e admiration was but superficial.

She turned, with a spice of ill-humor, and saw Esther still standing
timidly behind her. Her face flushed for she knew the child had
overheard her in a lie.

"What art thou waiting about for?" she said roughly in Yiddish. "Na!
there's a peppermint."

"I thought you might want me for something else," said Esther, blushing
but accepting the peppermint for Ikey. "And I--I--"

"Well, speak up! I won't bite thee." Malka continued to talk in Yiddish
though the child answered her in English. "I--I--nothing," said Esther,
turning away.

"Here, turn thy face round, child," said Malka, putting her hand on the
girl's forcibly averted head. "Be not so sullen, thy mother was like
that, she'd want to bite my head off if I hinted thy father was not the
man for her, and then she'd _schmull_ and sulk for a week after. Thank
God, we have no one like that in this house. I couldn't live for a day
with people with such nasty tempers. Her temper worried her into the
grave, though, if thy father had not brought his mother over from Poland
my poor cousin might have carried home my fish to-night instead of thee.
Poor Gittel, peace be upon him! Come tell me what ails thee, or thy dead
mother will be cross with thee."

Esther turned her head and murmured: "I thought you might lend me the
three and sevenpence halfpenny!"

"Lend thee--?" exclaimed Malka. "Why, how canst thou ever repay it?"

"Oh yes," affirmed Esther earnestly. "I have lots of money in the bank."

"Eh! what? In the bank!" gasped Malka.

"Yes. I won five pounds in the school and I'll pay you out of that."

"Thy father never told me that!" said Malka. "He kept that dark. Ah, he
is a regular _Schnorrer_!"

"My father hasn't seen you since," retorted Esther hotly. "If you had
come round when he was sitting _shiva_ for Benjamin, peace be upon him,
you would have known."

Malka got as red as fire. Moses had sent Solomon round to inform the
_Mishpocha_ of his affliction, but at a period when the most casual
acquaintance thinks it his duty to call (armed with hard boiled eggs, a
pound of sugar, or an ounce of tea) on the mourners condemned to sit on
the floor for a week, no representative of the "family" had made an
appearance. Moses took it meekly enough, but his mother insisted that
such a slight from Zachariah Square would never have been received if he
had married another woman, and Esther for once agreed with her
grandmother's sentime