528 ASCH
"Nothing there for you/' he said.
"Kebbe," said Taube, shyly, "excuse me, translate the Hebrew for me !"
"But it is Torah, an exposition of a passage in the Torah. You won't understand."
"Well, if you would only read the letter in Hebrew, but aloud, so that I may hear what he says."
"But you won't understand one word, it's Hebrew !" persisted the Dayan, with a smile.
"Well, I won't understand, that's all," said the woman, "but it's my child's Torah, my child's!"
The Dayan reflected a while, then he began to read aloud.
Presently, however, he glanced at Taube, and remem- bered he was expounding the Torah to a woman ! And he felt thankful no one had heard him.'
"Take the letter, there is nothing in it for you," he said compassionately, and sat down again in his place.
"But it is my child's Torah, my YitzchokePs letter, why mayn't I hear it? What does it matter if I don't understand ? It is my own child !"
The Dayan turned coldly away.
When Taube reached home after this interview, she sat down at the table, took down the lamp from the wall, and looked silently at the letter by its smoky light.
She kissed the letter, but then it occurred to her that she was defiling it with her lips, she, a sinful woman!
She rose, took her husband's prayer-book from the bookshelf, and laid the letter between its leaves.
Then with trembling lips she kissed the covers of the book, and placed it once more in the bookcase.
