Franz Liszt - "Life of Chopin"

Emerson Hough - "The Law of the Land"

Jerome K. Jerome - "Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow"

John Fox, Jr. - "The Little Shepherd of Kingdom Come"

New Philadelphia Book Publisher Highlights Local Talent
Book and Publishing News from Publishers Newswire(tm)

Looking for Child to be on Cover of a New Book, 'The Model Child'
PHILADELPHIA, Pa. -- The Philadelphia literary world will celebrate the launch of two new players today, April 10th: Kay Square Press, a new publishing company focused on Philadelphia-area artists, their stories, and their art; and Kay Square's first release, 'With the Rich and Mighty: Emlen Etting of Philadelphia' (ISBN: 978-0-9815129-0-7), a critical biography by Kenneth C. Kaleta.

FlatSigned Press Alleges Don Imus Remarks Damage Legacy of President Gerald R. Ford
NEW YORK, N.Y. -- Nathan Yungerberg, an accomplished model scout and professional child photographer is launching a nation-wide casting call to find the cover model for his highly anticipated book release, 'The Model Child: A Parents Guide to the Child Modeling Industry' (ISBN: 978-0-9817018-0-6).

Books: The Rise of David Levinsky

A >> Abraham Cahan >> The Rise of David Levinsky




As for Sadie, who lived in the same house now, and who visited
Dora's apartment at all hours, she was too silly and too deeply
infatuated with her friend to suspect her of anything wrong

I idolized Dora. It seemed to me that I adored her soul even more
than I did her body. I was under her moral influence, and the
firmness with which she maintained the distance between us
added to my respect for her. And yet I never ceased to dream of
and to seek her moral downfall

I had extended my canvassing activities to a number of cities
outside New York, my territory being a semicircle with a radius of
about a hundred and fifty miles. I had long since picked up some
of the business jargon of the country and I was thirstily drinking in
more and more

"What do you think of this number, Mr. So-and-so?" I would say,
self-consciously, to a merchant, as I dangled a garment in front of
him.

"You can make a run on it. It's the kind of suit that gives the
wearer an air of distinction."

If I heard a bit of business rhetoric that I thought effective I would
jot it down and commit it to memory. In like manner I would
write down every new piece of slang, the use of the latest popular
phrase being, as I thought, helpful in making oneself popular with
Americans, especially with those of the young generation. But
somehow a slang phrase would be in general use for a
considerable time before it attracted my attention. The Americans
I met were so quick to discern and adopt these phrases it seemed
as if they were born with a special slang sense which I, poor
foreigner that I was, lacked.

That I was not born in America was something like a physical
defect that asserted itself in many disagreeable ways--a physical
defect which, alas! no surgeon in the world was capable of
removing

Other things that I would enter in my note-book were names of
dishes on the bills of fare of the better restaurants, with
explanations of my own. I would describe the difference between
Roquefort cheese and Liederkranz cheese, between consommé
Celestine and consommé princesse; I would make a note of the
composition of macaroni au gratin, the appearance and taste of
potatoes Lyonnaise, of various salad-dressings. But I gradually
picked up this information in a practical way and really had no
need of my culinary notes. I had many occasions to eat in
high-class restaurants and I was getting to feel quite at home in
them

Max's conjecture regarding Chaikin was borne out. The talented
designer had given up his job at the Manheimer Brothers' and
opened a cloak-and-suit house with a man who had made
considerable money as a cloak salesman, and as a landlord for a
partner. When Max heard of it he was overjoyed

"I tell you what, Levinsky," he said, half in jest and half in earnest.
"Let the two of us make a partnership of it. I could put some
money into the business."

I reflected that when I approached him for a loan of four hundred
dollars, on my first visit at his house, he had pleaded poverty

"I could do a good deal of hustling, too," he added, gravely.
"Between the two of us we should make a great success of it."

I gave him an evasive answer. I must have looked annoyed, for he
exclaimed: "Look at him! Look at him, Dora! Scared to death, isn't
he?" And to me: "Don't be uneasy, old chap! I am not going to
snatch your factory from you.

But you are a big hog, all the same. I can tell you that. How will
you manage all alone? Who will take care of your business when
you go traveling?"

"Oh, I'll manage it somehow," I answered, making an effort to be
pleasant.

"Chaikin was scarcely ever in the shop, anyhow."

CHAPTER XVII I TRAVELED quite often, sometimes staying
away from New York for two or three days, but more frequently
for only one day. On one occasion, however, I was detained on the
road for five days in succession. It was the beginning of June, a
little over a year since the Margolises moved into the Clinton
Street flat with myself as their boarder. I was homesick. I missed
Dora acutely. I loved her passionately, tenderly, devotedly. I now
felt it with special force. Her face and figure loomed up a hundred
times a day.

"Dora dear! Bridie mine!" I would whisper, all but going to pieces
with tenderness and yearning

One afternoon, after closing an unexpectedly large sale in a
department store, I went to the jewelry department of the same
firm and paid a hundred and twenty dollars for a bracelet. I knew
that she would not be able to wear it, yet I was determined to
make her accept it

"Let her keep it in some hiding-place," I thought. "Let her steal an
occasional look at it. I don't care what she does with it. I want her
to know that I think of her, that I am crazy for her."

It was Friday evening when I returned to New York, having been
on the road since the preceding Monday morn- ing. I first went to
my place of business and then to a restaurant for supper. I would
not make my appearance at the house until half past 10, when the
coast was sure to be clear. With thrills of anticipation that verged
on physical pain I was looking forward to the moment when I
should close the bracelet about her slender white wrist

At the fixed minute I was at the door of the Clinton Street
apartment. I pulled the bell. I expected an excited rush, a violent
opening of the door, a tremulous: "My loved one! My loved one!"

There was a peculiar disappointment in store for me. She received
me icily, not letting me come near her

"Why, what's the matter? What's up?" "Nothing," she muttered

When we reached the light of the Sabbath candles in the
dining-room I noticed that she looked worn and haggard

"What has happened?" I asked, greatly perplexed. "I have
something for you," I said, producing the blue-velvet box
containing the bracelet and opening it. "Here, my bride!"

"How dare you call me 'bride,' you hypocrite?" she gasped. "Away
with you, your present and all!"

"Why? Why? What does it all mean?" I asked, between mirth and
perplexity

For an answer she merely continued: "You thought you could bribe
me by this present of yours, did you? You can fool me no longer. I
have found you out.

You have fallen into your own trap. You have. How dare you buy
me presents?"

At this she tore the bracelet out of my hand and flung it into the
little corridor. She was on the verge of a fit of hysterics. I fetched
her a glass of water, but she dashed it out of my hand. Then,
frightened and sobered by the crash, she first tiptoed to the
bedroom to ascertain if Lucy was not awake and listening, and
then went to the little corridor, picked up the bracelet and slipped
it into my pocket

"If you have decided to get married, I can't stop you, of course,"
she began, in a ghastly undertone, as she crouched to gather up the
fragments of the glass and to wipe the floor.

"Decided to get married?" I interrupted her. "Where on earth did
you get that? What 'trap' are you talking about, Dora?"

She made no answer. I continued to protest my innocence. Finally,
when she had removed the broken glass, she said: "It's no use
pretending you don't know anything about it. It won't do you any
good. You have been very foxy about it, but you made a break, and
there you are! You think you are very clever. If you were you
wouldn't let your shadchen [note] know where you live--"

Oh, I see," I said, with a hearty laugh. "Has he been here?" And I
gave way to another guffaw

Shadchen was a conspiracy name for a man who would bring an
employer together with cloak-makers who were willing to cheat
the union. The one who performed these services for me was one
of my own "hands." He was thoroughly dishonest, but he
possessed a gentle disposition and a certain gift of expression.
This gave him power over his shopmates. He was their "shop
chairman" and a member of their "price committee." He was the
only man in my employ who actually received the full union price.
In addition to this, I paid him his broker's commission for every
new man he furnished me, and various sums as bribes pure and
simple

I explained it all to Dora. The ardor with which I spoke and the
details of my dealings with the shadchen must have made my
explanation convincing, for she accepted it at once

"You're not fooling me, are you?" she asked, piteously, yet in a
tone of immense relief.

"Strike me dumb if--"

"'S-sh! Don't curse yourself," she said, clapping her hand over my
mouth. "I can't bear to hear it. I believe you. If you knew what I
have gone through!"

"Poor, poor child!" I said, kissing her soft white fingers tenderly.
"Poor, poor baby! How could you think of such a thing! There is
only one bride for me in all the world, and that is my own Dora
darling."

Her face shone with a wan, beseeching kind of light

Again I drew forth the bracelet

"Foolish child!" I said, examining it. "Thank God, it isn't damaged.
Not a bit."

I took her by the hand, opened the bracelet, and closed it over her
wrist.

She instantly took it off again, with an instinctive side-glance at
the door. Then, holding it up to the light admiringly, she said:
"Oh! Oh! Must have cost a pile of money! Why did you spend so
much? I can't wear it, anyway. Better return it."

"Never! It's yours, my sweetheart. Do whatever you like with it.
Put it away somewhere. If you wear it for one minute every week I
shall be happy. If you only look at it once in a while I shall be
happy."

"I am afraid to keep it. Somebody may come across it some day.
Better return it, my loved one! I am happy as it is. It would make
me nervous to have it in the house."

She made me take it back

"Thank God it wasn't a real shadchen! I thought I was going to
commit suicide," she said

I seized her in my arms. She abandoned herself to a transport of
gratitude and happiness in which her usual fortitude melted away

The next morning she had the appearance of one doomed to death.
Her eyes avoided everybody, not only her husband and Lucy, but
myself as well. She pleaded indisposition

Max left for the synagogue, as he always did on Saturday morning.
I accompanied him out of the house, on my way to business. We
parted at a corner where I was to wait for a street-car. Instead of
boarding a car, however, I returned home. I was burning to be
alone with Dora, to cuddle her out of her forlorn mood

"I have come back for a minute just to tell you how dear you are to
me," I whispered to her in the presence of the children, who were
having their breakfast. I signed to her to follow me into the parlor,
and she did. "Just one kiss, dearest!" I said, clasping her to me and
kissing her. "I'd let myself be cut to pieces for you."

She nestled to me for a moment ,gave me a hasty kiss, and ran
back to the children, all without looking at me

I went away with a broken heart

Late that evening, when we found ourselves alone, and I rushed at
her, she gently pushed me off

"Why? What's the trouble?" I asked.

"No trouble at all," she answered, looking down, with shamefaced
gravity

"Do you hate me?"

"Hate you! I wish I could," she answered, with a sad smile, still
looking down.

"Why this new way, then?" I said, rather impatiently. "You are
dearer than ever to me, Levinsky. Tell me to jump into fire, and I
will. But--can't we love each other and be good?"

"What are you talking about, Dora? What has got into you? Do you
know what you are to me now?" I demanded, melodramatically

I made another attempt at kissing her, but was repulsed again

"Not now, anyway, my loved one," she said, entreatingly. "Let a.
few days pass. You don't want me to feel bad, do you, dearest?"

I looked sheepish. I was convinced that it was merely a passing
mood

[note: shadchen]: Marriage broker, match-maker

CHAPTER XVIII NEXT Monday, when I was ready to go to my
place of business, Dora left the house, pitcher in hand, before I
rose from the breakfast-table. She was going for milk, but a
side-glance which she cast at the floor in my direction as she
turned to shut the door behind her told me that she wanted to see
me in the street. After letting some minutes pass I put on my
overcoat and hat, bade Max a studiously casual good-by, and
departed

I awaited her on the stoop. Presently she emerged from the grocery
in the adjoining building

"Could you be free at 4 o'clock this afternoon?" she asked,
ascending the few steps, and pausing by my side. "I want to have a
talk with you.

Somewhere else. Not at home."

"Why not at home, in the evening?" "No. That won't do," she
overruled me, softly. "Somebody might come in and interrupt me.
I'll wait for you in the little park on Second Avenue and Fifteenth
Street. You know the place, don't you?"

She meant Stuyvesant Park, which the sunny Second Avenue cuts
in two, and she explained that our meeting was to take place on
the west side of the thoroughfare

"Will you come?" she asked, nervously

"I will, I will. But what's up? Why do you look so serious? Dora!
Dora mine!"

"'S-sh! You had better go. When we meet I'll explain everything.
At 4 o'clock, then. Don't forget. As you come up the avenue, going
up-town, it is on the left-hand side. Write it down."

To insure against any mistakes on my part she made me repeat it
and then jot it down. As she turned to go upstairs she said, in a
melancholy whisper: "Good-by, dearest."

When I reached the appointed place the brass hands of the clock
on the steeple high overhead indicated ten minutes of 4. It was
June, but the day was a typical November day, mildly warm, clear,
and charged with the exhilarating breath of a New York autumn.
Dora had not yet arrived. The benches in the little park were for
the most part occupied by housewives or servant-girls who sat
gossiping in front of baby-carriages, amid the noise of romping
children. Here and there an elderly man sat smoking his pipe
broodingly. They were mostly Germans or Czechs. There were
scarcely any of our people in the neighborhood at the period in
question, and that was why Dora had selected the place

I stood outside the iron gate, gazing down the avenue. The minutes
were insupportably long.

At last her womanly figure came into dim view. My heart leaped. I
was in a flutter of mixed anxiety and joyous anticipation. "Oh,
she'll back down," I persuaded myself

She was walking fast, apparently under the impression that she
was late. Her face was growing more distinct every moment. The
blue hat she wore and the parasol she carried gave her a new
aspect. I had more than once seen her leave the house in street
array, but watching her come up the street thus formally attired
somehow gave her a different appearance

She looked so peculiarly dignified and so exquisitely lady-like she
almost seemed to be a stranger. This, added to her romantic
estrangement from me and to the clandestine nature of our tryst,
produced a singular effect upon me.

"Am I very late?" she asked

"No. Not at all, Dora!" I said, yearningly

She made no answer

We could not find an empty bench, and to let Germans overhear
our Yiddish, which is merely a German dialect, would have been
rather risky. So she delivered her message as we walked round
and round, both of us eying the asphalt all the while. Her beautiful
complexion and our manner attracted much attention. The people
on the benches apparently divined the romantic nature of our
interview. One white-haired little man with a terrier face never
took his eyes off her

"First of all I want to tell you that this is one of the most important
days in my life," she began. "It is certainly not a happy day. It's
Yom Kippur [note] with me. I want to say right here that I am
willing to die for you, Levinsky. I am terribly in love with you,
Levinsky. Yes--"

Her voice broke. She was confused and agitated, but she soon
regained her self-mastery. She spoke in sad, solemn, quietly
passionate tones, and gradually developed a homespun sort of
eloquence which I had never heard from her before. But then the
gift of homely rhetoric is rather a common talent among
Yiddish-speaking women

The revolting sight of the dog-faced old fellow who was ogling
Dora so fascinated me that it interfered with my listening. I made
a point of looking away from him every time we came round to
his bench, but that only kept me thinking of him instead of
listening to Dora. Finally we confined our walk to the farther side
of the little park, giving him a wide berth

"I love you more than I can tell you, Levinsky," she resumed. "But
it is not my good luck to be happy. I dreamed all my life of love,
and now that it is here, right here in my heart, I must choke it with
my own hands." "Why? Why?" I said, with vehemence. "Why
must you?"

"Why!" she echoed, bitterly. "Because the Upper One brought you
to me only to punish me, to tease me. That's all. That's all. That's
all."

"Why should you take it that way?" "Don't interrupt me,
Levinsky," she said, chanting, rather than speaking. As she
proceeded, her voice lapsed into a quaint, doleful singsong, not
unlike the lament of our women over a grave. "No, Levinsky. It is
not given to me to be happy. But I ask no questions of the Upper
One. I used to live in peace. I was not happy, but I lived in peace.
I did not know what happiness was, so I did not miss it much. I
only dreamed of it. But the Lord of the World would have me
taste it, so that I might miss it and that my heart might be left with
a big, big wound. I want you to know exactly how I feel.

Oh, if I could turn this poor heart of mine inside out! Then you
could see all that is going on there. Listen, Levinsky. If it were not
for my children, my dear children, my all in all in the world, I
should not live with Margolis another day. If he gave me a
divorce, well and good; if not, then I don't know what I might do. I
shouldn't care. I love you so and I want to be happy. I do, I do, I
do."

A sob rang through her voice as she repeated the words. "You do,
and yet you are bound to make both of us miserable," I said

"Can I help it?"

"If you would you could," I said, grimly. "Get a divorce and let us
be married and have it over."

She shook her head sadly

"Thousands of couples get divorced." She kept shaking her head

"Then what's the use pretending you love me?"

"Pretending! Shall I turn my heart inside out to show you how hard
it is to live without you? But you can't understand. No, Levinsky. I
have no right to be happy. Lucy shall be happy. She certainly
sha'n't marry without love. Her happiness will be mine, too. That's
the only kind I am entitled to. She shall go to college. She shall be
educated. She shall marry the loved one of her heart. She shall not
be buried alive as her mother was. Let her profit by what little
sense I have been able to pick up."

A bench became vacant and we occupied it. The momentary
interruption and the change in her physical attitude broke the
spell. The solemnity was gone out of her voice. She resumed in a
distracted and somewhat listless manner, but she soon warmed up
again

"What would you have me do? Let Lucy find out some day that her
mother was a bad woman? I should take poison first."

"A bad woman!" I protested. "A better woman could not be found
anywhere in the world. You are a saint, Dora."

"No, I am not. I am a bad, wicked, nasty woman. I hate myself."

"'S-sh! You mustn't speak like that," I said, stopping my ears. " I
cannot bear it."

"Yes, that's what I am, a nasty creature. I used to be pure as gold.
There was not a speck on my soul, and now, woe is me, pain is
me! What has come over me?"

When she finally got down to the practical side of her resolution it
turned out that she wanted me to move out of her house and never
to see her again

I was shocked. I flouted the idea of it. I argued, I poured out my
lovelorn heart. But she insisted with an iron-clad finality. I argued
again, entreated, raved, all to no purpose

"I'll never come close to you. All I want is to be able to see you, to
live in the same house with you."

"Don't be tearing my heart to pieces," she said. "It is torn badly
enough as it is. Do as I say, Levinsky." "Don't you want to see me
at all?" "Oh, it's cruel of you to ask questions like that. You have
no heart, Levinsky. It's just because I am crazy to see you that you
have got to move."

"Don't you want me even to call at your house?" I asked, with an
ironical smile, as though I did not take the matter seriously

"Well, that would look strange. Call sometimes, not often, though,
and never when Margolis is out."

"Oh, I shall commit suicide," I snarled

"Oh, well. It isn't as bad as all that."

"I will. I certainly will," I said, knowing that I was talking
nonsense

"Don't torment me, Levinsky. Don't sprinkle salt over my wound.
Take pity on me. Do as I wish and let the tooth be pulled out with
as little pain as possible."

I accompanied her down the avenue as far as Houston Street,
where she insisted upon our parting. Before we did, however, she
indulged in another outburst of funereal oratory, bewailing her
happiness as she would a dead child. It was apparently not easy
for her to take leave of me, but her purpose to make our romance
a thing of the past and to have me move to other lodgings
remained unshaken

"This is the last time I shall ever speak to you of my love,
Levinsky," she said. "I must tear it out of my heart, even if I have
to tear out a piece of my heart along with it. Such is my fate.
Good-by, Levinsky. Good luck to you. Be good. Be good. Be
good. Remember you have a good head. Waste no time. Study as
much as you can. God grant you luck in your business, but try to
find time for your books, too. You must become a great man. Do
you promise me to read and study a lot?"

"I do. I do. But I won't move out. I can't live without you. We
belong to each other, and all you say is nothing but a woman's
whim. It's all bosh," I concluded, with an air of masculine
superiority. "I won't move out."

"You shall, dearest. Good-by. Good-by."

She broke into a fit of sobbing, but checked it, shook my hand
vehemently and hastened away

[note: Yom Kippur] Day of Atonement; figuratively, a day of
anguish and tears

CHAPTER XIX I HOPED she would yield, but she did not. I
found myself in the grip of an iron will and I did as I was bidden

When I set out in quest of a furnished room I instinctively betook
myself to the neighborhood of Stuyvesant Park. That park had
acquired a melancholy fascination for me. As though to make
amends for my agonies, I determined to move into a good,
spacious room, even if I had to pay three or four times as much as
I had been paying at the Margolises'. I found a sunny front room
with two windows in an old brown-stone house on East Nineteenth
Street, between Second Avenue and First, a short distance from
the little park and near an Elevated station. The curtains, the
carpet, the huge, soft arm-chair, and the lounge struck me as
decidedly "aristocratic." To cap the climax of comfort and
"swellness," the landlady--a gray little German-American--had, at
my request, a bookcase placed between the mantelpiece and one
of the windows. It was a "regular" bookcase, doors and all, not a
mere "what-not," and the sight of it swelled my breast

"I shall forget all my troubles here," I thought. "I am going to buy a
complete set of Spencer and some other books. Won't the
bookcase look fine! I shall read, read, read."

When I reported to Dora that I was ready to move, her face
clouded

"You seem to be glad to," she said, with venom, dropping her eyes

"Glad? Glad? Why, I am not going to move, then. May I stay here,
darling mine? May I?"

"Are you really sorry you have to move?" she asked, fixing a
loving glance at me. "Do you really love me?"

There were tears in her eyes. I attempted to come close to her, to
kiss her, but she held me back

"No, dearest," she said, shaking her head. "Move out to-morrow,
will you? Let's be done with it."

"And what will Max say?" I asked, sardonically. Will nothing seem
strange to him nothing at all?"

"Never mind that."

She never mentioned Max to me now, not even by pronoun

"Then you must know him to be an idiot." Now I hated Max with
all my heart.

"Don't," she implored

"Oh, I see. He's dear to you now," I laughed

"Have a heart, Levinsky. Have a heart. Must you keep shedding my
blood? Have you no pity at all?"

"But it is all so ridiculous. It will look strange," I argued, seriously.

"He is bound to get suspicious."

"I have thought it all out. Don't be uneasy. I'll say we had a quarrel
over your board bill."

"A nice dodge, indeed! It may fool Dannie, not him."

"Leave it all to me. Better tell me what sort of lodgings you have
got. Is it a decent room? Plenty of air and sunshine? But, no. Don't
tell me anything. I mustn't know." I sneered

She was absorbed in thought, flushed, nervous.

Presently she said, with an effect of speaking to herself: "It's sweet
to suffer for what is right."