Part 4

"Funny what a hit them pumps make! Mr. Leavitt was crazy about them, too; but, say, what your mother thinks of these satin slippers I'd hate to tell you. When she was down the day before I left she looked at 'em till I got so nervous I tripped over the cracks between the boards. Say, but wasn't she sore about the new glass fixtures! I kinda felt like it was my fault, too; but I was strong for 'em because--"

"Mamma's the old-fashioned kind, Miss Ruby--her and poor papa like the old way of doing things. She's getting old, Miss Ruby, but she means well. She's a good mother--a good mother."

"She's sure a grand woman--carrying soup across to old Levinsky every day, and all."

"She's more'n you know she is, too, Miss Ruby--little things that woman does I could tell you about--when she didn't have it so good as now neither."

Miss Ruby dropped her lids until her eyes were as soft as plush behind the portieres of her lashes; her voice dropped into a throat that might have been lined with that same soft plush.

"I had a mother for two days--like I said to Mr. Leavitt the other day up in the country--we was talking about different things. I says to him, I says, she quit when she looked at me--just laid down and died when I was two days old. I must have been enough to scare the daylights out of any one. Next to a pink worm on a fish-hook gimme a red-headed baby for the horrors! Say, you ought to seen Mr. Leavitt fish! Six bass he caught in one day--I sat next him and watched; we had 'em fried for supper. He's some little--"

"What a pleasure you'd 'a' been to your mother, Miss Ruby! Such a girl like you I could wish my own mother."

"That's just what Mr. Leavitt used to tell me; but, gee! he was a kidder! I--I oughtta had a mother! Sometimes I--sometimes in the night when I can't sleep--daytimes you don't care so much--but sometimes at night I--I just don't care about nothing. With a girl like me, that ain't even known a mother or father, it ain't always so easy to keep her head above water."

"Poor little girl!"

"Since the day I left the Institootion I been dodging the city and jumping its mud-holes like a lady trying to cross Sixth Avenue when it's torn up. I--oh, ain't I the silly one?--treating you to my troubles! Say, I got a swell riddle! I can't give it like Leavitt--like Simon did; but--"

"Always Mr. Leavitt, and now it's Simon yet--such a hit as that man made with you--not?"

"Hit! Can't a girl have a gentleman friend? Can't you have a lady friend--a friend like Miss Washeim, who comes in for shoes three times--"

"Ruby, can I help it when she comes in here?"

"Can I help it when I go to the country and meet Mr. Leavitt?"

"Ruby!"

Mr. Ginsburg slid himself along the bench until a customer for a AA misses' last would have fitted with difficulty between, and looked at her as ancient Phidias must have looked at his Athene.

"Ruby--I can't keep it back no longer--since you went away on your vacation I've had it inside of me, but I never knew what it was till you walked back this morning. First, I thought I was sick with the heat; but now I know it was you--"

"What--what you--"

"I--I invite you to get married, Ruby. I got a feeling for you like I never had for any girl! I want it that mamma should have a good girl like you to make it easy for her. I can't say what I want to say, Ruby; I don't say it so good, but--a girl could do worse than me--not, Ruby?"

Miss Cohn's fingers closed over the shoe-hook at her belt until the knuckles sprang out whiter than her white skin.

"Oh, Mr. Ginsburg! What would your mamma say? A young man like you, with a grand business and all--you could do for yourself what you wanted. If you was only a drummer like Simon; but--"

A wisp of Miss Cohn's hair, warm as sunset, brushed close to Mr. Ginsburg's lips; he groped for her hand, because the mist of his emotions was over his eyes.

"Ruby, I invite you to get married; that's--all I want is that mamma should have it good with me always like she has it now. She's getting old, Ruby, and I always say what's the difference if I humor her? When she don't want to move in an apartment with a marble hall and built-in wash-tubs, I say: All right; we stay over the store. When she don't like it that I put a telephone in, I tell her I got a friend in the business put it in for nothing. You could give it to her as good as a daughter--not, Ruby?"

"She's a grand woman, Abie; she--"

"Ruby!"

"Oh! Oh!"

In the eventide quiescence of the shop, with the heliotrope of early dusk about them, and passers-by flashing by the plate-glass window in a stream that paused neither for love nor life, Mr. Ginsburg leaned over and gathered Miss Cohn in his arms, pushed back the hair from her forehead and kissed her thrice--once on each lowered eyelid, and once on her lips, which were puckered to resemble a rosebud.

"Abie, you--you mustn't! We're in the store!"

"I should worry!"

"What will--what will they say?"

"For what they say I care that much!" cried Mr. Ginsburg, with insouciance. "Ain't I got a ruby finer than what they got in the finest jewelry store?"

Miss Cohn raised her smooth cheek from the rough weft of Mr. Ginsburg's sleeve.

"What your mamma will say I don't know! You that could have Beulah Washeim or Birdie Harburger, or any of those grand girls that are grand catches--I ain't bringing you nothing, Abie."

"We're going to make it grand for mamma, Ruby--that's all I want you to bring me. She'll have it so good as never in her life. You are going to be a good daughter to her--not, Ruby?"

"Yes, Abe. If we take a bigger apartment she can have an outside room, and I can take all the housekeeping off her hands. Such nut-salad as I can make you never tasted--like they serve it in the finest restaurant! I got the recipe from my landlady. If we take a bigger apartment--"

"What mamma wants we do--how's that? She's so used to having her own way I always say, What's the difference? When poor papa lived she--"

"Abe, there's your mamma calling you down the back stairs now--you should go up to your supper. I must go, too; my landlady gets mad when I'm late--it's half past six already. Oh, I feel scared! What'll she say when she hears?"

"Scared for what, my little girl?... Yes, mamma; I'm coming!... There ain't a week passes that mamma don't say if I find the right girl I should get married. Even the other night, before I knew it myself, she said it to me. 'Abie,' she always says, 'don't let me stand in your way!'... Yes, mamma; I'll be right up!... You and her can get along grand when you two know each other--grand!"

"Your mamma's calling like she was mad, Abie."

"To-night, Ruby, you come up to us for supper--we bring her a surprise-party."

"Oh, you ain't going to tell her to-night--right away--are you?"

"For what I have secrets from my own mother? She should know the good news. Get your hat, Ruby. Come on, Ruby-la! Come on!"

"Oh, Abie, you ain't going to forget to lock the front store door, are you?"

"_Ach!_--that should happen to me yet. The things a man don't do when he's engaged! If mamma should know I forget to lock the store she'd think I've gone crazy with being in love--you little Ruby-la!"

Mr. Ginsburg hastened to the front of the store on feet that bounded off the floor like rubber balls, and switched on the electric show-window display.

"Abe, you got the double switch on! What you think this is--convention or Christmas week?"

"To-night we celebrate with double window lights. What's the difference if it costs a little more or a little less? The night he gets engaged a fellow should afford what he wants."

"Abe!"

"There now--with two locks on the door we should worry about burglars! I'm the burglar that's stealing the ruby, ain't I?... One, two, three--up we go, to mamma and supper. Watch out for the step there! I want her to see my Ruby--finer than you can buy in the finest jewelry store!" cried Mr. Ginsburg, clinging proudly to his metaphor.

Any of three emotions were crowded into his voice--excitement, trepidation, the love that is beyond understanding--or the trilogy of them all.

"Come along, Ruby-la!"

Through the rear of the store and up a winding back stairway they marched like glorified children; and at the first landing he must pause and kiss away the words of fear and nervousness from her lips and look into her diffident eyes with the same rapture that was Jupiter's when he gazed on Antiope.

"Such a little scarey she is--like mamma was going to bite!"

At the top of the flight the door of the apartment stood open; a blob of gas lighted a yellowish way to the kitchen, and through the yellow Mrs. Ginsburg's voice drifted out to them:

"Once more I call you, Abie, and then I dish up supper and eat alone--no consideration that boy has got for his mother! He should know what it is not to have a mother who fixes him _Pfannkuechen_ in this heat! Don't complain to me if everything is not fit to eat! In the heat I stand and cook, and that boy closes so late--Abie! Once more I call you and then I dish up. Ab-ie!" Mrs. Ginsburg's voice rose to an acidulated high C.

"Mamma! Mamma, don't get so excited--it ain't late. The days get shorter, that's all. Look! I brought company for supper. We don't stand on no ceremony. Come right in the kitchen, Ruby."

Mr. Ginsburg pushed Miss Cohn into the room before him, and Mrs. Ginsburg raised her face from over the steaming stove-top--the pink of heat and exertion high in her cheek. Reflexly her hand clutched at the collar of her black wrapper, where it fell away to reveal the line where the double scallop of her chin met the high swell of her bosom.

"Miss Cohn! Miss Cohn!"

"How do you do, Mrs. Ginsburg? I--"

"Sit right down, Miss Cohn--or you and Abie go in the front room till I dish up. You must excuse me the way I holler, but so mad that boy makes me. Just like his poor papa, he makes a long face if his supper is cold, but not once does he come up on time."

"All men are alike, Mrs. Ginsburg--that's what they say about 'em anyway."

"Such a supper we got you'll have to excuse, Miss Cohn. Abie, take them German papers off the chair. Miss Cohn can sit out here a minute if she don't mind such heat. If Abie had taken the trouble to tell me you was coming I'd have fixed--"

"I am glad you don't fix no extras for me, Mrs. Ginsburg. I like to take just pot-luck."

"Abie likes _Pfannkuechen_ and pot-roast better than the finest I can fix him, and this morning at Fulton Market I seen such grand green beans; and I said to Yetta, 'I fix 'em sweet-sour for supper; he likes them so.'"

"I love sweet-sour beans, too, Mrs. Ginsburg. My landlady fixes all them German dishes swell."

"Well, you don't mind that I don't make no extras for you? You had a nice vacation? I tell Abie he should take one himself--not? He worked hisself sick last week. I was scared enough about him. Abie, why don't you find a chair for yourself? Why you stand there like--like--"

Even as she spoke the red suddenly ran out of Mrs. Ginsburg's face, leaving it the color of oysters packed in ice.

"Abie!"

For answer Mr. Ginsburg crossed the room and took his mother in a wide-armed embrace, so that his mouth was close to her ear. His lips were pale and tinged with a faintly green aura, like a child's who holds his breath from rage or a lyceum reader's who feels the icy clutch of stage-panic on him.

"Mamma, we--we--me and Ruby got a surprise-party for you. Guess, mamma--such a grand surprise for you!"

Mrs. Ginsburg placed her two fists against her son's blue shirt-front, threw back her head, and looked into his eyes; her heavy waist-line swayed backward against his firm embrace; immediate tears sprang into her eyes.

"Abie! Abie!"

"Mamma, look how happy you should be! Ain't you always wanted a daughter, mamma? For joy she cries, Ruby."

"Abie, my boy! _Ach_, Miss Cohn, you must excuse me."

"Aw, now, mamma, don't cry so. Look! You make my shoulder all wet--shame on you! You should laugh like never in your life! Ruby, you and mamma kiss right away--you should get to know each other now."

"_Ach_, Miss Cohn, you must excuse me. I always told him I mustn't stand in his way; but what that boy is to me, Miss Cohn--what--what--"

"Ruby--mamma, call her Ruby. Ain't she your little Ruby as much as mine--now, ain't she?"

"Yes; come here, Ruby, and let me kiss you. Since poor papa's gone you can never know what that boy has been to me, Ruby--such a son; not out of the house would he go without me! It's like I was giving away my heart to give him up--like I was tearing it right out from inside of me! _Ach_, but how glad I am for him!"

"Aw, mamma--like you was giving me up!"

Mr. Ginsburg swallowed with such difficulty that the tears sprang into his eyes.

"I ain't taking him away from you, Mrs. Ginsburg--he's your son as much as ever--and more."

"Call her mamma, Ruby--just like I do."

"Mamma! Just don't you worry, mamma; it's going to be grand for you and me and all of us."

"Hear her, mamma, how she talks! Ain't she a girl for you?"

"You--you children mustn't mind me--I'm an old woman. You go in the front room, and I'll be all right in a minute--so happy I am for my boy. You bad boy, you--not to tell your mamma the other night!"

"Mamma, so help me, I didn't know it myself till I seen her come back to-day so pretty, and all--I just felt it inside of me all of a sudden."

"Aw, Abe--ain't he the silly talker, Mrs. Ginsburg?--mamma! You mustn't cry, mamma; we'll make it grand for you."

"Ain't I the silly one myself to cry when I'm so happy for you? I'll be all right in a minute--so happy I am!"

"Ruby, you tell mamma how grand it'll be."

Miss Cohn placed her arms about Mrs. Ginsburg's neck, stood on tiptoe, and kissed her on the tear-wet lips.

"You always got a home with us, mamma. Me and Abie wouldn't be engaged this minute if it wasn't that you would always have a home with us."

With one swoop Mr. Ginsburg gathered the two women in a mutual embrace that strained his arms from their sockets; his voice was taut, like one who talks through a throat that aches.

"My little mamma and my little Ruby--ain't it?"

Mrs. Ginsburg dried her eyes on a corner of her apron and smiled at them with fresh tears forming instantly.

"He's been a good boy, Ruby. I only want that he should make just so good a husband. I always said the girl that gets him does well enough for herself. I don't want to brag on my own child, but--if--"

"Aw, mamma!"

"But, if I do say it myself, he's been a good boy to his mother."

"Now, mamma, don't begin--"

"I always said to him, Ruby, looks in a girl don't count the most--such girls as you see nowadays, with their big ideas, ain't worth house-room. I always say to him, Ruby, a girl that ain't ashamed to work and knows the value of a dollar, and can help a young man save and get a start without such big ideas like apartments and dummy waiters--"

"Honest, wouldn't you think this was a funeral! Mamma, to-night we have a party--not? I go down and get up that bottle of wine!"

"_Himmel!_ My _Pfannkuechen_! Yes, Abie, run down in the cellar; on the top shelf it is, under the grape-jelly row--left yet from poor papa's last birthday. _Ach_, Ruby, you should have known poor papa--that such a man could have been taken before his time! Sit down, Ruby, while I dish up."

The tears dried on Mrs. Ginsburg's cheeks, leaving the ravages of dry paths down them; Mr. Ginsburg's footsteps clacked down the bare flight of stairs.

"Abie! Oh, Abie!"

"Yes, mamma!"

His voice came up remotely from two flights down, like a banshee voice drifting through a yellow sheol of dim-lit hallway.

"Abe, bring up some dill pickles from the jar--there's a dish in the closet."

"Yes, I bring them."

Between the two women fell silence--a silence that in its brief moment spawned the eggs of a thousand unborn thoughts.

From her corner the girl regarded the older woman with a nervous diffidence, her small, black-satin feet curled well inward and round the rungs of the chair.

"I--I hope you ain't mad at me, Mrs. Ginsburg--you ain't more surprised than me."

A note as thin as sheet tin crept into Mrs. Ginsburg's voice.

"He's my boy, Ruby, and what he wants I want. I know you ain't the kind of a girl, Ruby, that won't help my boy along--not? Extravagant ways and high living never got a young couple nowheres. Abie should take out a thousand more life insurance now; and, with economical ways, you got a grand future. For myself I don't care--I ain't so young any more, and--"

"You always got a home with us, Mrs. Ginsburg. You won't know yourself, you'll have it so good! If we move you with us out of this dark little flat we--you won't know yourself, you'll have it so good!"

"I hope you ain't starting out with no big ideas, Ruby--this flat ain't so dark but it could be worse. For young people with good eyes it should do all right. If it was good enough for Abie's papa and me it--"

Mr. Ginsburg burst into the kitchen, a wine-bottle tucked under one arm and a white china dish held at arm's-length.

"Such pickles as mamma makes, Ruby, you never tasted! You should learn how. You two can get out here in the kitchen, with your sleeves rolled up to your elbows, and such housekeeping times you can have! I'll get dill down by Anchute's like last year--not, mamma?... Come; we sit down now. We can all eat in the kitchen, mamma. Don't make company out of Ruby--she knows we got a front room to eat in if we want it. Come and sit down, Ruby, across from mamma, so we get used to it right away--sit here, you little Ruby-la, you!"

Mr. Ginsburg exuded radiance like August bricks exude the heat of day. He kissed Miss Cohn playfully under the pink lobe of each ear and repeated the performance beneath Mrs. Ginsburg's not so pink lobes; carved the gravy-oozing slices of pot-roast with a hand that was no less skilful because it trembled under pressure of a sublime agitation.

"Ruby, I learn you right away--we always got to save mamma the heel of the bread, 'cause she likes it."

Miss Cohn smiled and regarded Mr. Ginsburg from the left corner of each eye.

"I wasn't so slow learning the shoe business, was I, Abe?"

"You look at me so cute-like, and I'll come over to you right this minute! Look at her, mamma, how she flirts with me--just like it wasn't all settled."

"Abie, pass Ruby the beans. Honest, for a beau, you don't know nothing--your papa was a better beau as you. Pass her the beans. Don't you see she ain't got none? You two with your love-making! You remind me of me and poor papa; he--he--"

"Now, mamma, don't you go getting sad again like a funeral."

"I ain't, Abie. I'm--so happy--for you."

"To-night we just play, and to-morrow mamma decides when we get married--not, Ruby? We do like she wants it--to-night we just play. Ruby, pass your glass and mamma's, and we drink to our three selves with claret."

Mr. Ginsburg poured with agitated hand, and the red in his face mounted even as the wine in the glass.

"To the two grandest women in the world! May we all be happy and prosperous from to-night!" Mr. Ginsburg swung his right arm far from him and brought his glass round to his lips in a grand semi-circle. "To the two grandest women in the world!"

Mrs. Ginsburg tipped the glass against her lips.

"To my two children! God bless them and poor papa!"

"The first time I ever seen mamma drink wine, Ruby. She hates it--that shows how much she likes you already. Eat your dessert, mamma; it'll take the taste away. You like noodle dumplings? Such dumplings as these you should learn to make, Ruby-la."

"Children, you have had enough supper?"

"It was a grand supper, mamma."

They scraped their chairs backward from the table and smiled satiated, soul-deep smiles. From the sitting-room a clock chimed the half-hour.

"So late, children! _Ach_, how time flies when there's excitement! You and Ruby go in the parlor--I do the dishes so quick you won't know it."

"Ruby can help you with the dishes, mamma."

"Sure I can; we can do 'em in a hurry, and then go maybe to a picture show or some place."

"Picture show--nine o'clock!"

"There's always two shows, Mrs. Ginsburg--the second don't begin till then. I always go to the second show--it's always the liveliest."

"Come on, mamma; you and Ruby do the dishes, and we go. It's a grand night, and for once late hours won't hurt you."

"_Ach_, you ain't got no time for a old lady like me--in the night air I get rheumatism. Abie can tell you how on cool nights like this I get rheumatism. You two children go. I'm sleepy already. These few dishes I can do quicker as with you, Ruby."

"Without you we don't go--me and Ruby won't go then."

"We won't go, then, like Abe says--we won't go then."

"Abie, if it pleases me that you go to the picture show for an hour--you can do that much for mamma the first night you're engaged; some other night maybe I go too. Let me stay at home, Abie, and get my sleep like always."

"Ah, mamma, you're afraid. I know you even get scared when the bed-post creaks. We stay home, too."

"Ruby, for me will you make him go?"

"Abie, if your mamma wants you to go for an hour--you go. If she comes, too, we're glad; but many a night I've stayed in the boarding-house alone. If you was afraid you'd say so--wouldn't you, Mrs. Ginsburg--mamma?"

"Afraid of what? Nobody won't steal me!"

"Sure, mamma?"

"Get Ruby's hat and coat, Abie. Good-by, you children, you! Have a good time. Abie, stop with your nonsense--on the nose he has to kiss me!"

"Ruby, just as easy we can stay at home with mamma--not?"

"Sure! Aw, Abe, don't you know how to hold a girl's coat? So clumsy he is!"

"Good night, Ruby. I congratulate you on being my daughter. Good night, Ruby--you come to-morrow."

"Good night, mamma--to-morrow I see you."

"Good night, mamma. In less than an hour I be back--before the clock strikes ten. You shouldn't make me go--I don't like to leave you here."

"Ach, you silly children! I'm glad for peace by myself. Look! I close the door right on you."

"Good night, mamma. I be back by ten."

"Good-by, Abie."

"What?"

"Good night, children!"

* * * * *

When the clock in the parlor struck eleven Mrs. Ginsburg wiped dry her last dish, flapped out her damp dish-towel, and hung it over a cord stretched diagonally across a corner of the kitchen. Then she closed the cupboard door on the rows of still warm dishes, slammed down the window and locked it, reached up, turned out the gas, and groped into her adjoining bedroom.

Reflected light from the Maginty kitchen lay in an oblong on the floor and climbed half-way on the bed. By aid of the yellow oblong Mrs. Ginsburg undressed slowly and like a withered Suzanne, who dared not blush through her wrinkles.

The black wrapper, with empty arms dangling, she spread across a chair, and atop of it a black cotton petticoat, sans all the gentle mysteries of lace and frill. Lastly, beside the bed, in the very attitude of the service of love, she placed her shoes--expressive shoes, swollen from swollen joints, and full of the capacity for labor.

Then Mrs. Ginsburg climbed into bed, knees first, threw backward over the foot-board the blue-and-white coverlet, and drew the sheet up about her. A fresh-as-water breeze blew inward the lace curtain, admitting a streak of light across her eyes and a merry draught about her head. The parlor clock tonged the half-hour.

Silence for a while, then the black rush of a train, an intermittent little plaint like the chirrup of a bird in its cage, the squeak of a bed-post, and a succession of the unimportant noises that belong solely to the mystery of night.

Finally, from under the sheet, the tremolo of a moan--the sob of a heart that aches and, aching, dares not break.

THE OTHER CHEEK