V
Drabkin’s wedding was postponed for half a year, but the dowry of five hundred roubles was at once placed into his hands, that he might open a shop immediately. For he was known by all to be an honourable man.
He bought a sewing-machine, shears, knives; wooden pliers he made himself; and together with his future wife he sat down to work. The shop, naturally, was in her name.
He was submerged with orders.
He became a new man,—jollier, livelier, more enthusiastic. He attacked his work arduously.
It seemed that he wanted to pile up more and more money.
He felt a sensation that he had never before experienced. He had money! He had money! He was a boss for himself! Often he would get a ticklish feeling, and he would smile happily and begin to hum a tune. He was superlatively happy. He made plans—the dowry would grow, he would accumulate heaps of money, he would accomplish miracles!...
“I’ll show them!” he would shout, triumphantly, to nobody in particular, pushing the treadle of his machine vigorously as he sewed away.
“Show whom?” asked his fiancée, after he had shouted his defiance for the tenth time.
“Everybody!” he replied. “They’ll hear from me!”
And then he would fall to explaining just how he would “show them.”
A single cloud, however, darkened his bright sky: he longed for Chashke. Chashke was lacking.
He would blink, screw up his eyes as he smeared a thread with pitch, and gaze at his betrothed, but all the time he would be thinking of Chashke, comparing her with his affianced.
“Why do you look at me like that?” Chyenke would ask with a smile.
But he would make no reply, continuing to smear his thread with pitch.
“Haven’t you ever seen me before? Do you want to see whether you’ve made a mistake in choosing me?” she would continue, throwing her work aside and placing her arms about his neck.
But he remained silent. He stuck the thread through the eye of the needle and began to sew. He felt that this woman beside him was a stranger,—that he did not even know her.
“Are you angry with me?” asked the stranger, releasing his head and ready to become angry herself.
“Why angry?” he replied, looking intently upon the pocketbook as he pierced it with the needle. “I looked at you. Is it forbidden me to look at you?”
He would step often into Chashke’s, if only for a few moments. And for even these few moments they both felt heavy at heart. Both stood there with tears in their eyes.
When Drabkin would come for a visit, the old woman would go off into the kitchen, muttering to herself and wrinkling her brow. There she would sit down before a dingy little lamp, beginning to darn a stocking and staring into the semi-gloom, lost in thought of her foolish, unfortunate daughter.
Drabkin, at such times, would stand by the window and write upon the panes with his fingers, or gaze vacantly before him, waiting for Chashke to speak.
And Chashke sat bent over her work, and something tugged, tugged away at her heart-strings.
She was waging a tremendous battle. She wished to forget everything. All was over! Too late! It was so decreed by Fate! Yet a frightful, poignant yearning held her in its grip. And in the solitude of night she would moisten the pillow with hot tears that rolled slowly down her cheeks. And often it would seem to her that there would come a day,—who knew in how many years around?—when he would come falling at her feet and.... Ah, she had never thought the matter out to its conclusion....
But he must not learn of her sufferings!
And Chashke would take courage, breathe more easily, and be the first to speak.
“How are you getting along? Plenty of work?”
Yes. On this topic he could find ever so much to say. But he felt sad at heart. He then replied in a nasal tone, “Nothing to complain. Work is the least of my worries.”
“For whom are you making purses now?” she asked, ignoring his last words.
“For Etkin,” he replied, curtly, as if angry that she should harp on that theme.
But no, he must really tell her how, from his own former employer, Mayshe Baruch, he had won away as a customer the shopkeeper Etkin. That was certainly interesting. And gradually he became engrossed in his talk and warmed to his subject, telling how he had brought a piece of his work into Etkin’s and how everybody had viewed it with delight. And at once he received a big order for more. And Mayshe Baruch had met him and tried to intimidate him by threatening to slap his face. Ha-ha-ha, he had found the right one to scare! No sirree! He’d show Mayshe! He would go in to Brzerzinski, for whom Mayshe Baruch did work, and let Mayshe try to do something to him! Aha! He’d put Mayshe Baruch out of business in a jiffy.... And he was even considering going in to Abraham Baer’s customers. He had a score to settle with Abraham Baer. He knew all his customers, even those from out of town, and he would send quotations for work to all of them.... He’d show them!... He’d lead the bosses a merry dance!
Chashke listened with delight. But a single question weighed upon her heavily; she could not repress it. She lowered her head over her work and asked, with a stifled voice, “How is your Chyenke?”
He interrupted his account and suddenly became sad once more.
“How should she be? She works.”
And again he stared vacantly through the window. She remained bent over her work, without raising her eyes. And soon they parted, with hearts as heavy as stone....
But later he became so engrossed in his work that he forgot the burden of his heart. He grew accustomed to Chyenke and became more talkative. And once he began to tell her how he used to quarrel with his employers and get the best of them. She laughed. Yes, she knew all about him and his pranks.
“I never spoke a pleasant word to any of them. Not even with the best of them,” he told her. “I always showed them my claws.”
“I’ll tell you the truth,” she asserted, with a serious mien. “If I had been your employer I wouldn’t have let you darken my door. Even if I knew that I’d make millions from you.”
He made no reply, working the treadle faster than before, and waiting for Chyenke to continue.
“It won’t be like that in our shop,” she added.
“Certainly not,” he hastened to agree. “We’ll deal differently with our employés.”
“Differently or not differently,” she replied, “if anybody tries such tricks with us, we’ll take him by the collar right away and down the stairs he goes!”
“That’s merely what you say....”
“And that’s exactly how it’ll be,” she answered with the same gravity as before. “If I’m a boss, then I must be a boss. I know. I’ve worked for bosses, too, and have quarrelled with them. And you may be sure that they were in the wrong. But to fight just for the fun of it! I’d like to see them try it!”
“It couldn’t happen in our place,” he said. “I’ll yield to them in everything.”
“What do you mean, yield to them in everything?” Her voice rose slightly. “Bah! Not even a hair’s breadth! Why should I treat people better than I myself was treated?”
Drabkin turned pale. His hand trembled.
“We’ll see about that,” he answered weakly. He restrained himself, but his blood was boiling.
“What shall we see, what?” asked Chyenke. “I certainly won’t treat my employés any better than I was treated. Why should I give in to them? Let them walk all over me?”
He was silent. He was already infuriated, but strove to choke back his words. He applied himself industriously to his work and did not utter another sound, although it was a long time before Chyenke stopped talking....
That night he ran to Chashke. He repeated the conversation to her.
“Did you ever hear such talk?” he cried, as he finished his story.
“Chyenke is as right as the day,” interposed the old woman.
“Did you ever hear such talk?” he repeated, looking into Chashke’s eyes.
“Well?” she queried, coldly.
“What do you mean, ‘Well?’” he shouted. “What do you mean by your ‘Well?’”
“What do you expect? Everybody to agree with you?”
“What do you mean, everybody to agree with me? What do you mean?” he gesticulated. “Isn’t she engaged to me?”
“But you each have minds of your own and hearts of your own,” replied Chashke.
“He’d like his betrothed to be as stupid as himself,” the old woman chimed in.
“But why? How comes it that you understand?” he insisted to Chashke.
“She always was a big fool,” the mother replied. But the daughter blushed, and was silent.
“Then why shouldn’t she?” persisted Drabkin, referring to his betrothed.
“Well——” interrupted Chashke.
He was at a loss for a plausible response.
“Well, speak, what is it you wish?”
“What should I wish? I don’t wish anything,” he snarled indignantly.
He left the house in silent anger. He had wanted her to help him feel angry, to be beside himself with rage as usual....
The following day he tried again to talk the matter over with Chyenke, but she merely repeated her opinions of yesterday.
“Then I tell you,” he exclaimed, concisely and firmly, “that our employés shall be treated as I see fit!”
“And I tell you,” interjected Chyenke, “that in the first place we haven’t any employés, nor are we hiring any. And in the second place, they’ll be treated as I think proper!”
“We shall see!”
“We shall see!”
He became angry, she became angry, and they did not speak to each other for the rest of that day.
“If that’s the kind of a fellow he is,” she thought, “then he’s not going to have the say about the money.”
He sat there as if on pins and needles. He was in a rage; his blood was boiling. He wanted to spring up, spit out with scorn and break with Chyenke for good. But something restrained him. That “something” did not permit him to carry out what he yearned so strongly to do. That “something” held him riveted to the spot and dammed his anger. And that “something” was not very clear to him. He only felt it strongly; it sent a warmth through his whole body.... Just through his inside pocket....
“Well, well. We’ll see,” he thought. “After the wedding it’ll be a different story.”
When they separated at the end of that day Chyenke said to him, “Well, now run off to your Chashke and fill her ears with complaints against me.”
“If I want to run to her, I won’t ask you.”
Chyenke had resolved to put an end to his visits to Chashke. If he cared more for Chashke, then let him take her. She could afford to have a sweetheart all her own.
But she desired to raise no scandals before the wedding. After their marriage she would know how to wean him away from Chashke’s, and how to keep her from ever crossing their threshold....
But Drabkin seemed to have lost all desire to go to Chashke. He did not go to her that evening, nor the next. Why should he? He was angry with her.