The Yoke of the Thorah. Harland Henry

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СКАЧАТЬ taking long walks here every afternoon. There's scarcely a tree or stone that I'm not familiar with; and I've discovered lots of delightful little places—nooks and corners—that nobody else suspects the existence of. Sometime I'd like to show you some of them. They'd be splendid to paint.”

      By this time they were seated.

      “Oh, thank you,” said Elias, “that will be charming. And so, you went to the Normal College?”

      “Yes; I graduated there last spring.”

      “Graduated! Why, I shouldn't have thought you were old enough!”

      “How old do you think I am?”

      “Seventeen?”

      “Oh, ever so much older. Guess again.”

      “Eighteen, then?”

      “I'll be nineteen in January—January third—just one month from to-day.”

      “Mercy! You're very venerable, to be sure. And then, having graduated from the Normal College, what an immense deal of wisdom you must possess, too!”

      She laughed as gayly as though he had perpetrated a rare witticism; and then said, “No, seriously, I never learned much at the Normal College—I mean in the classes—except a lot of mathematics and Latin, which I've forgotten all about now. I learned a little from the other girls, though. Some of them were wonderfully intelligent and cultivated; and they put me on the track of good books and such things. Shall we start home now?” (They rose and began to retrace their steps.) “Tell me, Mr. Bacharach, what is the one book which you like best of all?”

      “That's rather a hard question. Suppose I were to put it to you, could you answer it?”

      “Oh, yes. I think 'Adam Bede' is the greatest book that was ever written.”

      “That's saying a vast deal, isn't it?”

      “Well, of course, I mean the greatest book of its kind—the most vivid and truthful picture of real deep feeling. I wasn't thinking of scientific books, or essays, or histories, like Spencer, or Emerson, or Macaulay. I mean, it pierces-deeper into the heart, than any other book that I have read.”

      “Have you ever read 'Wilhelm Meister?'”

      “No. I was going to, though. One of the girls lent me a copy—Carlyle's translation. She said it was splendid. But when my father saw it he made me give it back. He holds very old-fashioned ideas of literature, you know; and he says that Goethe is demoralizing. His taste in music is old-fashioned, too. He never will take me to hear good music. It bores him dreadfully. He likes to go to grand sacred concerts on Sunday evening, where they play Strauss and Offenbach, and then at the end 'Home, Sweet Home.' Strauss and Offenbach and even 'Home, Sweet Home' are very well of their kind; but one tires of them after a while, don't you think so? I haven't been at a Symphony or Philharmonic for more than a year.”

      “Why don't you go to the rehearsals?”

      “Why, he won't take me to the rehearsals, any more than to the concerts.”

      “But you can go to them alone. They're in the afternoon.”

      “Oh, but I can't bear to hear music alone. I I must have somebody with me, or else I don't enjoy it at all. I always want somebody to nudge, when the music is especially thrilling; don't you?”

      “Yes, one longs for a sympathetic neighbor,” Elias admitted; and thought in his own soul, “I wish the old man would deputize me; it must be exceedingly pleasant to be nudged by her little elbow.”

      When they had reached the house, Christine asked him whether he wouldn't come in for a little while; and he replied that he guessed he would, for the purpose of putting away his paraphernalia, which he had left cluttering up the parlor. Inside they found old Redwood, who explained that he had departed from his custom that morning, and chosen quite a different quarter of the park for his outing. Elias stowed his things under the piano. As he was doing so, a bell rang below stairs.

      “Dinner,” announced the old man. “Come, Mr. Bacharach.”

      Elias began to make his excuses.

      “Oh, none o' that!” the old man cried, grasping Elias's arm. “Come down and take pot-luck; and may good digestion wait on appetite.”

      Pretty soon Elias found himself installed at Redwood's table, with Christine beaming upon him from one end, and the old man carving a turkey at the other.

      “Well, I declare, Chris, this is quite jolly, ain't it? To have company to dinner! We two—she and I, Mr. Bacharach—we generally dine alone; and as we've told each other about all either of us knows, time and time again, we don't find it particularly lively; do we, Chris? Now, Mr. Bacharach, I know that you Israelites—excuse me—you foreigners—don't drink ice-water with your meals; but as I haven't got any wine to offer you, I'll send out for some beer. Mary!”

      The maid appeared; and old Redwood instructed her to purchase a quart of beer at the corner liquor store. “You'll have to go in by the side-door, Mary, because it's Sunday. And if any policeman should ask what you've got in the pitcher, tell him it's milk. Don't be afraid. If he takes you up, I'll go bail for you. Ha-ha-ha!”

      “Father!” cried Christine, with a glance at once beseeching and reproachful.

      “Beer,” the old man continued, moderating his hilarity, and adopting a commentative tone, “beer is a great drink, mild, refreshing, wholesome. And it's done a sight of good for temperance, too—more than all your total abstinence orators and blue-rib-bonites put together. I'm very fond of it, and always drink it with my lunch, down-town. There's a saloon just under my shop. But Chris there, she can't abide it, on account of the bitter. She likes wine—and wine—not being a capitalist—I call an extravagance.”

      “Yes,” said Christine, “I think wine is perfectly delicious; and so pretty to look at, with its deep red or yellow. Once a friend of father's sent us a whole box of wine—Rhine wine—and——”

      “And,” old Redwood interrupted, “and that innocent appearing young woman there, sir, she disposed of every blessed drop of it; she did, for a fact. What do you think of that?”

      “Oh, father,” protested Christine, blushing beautifully, “you ought not to say such a thing. Mr. Bacharach might believe you.”

      “Well, any how, I wish we had some of it left to offer you, Mr. Bacharach,” said Redwood. “But here comes the beer.”

      “Oh, by the way,” put in Elias, addressing himself to Christine, “did you know? They're going to give the 'Damnation of Faust' at the Symphony rehearsal Friday afternoon—the great work of Berlioz. Have you ever heard it?”

      “No; but I have heard selections from it. I wish”—bringing her eyes to bear upon her father—“I wish I could go.”

      “Well, why don't ye? Who's to prevent ye?”

      “Will you take me?”

      “Not I. But, Great Scott, what's the use of being a pretty young girl if you've got to drag your aged father around after you? Why don't СКАЧАТЬ