aid.

"Not altogether. The Belcovitches have gone up in the world. They live
on the first floor now."

"Not much of a rise that," said Esther smiling, for the Belcovitches had
always lived on the third floor.

"Oh, they could have gone to a better street altogether," explained
Debby, "only Mr. Belcovitch didn't like the expense of a van."

"Then, Sugarman the _Shadchan_ must have moved, too," said Esther. "He
used to have the first floor."

"Yes, he's got the third now. You see, people get tired of living in the
same place. Then Ebenezer, who became very famous through writing a book
(so he told me), went to live by himself, so they didn't want to be so
grand. The back apartment at the top of the house you used once to
inhabit,"--Debby put it as delicately as she could--"is vacant. The last
family had the brokers in."

"Are the Belcovitches all well? I remember Fanny married and went to
Manchester before I left here."

"Oh yes, they are all well."

"What? Even Mrs. Belcovitch?"

"She still takes medicine, but she seems just as strong as ever."

"Becky married yet?"

"Oh no, but she has won two breach of promise cases."

"She must be getting old."

"She is a fine young woman, but the young men are afraid of her now."

"Then they don't sit on the stairs in the morning any more?"

"No, young men seem so much less romantic now-a-days," said Debby,
sighing. "Besides there's one flight less now and half the stairs face
the street door. The next flight was so private."

"I suppose I shall look in and see them all," said Esther, smiling. "But
tell me. Is Mrs. Simons living here still?"

"No."

"Where, then? I should like to see her. She was so very kind to little
Sarah, you know. Nearly all our fried fish came from her."

"She is dead. She died of cancer. She suffered a great deal."

"Oh!" Esther put her cup down and sat back with face grown white.

"I am afraid to ask about any one else," she said at last. "I suppose
the Sons of the Covenant are getting on all right; _they_ can't be dead,
at least not all of them."

"They have split up," said Debby gravely, "into two communities. Mr.
Belcovitch and the Shalotten _Shammos_ quarrelled about the sale of the
_Mitzvahs_ at the Rejoicing of the Law two years ago. As far as I could
gather, the carrying of the smallest scroll of the Law was knocked down
to the Shalotten _Shammos_, for eighteenpence, but Mr. Belcovitch, who
had gone outside a moment, said he