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.All I want is to marry off my eldestdaughter and get her out of the way.And it won t be long before thisone here is grown up either, said one of the women, pointing a with-ered finger at a little girl of about twelve, whose face was quite fleshless.The child sat chewing a piece of bread and her jawbones could be seenchamping like the jaws of a skeleton. Look at her, she s bolting downher last piece of bread, and when that s finished she ll have to go hun-gry for hours and hours.It ll serve you jolly well right. The motherwas a decrepit old hag to all appearances she was over seventy, shewas toothless, her skin was all shrivelled up, her face was covered withhundreds of warts big and small. Shut up, you dirty Jews! cried a tall burly fellow in an ill-fittingtweed coat.It was the sort of coat that the squire in Jelhitz used towear.How, Deborah wondered, had he come by it? He sat puffing at aclay pipe.The fumes all but suffocated her.She moved over to theTHE DANCE OF THE DEMONS 259 other end of the carriage, but everywhere the air was foul and clammy,everywhere was darkness, everywhere men and women lay groaning intheir sleep.Those who were awake sat talking many foreign tongues.At the frontier they all had to get out for the customs inspection.Hundreds of battered trunks were opened, hundreds of bundles wereundone.A big-bellied woman, seemingly pregnant, was taken away forexamination by a masculine-faced woman official whose featuresDeborah had seen before.The pregnant woman pleaded and protestedat the top of her voice.Deborah was not even troubled to open hersuitcase.The customs officer simply waved her away, but began torummage suspiciously in a soiled little bundle, whose owner broke intoa shrill cackle. A fat lot he ll find in there.All my jewels, and I don t think. Was this really Warsaw? Yes, it was Warsaw indeed! Here she was in theold familiar station; everything looked just the same as she had left it.All she possessed now was a ruble and twenty kopecks.Should shewalk home, or should she be reckless and take a droshky? She wouldcertainly have danced for joy in the middle of the station for all to see,but her legs were failing her.They were very much enfeebled.Ah, therewas the gilt-framed mirror hanging on the wall, and there the sameright-angled sofa fitting so modestly into the corner. Hey, driver! The cabby whom she had hailed poked a weatherbeaten face out ofhis oversized blue greatcoat, and his hands emerged from his longsleeves.He touched up his horse with gusto, and away they sped pastthe station in the heart of the city.She lay back in the droshky.All that she beheld was hers the cabby, the horse, the droshky,Warsaw, they were all part of herself! The familiar streets reeled backdizzily as the droshky flew onwards.The streets were alive! The cobble-stones were alive! Yonder were the treetops of the Saxon Gardens.Theywere alive! Krulewski Street had rather an outlandish air about it; butthe girl who kept the soda-fountain parlor happened to come to thedoor and she gave Deborah a smile of recognition.Deborah was aboutto return the greeting; however, the droshky was moving too fast forthat.All the same Krulewski Street had now lost its outlandish air; thesudden appearance of that shop girl imbued it with a friendly homeyatmosphere. Warsaw! My dear own Warsaw! My very own! How I love you! 260 ESTHER SINGER KREITMAN Whoa-back! Why, we re here! Good heavens, I never realized it was such a shortjourney.I say, cabby, you certainly did it in record time! Betcher life I did! Whatcher expect for yer twenty kopecks? Hadyer money s worth, aintcher? Want me to take you to Berlin, do yer? Oh no, no, don t take me to Berlin! Please don t.Leave me where Iam! she felt like screaming.The children playing in the gateway did not recognize her.Nor didthe baker s wife, who sat on her usual chair in her usual corner of thegateway, selling bread rings out of a huge basket.She had a glass of teain her hands, but she was not drinking.She was busy giving a piece ofher mind to a man coated in flour from head to foot.Apparently hehad kept her waiting a long time for the batch of hot bread rings whichhe was now pouring into her basket.He gave Deborah an amused winkand went his way.Deborah followed him across the courtyard, her feetbuckling under her upon the tortuous cobbles.She began to climb thefamiliar staircase, littered with rubbish.Once or twice she slipped.At last she reached the doorway she knew so well, the varnishedbrown double doors.She knocked, and as she waited her heartslammed madly.No answer! Again no answer! After all, why should I knock? Surely I m at home now! How sillyof me. She flung open the double doors
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