His little local fame procured her some relief. At school he won a prize accorded by vote for the most popular boy. This had amazed him, for he had very little traffic with the others, and during playtime used to stand with his back to the wall and his arms folded, staring with unseeing eyes. When his sister asked one of the boys why Mendel had won the vote, the answer she received was: "He _can_ draw." As a result his brothers were helped and his mother was able to get work as a sempstress. They were relieved from the poverty that paralyses. They could go from day to day and carry their deficit from week to week. They could afford friends, and the visits of friends on a ceremonious basis, and Abramovich was always trying to interest rich men in the wonderful family. It was Abramovich who bought Mendel his first box of oil-paints, not so much to give the boy pleasure as with the idea that he might learn to paint portraits from photographs. That, however, was not in the boy's idea. He abandoned his imaginary landscapes and began to paint objects, still in the manner of the pavement artist, thrilled with the discovery that he could more and more exactly reproduce what he saw. He painted a loaf of bread and a cucumber so like the originals that Abramovich was wildly excited and rushed off to bring Mr. Jacobson, a Polish Jew, a timber-merchant and very rich, to see the marvel. Mendel was unprepared. He sat painting in the kitchen with his mother and Lotte, his younger sister. Abramovich and Mr. Jacobson came in. Jacobson was ruddy, red-haired, with a strange broad face and a flat nose, almost negroid about the nostrils. He wore a frock-coat, a white waistcoat with a cable-chain across it, and rings upon his fingers. Mendel had a horror of him, and was overcome with shyness. Mr. Jacobson put on his spectacles, stared at the picture. "Ye-es," he said. "That bread could be eaten. That cucumber could be cut and put into the soup. The boy is all right. Eh? Ye-es, and a beautiful boy, too." Mendel writhed. Golda was almost as overcome with shyness as he. In silence she produced all the boy's drawings and pictures and laid them before the visitors. Abramovich was loud in his praises, but not too loud, for he knew that Mr. Jacobson loved to talk. And indeed it seemed that Mr. Jacobson would never stop. He stood in the middle of the room and wagged his fat, stumpy hands and held forth:--