It was no secret in the town that old Reb Shloimeh spent two to three hours daily sitting with the teacher, only what they did together, that nobody knew. They tried to worm something out of the maid, but what was to be got out of a "glomp with two eyes," whose one reply was, "I don't know." They scolded her for it. "How can you not know, glomp?" they exclaimed. "Aren't you sometimes in the room with them?" "Look here, good people, what's the use of coming to me?" the maid would cry. "How can I know, sitting in the kitchen, what they are about? When I bring in the tea, I see them talking, and I go!" "Dull beast!" they would reply. Then they left her, and betook themselves to the grandchildren, who knew nothing, either. "They have tea," was their answer to the question, "What does grandfather do with the teacher?" "But what do they talk about, sillies?" "We haven't heard!" the children answered gravely. They tried the old lady. "Is it my business?" she answered. They tried to go in to Reb Shloimeh's house, on the pretext of some business or other, but that didn't succeed, either. At last, a few near and dear friends asked Reb Shloimeh himself. "How people do gossip!" he answered. "Well, what is it?" "We just sit and talk!" There it remained. The matter was discussed all over the town. Of course, nobody was satisfied. But he pacified them little by little. The apostate teacher must turn hot and cold with him! They imagined that they were occupied with research, and that Reb Shloimeh was opening the teacher's eyes for him--and they were pacified. When Reb Shloimeh suddenly fell on melancholy, it never came into anyone's head that there might be a connection between this and the conversations. The old lady settled that it was a question of the stomach, which had always troubled him, and that perhaps he had taken a chill. At his age such things were frequent. "But how is one to know, when he won't speak?" she lamented, and wondered which would be best, cod-liver oil or dried raspberries. Every one else said that he was already in fear of death, and they pitied him greatly. "That is a sickness which no doctor can cure," people said, and shook their heads with sorrowful compassion. They talked to him by the hour, and tried to prevent him from being alone with his thoughts, but it was all no good; he only grew more depressed, and would often not speak at all. "Such a man, too, what a pity!" they said, and sighed. "He's pining away--given up to the contemplation of death."