to time a large, bright tear fell, over her
beautiful but depressed face onto the book, or the white table-cloth, or
her dress. His father never looked at her. Did he see she was crying?
Meyerl wondered. Then, how strangely he was reciting the Haggadah! He
would chant a portion in long-drawn-out fashion, and suddenly his voice
would break, sometimes with a gurgle, as though a hand had seized him by
the throat and closed it. Then he would look silently at his book, or
his eye would wander round the room with a vacant stare. Then he would
start intoning again, and again his voice would break.

They ate next to nothing, said grace to themselves in a whisper, after
which the father said:

"Meyerl, open the door!"

Not without fear, and the usual uncertainty as to the appearance of the
Prophet Elijah, whose goblet stood filled for him on the table, Meyerl
opened the door.

"Pour out Thy wrath upon the Gentiles, who do not know Thee!"

A slight shudder ran down between Meyerl's shoulders, for a strange,
quite unfamiliar voice had sounded through the room from one end to the
other, shot up against the ceiling, flung itself down again, and gone
flapping round the four walls, like a great, wild bird in a cage. Meyerl
hastily turned to look at his father, and felt the hair bristle on his
head with fright: straight and stiff as a screwed-up fiddle-string,
there stood beside the table a wild figure, in a snow-white robe, with a
dark beard, a broad, bony face, and a weird, black flame in the eyes.
The teeth were ground together, and the voice would go over into a
plaintive roar, like that of a hungry, bloodthirsty animal. His mother
sprang up from her seat, trembling in every limb, stared at him for a
few seconds, and then threw herself at his feet. Catching hold of the
edge of his robe with both hands, she broke into lamentation:

"Shloimeh, Shloimeh, you'd better kill me! Shloimeh! kill me! oi, oi,
misfortune!"

Meyerl felt as though a large hand with long fingernails had introduced
itself into his inside, and turned it upside down with one fell twist.
His mouth opened widely and crookedly, and a scream of childish terror
burst from his throat. Tartilov had suddenly leapt wildly into view,
affrighted Jews flew up and down the street like leaves in a storm, the
white-faced Rebbe sat in his chair, his under lip trembling, his mother
lay on her bed, looking all pulled about like a rumpled counterpane.
Meyerl saw all this as