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'Suffer! The artist's glance wandered cynically round the snug solidities of Sir Asher's exile, but he forbore to be personal. 'Then if we must suffer, why did you subscribe so much to the fund for the Russian Jews? Sir Asher looked mollified at Barstein's acquaintance with his generosity. 'That I might suffer with them, he replied, with a touch of humour.
Had he applied to the Russo-Jewish Fund, which existed to help such refugees from persecution? Did he know Jacobs, the dentist of the neighbouring Mansel Place? Jacobs had been one of Barstein's fellow-councillors in Zionism, a pragmatic inexhaustible debater in the small back room, and the voluble little man now loomed suddenly large as a possible authority upon his brother-dentist.
'She has read the Bible, and now reads Sir Asher into it. As well see a Saxon pirate or a Norman jongleur in a modern Londoner. As if to confirm Barstein's vision of the bluff and burly Briton, Sir Asher was soon heard over the clatter of conversation protesting vehemently against the views of Tom Fuller, the degenerate son of a Tory squire. 'Give Ireland Home Rule? he was crying passionately.
Yet he could not suspect the man of a glozing tongue, for of the leaders of Zionism Nehemiah spoke with, if possible, greater veneration, with an awe trembling on tears. His elongated figure grew even gaunter, his lean visage unearthlier, as he unfolded his plan for the conquest of Palestine, and Barstein's original impression of his simple sincerity was repeated and re-enforced.
But, unfortunately, the Mayoress of Middleton was deafish, so that he could not even shock her with his epigrams. It was extremely disconcerting to have his bland blasphemies met with an equally bland smile. On his other hand sat Mrs. Samuels, the buxom and highly charitable relict of 'The People's Clothier, whose ugly pictorial posters had overshadowed Barstein's youth.
'He goes out, he comes in. At this moment, to Barstein's great satisfaction, he did come in. 'Holy angel! he cried, rushing at the hem of Barstein's coat, and kissing it reverently. He was a gaunt, melancholy figure, elongated to over six feet, and still further exaggerated by a rusty top-hat of the tallest possible chimneypot, and a threadbare frockcoat of the longest possible tails.
'You're having all the fun down there, called out Sir Asher benevolently; and the bluff Briton even to the northerly burr was so vividly stamped upon Barstein's mind that he wondered the more that the Mayoress could see him as anything but the prosy, provincial, whilom Member of Parliament he so transparently was. 'A mere literary illusion, he thought.
'And cannot the Almighty support us in Turkey as well as in England? he asked. 'Yes, even in Bursia itself the Guardian of Israel is not sleepy. It was then that the word 'Luftmensch' flew into Barstein's mind. Nehemiah was not an earth-man in gross contact with solidities. He was an air-man, floating on facile wings through the æther.
'And do I not trust Him? said Nehemiah fervently. 'Otherwise, burdened down as I am with a multitude of children 'You made your own burden, Barstein could not help pointing out. Again that look of pain, as if Nehemiah had caught sight of feet of clay beneath Barstein's shining boots. "Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth," Nehemiah quoted in Hebrew.
Such a flood of language carried away the last remnants of Barstein's melancholia; he saw his imagined statue showering adjectives from its cornucopia. 'It is the cry of a dictionary in distress! he murmured, re-reading the letter with unction. It pleased his humour to reply in the baldest language. He asked for details of Silvermann's circumstances and sorrows.
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