When the three old usurers had bought themselves out of the Kasbah, they put their heads together and said, "Let us drive this fellow out of the Mellah, and so shall he be driven out of the town."Then the owner of the house which Israel rented for his lodging evicted him by a poor excuse, and all other Jewish owners refused him as tenant.But the conspiracy failed.By command of the Governor, or by his influence, Israel was lodged by the Nadir, the administrator of mosque property, in one of the houses belonging to the mosque on the Moorish side of the Mellah walls.
Seeing this, the usurers laid their heads together again and said, "Let us see that no man of our nation serve him, and so shall his life be a burden." Then the two Jews who had been his servants deserted him, and when he asked for Moors he was told that the faithful might not obey the unbeliever; and when he would have sent for negroes out of the Soudan he was warned that a Jew might not hold a slave.
But the conspiracy failed again.Two black female slaves from Soos, named Fatimah and Habeebah, were bought in the name of the Governor and assigned to Israel's service.
And when it was seen at length that nothing availed to disturb Israel's material welfare, the three base usurers laid their heads together yet again, that they might prey upon his superstitious fears, and they said, "He is our enemy, but he is a Jew: let the woman who is named the prophetess put her curse upon him." Then she who was so called, one Rebecca Bensabbot, deaf as a stone, weak in her intellect, seventy years of age, and living fifty years on the poor-box which Reuben Maliki kept, crossed Israel in the streets, and cursed him as a son of Beelzebub predicting that, even as he had made the walls of the Kasbah to echo with the groans of God's elect, so should his own spirit be broken within them and his forehead humbled to the earth.He stood while he heard her out, and his strong lip trembled at he words; but he only smiled coldly, and passed on in silence.
"The clouds are not hurt," he thought, "by the bark of dogs."Thus did his brethren of Judah revile him, and thus did they torture him;yet there was one among them who did neither.This was the daughter of their Grand Rabbi, David ben Ohana.Her name was Ruth.
She was young, and God had given her grace and she was beautiful, and many young Jewish men, of Tetuan had vied with each other in vain for he favour.Of Israel's duty she knew little, save what report had said of it, that it was evil; and of the act which had made him an outcast among his own people, and an Ishmael among the sons of Ishmael she could form no judgment.But what a woman's eyes might see in him, without help of other knowledge, that she saw.
She had marked him in the synagogue, that his face was noble and his manners gracious; that he was young, but only as one who had been cheated of his youth and had missed his early manhood, the when he was ignored he ignored his insult, and when he was reviled he answered not again; in a word, the he was silent and strong and alone, and, above all that he was sad.
These were credentials enough to the true girl's favour, and Israel soon learnt that the house of the Rabbi was open to him.
There the lonely man first found himself.The cold eyes of his little world had seen him as his father's son, but the light and warmth of the eyes of Ruth saw him as the son of his mother also.
The Rabbi himself was old, very old--ninety years of age--and length of days had taught him charity.And so it was that when, in due time, Israel came with many excuses and asked for Ruth in marriage, the Rabbi gave her to him.
The betrothal followed, but none save the notary and his witnesses stood beside Israel when he crossed hands over the handkerchief;and, when the marriage came in its course, few stood beside the Chief Rabbi.Nevertheless, all the Jews of the quarter and all the Moors of Tetuan were alive to what was happening, and on the night of the marriage a great company of both peoples, though chiefly of the rabble among them, gathered in front of the Rabbi's house that they might hiss and jeer.
The Chacham heard them from where he sat under the stars in his patio, and when at last the voice of Rebecca the prophetess came to him above the tumult, crying, "Woe to her that has married the enemy of her nation, and woe to him that gave her against the hope of his people!
They shall taste death.He shall see them fall from his side and die,"then the old man listened and trembled visibly.In confusion and fierce anger he rose up and stumbled through the crooked passage to the door, and flinging it wide, he stood in the doorway facing them that stood without.
"Peace! Peace!" he cried, "and shame! shame! Remember the doom of him that shall curse the high priest of the Lord."This he spoke in a voice that shook with wrath.Then suddenly, his voice failing him, he said in a broken whisper, "My good people, what is this? Your servant is grown old in your service.
Sixty and odd years he has shared your sorrows and your burdens.
What has he done this day that your women should lift up their voices against him?"But, in awe of his white head in the moonlight, the rabble that stood in the darkness were silent and made no answer.Then he staggered back, and Israel helped him into his house, and Ruth did what she could to compose him.But he was woefully shaken, and that night he died.
When the Rabbi's death became known in the morning, the Jews whispered, "It is the first-fruits!" and the Moors touched their foreheads and murmured "It is written!"
