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Updated: June 18, 2025
If you will not come to my arms peaceably, I must use force; but come you shall!" He clasped the frail girl in both his arms, and lifting her up from the ground, he bore her towards the door. Anger and despair lent Kathinka tenfold strength. With a cry for help, she struggled in his embrace and by a mighty effort freed herself.
"Then I will be taken back and treated more harshly than before. I would rather die than go back to that dreary cell. It is dangerous for you to harbor me. I must leave here at once, this very night." "Where will you go?" asked Kathinka, who was seated at the sufferer's side, and wiped the perspiration from his fevered brow. "I do not know. Anywhere!
Perhaps Drentell is honorable enough to desist if he sees that his advances are repelled." Kathinka shook her head, despondently. "I fear not, father. You should have seen his face and heard his words. Such passion is not subdued by neglect. I am afraid that he will become our implacable enemy and that we will eventually have more to fear from his hatred than from his love."
With a cry of mingled joy and rage, he threw himself upon her and put his arms firmly around her. "Ha! beautiful Kathinka!" he said, ironically; "so we meet again. How happy you must be to see me! Yes, I love you still, and you shall be mine, all mine! Don't struggle, sweet one; I shall remove you to my dwelling, far from all this noise and tumult. Ho, there! make room there for me and my prize!"
"Well, my child; who has stolen your heart?" asked the Rabbi, kindly. "Father, I love Joseph Kierson," said Kathinka, faintly, hiding her blushing face upon the Rabbi's shoulder. "What, my former pupil?" asked the Rabbi, astonished. "I must have been blind not to have observed it. And does he love you?" "I think he does," she archly answered. "But Joseph is poor," returned her father.
Loris had fallen upon his knees and had seized the girl's hand, which he lifted passionately to his lips. Alone with this singular man, who seemed swayed only by his passions, Kathinka was overcome by a terror which robbed her of the power of speech. She could only gaze into Loris' upturned face in mute despair.
Rabbi Mendel looked up from his books and gazed fondly at his daughter, who, seated with the full light of the window falling upon her face, appeared the embodiment of loveliness. Then turning to his wife, he asked: "Recha, have you spoken to Kathinka about young Goldheim?" "No," replied Recha; "I left it for you to tell."
Kathinka saw the deadly pallor that spread over his countenance, watched his quivering lip and darkening brow. He read to the end, and crumpling the letter in his hand, he threw himself upon the sofa in a paroxysm of grief. The girl who had never before seen her father so affected became seriously alarmed. "What is it, father? What does he write?" she asked.
It was more offensive than the first. There was still time to save him from ignominious exile. He hinted, moreover, at a movement to drive the Jews out of Kief and promised to avert the catastrophe if Kathinka yielded to his persuasions. There were passion and insult in every line.
But tell me, Kathinka," continued the Rabbi, looking intently at his daughter, "is there not another reason for your refusal of Samuel's hand?" Kathinka became very red, and looked pleadingly at her mother. "My dear," said Recha, "you had better confess all to your father. He has a right to know." Still the girl remained silent.
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