Moses saw his dead Gittel lulling his boy to sleep. Blinded by his tears, he did not see that they were falling thick upon the little white face.
"Nay, dry thy tears, I tell thee, my little Benjamin," said Benjamin, in tones more tender and soothing, and launched into the strange wailing melody:
"Alas, woe is me!
How wretched to be
Driven away and banished,
Yet so young, from thee."
"And Joseph's mother called to him from the grave: Be comforted, my son, a great future shall be thine."
"The end is near," old Four-Eyes whispered to the father in jargon. Moses trembled from head to foot. "My poor lamb! My poor Benjamin," he wailed. "I thought thou wouldst say Kaddish after me, not I for thee." Then he began to recite quietly the Hebrew prayers. The hat he should have removed was appropriate enough now.
Benjamin sat up excitedly in bed: "There's mother, Esther!" he cried in
English. "Coming back with my coat. But what's the use of it now?"
His head fell back again. Presently a look of yearning came over the face so full of boyish beauty. "Esther," he said. "Wouldn't you like to be in the green country to-day? Look how the sun shines."
It shone, indeed, with deceptive warmth, bathing in gold the green country that stretched beyond, and dazzling the eyes of the dying boy. The birds twittered outside the window. "Esther!" he said, wistfully, "do you think there'll be another funeral soon?".
The matron burst into tears and turned away.
"Benjamin," cried the father, frantically, thinking the end had come, "say the Shemang."