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It was in this happier mood that Barstein ran down to Middleton to plead his suit verbally with Sir Asher Aaronsberg. Mabel had feared to commit their fates to a letter, whether from herself or her lover. A plump negative would be so difficult to fight against. A personal interview permitted one to sound the ground, to break the thing delicately, to reason, to explain, to charm away objections.
With his head thus orientally equipped for prayer, Sir Asher suddenly changed into a Rembrandtesque figure, his white beard hiding the society shirtfront; and as he began intoning the grace in Hebrew, the startled Barstein felt that the Mayoress had at least a superficial justification.
'But then there is the meter and the cost of the burners. He calculated that four pounds would convert the room into a salon of light that would attract all the homeless moths of the neighbourhood. So this was the four-pound solution, Barstein reflected with his first sense of solid foothold.
'Never once has He deserted me and my children. 'But what have you done? inquired Barstein. The first shade of reproach came into Nehemiah's eyes. 'Ask sooner what the Almighty has done, he said. Barstein felt rebuked. One does not like to lose one's character as a holy angel. 'But your restaurant? he said. 'Where is that? 'That is here. 'Here! echoed Barstein, staring round again.
With the Christian Mayoress of Middleton to take in to dinner at Sir Asher Aaronsberg's, Leopold Barstein as a Jewish native of that thriving British centre, should have felt proud and happy. But Barstein was young and a sculptor, fresh from the Paris schools and Salon triumphs.
'You're not very romantic, Mabel pouted. Indeed, this Barstein, whose mere ideal could so interrupt the rhapsodies due to her admissions of affection, was distinctly unsatisfactory. She touched his hand furtively under the tablecloth. 'After all, she is very young, he thought, thrilling. And youth was plastic he, the sculptor, could surely mould her. Besides, was she not Sir Asher's daughter?
But Barstein drew back his own coat-tail from the attempted kiss. 'Where is the gas? he asked drily. 'Alas, the company removed the meter. 'But the gas-brackets? 'What else had we to eat? said Nehemiah simply. Barstein in sudden suspicion raised his eyes to the ceiling. But a fragment of gaspipe certainly came through it.
The mahogany furniture, the iron safes, the ledgers, the silent obsequious clerks and attendants through whom Barstein had had to penetrate, the factory buildings stretching around, with their sense of throbbing machinery and disciplined workers, all gave the burly Briton a background against which visions and emotions seemed as unreal as ghosts under gaslight.
It occurred to the cynical Barstein that even the defeat of Roman Catholicism meant no victory for Judaism, but he stayed his tongue with a salted almond. Let the Briton make the running. This the young gentleman proceeded to do at a great pace. 'Then how about Home Rule for India? There's no Catholic majority there! 'Give up India! Sir Asher opened horrified eyes. This heresy was new to him.
Barstein, disconcerted, yearned to repeat his statement in a shout, but neither the pitch nor the proposition seemed suitable to the dinner-table. The Mayoress added ecstatically: 'You can imagine him sitting at the door of his tent, talking with the angels. This time Barstein did shout, but with laughter. All eyes turned a bit enviously in his direction.
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