moses levinsky awoke with a start upon his humble couch in the little hall bedroom in the sixth story of the immense and crowded tenement-house in eldridge street, new york city, in which he dwelt. he very much feared that he had overslept himself and would be late at the early morning service of the congregation sons of peace. the light which shown through the narrow window of his room was much brighter than the pale illumination which usually greeted his early waking eyes and seemed to show that the day was further advanced. a glance at the cheap silver watch which lay upon his trousers on the chair next to his bed showed him that his apprehensions were only too well founded.
the congregation sons of peace invariably began its devotions at 6 a.m. moses levinsky was in the habit of rising at half-past five; his toilet and the walk to the little meeting-room in the next block required twenty-five minutes, and he was regularly in his place five minutes 129before the voice of the chazan or precentor, chanting in classic hebrew, “exalted be the living god and praised,” betokened that the service of adoration and supplication, with which modern israel supplies the place of the ancient sacrificial worship, had begun. but to-day the watch which usually indicated about a quarter past five when he first glanced at it in the early mornings, stood at half-past six. the congregation had already been engaged in prayer for a full half-hour, and he could hardly hope to be with them before the services, which usually lasted somewhat less than an hour, were concluded. watches and clocks are obstinate creatures. they persist in their opinions, which can be plainly read in their faces. they care not at all how disagreeable or unpleasant their statements may be to those who consult them, and they can neither be reasoned with nor stared out of countenance. and so moses levinsky’s watch did not recede at all for all the hard stares which that rather confused individual directed at it; but, on the contrary, advanced a minute or so, while he, who had now risen upon his side and rested upon his left arm, gazed at it with puzzled and rueful countenance.
the truth was that moses was in doubt as 130to the right course to pursue. his watch told him that he might as well make an exception to-day from his regular practice and stay at home, for he could never hope to be on time at the services, or even present during any considerable portion of them. on the other hand, his conscience smote him greatly at having overslept himself; and thus incurred the danger of breaking his life rule, of always beginning the day in the house of god, and in the words which the ship captain once addressed to the prophet jonah when he had gone to sleep in the midst of all the turmoil of the storm, it called to him, “what aileth thee, o sleeper? arise, cry out unto thy god.” after a minute’s hesitation conscience won the battle over comfort. moses hastily sprang from his couch, made his simple toilet as speedily as possible, and in something less than twenty minutes was on his way to the little synagogue (“place of prayer” was the unassuming name which the worshippers themselves gave it) of the congregation of the sons of peace. while he is on his way thither, we will take occasion to describe him to our readers; for many of them, no doubt, are at a loss to understand what kind of a person he is, and particularly fail to comprehend why he should be so dreadfully put out at the mere possibility of being absent from prayers one morning, a thing which, i am sure, would never disturb the majority of my worthy readers in their mental tranquillity.
he was nothing but a commonplace, every-day peddler
page 131
131moses levinsky was a very ordinary and insignificant individual, such as you might pass a thousand times in the street and never pay any attention to. he was nothing but a commonplace, every-day peddler who wandered from morning to evening through the streets of the great metropolis, with a huge basket suspended in front of him, filled to overflowing with a miscellaneous assortment of goods—suspenders, shoe laces, pins, needles, tape, handkerchiefs, stockings, and what not—and endeavored to induce his fellow-beings to purchase sufficient of his store to provide him with a meagre livelihood. he had straight and regular features, of a rather handsome semitic type, though worn and furrowed, not so much by years—he was only forty-three—as by care and anxiety; his hair and large irregular beard were black, heavily streaked with gray, and his clothes and close-fitting derby hat were decidedly shabby. all in all, he was not an imposing figure; and when we add to the unimpressiveness of his exterior the fact that he had a nervous, deprecatory manner, and looked around him with timid, 132apprehensive eyes, and also that he was a very indifferent master of the vernacular, which he spoke hesitatingly and with a pronounced slavonic-jewish accent, the reader will at once realize that he was of the type which low comedians love to caricature and street urchins to mock at, if not to treat worse.
but his external appearance was no indicator, except for those who are accustomed to read and understand such exteriors, of his internal characteristics. beneath the unprepossessing outward semblance there dwelt a keen intellect and a noble soul which might well deserve the admiration of the discerning. he had received a good education of its kind in his youth in his russian home. he had been thoroughly trained in hebrew, had read the entire bible in the original, and was well acquainted with the talmud and the modern hebrew literature from which he had derived correct ideas of the world and the development of modern science. but he had not been able to utilize his training either in his native land or america. in russia he had desired to become a rabbi, for which his learning and his sincere religious bent amply fitted him; but all the positions he knew of were filled, and so after a few years’ vain waiting he kissed his wife and his two little ones good-by 133(he had married early while still a student at the yeshibah) and set sail for america, where, he thought, congregations without number were ready to greet him as their spiritual chief. but a brief glance at the conditions surrounding the rabbinate among his immigrant brethren under the western skies had cured him of his desire to make it his vocation. as he had neither capital nor sufficient secular training to enable him to become a merchant, or secure a remunerative commercial position, he had only the choice between two ways of gaining a livelihood. he could become a workman in a sweat-shop or a peddler. he chose the latter and, at the time this story begins, had pursued the occupation of itinerant merchant, an occupation in which there is little gain and less glory, for some ten years. during all these years he had permitted himself only one form of pleasure, attendance at the house of god. the theatre knew him not, the interior of saloons saw him only when on business bent; but at the synagogue he was a regular attendant, never missing the early morning services or the evening gatherings, in which the rabbi expounded the talmud and its commentaries to a group of attentive “learners.”
apart from his natural piety it had gradually become a matter of pride with him to be regular 134and punctual in his attendance at the synagogue, and consequently he felt considerably mortified when on the morning of our tale he found that he must either be absent or late at service. on his way to the house of worship he tried to console himself with the sneaking hope that perhaps his watch was fast and that the hour was not really as late as it indicated. but his hopes were doomed to disappointment. as he entered the little synagogue the mourners were just repeating the last kaddish, and most of the other worshippers were folding and putting away their tallithoth and tephillin, preparatory to leaving for the work of the day.
poor moses! a pang went through his heart at the thought that he, whose punctuality and zeal had become proverbial, should be so culpably remiss as to appear in shool when services were practically over, and a keener pang yet pervaded him when he noticed the expression of wonderment with which his companions and fellow-members gazed at him. nor did they confine themselves to looks of amazement; but, being finished with their devotions, they gave free expression to their astonishment in questions. “what’s the matter, levinsky?” he was asked from all sides. “aren’t you well, or are you getting lazy, or are you turning link?” to all these 135interrogations moses returned no answer; indeed, he felt morally too much crushed to defend or even to palliate his shortcoming. gloomily he proceeded to put on his prayer-shawl and phylacteries and with much less fervor than usual he recited the morning prayer. by the time he had concluded his devotions every one else had left except the shammas, who, obliged by his office to remain, had waited impatiently to lock the synagogue, and who felt considerably aggrieved at moses for having caused him to lose so much of his valuable time, which might have been utilized for collecting a bill or arranging a shidduch. listlessly moses left the room and directed his feet street-ward, but not too listlessly to feel the withering glance of reproach which the shammas shot after him as he departed.
the street was thronged and bustling with the full tide of activity which had now begun, but moses paid no attention to its appearance. he did not even notice the friendly greetings of several acquaintances whom he passed on his homeward way. his mind had only room just then for one thought, that of mortification at his inexplicable tardiness and the humiliation which that morning had brought him in the opinion of his fellow-congregants. he reached the huge tenement he called his home and began mechanically 136to climb the narrow and interminable staircases that led up to his room. the building was comparatively quiet. most of the male inmates and of the children of school age had already departed, the former to take up their daily tasks, the latter for the immense public school a few blocks away. no one met him on the stairs to draw his mind from its gloomy abstraction. but as he reached the fifth floor he perceived something which at once, arrested his attention and turned his thoughts to matters outside of himself. it was a strong and pungent smell, the smell of smoke. he stopped, all his senses at once keenly alert. like all tenement-dwellers he realized well the meaning of smoke. it meant fire, and fire all too often meant death in those lofty and crowded edifices, from whose upper portions escape was always difficult and sometimes impossible. even as he stood, the noise of uneasy motion in the apartments at the side of the hall where he was and a sudden clamor of voices within betokened that their occupants too had smelt the smoke and were seized with sudden dread. doors were flung open; the white, anxious faces of frightened women, followed by wondering little children, peered out. there was a rush of feet in the hall below and quavering voices screamed 137“fire! fire!” by this time (a very brief interval only had passed) moses levinsky had located the direction whence the smoke proceeded. it came from the sixth story, and was already quite dense at the head of the stairs. as he gazed, levinsky thought he could hear children’s voices, faintly crying, as if half stifled.
what should he do? for a moment he thought he would rush downstairs to the street and start the fire-alarm at the next corner. but he realized instantly that quicker action was necessary in this case, that human lives, children’s lives probably, were in imminent danger, and that he must do something himself to rescue them, leaving to others the task of notifying the fire department. with a few swift bounds he was at the next landing, clearing three steps at every leap. the fire was evidently in the apartments on the left side of the hall, where lived the shapiros with their three children, for dense smoke was pouring from their rear door and children’s voices were heard from within, feebly wailing. the rooms on the other side of the hall, occupied by the arnowitzs, a young married couple, were still and evidently empty. with one rush levinsky was at the door through whose interstices the smoke proceeded 138and endeavored to open it. it was closed and resisted his efforts. he kicked at it frantically. it did not yield. in the meanwhile the smoke was pouring forth in denser clouds, paining his eyes and his lungs, and the children’s voices were growing fainter and feebler. with mad frenzy moses levinsky threw his body against the door; it shook and quivered but did not yield. again he tried to kick it in, striking his right foot in his thin boot against the door with all his strength, and with utter disregard for the pain and possible injury to himself. in vain. the door was strong and firmly locked, while levinsky was but an indifferent specimen of muscular development (his athletics had all been of the intellectual variety), and all his efforts to break it down were of no avail. several precious minutes had now passed and levinsky was almost in despair. he was hesitating what to do, and half inclined to rush downstairs in quest of additional help when his eyes, aimlessly wandering about the hall, chanced to light in the opposite corner, and lo and behold! there stood an axe. it was the axe with which shapiro was accustomed to chop wood in the yard. usually he kept it in his rooms, but that morning had left it, by a providential chance, in the hall. instantly 139moses levinsky seized it. a few vigorous blows, launched with all his strength against the door, brought it down and he rushed into the smoke-filled room. in the corner he saw dimly three little figures. two were clinging to each other and one was lying prostrate on the floor. they were sarah and ikey, the five-year and three-year-old daughter and son, and little josey, the eighteen-months-old baby of the shapiros. the older ones were still conscious, but wee little josey had been overcome by the smoke and had fallen to the floor. in the middle of the room stood the large family bed, the bed-clothing fiercely burning and emitting dense volumes of black smoke. levinsky’s first thought was of the children. lifting up and holding the unconscious child with his right hand and taking a hand of each of the other children in his left, he rushed from the room.
by this time the whole house and all the neighborhood had taken alarm. as he hastened down the stairs, in an effort to find a place where the unconscious child might have fresh air, there came rushing toward him a throng of neighbors; among them several firemen, with a portable extinguisher, and a physician. moses levinsky’s task had been accomplished. the firemen proceeded to deal in systematic manner 140with the fire, which had now grown large enough to threaten the whole house. the physician took charge of the unconscious infant and in a few minutes had brought him to. but who is this whose agonized screams are now heard, and who comes rushing through the dense crowd, frantically crying, “my children! o my children!” it is the mother, mrs. shapiro, who had gone out to do her marketing, together with her neighbor, mrs. arnowitz, and, in the manner customary in that vicinity, had locked her children in the room until her return. when she saw that her children were alive and well, she kissed and hugged them frantically, and drew them to her breast as if she half doubted the evidence of her senses. then she asked who was their brave rescuer; and when all pointed to moses levinsky, she fell on her knees before him and kissed his hands and called him a malach of god, sent directly from heaven to rescue her dear ones. but moses levinsky did not grow at all conceited nor take the praise to himself. his face was lighted up with the gleam of intelligence, with the satisfaction of a problem solved. all he said was: “now i see that god is good and his plans are wise. he made me late at shool so that i should be on time to save these poor nefoshos. 141i was too late for one mitzvah, but just in time for another, and that is quite in accordance with the halachah; for does not the talmud tell us, ‘he that has to perform one mitzvah is exempt from another’?”
