's all right. You needn't apologize,” the rabbi said.
“But what I ask,” Elias went on, “I ask as a kindness, please leave me
alone.”
“That,” returned the rabbi, “is a request which I am compelled to deny.”
Elias stood still for an instant, as if undetermined what to do. He
felt the blood rush angrily to his brain, and then sink away, leaving a
violent ache behind it. “Well, I suppose I'll have to grin and bear it,
then,” he said by and by, and dropped upon a chair.
After an interval of silence Elias began, with sufficient coolness,
“Would you mind telling me _why_ you consider it your duty to remain
with me all day?”
“It is my duty to be on hand, to be at your side, when the moment of
your need shall arrive. It may be any moment now.”
“Of my need? I don't understand.”
“When the Lord manifests Himself,” the rabbi explained.
“Oh,” said Elias, and relapsed into silence. He added presently, “I'm
going down stairs, to get a glass of water,” and rose.
“You'll come back?” questioned the rabbi, “Yes, I suppose so.”
But when he had reached the foot of the staircase, and saw his hat
hanging from the rack near the vestibule door, a temptation presented
itself which was too strong for flesh and blood to resist. He caught his
hat up, and put it upon his head, and dashed out into the street. It
was raining. He had no umbrella. But he did not mind. He walked rapidly,
without an objective point, without even noticing what direction he
followed.