The waiters and waitresses were running up and down like frightened hares. The relatives of both parties were so excited that they did nothing but shout aloud at the top of their voices. How long more were they going to carry on the preparations? Surely, it was already time to finish the bride’s toilette? Why should she and the bridegroom be kept fasting the whole day? The cry, “It is time! It is time!” became more general, but no one even attempted to do anything whatever. Isaac-Naphtali ran here and there, in a velveteen jacket, under the tails of which he kept his hands locked within each other, as if he were a preacher. And, his wife, Dvossa-Malka, also made a terrible noise, an uproar. Everybody who could ran backwards and forwards, stumbling over one another in their haste, and holding their hands out in front of them, as if they were ready to set to work at anything, but were not given the work to do.
Between the two sets of relations a great rivalry had sprung up; and, two distinct parties were formed, opposing each other at every turn.
“Nu! why is there nothing done yet?” someone belonging to the bridegroom asked, only to be answered by someone from the bride’s family with the sneer:
“Why are you not doing something yourself?” And, to this the first speaker made haste to reply: “Did you ever hear the likes? To keep the children fasting for hours and hours on end!”
“Did you ever hear the like — keeping the children fasting for hours and hours on end?” was the opponent’s echoing remark.
“Why are they running up and down, here and there?”
“What sort of running about is it?”
“Everybody is running, and everybody is making a noise, and still they are not advancing one step further. Beautiful management!”
“Though they run about and make a noise, they are not doing a single thing.”
“Perhaps there is enough talking going on? There must be an end to everything. Let there be a start to get the work done!”
“Well, let there be an end of talking. Let there be a start made to get the work done. There must be an end to this talking.”
“Where are the musicians?” asked one of the bridegroom’s relatives.
“Yes, the musicians — where are they?” replied the bride’s relatives.
The musicians were at this moment occupied in getting themselves ready for the night’s work. They were tuning their instruments, and waxing their bows. But, as usual, Yekel Bass was otherwise occupied. He was dragging out of his corner, by the ear, a second delinquent, and dealing him out a goodly share of blows. When he had the boy already outside the door, he whispered, nay, rather hissed into the ear he was pinching with all his might: “I will show you, devil, how to strum the string of my ‘bass!’ ”
Michsa the drummer, not having anything else to do, was scratching the side of his face that had whiskers. He was not looking at anybody. Reb Chaikel Flute was chatting to a teacher of his acquaintance. He took a pinch of snuff from the preacher’s box with his forefinger and thumb; and, holding it in mid-air, he proceeded to scatter his words on to the teacher as though he were dropping them from the mouth of a sack.
And, the rest of the musicians — the swollen-faced young man with the long teeth — were standing around Stempenyu, who was talking to them in the jargon that all musicians used, so that no one would understand what they were saying. They seemed to be engrossed in a highly interesting subject.
“Who is the maiden who is standing near the bride?” asked Stempenyu, turning his glances in the direction of Rochalle the beautiful. “You go, Jeremiah,” he added, to one of the apprentices, “and find out for me who she is. Be quick about it!”
Jeremiah was not away many minutes. He returned with definite information.
“She is not a maiden. She is a married woman. She is Isaac-Naphtali’s daughter-in-law, and comes from Yehupetz. That is her husband in the velvet skull-cap. Do you see him? He is just turning towards us.”
“To the devil with you!” cried Stempenyu excitedly. “You were not long finding all this out! Oh, she is very beautiful. Quick! Look at the expression in her wonderful blue eyes!”
“If you wish me to,” began the swollen-faced Jeremiah, “if you wish me to, I will start a conversation with her and find out more for you.”
“To the devil with you, you hideous monster! Nobody wants you to open your hideous mouth. I can talk to her myself if I want to!”
“Nu!” said someone to Stempenyu, seeing that there was likelihood of a quarrel. “Nu! Stempenyu, make a start. Let them see how you can pierce their hearts with your fiddle; and, how you can tear out their bowels.”
Stempenyu needed no further reminder. He took up his fiddle, winked at the men, who at once put themselves in readiness for the signal, and he began to play the opening overture.
IV STEMPENYU’S FIDDLE
No pen can describe how beautifully Stempenyu played the accompaniment to the bride’s enthronement. It was not an ordinary wedding march that he played, not by any means an ordinary melody, such as one might have heard anywhere. It was a god-like melody, pervaded with a certain spiritual meaning that was reminiscent of nothing anyone had ever listened to before. It was as if Stempenyu, having taken his stand in front of the bride, was desirous of playing on his fiddle a special sermon for her edification — a long, beautiful sermon touching on the life she had led hitherto, and the different life to which she was going, on the threshold of which she now found herself. Somehow, it seemed that he was particularly anxious to emphasize the contrast between the easy, careless days of maidenhood, and the deep responsibilities which the future held for her. Gone was her childhood, and in its place she would find a serious woman with covered locks, her beauty and her youth hidden under the cap which orthodoxy demanded she should wear. No more joyousness! No more play! No more ease! Farewell youth, farewell! Hail! all hail to the woman that has come forth to the light of day!
Despite the beauty of his playing, the solemnity of it all made it inexpressibly sad. The fiddle seemed to weep and wail after its own fashion, so much so that the women were moved to tears. They could not keep themselves from weeping out loud.
“How short a time it seems since I was a bride myself, sitting on a little throne,” murmured an old woman. “It seems but yesterday that I was waiting for the women to tie up my hair. And, I imagined that the angels that are in heaven had intervened in my life; for, it seemed to me that I was the most fortunate creature in the whole wide world. And, how is it in reality? What has it turned out to be?”
“Oh, God,” prayed another woman, half aloud. “Oh, God, let it be the fate of my eldest daughter to be married soon. Only let her have better luck than I had. God forgive me for my sinful words!”
While the women were musing thus, Stempenyu was playing. His orchestra now accompanied him at intervals. His fiddle did not play. It talked, saying a multitude of things which were sad, and melancholy to the verge of tears, almost a series of long drawn-out sobs. Not a murmur was to be heard, not a movement. Nothing but the low, thin, plaintive notes of the violin seemed to be in existence. Everybody held his or her breath, for fear of missing a single note. The people felt that it would be better to lose a fortune than a single note from Stempenyu’s fiddle. The old men fell into reveries; the women were stricken with dumbness; and the boys and girls clambered on to chairs and tables so as to see the musicians as well as hear them.