nded as he was, could have had so simple and unquestioning a
loyalty to these worn old costumes of the past. But she said wistfully
that she thought he had died a much happier man because of his religion
... and that was what was hardest of all for her to understand.

Aunt Selina herself was a Christian. She put as little stock in
Christian Science, though, as in Judaism. It was a fad for her, and an
escape from the hindrances which connection with the Jewish faith would
have entailed. I think she had an idea that people would forget she had
ever been a Jewess and would accept her for a Christian without her
having to go through the extremer forms of proselytism. Like me, she
lacked spirit for either one thing or the other. Like me, she dreaded to
be classed among her own people. But in this we were unlike: that her
dread amounted to a vindictive and brutal antagonism towards whatever
and whoever smacked of Jewry. I think she even objected to adopting me
for a while, because my name was a distinctly Jewish one, and because it
would leave no doubt in her neighbor's eyes as to my race--and hence, no
doubt as to hers.

Aunt Selina lived on Central Park West in the City. She was full of
social ambitions. She had a good many friends from among the
intellectuals of Washington square: Christians, of course, most of them.
Her closest companion was a Mrs. Fleming-Cohen, who claimed to be a
Theosophist. Born with the name of Cohen, she had married a Mr. Fleming
who had made necessary, by his conduct, an early divorce. My aunt, Mrs.
Haberman, and Mrs. Fleming-Cohen lunched together very often, and I
suspect they had a tacit but inviolable agreement never to mention to
each other that bond of race and religion which, stronger than their
professed tastes, drew them instinctively together.

My life in Aunt Selina's apartment was a lonely one. She was hardly the
sort of woman to whom young folks would go for sympathy. She did not
mistreat me, of course, but left me entirely to my own devious ways. For
the ways of a boy of fourteen--especially of an orphan of somewhat shy
and melancholic disposition--are bound to be devious.

I had much to fight out with myself. I lacked any help from the
outside--and though I won over my impulses, my doubts and inner
conflicts, the struggle left me a weak, shy, shunning boy.

For the first year of my life with Aunt Selina I went to a nearby public
school. There were a good many Jewish boys in my c