d not tell me, Jankiel."

The mirthless, bilious cackle of Jankiel interrupted. "I know a thing
or two," he exclaimed; "I knew that you, Abraham, would not easily
agree to it. I shall manage that without your help."

"Hush!" hissed Calman. The voices dropped again to a whisper.

"Eliezer, go away!" insisted Meir.

The singer did not seem to understand. "Eliezer! do you want to
honour your father, as it is commanded from Sinai?"

Kamionker's son sighed.

"I pray to Jehovah that I may honour him." Meir grasped him by the
hand.

"Then go at once--go! if you stop here any longer you will never be
able to honour your father again!" He spoke so impressively that
Eliezer grew pale and began to tremble.

"How can I go now, if they are discussing secrets there?"

The voice of Jankiel became again distinctly audible:

"The tailor Shmul is desperately poor; the driver Johel is a thief.
Both will be well paid."

"And the peasants who carted the spirit?" asked Abram.

Jankiel laughed.

"They are safe; their souls and bodies and everything that belongs to
them is pledged to my innkeepers."

"Hush!" whispered again the phlegmatic, therefore cautious, Kalman.

Eliezer trembled more and more. A ray of light had pierced his dreamy
brain.

"Meir! Meir!" he whispered, "how can I get away? I am afraid to cross
the room; they might think I had overheard their secrets."

With one hand Meir pushed the table from the window, and with the
other helped his friend to push through. In a second Eliezer had
disappeared from the room. Meir drew himself up and murmured:

"I will show myself now, and let them know that somebody has
overheard their conversation."

Then he opened the low door and entered into the next room. There,
near the wall, on three chairs closely drawn together, sat three men.
A small table stood between them. Kalman, in his satin garment,
looked calm and self-possessed. Jankiel and Abraham rested their
elbows on the table. The first was red with excitement and his eyes
glittered with malicious, greedy light; the latter looked pale and
troubled, and kept his eyes fixed on the floor; but nothing was
capable of disturbing the smiling equanimity of Kalman. When Meir
entered the room, he heard distinctly his uncle's words:

"And if the whole place burns down with the spirit vaults?"

"Ah! ah!" sneered Jankiel, "what does it matter? One more Edomite
will become a beggar!"

Here the speaker stopped and began t