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The curious episode in the London Ghetto the other winter, while the epidemic of small-pox was raging, escaped the attention of the reporters, though in the world of the Board-schools it is a vivid memory. But even the teachers and the committees, the inspectors and the Board members, have remained ignorant of the part little Bloomah Beckenstein played in it.
Yet these sins of omission were virtues of commission elsewhere; for if Bloomah's desk was vacant, it was only because Bloomah was slaving at something that her mother considered more important. 'The Beckenstein family first, the workshop second, and school nowhere, Bloomah might have retorted on her mother. At home she was the girl-of-all-work.
Beckenstein connected the degenerate innovation with the invasion of the school by 'furriners' all these hordes of Russian, Polish, and Roumanian Jews flying from persecution, who were sweeping away the good old English families, of which she considered the Beckensteins a shining example. What did English people want with banners and such-like gewgaws?
'Bloomah Beckenstein, do you want me to pull you out by your plait? 'Mrs. Beckenstein, really you mustn't come here like that! said the teacher in her most ladylike accents. 'Tell Bloomah that, answered Mrs. Beckenstein, unimpressed. 'She's come here by runnin' away from home.
So now, then, Bloomah Beckenstein! Don't they teach you here: "Honour thy father and thy mother"? Poor Bloomah rose, feeling vaguely that fathers and mothers should not dishonour their children. With hanging head she moved to the door, and burst into a passion of tears as soon as she got outside. After, if not in consequence of, this behaviour, Mrs.
In the living-rooms she did cooking and washing and sweeping; in the shop above, whenever a hand fell sick or work fell heavy, she was utilized to make buttonholes, school hours or no school hours. Bloomah was likewise the errand-girl of the establishment, and the portress of goods to and from S. Cohn's Emporium in Holloway, and the watch-dog when Mrs. Beckenstein went shopping or pleasuring.
They might have been forgiven for not connecting Bloomah with blooms, for she was a sad-faced child, and even in her tenth year showed deep, dark circles round her eyes. But they were beautiful eyes, large, brown, and soft, shining with love and obedience. Mrs. Beckenstein, however, found neither of these qualities in her youngest born, who seemed to her entirely sucked up by the school.
Benjamin Beckenstein, the cutter of the Emporium, who favoured the latter hypothesis reported a significant saying: 'I have lived with two angels; I can't live with a demon. 'Ah, at last he sees my Fanny was an angel, said Natalya, neglecting to draw the deduction anent America, and passing over the other angel. And she embroidered the theme.
Bloomah's heart was in her mouth when Mrs. Beckenstein clucked her tongue in reading it. She felt sure that the epidemic had invaded one of those numerous family hearths. Her mother handed her the card silently. 'DEAR MOTHER, 'I am rakked with neuraljia. Send Bloomah to fry the fish. Bloomah turned white; this was scarcely less tragic. 'Poor Becky! said her heedless parent.
'A good old English family; Benjamin Beckenstein is his name, and he is dying to step into Elias's shoes. 'His feet are too large! And she flicked the photograph floorwards with her bediamonded finger. 'But why waste the engagement-ring? pleaded Sugarman, stooping to pick up the suitor. 'What an idea! A new man, a new ring! And Fanny slammed the door. 'Impudence-face!
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