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‘Don’t waste time, granny,’ Becky broke in petulantly, ‘if we are going.’

‘No, my dear. We’ll go at once.’ And, releasing the boy, Natalya partly undid the lower buttons of his waistcoat.

‘You wear no four-corner fringes!’ she exclaimed tragically. ‘She neglects even to see to that. Ah, it will be a good deed to carry you from this godless home.’

‘But I don’t want to go with you,’ he said sullenly, reminded of past inquisitorial worryings about prayers.

‘You little fool!’ said Becky. ‘You are going–and in that cab.’

‘In that cab?’ he cried joyfully.

‘Yes, my apple. And you will never be beaten again.’

‘Oh, she don’t hurt!’ he said contemptuously. ‘She hasn’t even got a cane–like at school.’

‘But shan’t we take our things?’ said Becky.

‘No, only the things you stand in. They shan’t have any excuse for taking you back. I’ll find you plenty of clothes, as good as new.’

‘And little Daisy?’

‘Oh, is it a girl? Your stepmother will look after that. She can’t complain of one burden.’

She hustled the children into the cab, where, with the sack and herself, they made a tightly-packed quartette.

‘I say, I didn’t bargain for extras inside,’ grumbled the cabman.

‘You can’t reckon these children,’ said Natalya, with confused legal recollections; ‘they’re both under seven.’

The cabman started. Becky stared out of the window. ‘I wonder if we’ll pass Mrs. Elkman,’ she said, amused. Joseph busied himself with disentangling the tails of his kite.

But Natalya was too absorbed to notice their indifference to her. That poor little Daisy! The image of the baby swam vividly before her. What a terrible fate to be left in the hands of the public-house woman! Who knew what would happen to it? What if, in her drunken fury at the absence of Becky and Joseph, she did it a mischief? At the best the besotted creature would not take cordially to the task of bringing it up. It was no child of hers–had not even the appeal of pure Jewish blood. And there it lay, smiling, with its beautiful blue eyes. It had smiled trustfully on herself, not knowing she was to leave it to its fate. And now it was crying; she heard it crying above the rattle of the cab. But how could she charge herself with it–she, with her daily rounds to make? The other children were grown up, passed the day at school. No, it was impossible. And the child’s cry went on in her imagination louder and louder.

She put her head out of the window. ‘Turn back! Turn back! I’ve forgotten something.’

The cabman swore. ‘D’ye think you’ve taken me by the week?’

‘Threepence extra. Drive back.’

The cab turned round, the innocent horse got a stinging flip of the whip, and set off briskly.

‘What have you forgotten, grandmother?’ said Becky. ‘It’s very careless of you.’

The cab stopped at the door. Natalya looked round nervously, sprang out, and then uttered a cry of despair.

‘Ach, we shut the door!’ And the inaccessible baby took on a tenfold desirability.

‘It’s all right,’ said Becky. ‘Just turn the handle.’

Natalya obeyed and ran in. There was the baby, not crying, but sleeping peacefully. Natalya snatched it up frenziedly, and hurried the fresh-squalling bundle into the cab.

‘Taking Daisy?’ cried Becky. ‘But she isn’t yours!’

Natalya shut the cab-door with a silencing bang, and the vehicle turned again Ghettowards.

VI

The fact that Natalya had taken possession of the children could not be kept a secret, but the step-mother’s family made no effort to regain them, and, indeed, the woman herself shortly went the way of all Henry Elkman’s wives, though whether she, like the rest, had a successor, is unknown.

The sudden change from a lone old lady to a mater-familias was not, however, so charming as Natalya had imagined. The cost of putting Daisy out to nurse was a terrible tax, but this was nothing compared to the tax on her temper levied by her legitimate grandchildren, who began to grumble on the first night at the poverty and pokiness of the garret, and were thenceforward never without a lament for the good old times. They had, indeed, been thoroughly spoilt by the father and the irregular menage. The Christian wife’s influence had been refining but too temporary. It had been only long enough to wean Joseph from the religious burdens indoctrinated by Fanny, and thus to add to the grandmother’s difficulties in coaxing him back to the yoke of piety.