Part 18 (2/2)

5

On a school holiday, when Zerach Kneip shut the Gemoreh and began to tell stories, he was a different person.

He took off his cap and sat in his bushy locks (the skull-cap was hidden by them); he unb.u.t.toned his kaftan, smoothed out his forehead. His lips smiled, and even his voice was different.

He taught us in the hard, gruff, angry voice in which he spoke to the rebbitzin; he told us stories in the gentle, small, kind voice in which he addressed Shprintze, his dear soul.

And we used to implore him as though he were a brigand to tell us a story. We were unaware of the fact that Zerach Kneip knew only one chapter of the Talmud, with which his course for little boys began and ended, and that he _had_ to fill up the time with stories, specially in winter when there are no religious holidays. We little fools used to buy stories of him with peas and beans, and once even we saved up to buy Shprintze a red flannel spencer.

For the said spencer, Reb Zerach told us how the Almighty takes a soul out of his treasure-house and blows it into a body.

And I pictured to myself the souls laid out in the Almighty's store-room like the goods in my mother's shop, in boxes, red, green, white, yellow, and blue, and tied with string.

6

”When G.o.d,” said the rabbi, ”has chosen a soul and decided that it is to go down into the sinful world, it trembles and cries.

”In the nine months before birth an angel teaches it the whole Torah; then he gives it a fillip under the nose, and the soul forgets everything it has learned.

”That,” added the rabbi, ”is why all Jewish children have cloven upper lips.”

That same evening I was skating on the ice outside the town, and I observed that the Gentile boys, Yantek, Voitek, and Yashek, had cloven upper lips just like ours.

”Yashek,” I risked my life and asked, ”_ti takshe mayesh dushe_?”[31]

”What does it matter to you, soul of a dog?” was the distinct reply.

7

Beside going to the rabbi, I had a teacher for writing. This teacher was supposed by the town to be a great heretic, and the neighbors wouldn't borrow his dishes.[32]

He was a widower, and people never believed that Gutele, his daughter, a girl about my age, knew how to make meat kosher.

But he was exceedingly accomplished, and my mother was determined that her only son should learn to write.

”I beg of you, Reb teacher,” she said to him, ”not to teach him anything heretical, nothing out of the Bible, but teach him how to write a Jewish letter, just a 'greeting to any friend' letter.”

But I don't know if he kept his word. When I gave him the poser about the cleft lips, he went into a fury; he jumped up from his chair, overturned it with his foot, and began to caper about the room, crying out:

”Blockheads! murderers! bats!” By degrees he grew calm, sat down again, wiped his spectacles, and drew me to him:

”My child,” he said, ”never believe such rubbish. You took a good look at the Gentile boys who were skating? What are their names?”

I told him.

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