So he is, most of the time—a sunbeam took human shape when he was born. But naturally that dreadful scene left a scar on his brain, as the bullet left a scar on his shoulder, and he is always liable to see red when Kishineff is mentioned.
VERA
I will never mention my miserable birthplace to him again.
MENDEL
But you see every few months the newspapers tell us of another pogrom, and then he screams out against what he calls that butcher's face, so that I tremble for his reason. I tremble even when I see him writing that crazy music about America, for it only means he is brooding over the difference between America and Russia.
VERA
But perhaps—perhaps—all the terrible memory will pass peacefully away in his music.
MENDEL
There will always be the scar on his shoulder to remind him—whenever the wound twinges, it brings up these terrible faces and visions.
VERA