Stempenyu: A Jewish Romance by Sholem Aleichem, Hannah Berman Read Free Book Online Page B

her grow up strong. That’s all we ask of her, or expect.”
    And, in order that they might have one burden the less on their shoulders, one child less playing about the house, Rochalle had been sent to school with the boys. When she grew a little older, they sent her to learn to write from old Mottel Sprais, who kept a school for girls. She made many friends amongst the girls she found at the school. She liked best to sit with the older girls, andto listen to the stories they used to tell one another. She always thought their stories were beyond compare for wonder, and excitement. And, the girls in turn loved the little Rochalle for her gentle ways; but, more especially for her clear, melodious voice. A dozen times a day someone said to her:
    “Sing us something, Rochalle. There is no one near us. The boys have gone away to play elsewhere.”
    Rochalle was ashamed to sing if there was anyone near her. She did not mind the girls; but, she was shy before the older people or the boys. The girls themselves told her it was not nice to sing when the big boys were within hearing distance. It was forbidden, besides.
    “Well, sing for us. How many times have we to ask you, Rochalle?”
    And, Rochalle obeyed the girls, and began to sing, in her thin, childish, but pleasant, voice, a little Yiddish song, a doggerel verse something like this:
    “On the hill stands a dove,
    Softly sighing and moaning—
    ‘Far-off is my love,
    Far off is he roaming!’ ”
    Rochalle sang the love-song with much feeling. It was as if she understood already, at her age, the meaning of the word “love.” But, the others, the girls who were listening to her, understood the meaning of the word much better than she did. They sighed as she sang, and often shed tears as well. One of the girls in particular loved to hear Rochalle sing. She was an orphan girl of great beauty, whose name was Chaya-Ettel. Her historywas brief, nor was it in any respect singular. Indeed, so common are histories like hers, that one could tell them in a breath without the least fear of being misunderstood.
    Several years before Chaya-Ettel’s introduction into this history, there lived two brothers in the same village. One brother was called Aaron, and the other was Leib. Aaron was quite a young man when he died, and his wife did not long survive him. They left behind them a little child, Chaya-Ettel. Her uncle Leib was full of pity for the tiny orphan, and he took her, and adopted her—along with her inheritance. He did not treat her well. But, he kept a tight hold of her inheritance, which, according to the report that was current in the village, amounted to no less than three thousand
roubles
. The very moment he could, he married Chaya-Ettel to the first-comer, a man who was altogether wanting in character and principle. He treated her so harshly that Chaya-Ettel could not live over his treatment. She died at the early age of twenty-two, of a broken heart.
    When she was still a child, and went to the school of Mottel Sprais to learn to write, she grew very much attached to Rochalle. They were never apart, and their love never waned.
    One Sabbath morning, when the two little girls were sitting in the window-seat, both of them dressed in their best clothes, Rochalle began to sing, while Chaya-Ettel listened:
    “Ah, you are going away—
    Ah, you are going away,
    And me you are leaving behind!”
    “Rochalle, my darling, my love, sing that again,” Chaya-Ettel begged of her.
    “Very well, I will begin it again if you wish.
    “Ah, you are going away—
    Ah, you are going away,
    And me you are leaving behind!”
    Chaya-Ettel was completely overcome. She fell forward, buried her face in her hands, and wept bitterly, her whole body heaving with agitation.
    “God help you, Chaya-Ettel, are you weeping? Why are you weeping? Tell me what was come over you that you bust out weeping all at once?”
    “Oh, Rochalle,” she managed to say at last, “it is your song—your little