Stempenyu: A Jewish Romance (9 page)

“Why is it,” asked Stempenyu, “that one never sees you going for a walk, neither on Sabbaths, nor on Holy Days? You are in Tasapevka nearly a whole year—more than a year, and you have never yet taken a walk along the Berdettsever Road. You live so far out of the village itself that I never knew you were here at all. It was only yesterday that I got to know it. When I saw you … I wished to talk with you yesterday; but, I could not. Do you not know what our little Jewish villages are like? The moment two persons are seen talking together, the villagers begin to talk about them.

“But, I beg of you to take a walk next Sabbath afternoon along the Berdettsever Road. You will find the whole town there. You will be sure to go there, won’t you? You will surely walk on the Berdettserver Road—eh?”

Rochalle had no time to answer him. For, at this very moment, her mother-in-law, Dvossa-Malka, having missed her from the room, had rushed off in search of her. When she found her standing in the doorway, with Stempenyu beside her, she was filled with surprise. “What does this mean?” she asked herself. And, as if he had divined her question, Stempenyu, who had never been known to lose his presence of mind in a critical moment, and who had never been at a loss for a way out of an embarrassing situation—Stempenyu turned to Dvossa-Malka, and said:

“We were talking about the wedding of the Rebbe’s daughter in Skvirro. Your daughter-in-law was a child at the time that I was playing at the Rebbe’s wedding. She
does not remember a single thing about it.”

“Certainly not! How could she remember it!” replied Dvossa-Malka. “But, I remember it quite clearly. I was there with my husband; and, we had to sleep in a field overnight, so crowded was the village with strangers.”

“But, you can know nothing of the overcrowding,,” said Stempenyu. “I will tell you something more than you know.” And, he proceeded to tell her a number of stories of all kinds of descriptions. And, while they were thus occupied, Rochalle slipped away from them and went back to her place at the table, at the right-hand side of the bride.

As we have said already, Stemepenyu could talk. But he had yet another quality. He could talk with old women—gossip with them for hours on end. He could talk the teeth out of their heads, as the saying goes, when necessary. Nor did he need any instructions in the art of keeping them completely under the sway of his eloquence. The world repeats a proverb to the effect that a witch trained into witchcraft is worse than one born with the gift. And, Stempenyu had gone through an excellent school, where he acquired the art of fascination until he was a perfect master in it, as we shall see presently.

“What a cheek he has!” cried Rochalle within herself. “The impudence of him to tell me to be sure to walk next Sabbath afternoon along the Berdettsever Road! What next? The idea of it! Only a musician who plays before the public could have such a cheek.” Her heart was hot with anger, as she walked home from the wedding-feast.

The Sabbath came round in due course, and Rochalle’s husband, as well as her father-in-law and her
mother-in-law, betook himself to his bedroom to sleep for the rest of the afternoon. It had been their habit to do so, for years. And, not only their habit, but the habit of everyone around them—the habit which the Jews of Russian villages had inherited from many lines of ancestors.

Rochalle took her place in the open window. She sat quite still, and hummed to herself one of her little songs, under her breath, as she gazed out dreamily at the street in front of her. She saw, as on all other Sabbath afternoons, the girls of the village promenading up and down. They had gay ribbons in their hair, and wore dresses of all colours—red and blue, yellow and green. They had on shiny boots and tiny gloves. They were all either going to or coming from the Berdettsever Road, where they had an opportunity to show off their pretty dresses, and where they walked up and down in rows, stealing glances at the young men, who were also dressed in bright-coloured, tight fitting clothes, and wore the shiniest of shiny boots. There, along the well-known promenade, the girls would drop their eyes and blush scarlet at the least thing. Their hearts fluttered, as they made love after the fashion peculiar to the village from time immemorial.

Rochalle knew what went on there very well. Why should she not know it? It was not so long since she herself had gone abroad with a group of girls, wearing a bunch of bright-coloured ribbons in her hair. But, now everything was different with her.

Rochalle looked about her. Everyone in the house was fast asleep and snoring loudly. Only she herself seemed to be alive. The other three were to her like
dead persons. She felt as if she were in a house alone with real corpses. She leant her head on her hands, and there came back to her memory with a rush, a song she used to sing when she was a little girl:

“Good Sabbath!” cried a voice at her elbow. Rochalle was startled out of her reverie. She lifted her head, and saw standing in front of her, on the other side of the open window, the figure of Stempenyu.

“A good Sabbath to you, I say!” he repeated.

“What is this? How did you come here?” Rochalle wished to ask him, and leave the window without waiting for an answer. But she said instead:

“A good Sabbath to you, and a good year!”

“You did not take my advice and go for a walk on Berdettsever Road. I looked for you there, but in vain. I have … I am … here, read this!”

Stempenyu handed Rochalle a folded sheet of paper, and vanished.

For a long, long time Rochalle held the paper in her hand, not knowing what to do with it, and failed to understand what it was all about. But when the first flush of excitement was over, she opened the letter and found that it was written on a large sheet of paper, in plain Yiddish, and with many errors both of spelling and construction.

“MY DARLING ANGEL FROM HEAVEN,” it ran,—“When I saw your heavenly form for the first time my eyes were dazzled, and in my heart a fierce flame of love sprang up. You are my soul—the light of my life. My heart was drawn towards you from the very first. And your beautiful face and you heavenly eyes enraptured me. My soul, my heart and my life are yours. I dream of you, and without you the sun itself is turned to darkness. And I tremble in every limb lest I know not what. I will love you for ever and ever and ever, until my light goes out. I follow your footsteps from afar and kiss the ground you have trodden on, and a thousand times I kiss your beautiful eyes.

STEMPENYU”

Let us now leave the “Queen’s Daughter,” and turn back to the “King’s Son.” We will leave Rochalle, and talk only of Stempenyu.

It is true that the letter he had handed to Rochalle was by no means well written. But, that could not be helped. Stempenyu was undoubtedly a hero—a handsome scamp. He could do many things well, but he was not the least bit of a scholar. His father, Berrel Bass—peace be unto him!—had seen that Stempenyu was anxious to play music, and that he refused to learn anything else, though one burned him and baked him alive. He, therefore, gave up all attempts to make of him anything else but a musician. He took him into his orchestra, and put him through all sorts of ordeals in order to test his mettle, with the result that Stempenyu got his own way, and kept his fiddle, from which profession he never had
the lest desire to run away.

Berrel Bass had had other children beside Stempenyu, and they were all musicians. But, Stempenyu outdistanced them all by a great length. He seemed to have in him a spark of his grandfather’s genius—his grandfather, Shmulik Trumpet, who had been personally acquainted with the great Paganini.

In his twelfth year, Stempenyu could already play the bridal march which was played when the ceremony of seating the bride was taking place. And, he could play all the pieces which were necessary for an entire wedding-feast, including the music of all the dances. For the exceptional talent which he thus showed the world, his father, Berrel Bass, loved him more than any of the other children, who went in rags, half naked and barefooted, while Stempenyu had good clothes and looked smart and clean. And, although he often beat him black and blue, and pulled his ears, and thumped him, and pinched him, and inflicted on him all sorts of bodily torture, his father still regarded him as the light of his eyes—the ornament of his family—the comfort of his declining years, and the reward for all his labors and trials. He showed off with him, and pushed him into the eyes of strangers at every opportunity. He used to say of him, with a proud air, “Do you see, devils, this youngster will support me in my old age. It is all right. I can depend on him!”

But, Berrel Bass was not destined to be supported by Stempenyu in his old age. For, when Stempenyu was about fifteen years old, he left his father and his home in search of adventure, with only a few coppers in his pocket, and an old broken fiddle hidden away under his coat-tails. He wished to see the whole world. And, he wandered
in and out of all and made every possible hole and corner, through many towns and villages, in the company of many different orchestras. He would not stay in the same place for more than a six-month at the outside. He always drawn towards some new place—somewhere where he had not been, and which was further and further away from his home. From Tasapevka he went to Stepevka, from Stepevka to Karretz, from Karretz to Balta, from Balta to Old Constantin, and from there to Berdettsev; and so on, always further and further, until at least he found himself in Odessa, from which city he turned back again towards home. On his return journey, he stopped again at every little town and village where he had the least opportunity of being head to any advantage. According to his wishes, so it fell out. He was heard everywhere, and his fame spread like wild-fire. Wherever he went, he found that the people had already heard of him in advance of his coming—had heard that there was a certain musician called Stempenyu, who was going about from place to place, all the world over, playing his fiddle with so much genius that the like of his music had never been heard before since the sawn of creation.

It may be gathered from what was said of him that the greatest excitement prevailed whenever he made his appearance in a community. At eighteen years of age, he had already an orchestra of his own, traveling about, and playing at the most important wedding feasts and other gatherings. And, in this way, in the course of time, Stempenyu gave up playing in other orchestras, as he had to do before; for instance, the Conatopar Orchestra, the fame of which was very great, or the Shmielor, or the
Viennese, or the Sarragrada, or any other of the orchestras which were known everywhere, and for which he had played at different times.

It stands to reason that Stempenyu’s success brought him very few friends, and many enemies. As the latter put it, he tore the bread out of the mouths of other musicians. And, on his head were poured out many cart-loads of oaths and curses every day of the week, and every hour of the day. But, to his face he was flattered, and made much of, though the words were born out of malice and spite. Every individual musician knew in his heart that the moment Stempenyu took his fiddle in his hand there was nothing left for any of them to do but to go to bed.

For generations past, the majority of musicians have been passionately attached to the practice of storytelling. They would listen for hours on end to all sorts of tales, of fairies and witches and wonderful doings, legends and romances. And, the members of Stempenyu’s orchestra were not exceptional. They not only listened to stories with pleasure, but themselves told many wherever they went. Stempenyu was their hero, and all their stories centered around him. He was, according to the stories, the most marvelous and the most terrible man who had ever lived. And, there arose a belief in the towns and villages to the effect that Stempenyu had sold himself to the Evil One, and that his fiddle had belonged to the great Paganni himself, whose soul still dwelt in it.

When the local musicians heard that Stempenyu and his orchestra were coming into the village, they cursed him and his assistants for hours on end. And, it is hardly necessary to add that their wives took up the cudgels
against Stempenyu, and positively poured out on him a terrific flood of such curses as made one tremble to listen to, and lifted the hair of one’s head with fear.

The whole year round, the local orchestras were starved, worn thin as laths with the anxiety of borrowing, and pawning, and trying to get this and that on trust. They were so poor that they almost ate up their own skins, since nothing else was available. And to what end? Because they knew that on such and such a date, the daughter of such and such a man of wealth was going to be married. And, they hoped to make a few
roubles
out of the marriage-feast. But, what happened? At the end of their period of waiting, when they were about to tune up their instruments, behold there came into the village an evil spirit—a stranger from goodness alone knew where, and snatched the piece of bread from between the very teeth of the musicians!

“Oh, may the thunder strike down Stempenyu! May the lightning shrivel him up!”

But, from a personal point of view, Stempenyu made no enemies anywhere. He was a good comrade to everybody who had need of him. When he was done with his work of playing at a wedding, he generally gathered together all the musicians of the village, and gave them a grand supper on the most lavish scale possible. He did not economize the liquor, and got the finest dainties that were to be had, without caring a rap for the cost. And, before he left the village, he gave the boys and girls handfuls of coppers, so that they might not forget that he had been amongst them. In a word, he was the best of companions, and the very soul of liberality.

“Do you know what?” the wives of the local musicians
said to one another, after Stempenyu had been in their village and had gone away again. “Do you know what? No one ought to attempt to weigh and measure a Jewish heart!”