But she came to him later, offering her foot, and he obliged her once more, steadying her by pretending to make a game of it, panting, growling like a pet puppy with a bone. She presented the other foot. Emboldened, as her breath began to come short, he let his hand fly up her leg. She withdrew, gasping. But she didn’t flee. Instead, after a pause, she drew close to him again. Rolling over on his back, he slipped a hand under her nightgown to fondle her. But he couldn’t quite reach. Keening, she had to squat. Afterward, her eyes charged with rancour, she said, “You are not to come here next Sunday. Mr. Nicholson will be away. A poetry reading.”
“Leave the bolt off the door and I will come after dark.”
“Oh, no,” she pleaded, rocking her face in her hands, sniffling; and he had to move smartly to avoid a kick in the groin.
The following Sunday, a misery to her, she paced up and down the cottage, wringing her hands, bumping into things. She bolted the back door immediately before sunset and lay down to rest, fighting another dizzy spell, a pillow squeezed between her thighs, weeping. It was no good. She started each time she thought she heard him on the cinder path. She unbolted the door and made herself some tea. She couldn’t keep it down. She tried needlework, but her hands wouldn’t stop trembling. She shot the door bolt again, angrily this time, but still he didn’t come. She set her rolling pin on the kitchen table and unbolted the door. It didn’t matter any more. He wasn’t coming. It was too late. Probably he was with Mr. Nicholson. Imagining postures that disgusted her, she filled a basin with water and washed, remembering to bolt the door first. When she heard him on the path, singing one of his mournful synagogue songs, she blew out her candle and didn’t move. Her eyes filled with tears. Silence. Then cinders flew against the kitchen window. The neighbours, the neighbours. She relit her candle and quickly unbolted the door and let him in. “You must leave at once,” she said.
But he was already inside, smiling. She retreated to her rocking chair, her eyes rimmed red, the family Bible on her lap. “Do not comfort yourself, boy, thinking hell is an abstraction. It’s a real place waiting on disgusting little sinners like you. If you have ever seen a swine roasting on a spit, its flesh crackling and sizzling, squirting fat, well that’s how fierce are the eternal flames in hell’s coolest regions.”
He sat down in Mr. Nicholson’s chair and shook off his wooden shoes.
“There is laundry stacked and ready,” she said, “and it appears to me that these tiles have lost their sparkle.”
He did the laundry, seemingly more amused than angry, and then he got down on his hands and knees and tackled the kitchen floor. Coming close to her rocking chair, he startled her, nuzzling her legs, growling. She jumped free, tore chunks out of a loaf of bread and tossed them in the air, making him leap for them. When he missed, she reached for her rolling pin, threatening him. He sank to all fours, pawing at the stones with his head bowed, whimpering. She laughed, which he took as an invitation to nuzzle her between the legs again, somewhat higher this time. She stumbled backward, appalled, suddenly seeing him not as a playful pup but as a menacing goat. She reached for her rolling pin and struck him with it, the blow glancing off his shoulder. Incensed, he tore it from her, sending it bouncing off a wall. She retreated hastily behind a chair, panting, and once more asked him to leave.
“No,” he said.
Only then did she notice the parcel he had brought with him. It was wrapped in old newspapers and tied with a string. “What have you got there?” she asked.
“A surprise for you, Mrs. Nicholson.”
“That would be most improper. You will take it with you when you leave, boy.”
“After I have emptied the slops?”
“Yes.”
Subdued, apprehensive, she swept the remaining chunks of bread into a corner and then led him to the deal table and introduced him to the New Testament of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. “‘Again,’” she intoned, swaying her eyes shut, “ ‘the devil taketh him up into an exceedingly high mountain, and showeth him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them; And saith unto him, All these things I will give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me. Then saith Jesus unto him, Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.’”
Finally she showed him his usual place, reminding him of his prayers and the slops, and then she retired to her bedroom, leaving her door ajar. But he didn’t follow. Instead he slipped into Mr. Nicholson’s old nightshirt and waited on the stone floor, hands clasped behind his back, singing:
He heard her thrashing about. She called out to him, but as if possessed, his name plucked from a nightmare against her wishes. He didn’t answer. He sang:
Soon she called out again, peremptorily this time, demanding a fresh candle. He brought it to her, lit it, and retreated to his place. Within the hour she stood over him. “Are you diseased?” she asked.
“No, madam.”
“Well, then.”
He padded after her into the bedroom and the first thing he did was to show himself and piss into the chamberpot. “Empty it,” he said.
Retreating into a corner, she began to weep.
“Do as I saith.”
She emptied the chamberpot and then blew out the candle. He thrust her on to the bed and she would not remove her long flannel nightgown but raised it, hiding her face. He let that go the first time, which was quick for both of them, but before he took her again he relit the candle and made her shed her nightgown and look on him. Afterward, even as she wept softly, he retrieved his package, undid the string, and dumped his coal black laundry on her sweaty body. “I will not leave here before dawn,” he said, “if it is not ready for me.”
The following Sunday, with an especially jolly Mr. Nicholson there, Ephraim mortified her by teasing her with his foot under the table when they sat down to supper together. He was more than somewhat surprised when she did not come to him by the fireplace once Mr. Nicholson had begun to snore. But then, in the early hours of the morning, she was there, rousing him from a deep sleep with her foot. “I had expected you earlier,” he said. “Go back to your room.”
Stung, she turned to flee.
“Wait.”
She paused.
“Here,” he said, tossing her his parcel.
The next Sunday no sooner did Ephraim sit down to the deal table for his lesson with Mr. Nicholson than Mrs. Nicholson swept into the room, her needlework to hand.
“You will not sit here through my lessons any more,” Ephraim said.
Mrs. Nicholson fled.
“Oh dear,” Mr. Nicholson stammered, “what have you done now?”
“You are a sweet man, sir, of kind and gentle disposition, but I am not of your sort.” Unbuttoning him, he added, “In payment for these lessons and because I hold you in high regard I will do this much for you, but no more.”