“And Mr. Kaatenstein was also dark, but was a tall, slim man, and was kind and fond of the children, especially the two little girls. Mrs. Kaatenstein was fond of the children also, but mostly fond of the two boys.
“And Harry Kaatenstein was much like his mother, only he was not so dark, and he was ten years old.
“And Leah Kaatenstein was ten years old also—the two were twins—and she had an eye for strict economy, and wore plain gingham frocks, and had a long dark braid of hair, and played with very homely dolls.
“And Jenny Kaatenstein was seven years old and was most uncommonly fat, and was rarely seen without a bit of unleavened bread in her hand—for the children were allowed to have all that they wanted of unleavened bread. They did not want very much of it, except Jenny. And they all preferred to eat leavened bread spread with butter and sprinkled with sugar—but they couldn’t have as much as they wanted of that.
“And little Willy Kaatenstein was only four and pronounced all his words correctly and seemed sometimes possessed of the wisdom of the serpent. He had very curly hair, and it seemed an unwritten law that whenever a grown-up lady passed by and saw the children playing on the walk in front of their house she must stop and exclaim what a pretty boy little Willy was and ask him for one of his curls. Whereat little Willy would stare up into the grown-up lady’s face in a most disconcerting fashion and perhaps ask her for one of her curls. Or if the groceryman or the butcher would stop on his way to the kitchen and ask little Willy what was his name and how old was he, little Willy would answer with surprising promptness, and directly would ask the groceryman or the butcher what was his name and how old was he.
“And Emma, the hired girl, was raw-boned and big-fisted and frightfully cold-blooded and unsympathetic. And she had a sister who came to see her and sat in the hot kitchen talking, while Emma pared potatoes or scrubbed the floor. The sister’s name was Juley, and she sometimes brought strange, green candy to the children, which their mother never allowed them to eat. And sometimes Juley brought them chewing-gum, which they were not allowed to chew.
“And Uncle Will was a short, stout man, with a face that was nearly always flushed. He seemed fond of beer. There were a great many cases of beer in the cellar which belonged to Uncle Will. And there were cases full of beer-bottles that had all been emptied, and the children would have liked to sell the bottles, but they were not allowed to sell bottles. Uncle Will was also fond of little Willy, and on summer evenings when he and Mr. Kaatenstein were at home, and after they had eaten dinner, Uncle Will might have been heard inviting little Willy, in his hoarse, facetious voice, to come and have a glass of beer with him. And when little Willy, with his short curls and his small white suit, would come and just taste of the beer and would make a wry mouth and shed a few abortive tears over its bitterness, Uncle Will would laugh very heartily and jovially indeed.
“Mrs. Kaatenstein had a great many ducks and geese in the back-yard and spent much time among them, fattening them to eat and fussing over them, in the forenoons. So the children never played there in the forenoon.
“There were a great number of things that the Kaatenstein children were not allowed to do—the things they were allowed to do were as nothing by comparison, and the things they were allowed to do were, for the most part, things they did not care about.
“They had each a square iron bank in which were ever so many silver quarters and dimes and half-dollars and nickels and gold pieces, too, for they were a Jewish family. Their father and their Uncle Will kept dropping coins into the little slits in the tops of the banks from time to time, and friends of the family would also kindly contribute, and their uncles and aunts would send money for that purpose all the way from Cincinnati. So there was wealth in these banks, but the children were not allowed to have any of it. And they were never given any money ‘to throw away buying things,’ as their mother said, except a nickel once in a long while—one nickel for the four of them.