“And in being faithful to him you have caused justice to be done to me. It would have been a robbery of me too that I should never have known of the inheritance he had prepared for me. I thank you with my whole soul.”
“Be worthy of him, young man. What is your vocation?” This question was put with a quick abruptness which embarrassed Deronda, who did not feel it quite honest to allege his law-reading as a vocation. He answered,
“I cannot say that I have any.”
“Get one, get one. The Jew must be diligent. You will call yourself a Jew and profess the faith of your fathers?” said Kalonymos, putting his hand on Deronda’s shoulder and looking sharply in his face.
“I shall call myself a Jew,” said Deronda, deliberately, becoming slightly paler under the piercing eyes of his questioner. “But I will not say that I shall profess to believe exactly as my fathers have believed. Our fathers themselves changed the horizon of their belief and learned of other races. But I think I can maintain my grandfather’s notion of separateness with communication. I hold that my first duty is to my own people, and if there is anything to be done toward restoring or perfecting their common life, I shall make that my vocation.”
It happened to Deronda at that moment, as it has often happened to others, that the need for speech made an epoch in resolve. His respect for the questioner would not let him decline to answer, and by the necessity to answer he found out the truth for himself.
“Ah, you argue and you look forward—you are Daniel Charisi’s grandson,” said Kalonymos, adding a benediction in Hebrew.
With that they parted; and almost as soon as Deronda was in London, the aged man was again on shipboard, greeting the friendly stars without any eager curiosity.
CHAPTER LXI.
“Within the gentle heart Love shelters him,
As birds within the green shade of the grove.
Before the gentle heart, in Nature’s scheme,
Love was not, nor the gentle heart ere Love.”
—GUIDO GUINICELLI (Rossetti’s Translation).