Eleazar?"

And they plunge once more into a deep converse about all sorts of
things, and there seems to be no reason why it should ever end.

It grows darker and darker.

They have come to walk closer together.

Now he takes her hand, she gives a start, but his hand steals further
and further into hers.

Suddenly, as dropt from the sky, he bends his face, and kisses her on
the cheek.

A thrill goes through her, she takes her hand out of his and appears
rather cross, but he knows it is put on, and very soon she is all right
again, as if the incident were forgotten.

An hour or two go by thus, and every day now they steal away and meet
outside the town.

And Eleazar began to frequent her parents' house, the first time with an
excuse--he had some work for Feigele. And then, as people do, he came to
know when the work would be done, and Feigele behaved as though she had
never seen him before, as though not even knowing who he was, and
politely begged him to take a seat.

So it came about by degrees that Eleazar was continually in and out of
the house, coming and going as he pleased and without stating any
pretext whatever.

Feigele's parents knew him for a steady young man, he was a skilled
artisan earning a good wage, and they knew quite well why a young man
comes to the home of a young girl, but they feigned ignorance, thinking
to themselves, "Let the children get to know each other better, there
will be time enough to talk it over afterwards."

Evening: a small room, shadows moving on the walls, a new table on which
burns a large, bright lamp, and sitting beside it Feigele sewing and
Eleazar reading aloud a novel by Shomer.

Father and mother, tired out with a whole day's work, sleep on their
beds behind the curtain, which shuts off half the room.

And so they sit, both of them, only sometimes Eleazar laughs aloud,
takes her by the hand, and exclaims with a smile, "Feigele!"

"What do you want, silly?"

"Nothing at all, nothing at all."

And she sews on, thinking, "I have got you fast enough, but don't
imagine you are taking somebody from the street, just as she is; there
are still eighty rubles wanting to make three hundred in the bank."

And she shows him her wedding outfit, the shifts and the bedclothes, of
which half lie waiting in the drawers.

* * * * *

They drew closer one to another, they became more and more intimate, so
that all looked upon them as engage