"Leah, what a pretty girl you are!" And the voice is not that of an old man; it is _his_ voice. I open my eyes a little way; it is _his_ face: "Sst!" he whispers; "don't tell! I enticed Reb Zeinwill into the wood, put him into a sack, tied it up, and threw it into the river (this was out of a story my mother once told me), and I am here in his place!" I woke trembling. Pale moonshine was lighting the whole room through a chink in the shutter, and I noticed, for the first time, that the lamp was once more hanging from the ceiling, and that my parents were sleeping in bed-clothes. Father smiled in his sleep; mother breathed quietly, and the good angel said to me: "If you are obedient and pious, your father will recover his health; your mother will not have to toil into her old age, and your little brothers will become learned men--rabbis, authorities in the Law, great, great Jews. Their school fees will be paid." "Only," put in the bad angel, "Reb Zeinwill will kiss you with his damp whiskers, and clasp you in his bony arms; and he will torment you as he did the other wives, and send you to an early grave, and _he_ will come back and grieve, and he will teach you no more songs, or sit with you evening after evening--you will be sitting with Reb Zeinwill!" No! not if the heavens should fall about the earth! Tear up the contract! I did not sleep again till morning. My mother was the first to wake. I wanted to talk with her, but I was accustomed to go for help to my father. There, he wakes. "Do you know, Sarah'le," are his first words, "I feel so well to-day. You will see, I shall go out." "Praise to His dear Name! It is all owing to our daughter's good fortune, all thanks to her merit." "And the Röfeh was quite right: the milk agrees very well with me." They are silent, and the good angel repeats: "If you are good and pious, your father will get well, while if your lips let fall wicked words, he will decline and die." "Listen, Sarah'le," continued my father, "you are not to go about peddling any more." "What do you mean?" "What I say! I will go to-day to Reb Zeinwill; he will take me into a business, or lend me a few rubles, and we will have a little shop; I will serve a bit, and you a bit--and later I will deal in produce." "God grant it." "He _will_ grant it. If you want a dress for the wedding, buy it--even _two_ dresses. Why not? He said we were to get what we wanted. You are not going in your old clothes?" "Go along with you! The thing is to have something made for the children. Reuben has been going barefoot--last week he got a splinter in his sole, and he is limping now. Winter is coming on, too, they want coats and shirts and warm cloaks." "Buy, buy!" "You hear?" said the good angel. "If you speak out, your mother will have no new dress, and you know the old one is falling to bits; the little brothers will run barefoot to Cheder in the sharpest frost, and in summer they will get splinters in their soles."