THE JEWISH CHRONICLE
8
Society Ball." He waved a concilatory
bandaged finger at her. Gerty idly won-
dered why one of his fingers was always
bdund up in a piece of his stained white
apron. "You hear me tsi not?" he re-
peated.
Gerty heard this time. "To-morrow,"
she said in a voice that invited no dis-
cussion. "To-morrow I go to night-
school."
Dave stood up, indignant and breath-
less. "All right," he sputtered, and left.
His words, wafted in through a broken
screen-door, aroused her tired aunt, a
kindly creature with a large family and
no system.
"Gerty," she pleaded, "Why do you
make Dave mad? Such a nice boy. Every
night he comes and waits and waits.
Such a boy on my Jennie beschert. A
fine butcher-shop in his own name hasn't
he got? And a four-family flat in the
high-tone ycgcnt too? And what have
you? Nothing with nothing. Money you
haven't got ; too healthy you're not. Your
pa, Olov Hasholom, said it should be a
shidach. But you work better in a cigar
factory with a yellow face and go to
night-school like you're learning for a
teacher."
"Tante," Gerty said, when her aunt
had stopped for breath. "Why should you
crger yourself ? I'm a young girl yet."
And her aunt, finally wearied with her
own outburst of entreaty, left Gerty
alone, a very quiet and miserable girl.
She felt deeply indebted to her uncle
and aunt. If it wern't for them, wouldn't
she still have been a homeless wanderer
in war-ridden Russia? She shuddered at
the thought. After her father's death
hadn't they sent her a schiff - carte and
forty rubles and bidden her come to their
home? Born in a country where a Schad-
chan earns a comfortable living, the only
child of disappointed but devoted par-
ents, she had always instinctively under-
stood that when the proper time came a
suitable husband, befitting her rank and
station, would be chosen and courted for
her. It was the ordinary and proper
custotn ; a custom not to be questioned,
but respected and obeyed. Gerty, how-.
ever, had been blissfully unconscious,
until a few days after her arrival, that
Dave, the Kotsiff from Minsk was the
one selected for her ; nor did she know
that he was a neighbor of her uncle and
aunt, and ready and willing to carry out
the terms of the agreement. Now that
she knew and understood, her soul re-
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voltcd. A wist ful, lonely little figure, she
sat there, a prey to dark and gloomy
thoughts.
Then. as if at sonic unbidden thought
she smiled, a happy sweet smile that
challenged the dimple and seemed to
light up the very corner where she sat.
Smiling she picked up the book and
entered the house; smiling, she washed
the two piles of dishes left by her over-
worked aunt ; and smiling, lay down to
sleep between her two youngest and most
restless cousins, her lips framing such
unaccustomed words as "won-der-ful,"
"op-por-tu-ni-ty," "free-dom."
The alarm clock, persistent and petul-
ant, disturbed her at five, and little Ben-
nie's feet accomplished the rest. Gerty
sat up fully awake. Another day, but
somehow a new day. With enviable ra-
pidity and adeptness she confined her-
self in the snug little black dress that
had served her faithfully for a year and
a half and now looked none the better
for its continued service; fastened Min-
nie's garters and tied her hair-ribbon,
laced Bennie's shoes and washed that
part of his face which, according to his
howling assertions, least needled it ; put
the coffee on the gas stove, prepared
her own lunch with the cornbeef pur-
chased the evening before and congealed
in the interval ; forced with difficulty a
little black sailor on her thick brown
hair, and, with her English book secure
under one arm, her lunch box in the
other, and a ready car-ticket in her
mouth, Gerty was launched on another
day.
She caught the car as it was just
starting, hung perilously in the air until
a fellow passenger pulled her up beside
him, and amidst all discussions of War,
Zionism and Kolinsky furs, opened her
precious little text-book and in an in-
stant was absorbed in study.
Gerty began once during the lunch
hour to tell about her adventure of the
previous evening, but Lena suddenly and
rudely interrupted with the startling an-
nouncement that her Louie was trading
his old and faithful beast of burden for
a Saxon while she herself had added to
her possessions a yellow fox that you'd
swear "was the real thing." And Gerty,
offended, had lapsed into silence.
The day dragged on to its finish.
Gerty, contrary to custotn, was the first
to reach home. Always weary and list-
less after a day's work, tonight she was
full of life and spirit. Her warmed-over
dinner seemed of little moment to her.
Her aunt, noting the change, remarked,
"That's right, Gerty, hurry up. Maybe
you and Dave go to the Ball tonight,
eh?" And she smiled knowingly and
sympathetically.
"No," answered Gerty, happily and
finally, "Tonight I go to night-school and
tomorrow I go to night-school, and to-
morrow and tomorrow too." And leav-
ing her aunt with mouth agape, uttering
incoherent protests, Gerty dashed out of
the house—not a moment too soon.
Dave was approaching the store, Dave
resplendent in a blue suit with visible
stripes, a pinched-back-belt-all-the-way-
around-model which took criminal ad-
vantage of his rotundity, a derby of a
size that revealed cautious forethought,
and light spats.
"Gerty," lie called out huskily, in a
tone meant to be forgiving and tender.
Her aunt came out, embarrassed with re-
grets and explanations. "Gerty," she be-
gan, "went to night-school. No. No,"
(Continued on Page 19)
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