"Feivele!" ventured Reb Monash to him one shabbos morning, "Tell me, what is this lord's son that takes thee about? I saw thee with him in Brownel Gap on Tuesday when I was going to Rabbi Shimmon. Thou didst not see me, no? Or maybe it suits thee not—when thou art with thy lord's son? The town talks! Tell me then, what wills he with thee? It likes me him not!"
"Oh, for God's sake, tatte...!"
For one moment the flame of the extinguished conflict seemed to glower and spit from Philip's eyes. Then he recovered himself. He stared into the pallor of his father's cheeks, avoiding the eyes, avoiding the deep lines of fatigue about the corners of his mouth. "Nothing, tatte, a friend! What will you?" Reb Monash was about to express his unease with another question when he too checked himself and the shadow of this new friendship lay between them, heavy, unexplained.
But when next Strauss seductively introduced the name of Kate into the conversation, Philip shouted suddenly, at the top of his voice—and in Cambridge Street, "Go to the devil, you're a swine!" He turned savagely on his heel and attempted for four evenings to attain emancipation in the Doomington Reference Library. He had not power enough, however, after the dull prostration of these months, to resist the suave note of apology and invitation which arrived for him on the fifth morning. A little public house near the skating rink the same evening found them closer friends than before.
Channah was not so easily subdued as Reb Monash. She had heard ugly reports—the girls at the hat factory were very eloquent on the subject—concerning Mr. Strauss and his "goings on." "Oh, Philip, Philip, there's a dear! Won't you now ... come, Feivele! Oh, do give him up! I hate him, I hate him! Give him up for my sake!" ... She returned frequently to the attack and knew devastatingly where his defences were weakest. "Not for me, give him up for mother's sake!"
Philip temporized. He'd think about it. What was all the worry about; couldn't he take care of himself? Channah, really, old girl, what on earth was there to sing about?
"But think! What would she have said? She'd have..."
"She'd have loved him! Just those little ways that any woman..."
"Any woman! That's just what I said!"
"Oh, shut up, Channah, for Heaven's sake, shut up!"