"Why not? You said anybody might hear." "Noting of the sort. I said a stranger might hear. But Mr. da Costa isn't a stranger. He knows too much about de matter." "What shall we do, then?" murmured the Rabbi. "I can vait till after dinner," said Yankelé, with good-natured carelessness. "I don't sleep—" Before the Rabbi could reply, the wife brought in a baked dish, and set it on the table. Her husband glowered at her, but she, regular as clockwork, and as unthinking, produced the black bottle of schnapps. It was her husband's business to get rid of Yankelé; her business was to bring on the dinner. If she had delayed, he would have raged equally. She was not only wife, but maid-of-all-work. Seeing the advanced state of the preparations, Manasseh da Costa took his seat at the table; obeying her husband's significant glance, Mrs. Red-herring took up her position at the foot. The Rabbi himself sat down at the head, behind the dish. He always served, being the only person he could rely upon to gauge his capacities. Yankelé was left standing. The odour of the meat and potatoes impregnated the atmosphere with wistful poetry. Suddenly the Rabbi looked up and perceived Yankelé. "Will you do as we do?" he said in seductive accents. [92] [92] The Schnorrer's heart gave one wild, mad throb of joy. He laid his hand on the only other chair. "I don't mind if I do," he said, with responsive amiability. "Then go home and have your dinner," said the Rabbi. "'THEN GO HOME AND HAVE YOUR DINNER.'" Yankelé's wild heart-beat was exchanged for a stagnation as of death. A shiver ran down his spine. He darted an agonised appealing glance at Manasseh, who sniggered inscrutably. "Oh, I don't tink I ought to go avay and leave you midout a tird man for grace," he said, in tones of prophetic rebuke. "Since I be here, it vould be a sin not to stay." The Rabbi, having a certain connection with religion, was cornered;
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