"'S-sh! You mustn't," she said, peremptorily, also in Yiddish. "You'll get me in trouble if you do. It'll be the ruin of me and of the children, too.
You mustn't."
"But you say your life is lost," I retorted, coming up close to the chair on which she sat. "Do you think it's easy for me to hear it? Do you think my heart is made of iron?"
"'S-sh! You know everything without my speaking," she said, slowly rising and drawing back. "You know well enough that I am not happy. Can't you rest until you have heard me say so again and again? Must you drink my blood? All right, then. Go ahead. Here. I am unhappy, I am unhappy, I am unhappy. Max is a good husband to me. I can't complain. And we get along well, too. And I shall be true to him. May I choke right here, may darkness come upon me, if I ever cease to be a faithful wife to him. But you know that my heart has never been happy. Lucy will be happy and that will be my happiness, too. She shall go to college and be an educated American lady, and, if God lets me live, I shall see to it that she doesn't marry unless she meets the choice of her heart. She must be happy. She must make up for her mother's lost life, too. If my mother had understood things as I do, I, too, should have been happy. But she was an old-fashioned woman and she would have me marry in the old-fashioned way, as she herself had married: without laying her eyes on her 'predestined one' until the morning after the wedding." She laughed bitterly. "Of course I did see Max before the wedding, but it made no difference. I obeyed my mother, peace upon her soul. I thought love-marriages were something which none but educated girls could dream of.
My mother—peace upon her soul—told me to throw all fancies out of my mind, that I was a simple girl and must get married without fuss. And I did. In this country people have different notions. But I am already married and a mother. All I can do now is to see to it that Lucy shall be both educated and happy, and, well, I beg of you, I beg of you, I beg of you, Levinsky, never let me talk of these things again. They must be locked up in my heart and the key must be thrown into the river, Levinsky. It cannot be otherwise, Levinsky. Do you hear?"
CHAPTER XIV
THE situation could not last. One morning about three weeks subsequent to the above conversation Max left town for a day. One of his debtors, a dancing-master, had disappeared without settling his account and Max had recently discovered that he was running a dance-hall and meeting-rooms in New Haven; so he went there to see what he could do toward collecting his bill. His absence for a whole day was nothing new, and yet the house seemed to have assumed a novel appearance that morning. When, after breakfast, Lucy ran out into the street I felt as though Dora and I were alone for the first time, and from her constraint I could see that she was experiencing a similar feeling. I hung around the house awkwardly. She was trying to keep herself busy. Finally I said: "I think I'll be going. Maybe there is some news about the lockout."
I rose to go to the little corridor for my hat, but on my way thither, as I came abreast of her, I paused, and with amorous mien I drew her to me.
She made but a perfunctory attempt at resistance, and when I kissed her she responded, our lips clinging together hungrily. It all seemed to have happened in a most natural way. When our lips parted at last her cheeks were deeply flushed and her eyes looked filmed
"Dearest," I whispered