Ghetto Tragedies. Israel Zangwill

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ ferment.

      "P—o—p—e, Pope," she spelt out of her infants' primer in Brum's hearing. "Pope? What's that, Brum?"

      "Oh, haven't you ever heard of the Pope, mother?"

      "No," said Zillah, crimsoning in conscious invisibility.

      "He's a sort of Chief Rabbi of the Roman Catholics. He wears a tiara. Kings and emperors used to tremble before him."

      "And don't they now?" she asked apprehensively.

      "No; that was in the Middle Ages—hundreds of years ago. He only had power over the Dark Ages."

      "Over the Dark Ages?" repeated Zillah, with a fresh, vague hope.

      "When all the world was sunk in superstition and ignorance, mother. Then everybody believed in him."

      Zillah felt chilled and rebuked. "Then he no longer works miracles?" she said faintly.

      Brum laughed. "Oh, I daresay he works as many miracles as ever. Of course thousands of pilgrims still go to kiss his toe. I meant his temporal power is gone—that is, his earthly power. He doesn't rule over any countries; all he possesses is the Vatican, but that is full of the greatest pictures by Michael Angelo and Raphael."

      Zillah gazed open-mouthed at the prodigy she had brought into the world.

      "Raphael—that sounds Jewish," she murmured. She longed to ask in what country Rome was, but feared to betray herself.

      Brum laughed again. "Raphael Jewish! Why—so it is! It's a Hebrew word meaning 'God's healing.'"

      "God's healing!" repeated Zillah, awestruck.

      Her mind was made up.

      X

      "Knowest thou what, Jossel?" she said in "Yiddish," as they sat by the Friday-night fireside when Brum had been put to bed. "I have heard of a new doctor, better than all the others!" After all it was the doctor, the healer, the exorcist of the Evil Eye, that she was seeking in the Pope, not the Rabbi of an alien religion.

      Jossel shook his head. "You will only throw more money away."

      "Better than throwing hope away."

      "Well, who is it now?"

      "He lives far away."

      "In Germany again?"

      "No, in Rome."

      "In Rome? Why, that's at the end of the world—in Italy!"

      "I know it's in Italy!" said Zillah, rejoiced at the information. "But what then? If organ-grinders can travel the distance, why can't I?"

      "But you can't speak Italian!"

      "And they can't speak English!"

      "Madness! Work, but not wisdom! I could not trust you alone in such a strange country, and the season is too busy for me to leave the factory."

      "I don't need you with me," she said, vastly relieved. "Brum will be with me."

      He stared at her. "Brum!"

      "Brum knows everything. Believe me, Jossel, in two days he will speak Italian."

      "Let be! Let be! Let me rest!"

      "And on the way back he will be able to see! He will show me everything, and Mr. Raphael's pictures. 'God's healing,'" she murmured to herself.

      "But you'd be away for Passover! Enough!"

      "No, we shall be easily back by Passover."

      "O these women! The Almighty could not have rested on the seventh day if he had not left woman still uncreated."

      "You don't care whether Brum lives or dies!" Zillah burst into sobs.

      "It is just because I do that I ask how are you going to live on the journey? And there are no kosher hotels in Italy."

      "We shall manage on eggs and fish. God will forgive us if the hotel plates are unclean."

      "But you won't be properly nourished without meat."

      "Nonsense; when we were poor we had to do without it." To herself she thought, "If he only knew I did without food altogether on Mondays and Thursdays!"

      XI

      And so Brum passed at last over the shining, wonderful sea, feeling only the wind on his forehead and the salt in his nostrils. It was a beautiful day at the dawn of spring; the far-stretching sea sparkled with molten diamonds, and Zillah felt that the highest God's blessing rested like a blue sky over this strange pilgrimage. She was dressed with great taste, and few would have divined the ignorance under her silks.

      "Mother, can you see France yet?" Brum asked very soon.

      "No, my lamb."

      "Mother, can you see France yet?" he persisted later.

      "I see white cliffs," she said at last.

      "Ah! that's only the white cliffs of Old England. Look the other way."

      "I am looking the other way. I see white cliffs coming to meet us."

      "Has France got white cliffs, too?" cried Brum, disappointed.

      On the journey to Paris he wearied her to describe France. In vain she tried: her untrained vision and poor vocabulary could give him no new elements to weave into a mental picture. There were trees and sometimes houses and churches. And again trees. What kind of trees? Green! Brum was in despair. France was, then, only like England; white cliffs without, trees and houses within. He demanded the Seine at least.

      "Yes, I see a great water," his mother admitted at last.

      "That's it! It rises in the Côte d'Or, flows N.N.W. then W., and N.W. into the English Channel. It is more than twice as long as the Thames. Perhaps you'll see the tributaries flowing into it—the little rivers, the Oise, the Marne, the Yonne."

      "No wonder the angels envy me him!" thought Zillah proudly.

      They halted at Paris, putting up for the night, by the advice of a friendly fellow-traveller, at a hotel by the Gare de Lyon, where, to Zillah's joy and amazement, everybody spoke English to her and accepted her English gold—a pleasant experience which was destined to be renewed at each stage, and which increased her hope of a happy issue.

      "How loud Paris sounds!" said Brum, as they drove across it. He had to construct it from its noises, for in answer to his feverish interrogations his mother could only explain that some streets were lined with trees and some foolish unrespectable people sat out in the cold air, drinking at little tables.

      "Oh, how jolly!" said Brum. "But can't you see Notre Dame?"

      "What's СКАЧАТЬ