2012年3月23日星期五

By my honorable word

  "But six pounds is a very great sum--without sureties," said Belcovitch, rubbing his time-worn workaday high hat in his agitation.   "I know it is!" answered Mendel, "but God is my witness that I mean to pay you. And if I die before I can do so I vow to send word to my son Daniel, who will pay you the balance. You know my son Daniel. His word is an oath."   "But where shall I get six pounds from?" said Bear helplessly. "I am only a poor tailor, and my daughter gets married soon. It is a great sum. By my honorable word, it is. I have never lent so much in my life, nor even been security for such an amount."   Mendel dropped his head. There was a moment of anxious silence. Bear thought deeply.   "I tell you what I'll do," said Bear at last. "I'll lend you five if you can manage to come out with that."   Mendel gave a great sigh of relief. "God shall bless you," he said. He wrung the sweater's hand passionately. "I dare say we shall find another sovereign's-worth to sell." Mendel clinched the borrowing by standing the lender a glass of rum, and Bear felt secure against the graver shocks of doom. If the worst come to the worst now, he had still had something for his money.   And so Mendel and Beenah sailed away over the Atlantic. Daniel accompanied them to Liverpool, but Miriam said she could not get a day's holiday--perhaps she remembered the rebuke Esther Ansell had drawn down on herself, and was chary of asking.   At the dock in the chill dawn, Mendel Hyams kissed his son Daniel on the forehead and said in a broken voice:  

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