"Come along!"
Bashe follows her automatically; neither has thought to fasten the door behind her. Bashe does not know herself how she reached the platform with her candles.
"Light them one at a time, for whom I shall tell you. Repeat my words. Say: God bless Mamishe and grant her long life!"
Bashe shakes as with ague: the first candle has always been father's.
"Repeat!" screams grandmother.
Bashe does so.
"The second: God make Chaïmle a good Jew!"
Little Bashe shakes more and more—her limbs are giving way beneath her—she does not hear her father's name. Her heart thumps, her temples throb, her eyes burn.
Grandmother has no pity on her—she screams louder every time:
"Repeat, repeat what I say!"