The Apprentices

by Leon Garfield

  He said this every year, and it was considered the second peak of humour of the evening.

  “And how long would you say it was that Elijah kept the widow’s cruse full of oil?” inquired Mr. Bunting, smiling again at his wife.

  “I’m not at all sure about that,” answered Mr. Israels slowly. “Perhaps two or three days?”

  “Of course,” said the broker, “it would depend on how much oil she had to begin with, before one could calculate how much actual money had been saved.”

  He thought about the linkboy and frowned.

  “There was the barrel of meal as well,” said Mr. Israels, anxious to defend the prophet against the charge of meanness.

  “Naturally that makes a difference. But supposing it was a matter of, say, four hours,” went on the broker, obsessed with his evening’s expenditure, “then that must be taken into account. Let’s say it was five hours—”

  “If it was only five hours, it would hardly have counted as a miracle! It must have been at least a week. . . .”

  Bunting listened in bewilderment and agitation and wondered if the dispute would ever end. What if Elijah, at that very moment, was driving down Carter Lane?

  “Well,” said Mr. Israels at length. “We mustn’t keep the prophet waiting!”

  He raised the second ceremonial glass of wine, which was the Cup of Redemption, pronounced the blessing, and drank.

  “Open the door, Bunting, my boy. Open the door for Elijah!”

  Awkwardly Bunting struggled to his feet and rested his hand affectionately on Rachel’s shoulder, so that he felt its fragile boniness and realised with a shock how young she really was. She glanced up at him, then, tossing her head, went back to begging little Moses for the trinket.

  Bunting went out into the quiet, dark hall and listened for a moment for the old man’s moaning. Silence.

  “Is the door open, my boy? Or are you waiting for Elijah to knock?”

  This was a new joke of Mr. Israels’, and Bunting heard his father laugh. Then he opened the street door and gazed out into the quiet immensity of the spring night.

  There was no prophet in the street, so Bunting looked up. A great white moon swam in the dark heavens, like the eye of the biggest stuffed carp in the universe. As it was Passover night, Bunting supposed the angels had eaten the rest, for he could see no mouth that said, “Schlemiel!”

  Presently he thought he heard a sound from upstairs. He left the open door and went to the foot of the stairs and listened carefully. Nothing.

  “Bunting! What are you doing out there? Come back. . . .”

  He went back into the dining room, where the Passover table was littered with nuts and grapes and all the cheerful confusion of a feast. He stared at the brimming cup set for Elijah, and a silence fell upon the room as the night air swept in. The candle flames, now sunk deep in their waxen sepulchres, ducked and bowed, and the shadows on the walls suddenly loomed upward, like a phantom company arising to greet the coming of their phantom king.

  Involuntarily everyone looked towards the open door, as, at this moment, they always did. What if Elijah the Tishbite, in all his robes and with all his ravens, should really come? What if his fiery chariot was, at this very moment, galloping down Carter Lane?

  Rachel began to giggle, and Mrs. Bunting said, “Ssh!” Mr. Israels drew in his breath, but no words came. He seemed to remain expanded, and full, as it were, of holy air. Even the broker was struck dumb, for there was a strange, fiery radiance creeping across the polished panel of the open door.

  Leaping flames were reflected, and there came a hissing and cracking sound, as of unearthly harness straining and burning wheels whirling through the streets of the air.

  “It’s Elijah!” murmured Bunting, and then the broker’s linkboy, with torch smoking and blazing, crept cautiously into the room. In addition to the smell of burning pitch, there was also a distinct smell of gin.

  “I was jes’ wonderin’ ’ow long you’d be, sir,” he mumbled, blinking round at the company, who stared back at him with mingled outrage and disappointment. “The door was open so I—”

  Whatever else he had to say was lost in a hoarse and fearful shriek that was accompanied by a loud clatter of feet descending the stairs.

  Bunting caught a brief glimpse, through the open door, of a tremendous, almost spectral sight. There was old Levy, his long coat flapping and his watch seals dancing, galloping across the hall on his way out of the street door!

  The old schnorrer, wearied of waiting for his supper and thinking he’d been forgotten, had crept from his deathbed onto the landing from where he’d intended to moan loudly enough to disturb everyone. Then, finding the house in silence and seeing the reflection of flames and smelling the fire, he had been seized with a ghastly dread that the house was burning down and everyone had left him behind to perish.

  “Save me! Save me!” he howled, and, skinny and jingling, capered frantically down Carter Lane.

  “Mr. Levy!” cried Bunting. “Your fish—”

  “What are you doing? Come back with that plate, you schlemiel!” he heard everyone shouting as he rushed out after old Levy with his portion of stuffed fish.

  Although Bunting must have realised that he’d been taken in by the old villain and that everybody had been right while he, as usual, had been wrong, his mind had been so firmly fixed on old Levy’s dying happy that it was impossible for him, in so short a time, to rearrange his thoughts and behave sensibly.

  “Mr. Levy, Mr. Levy! Here’s your fish—”

  Old Levy had not gone far; he and his crooked shadow had collapsed, puffing and panting, on a high doorstep at the corner of Creed Lane. His wind and panic spent themselves together, and, somewhat apprehensively, he crouched down and awaited the coming of the schlemiel, who had been his only ally in the household on which he had imposed himself.

  It was possible that he felt a pang of regret for having exposed the fool so openly and that he was sorry for what he might have lost in the fool’s heart. But who could say what a man as ancient as Levy, the watch seller, really felt?

  “Oy—oy—oy!” he said as Bunting came near.

  “Why did you run away, sir?”

  “It was the fire. I smelled it . . . and the Almighty gave me strength. . . .”

  “It wasn’t a fire, sir. It was only Elijah—I mean, it was a boy with a torch. . . .”

  “Elijah? So . . . so, the Almighty has pulled my old leg—even as He once pulled little Moses’ young one. He’s lame, you know. . . . Oy—oy—oy!”

  “I brought you the stuffed carp. . . .”

  Old Levy squinted up at the schlemiel in the moonlight and marvelled at the way he shone. He took the plate with trembling fingers.

  “So . . . so Elijah came at last,” he mumbled, and began to cram fragments of the fish into an opening in his beard. “And where’s the horseradish?”

  Before Bunting could reply, the old man raised his hand. There was a ticking and a tocking in the empty street. It was little Moses, hopping and limping under his cupboard case like a large beetle or a child carrying a child’s coffin. He halted at the sight of Bunting, then came on as he saw his ancient master eating.

  “Tell me, Moses,” whined old Levy, putting down his plate and clutching Bunting’s sleeve, “wherefore is this night different from all other nights?”

  Moses chuckled happily as old Levy began to ask the Four Questions in the high, lisping tones of a pretended child.

  “On all other nights we eat either sitting upright or reclining; but on this night we all recline.”

  He dragged in his coat to make a space for Bunting to recline beside him, while Moses crouched down and leaned against his cupboard case, which ticked away as if exasperated by not being on the move.

  Bunting sat, or was rather dragged down, for the old man had not let him go. Old Levy’s bones were miserable to lean against, and his buttons and watch seals dug into Bunting’s side.

  “We were Pharaoh’s bond
smen in Egypt, and the Lord our God brought us out therefrom with a mighty hand,” piped the crippled Moses to the deceitful watch seller and the clockmaker’s foolish apprentice.

  “Have a little stuffed carp, Moses,” urged old Levy, “for has not the Almighty brought us out once more from the house of bondage?”

  Moses leaned forward and his cupboard of watches chimed faintly as a timepiece struck a meaningless hour.

  “I must go back!” cried Bunting suddenly.

  “A little longer!” whined old Levy, who liked company. “Stay another minute! How much longer will the Almighty spare me? Who knows. Come—let’s sing, “Only one kid” and then we’ll part . . . till next year in Jerusalem, eh?”

  He hung onto Bunting’s sleeve despairingly, and began, in his horrible wheezing voice, to hum and chant the last of the Passover songs:

  “Only one kid,

  only one kid

  that my father bought for two zuzim. . . .

  Then came a cat

  And ate the kid

  That my father bought for two zuzim,”

  sang Moses, in his high, stammering voice; and his eyes were bright both for the cat and the kid.

  “Then came a dog

  And bit the cat

  That ate the kid

  That my father bought for two zuzim,”

  joined in Bunting, who loved the old song dearly.

  “Only one kid, only one kid.”

  They all joined in the refrain, and even as they did so, a bright and burning light came along the street, scouring out the shadows and reddening the fronts of the houses till they seemed to run with blood.

  “I knows that chune,” said the linkboy, who had been sent to fetch Bunting and the plate. “It’s Free Blind Mice, ain’t it?”

  He came and, with his torch held high, watched in puzzlement as the three children of Israel croaked and sang of an ancient deliverance under the many-chimneyed sky.

  “Then came a stick

  And beat the dog

  That bit the cat

  That ate the kid

  That my father bought for two zuzim!”

  “Only one kid . . . only one kid!”

  “Then came a fire,”

  cackled old Levy, pointing at the linkboy’s torch,

  “And burned the stick

  That beat the dog . . .”

  He began to clap his hands in time to the nursery song, and little Moses, with his box of watches rattling and jingling like timbrels, began to dance on his lame feet.

  “Then came a fire . . .”

  The link boy grinned and, creeping and hopping in Moses’s wake, waved his blazing torch in time to old Levy’s rhythmic clapping.

  “Then water came

  And quenched the fire

  That burned the stick . . .”

  Old Levy blew his nose and water flew out; the fire jumped in fright, and little Moses, with his burden of time, capered away like King David of old, while the stony-faced houses trembled in the hopping light.

  “Then came an ox

  And drank the water

  That quenched the fire . . .”

  Up lumbered Bunting, and, clumsy as the ox in the song, joined in with the nighttime dance.

  “Only one kid . . . only one kid!”

  “Then came the slaughterer

  And slaughtered the ox

  That drank the water . . .”

  screeched out old Levy; and he, too, with his long coat flapping and his watch seals jingling, linked himself into the leaping chain, while Pharaoh in his houses twitched the curtains and stared.

  “Only one kid . . . only one kid . . .”

  “Then came the Angel of Death

  And slew the slaughterer

  That slaughtered the ox

  That drank the water . . .”

  chanted little Moses, for it was his turn.

  At once, a chill wind swept down Carter Lane, tearing the torch flame from its roots. Old Levy clutched his chest and stumbled till—thank God!—Bunting came in with the last verse.

  “Then came the Almighty, blessed be He,

  And smote the Angel of Death

  That slew the slaughterer

  That slaughtered the ox

  That drank the water

  That quenched the fire

  That burned the stick

  That beat the dog

  That bit the cat

  That ate the kid

  That my father bought for two zuzim!”

  “Only one kid . . . only one kid!”

  The danger was past, and the old man breathed again; it was indeed a Passover night! At last the dancers swayed to a halt and sang the last refrain while the torchlight enveloped them in a fiery garment. Smoke billowed out and made them a concealing tent in the wilderness of Carter Lane.

  It was possible that Elijah the Tishbite, passing by in his robes and with all his ravens, had not seen, in all his wanderings, anything half so fine as the ancient man and the three children, escaping from the bondage of time.

  “Next year in Jerusalem, eh?” said old Levy to Bunting as the apprentice prepared to return to the clockmaker’s shop.

  Bunting nodded seriously and, with the timeless song with its immense chain of consequences deep in his heart, went back to the Passover table in Carter Lane.

  “Why were you so long?” whispered Rachel, pinching him sharply as he sat down.

  “I was only gone for a minute,” said Bunting, and then added softly, as if in expiation of his fault, “A thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the night.”

  Rachel stared at him.

  “What sort of a watch is that?” she asked cleverly. “Schlemiel!” and everyone laughed.

  ROSY STARLING

  ROSY STARLING, THE bird-cage maker, pretty as a picture and blind as a bat, came out into Drury Lane and felt light and warmth upon her face.

  “It’s a grand sunny day!” she said to the invisible world.

  “Sun? Day?” jeered a linkboy. “It’s four o’clock in the mornin’, miss, and black as soot! It’s me burnin’ torch! Can’t you smell the pitch?”

  “And there was me thinkin’ it was you smellin’ so horrible!” said Rosy pertly, and longed to put her tongue out, even though she had always been told never to make faces or folk would think her simple as well as blind.

  She was apprenticed to Mrs. Berry, a basketmaker in Feathers Court, and she made cages out of willow wands for canaries and linnets that were suitable as presents for children and sold at sixpence apiece. She carried a bundle of them over her arm, tied together with a plaited straw chain.

  “You got anuvver free hours beauty sleep,” said the linkboy, letting his light fall inquisitively on Rosy’s eyes, which were like bricked-up windows.

  “Then what are you doin’ up so long after your bedtime?” inquired Rosy. “And what’s all the bangin’ and shoutin’ about?”

  “They’re puttin’ up the maypole, and all them sweeps and their little sootikins are gettin’ ready to go a-Mayin’. But they ain’t washed yet, so they’re all as black as me ’at. There’s nothin’ worth seein’ . . . even if you could!”

  “Bleedin’ sauce,” said Rosy haughtily, “to mock me disability!”

  She began to move, lightly and hesitantly—like a dandelion clock in ruffled air—towards Maypole Alley. As she brushed and knocked against passersby, she turned and bade them, in no uncertain terms, to watch where they were going.

  Rosy Starling had a tongue in her head all right, even though she had no usable eyes; and Mrs. Berry, meaning for the best, had always encouraged her sharpness.

  “You’re as pretty as a picture, Rosy,” she kept telling her. “So you got to watch out . . . in a manner o’ speakin’, that is. This wicked world’s full of villains what’ll take advantage else!”

  Mrs. Berry said this in good faith; it never crossed her mind that, perhaps, she herself was taking advantage by building such a cage of su
spicion round her clever and industrious apprentice that no one was likely to get the chance to tempt her out of Feathers Court.

  Presently Rosy felt the tall, close buildings recede, and she knew she must be in the open space where Maypole Alley joined Little Drury Lane.

  “Watch what you’re doin’!” she kept calling out, feeling bustle and activity and heavy feet all round her and fearing that she was in danger of being tripped and strangled by the ropes employed in raising the maypole.

  “Rosy Starling!” someone cried. “You’ll get that pretty head knocked off!”

  She felt her cages gently tugged, and she herself conducted to a doorstep from where she might watch the May Day preparations in safety.

  Watch? Oh, she knew very well what things looked like; Mrs. Berry had told her, and, in addition, her own skilful hands presented to her imagination a wondrous variety of shapes to which were attached sounds and smells and those ghostly emanations given off alike by poles, posts, doors, and villains out to take advantage.

  “It’s goin’ to be a grand sunny day,” she said as she seated herself and rested her cages in her lap. “That is, if it don’t rain.”

  “Rosy Starling,” said the female who’d helped her, “you’re as pretty as a picture!”

  “I wish,” said Rosy, feeling her cheeks grow warm, “I could say as much for you.”

  Not knowing how to take the blind girl’s reply, the helper departed, and Rosy spread her skirts and laid out her wares so that nobody should sit near her and spoil her pitch. Then she took a piece of bread and cold sausage from one of her cages and settled down to enjoy her breakfast, and to listen, between munchings, to the cheerful uproar that attended the erection of the maypole.

  It had first been set up by a farrier, by name of Clarges, to commemorate the wedding of his daughter, a humble sempstress, to the Duke of Albemarle; and every May Day thereafter, Little Drury Lane had been sacred to the high hopes of lowly lasses on the lookout for wandering dukes.