'But how can I forget?' she answered him in his own idiom. 'Why should I forget? What hath he done?' He ceased to smooth her hair--his voice grew sad and stern. 'He hath profaned the Name. He hath lived like a heathen; he dieth like a heathen now. His blasphemy was a byword in the congregation. I alone knew it not till last Passover. He hath brought down my grey hairs in sorrow to the grave.' 'Yes, father, I know,' said Hannah, more gently. 'But he is not all to blame!' 'Thou meanest that I am not guiltless; that I should have kept him at my side?' said the Reb, his voice faltering a little. 'No, father, not that! Levi could not always be a baby. He had to walk alone some day.' 'Yes, and did I not teach him to walk alone?' asked the Reb eagerly. 'My God, Thou canst not say I did not teach him Thy Law day and night.' He uplifted his eyes in anguished appeal. 'Yes, but he is not all to blame,' she repeated. 'Thy teaching did not reach his soul; he is of another generation, the air is different, his life was cast amid conditions for which the Law doth not allow.' 'Hannah!' Reb Shemuel's accents became harsh and chiding again. 'What sayest thou? The Law of Moses is eternal; it will never be changed. Levi knew God's commandments, but he followed the desire of his own heart and his own eyes. If God's Word were obeyed, he should have been stoned with stones. But Heaven itself hath punished him; he will die, for it is ordained that whosoever is stubborn and disobedient that soul shall surely be cut off from among his people. "Keep My commandments, that thy days may be long in the land," God Himself hath said it. Is it not written: "Rejoice, O young man, in thy youth, and let thy heart cheer thee in the days of thy youth, and walk in the ways of thine heart and in the sight of thine eyes; but know thou that for all these things the Lord will bring thee into judgment"? But thou, my Hannah,' he started caressing her hair again, 'art a good Jewish maiden. Between Levi and thee there is naught in common. His touch would profane thee. Sadden not thy innocent eyes with the sight of his end. Think of him as one who died in boyhood. My God! why didst Thou not take him then?' He turned away, stifling a sob. 'Father,' she put her hand on his shoulder, 'we will go with thee to Stockbridge--I and the mother.' He faced her again, stern and rigid. 'Cease thy entreaties. I will go alone.' 'No, we will all go.' 'Hannah,' he said, his voice tremulous with pain and astonishment, 'dost thou, too, set light by thy father?' 'Yes,' she cried, and there was no answering tremor in her voice. 'Now thou knowest! I am not a good Jewish maiden. Levi and I are brother and sister. His touch profane me, forsooth!' She laughed bitterly. 'Thou wilt take this journey though I forbid thee?' he cried in acrid accents, still mingled with surprise. 'Yes; would I had taken the journey thou wouldst have forbidden ten years ago!' 'What journey? thou talkest madness.'