The tiny room is gloomy and dingy, and all four walls are weeping over the squalor.... Up on the dilapidated ceiling, there is a hook - an orphan bereft of its lamp. The huge, peeling oven, its loins girded with coarse sackcloth, stands hunched over in a corner, gazing at its lifeless neighbor, the black, empty stove. A pot with a scorched edge is sprawling upside down on the hob, and off to the side lies a broken spoon, RIP. The tin hero died a noble death: in the battle against dry, stubborn, leftover buckwheat.
The room is packed with furniture: there is a canopy bed with tattered curtains; the bedding, ungraced by linen, peers through the holes with red, feathery eyes; there is a cradle, revealing the big yellowish head of a sleeping baby. There is a tin-lined chest with an open padlock (and most likely containing no great riches); there is also a table with three chairs, the wood, once painted red, is dark and dirty now.... And if we add a bucket, a garbage can, a barrel of water, a poker, and a peel, you will understand why the two-by-four cabin is bursting at the seams.
And yet, it also has: a male and a female.
She, a woman just past her prime, is sitting on the chest, which is stuffed in between the canopy bed and the cradle.
To her right, the lone window, small and moldy; to her left, the table. While knitting a stocking, she rocks the cradle with one foot and listens to him, at the table, studying the Talmud, crooning the words in a lamenting tone. While chanting, he shifts about, restless, fidgety, nervous. He either swallows the words, drawls them out, reels them off, or gulps them down; some he stresses and dwells on lovingly, some he rattles off as though pouring peas out of a bag. And he never rests for an instant; now he pulls out a handkerchief that used to be red and whole, wipes his nose, and mops the sweat off his face and brow; next, he drops the handkerchief in his lap and starts twirling his sidelocks, tugging his pointed little beard with its touches of gray.... A hair comes out, and he hides it in the holy book, and begins slapping his knees. His hands touch the handkerchief, grab it, and stick a corner of it into his mouth; he bites down on it, crosses and then alternately recrosses his legs.
All the while, his pale forehead breaks into lines and creases, up and down and across, and a tiny T emerges above his nose. The folds of skin almost cover up the long eyebrows. All at once, apparently feeling a pang in his heart, he beats his right fist against the left side of his chest.... Abruptly he tilts his head to the left, closes off his left nostril with a finger, and turns his right nostril into an artificial fountain, swings his head over to the right, and the fountain spurts out of the left nostril!... In between, he inhales a pinch of snuff, sways back and forth more briskly, his voice rings out, the chair creaks, and the table groans!
The child sleeps through everything, it is accustomed to the background music.
And she, the prematurely shrunken wife, sits and beams at her husband. Her eyes are fixed on him; her ears never miss a single sound from his lips.... Every so often, she sighs: If only, she muses, he were as fit for this life as for the afterlife, then things would be bright and lovely for her in this world too....
"Oh well," she consoles herself, "that would be asking too much. Not everyone is destined to have the best of both worlds."
She listens.... Her shrunken face keeps changing: she is nervous too.
Only a moment ago, she was beaming with pleasure, taking such pride in his learning .... Now it strikes her that today is Thursday and she has no money for the Sabbath. And the heavenly light upon her face grows dimmer and dimmer until the smile fades totally .... Then she glances through the moldy window, peers at the sun (it must be late by now and she hasn't cooked a thing), and the knitting needles freeze in her hands. A dark shadow has drawn across her face. She looks at the baby; it's tossing and turning now, it will soon wake up. There isn't a drop of milk in the house for the sick child. And the shadow has already grown into a cloud. 'the knitting needles start quivering, quaking ....
And when she remembers that Passover is coming... that her earrings and the Sabbath candlesticks are at the pawnbroker's, that the chest is empty and the ceiling lamp has been sold - then the needles begin dancing murderously! The cloud over her face turns dark blue, heavy. And the small gray eyes, barely visible under the headcloth, flash like lightning.
He is still sitting there, chanting away; unaware that a storm is brewing, that the danger is nearing... that she has dropped the stocking and her needles and begun cracking her emaciated fingers, that her forehead is all wrinkled with pain. One eye closes and the other eye looks daggers at him, the husband, the scholar, so piercingly, that if he saw it, his blood would run cold; but he fails to see her blue lips shivering, her chin trembling, her teeth chattering, as she holds back with all her strength to keep from erupting.... He fails to notice that the thunder is about to boom out, that the tiniest spark could make it burst from her mouth.
And he, provides the spark:
Crooning a talmudic phrase, he then translates it: "From this we can deduce-" He is about to say: "... three things," but the word "deduce" is enough: Her bitter heart pounces upon it, the word falls like a spark in gunpowder.
Her self-control explodes. The unfortunate word has opened all the locked gates, torn away all the bolts. Raging, foaming at the mouth, she leaps at her husband, waving her nails in his face.
"Deduce!? Did you say 'deduce'!? I'll deduce you, by God!" she shrieks, hoarse with anger. "I'll deduce you, by God! Yes, yes!" she hisses, like a serpent. "Passover's coming... today's Thursday... the baby's sick... not a drop of milk! Ha!"
She gasps for breath, her sunken chest heaves up and down, her eyes blaze.
He is petrified. Blanching, he jumps up from the chair. Breathless with terror, he backs towards the door.
They stand face to face, staring at one another. His eyes are glassy with fear, hers are burning with anger.... He quickly realizes that her fury has paralyzed her tongue and her hands. His eyes keep getting smaller and smaller; he sticks one corner of the handkerchief in his mouth, moves a bit further back, takes a deep breath, and murmurs:
"Listen, woman... do you realize what it means to profane the holy writings, to prevent your husband from studying the Talmud? Huh! All you care about is bread and butter. Huh! Who feeds the tiniest sparrow? It all comes from not believing in God1 You're filled with the Evil Spirit. You care only about this world.... Foolish woman! Wicked woman! Not letting your husband study the Talmud! You'll go straight to hell!"
Her failure to answer spurs him on! Her face turns paler and paler, she trembles more and more violently, and the harder she trembles and the paler she becomes - the more quickly and firmly he speaks:
"Hell! Fire! Hang you by your tongue. The Highest Judgment: the Four Death Penalties."
She can't speak, her face is chalky.
He senses he is doing wrong, he shouldn't be hurting her like this, he's being dishonest; but he can't stop now. All the bad things in him come gushing out, he can't pull back.
"Do you know what that means?" His voice turns into a sinister thunder: "Stoning - they'll fling you into a pit and pelt you with stones! Burning-" he continues, astonished at his own audacity, "burning - they'll pour a spoonful of boiling molten lead into your innards! Slaying with a sword - they'll take a sword and slice your head off... like this!" And he draws his fingers across his neck. And finally: "Strangling - they'll choke you, choke you, do you hear! Do you understand? For keeping a man from studying! For profaning the Talmud!"
His heart is already aching with pity for his victim. But this is the first time he's ever won. The thought intoxicates him! What a stupid woman! He never thought he could terrorize her so easily.
"That's what happens when you profane the Holy Writings!" he finally exclaims. But then he breaks off; after all, she might come to her senses and grab a broom! He jumps back to the table, closes the talmudic tome, and dashes out....
"I'm going to synagogue!" he calls in a softer voice, banging the door behind him.
The yelling and the slamming have awoken the sickly child. It slowly raises its heavy lids. The waxen face twists, and the swollen nose starts whistling. But she remains motionless, raging, transfixed, oblivious of the child's voice.
"Ha!" a hoarse sound finally struggles out of her constricted chest. "So... not this world, not the next world.... Hang, he says, strangle, he says, burning pitch, lead, he says. Profaning the Talmud!
"Nothing.... nothing for me," her wretched heart sobs, "here, hunger, no clothes... no Sabbath candlesticks... nothing... the child starving... not a drop of milk... and in the next world - hanging... hanging by the tongue... for profaning the Talmud - he says.
"Hanging.... Ha! Ha! Ha!" these sounds choke out of her despairing voice. "Hanging, yes, but down here! Right away! What's the difference! Why wait?"
The child starts crying louder, but she still doesn't hear it.
"A rope! A rope!" she shrieks, beside herself, her eyes wildly scouring every nook and cranny for a rope. "Where can I get a rope? At least he won't find me here! Just let me out of this hell! Let him know what it's like! Let him be a mother! It's over with me, I'm an angel of death. Let me just put an end to it! An end to it! A rope!"
And the last word struggles out of her throat like a call for help at a fire.
She remembers that there is a rope around somewhere... yes, under the oven... they were supposed to bind up the oven for the winter, it must be underneath....
She runs over and finds the rope: What joy, she has found the treasure. She looks up at the ceiling, the hook is there.... All she has to do is get on the table.
Up she goes.
But from that height she sees the frightened, weakened child sitting up, leaning out of the cradle, trying to escape! It's about to tumble over.
"Mommy!" the sounds barely emerge from the weak throat.
Now a new anger takes hold of her.
She throws away the rope, jumps down, runs over to the child, and pushes it back down on the pillow, screaming:
"Bastard! Won't even let me hang myself! Can't even hang myself in peace! It wants to suck again! You can suck poison from my breast! Poison!
"C'mon, you greedy hog, c'mon!" she screams in one gasp, and stuffs her emaciated breast into the child's mouth:
"C'mon, suck it, bite it!"