Part 14

Now she could never find him, never see him! Now he could not lay his hands in blessing upon her and make her well! There was no one who pitied her, no one who loved her! There was nothing left to live for.

When the dimness which overmastering emotion causes passed, she looked about at the people to see if their grief was equal to her own. They were going about busily and happily as usual. Bright-haired girls tripped by in groups, carrying bouquets of gay flowers, and calm matrons led little children. Yes, yes, it was all true what Gaon had told her: _the world outside the gate was wicked!_

Why did they not mourn for him? Why did they not cover their heads with the white grave cloths and strew upon them ashes? Why did they not find the ones who killed him and torture them--torture them--torture them!

Her grief was transformed into rage. Physical exhaustion strung her nerves to the pitch of frenzy and sent the wild blood beating in her brain.

She threw away the old bag. She pushed back hastily the thick hair from her eyes. She straightened as best she could the miserable bent figure. She turned and faced the passers-by and the busy street. She flung her long, thin arms upward, as do Judean shepherds when they pray, and in that stern and ancient tongue which is rich in reproaches and the eloquence of vengeance, she cursed them. She cursed them in her rage and fury at their heartlessness, their wanton cruelty, their base ingratitude.

Shriller and shriller grew her voice, fiercer and more unrestrained the unintelligible words, which called down upon them the vengeance of the stern Hebrew God, who would destroy them with the fire of his wrath. Her frail body, swaying to and fro in the agony of emotion, was all but consumed by the whirlwind of passion that swept it. The heat of anger burned and withered it as does flame the stubble, and she fell forward exhausted, upon the walk.

Some one picked her up and placed her in a neighboring doorway. But what terrible grief breathed from her face! Her eyes, out of which the passion had died, were like dim, tarnished mirrors, and the pitiful mouth was pinched and pale. There was nothing left to live for! The sun had gone out and the moon was dead and the stars had fallen out of heaven.

When she reached home, she flung herself upon the floor and wept. To her grandmother’s questions and exhortations she was deaf. She did not hear them. Nothing mattered now.

Gaon came, his eyes shining with fanaticism, and told her that it was the eve of the Fourteenth of Nisan, that on the morrow the Passover began, and that she must help her grandmother prepare the evening meal. To his commands she turned unheeding ears. Her lifted face expressed the apathy of the dead. Her blurred eyes looked through him and beyond at something he could not see.

When the meal was ready, the cups of salted water set on, the bitter herbs, and the leg of mutton, Gaon arose and said reverently: “Blessed art Thou--who hast sanctified us by Thy commandments, and hast commanded us concerning the removal of the leavened bread.”

He took one of the lighted candles and proceeded to search carefully the house, according to the command, to make sure that nothing forbidden be left during the season of the feast. Into every nook and cranny of the two rooms he peered, saying after each examination that if anything forbidden be left unnoticed, it was not his fault and his heart was pure.

When Rahel heard him groping on the rickety stairs in the back room, she leaped to her feet and followed.

“Grandfather--do not go there! You know there can be nothing in my room. Do not go there!”

“I must do as the Law commands.”

“No--Grandfather!--it is useless--the stairs are unsafe--do not go!”

Unheeding her words, he climbed the creaking stairs, Rahel following. He flung the door open. The draft blew the candle flame to gigantic size, illuminating the picture high upon the opposite wall. In the momentary flash of light it was a living form. The dingy wall had parted and let in the mist-sweet, white, cloud-radiance of night, adown which sped toward the trembling, aged man the glorious figure of the young Messiah. For a moment he was overcome by fear and reverence, and awed into silence by the majesty of beauty.

Then his nature reasserted itself. He remembered that Rahel had begged him not to come. The truth dawned upon him. His face grew cruel and thin. Unspeakable anger shone from the narrow little eyes upon her who had broken the Law and a second time kept him from the vision. A hideous Hebrew type became visible beneath the mask which habit made. From under the snarling, lifted upper lip, long teeth protruded like tusks, and his voice was hoarse with wrath.

“Rahel, did you do that?”

No answer.

“Rahel, I say, did you do that?”

The strain of the day and the past two weeks had exhausted her. The face that looked back at him was as white and as emotionless as the dead. In the dulled eyes shone no light of comprehension.

“God of Abraham!--and painted in the place sacred to Jerusalem and the Temple! Never shall I gain the vision--never! never!” His shrunken body quivered like a leaf in the wind. “Now I shall never gain the vision!” Tears, pitifulness, a world of disappointment, trembled in his voice.

“I have sinned grievously. I have not kept the Law. It says: ‘If thy right hand offend thee, cut it off.’ And I let her live when she offended first--I let her live--Oh, God of Abraham--I let her live--”

“Do you understand what you have done; that you have defiled the house; that you have broken the express command of the Torah: ‘Thou shalt have no other Gods before me;’ that you have kept me from the vision? Do you understand?” The old anger flashed its wild light over his face and rang tempestuously in his voice. “Do you understand?”

“_There!_--take _that_!--and _that_!--” He struck her upon the head with all the force of his uplifted arm. “I will seal up the door; I will disclaim to my God accountability of this room and its contents! Now, O God, I have done as Thou commandest: ‘If thy right hand offend thee, cut it off.’”

In falling, Rahel’s temple struck a stone uncovered of plastering at the foot of the old rabbi’s wall, and she lay motionless, a thin stream of bright blood trickling down her cheek.

After fastening the door and sealing it securely and disclaiming, as was the custom on the eve of the Fourteenth of Nisan, accountability for anything forbidden found beneath his roof, he went back to his blind and aged wife, where he said grace with fervent solemnity and partook of the sacred meal.

That night the Hamburg fire broke out. The inhabitants of the Ghetto barely escaped. They were well-nigh forgotten. When the gate-keepers remembered them and let them out, they were on the verge of being roasted like rats in a trap.

Among the first to reach the Great Gate and wait were Gaon and his wife. Rahel was not with them. Faithful to his vow, he had left the door of the old rabbi’s room sealed and fastened.

The devastation of that terrible fire is a matter of history. It is numbered among the calamities that have befallen the human race. When, days later, the fire had subsided, nothing of the swarming Ghetto buildings was left but charred and crumbling wood.

When Easter dawned, bright and smiling, there still rose from this burnt and blackened district wreaths of smoke and white steam, up-curling reverently round the base of the indestructible stone of the old rabbi’s wall which, alone, of all the Ghetto, still stood erect, ascending like a peace offering of incense toward the glorious figure that looked down from above, a figure glowing with youth and beauty, and framed in the glittering light of spring--radiant, triumphant, indestructible, immortal--the King--the Hebrew Christ!

THE END

Transcriber Notes

Obvious punctuation errors have been corrected.

Page 88: “struggles eeriely” changed to “struggles eerily”