"How are we to know? Others run, and we run too."
After some time, one of our boys stopped. And seeing him, we also stopped, but still shouted:
"Murderers! Murderers! Murderers!"
"Where? Where? Where?"
"There, in the black forest, murderers beset us. They bound our teacher to a tree, and God knows if he is still alive."
. . . . .
If you envy us because we are free, because we do not go to "Cheder" (the "Rebbe" is lying ill), it is for nothing—for nothing. No one knows whom the shoe pinches—no one. No one knows who the real murderers are. We rarely see one another. When we meet, the first words are: "How is the teacher?" (He is no more Mazeppa.) And when we pray, we ask God to save the teacher. We weep in silence: "Oh, Father of the Universe! Father of the Universe!" And Elya? Don't ask about him. May the devil take him—that same Elya!
. . . . .
Epilogue
When the "Rebbe" recovered (he was ill six weeks, in the height of fever, and babbled constantly of murderers) and we went back to "Cheder," we hardly recognized him, so greatly had he changed. What had become of his lion's roar? He had put away his strap, and there was no more "Lie down," and no more Mazeppa. On his face there was to be seen a gentle melancholy. A feeling of regret stole into our hearts. And Mazeppa suddenly grew dear to us, dear to our souls. Oh, if he had only scolded us! But it was as if nothing had happened. Suddenly, he stopped us in the middle of the lesson, and asked us to tell him again the story of that "L'ag Beomer" day, and of the murderers in the forest. We did not hesitate, but told him again and again the story we knew off by heart—how murderers had come upon us in the forest, how they fell upon him, tied him to the tree, and were going to kill him with a knife, and how we rushed excitedly into the town, and by our shouting and clamours saved him.