Barstein laughed in spite of himself. And he was softened by noting how sensitive and artistic were Nehemiah's outspread hands—they might well have wielded the forceps. 'Yes, I dare say that is what will happen,' he said. 'How can you keep a restaurant up two pairs of stairs where no passer-by will ever see it?'
As he spoke, however, he remembered staying in an hotel in Sicily which consisted entirely of one upper room. Perhaps in the Ghetto Sicilian fashions were paralleled.
'I do not fly so high as a restaurant in once,' Nehemiah explained. 'But here is this great empty room. What am I to do with it? At night of course most of us sleep on it, but by daylight it is a waste. Also I receive several Hebrew and Yiddish papers a week from my friends in Russia and America, and one of which I even buy here. When I have read them these likewise are a waste. Therefore have I given myself a counsel, if I would make here a reading-room they should come in the evenings, many young men who have only a bed or a room-corner to go to, and when once they have learnt to come here it will then be easy to make them to eat and drink. First I will give to them only coffee and cigarettes, but afterwards shall my wife cook them all the Delicatessen of Poland. When our custom will become too large we shall take over Bergman's great fashionable restaurant in the Whitechapel Road. He has already given me the option thereof; it is only two hundred pounds. And if your gentility——'
'But I cannot afford two hundred pounds,' interrupted Barstein, alarmed.
'No, no, it is the Almighty who will afford that,' said Nehemiah reassuringly. 'From you I ask nothing.'
'In that case,' replied Barstein drily, 'I must say I consider it an excellent plan. Your idea of building up from small foundations is most sensible—some of the young men may even have toothache—but I do not see where you need me—unless to supply a few papers.'
'Did I not say you were from heaven?' Nehemiah's eyes shone again. 'But I do not require the papers. It is enough for me that your holy feet have stood in my homestead. I thought you might send money. But to come with your own feet! Now I shall be able to tell I have spoken with him face to face!'
Barstein was touched. 'I think you will need a larger table for the reading-room,' he said.
The tall figure shook its tall hat. 'It is only gas that I need for my operations.'
'Gas!' repeated Barstein, astonished. 'Then you propose to continue your dentistry too.'