ands, pulled down the nightcap, and
coughed and coughed and coughed, hoarsely at first, then louder, the
cough tearing at his sick chest and dinning in the ears. Then he sat
up, and went on coughing and clearing his throat, till he had brought up
the phlegm.

The little girl continued to be absorbed in her work and to swing her
feet, taking very little notice of her sick father.

The invalid smoothed the creases in the cushion, laid his head down
again, and closed his eyes. He lay thus for a few minutes, then he said
quite quietly:

"Leah!"

"What is it, Tate?" inquired the child again, still swinging her feet.

"Tell ... mother ... it is ... time to ... bless ... the candles...."

The little girl never moved from her seat, but shouted through the open
door into the shop:

"Mother, shut up shop! Father says it's time for candle-blessing."

"I'm coming, I'm coming," answered her mother from the shop.

She quickly disposed of a few women customers: sold one a kopek's worth
of tea, the other, two kopeks' worth of sugar, the third, two tallow
candles. Then she closed the shutters and the street door, and came into
the room.

"You've drunk the glass of milk?" she inquired of the sick man.

"Yes ... I have ... drunk it," he replied.

"And you, Leahnyu, daughter," and she turned to the child, "may the evil
spirit take you! Couldn't you put on your shoes without my telling you?
Don't you know it's Sabbath?"

The little girl hung her head, and made no other answer.

Her mother went to the table, lighted the candles, covered her face with
her hands, and blessed them.

After that she sat down on the seat by the window to take a rest.

It was only on Sabbath that she could rest from her hard work, toiling
and worrying as she was the whole week long with all her strength and
all her mind.

She sat lost in thought.

She was remembering past happy days.

She also had known what it is to enjoy life, when her husband was in
health, and they had a few hundred rubles. They finished boarding with
her parents, they set up a shop, and though he had always been a close
frequenter of the house-of-study, a bench-lover, he soon learnt the
Torah of commerce. She helped him, and they made a livelihood, and ate
their bread in honor. But in course of time some quite new shops were
started in the little town, there was great competition, the trade was
small, and the gains were smaller, it became necessary to borrow money
on i