Thank God, father made the blessing over wine. I, too. Father drank the cup full of wine. So did I, a cup full, to the very dregs. "See, to the dregs," said mother to father. To me she said: "A full cup of wine! You will drop off to sleep." Ha! Ha! Will I fall asleep? Not even if we are to sit up all the night, or even to broad daylight. "Well," said my father, "how are you going to ask the 'four questions'? How will you recite 'Haggadah'? How will you sing with me—'Slaves were we'?" My mother never took her eyes off me. She smiled and said: "You will fall asleep—fast asleep." "Oh, mother, mother, if you had eighteen heads, you would surely fall asleep, if some one sat opposite you, and sang in your ears: 'Fall asleep, fall asleep'!"
Of course I fell asleep.
I fell asleep, and dreamt that my father was already saying: "Pour out thy wrath." My mother herself got up from the table, and went to open the door to welcome Elijah the Prophet. It would be a fine thing if Elijah the Prophet did come, as my mother had said, with a bag on his shoulders, and if he said to me: "Come, boy." And who else would be to blame for this but my mother, with her "fall asleep, fall asleep." And as I was thinking these thoughts, I heard the creaking of the door. My father stood up and cried: "Blessed art thou who comest in the name of the Eternal." I looked towards the door. Yes, it was he. He came in so slowly and so softly that one scarcely heard him. He was a handsome man, Elijah the Prophet—an old man with a long grizzled beard reaching to his knees. His face was yellow and wrinkled, but it was handsome and kindly without end. And his eyes! Oh, what eyes! Kind, soft, joyous, loving, faithful eyes. He was bent in two, and leaned on a big, big stick. He had a bag on his shoulders. And silently, softly, he came straight to me.
"Now, little boy, get into my bag, and come." So said to me the old man, but in a kind voice, and softly and sweetly.
I asked him: "Where to?" And he replied: "You will see later." I did not want to go, and he said to me again: "Come." And I began to argue with him. "How can I go with you when I am a wealthy man's son?" Said he to me: "And as a wealthy man's son, of what great value are you?" Said I: "I am the only child of my father and mother." Said he: "To me you are not an only child!" Said I: "I am fretted over. If they find that I am gone, they will not get over it, they will die, especially my mother." He looked at me, the old man did, very kindly, and he said to me, softly and sweetly as before: "If you do not want to die, then come with me. Say good-bye to your father and mother, and come." "But, how can I come when I am an only child, the only one left alive out of seven?"
Then he said to me more sternly: "For the last time, little boy. Choose one of the two. Either you say good-bye to your father and mother, and come with me, or you remain here, but fast asleep for ever and ever."
Having said these words, he stepped back from me a little, and was turning to the door. What was to be done? To go with the old man, God-knows-where, and get lost, would mean the death of my father and mother. I am an only child, the only one left alive out of seven. To remain here, and fall asleep for ever and ever—that would mean that I myself must die....
I stretched out my hand to him, and with tears in my eyes I said: "Elijah the Prophet, dear, kind, loving, darling Elijah, give me one minute to think." He turned towards me his handsome, yellow, wrinkled old face with its grizzled beard reaching to his knees, and looked at me with his beautiful, kind, loving, faithful eyes, and he said to me with a smile: "I will give you one minute to decide, my child—but, no more than one minute."
. . . . .
I ask you. "What should I have decided to do in that one minute, so as to save myself from going with the old man, and also to save myself from falling asleep for ever? Well, who can guess?"