S. Agnon - A Guest for the NIght

This is how that piece of cloth came into the tailor’s hands. The colonel of his battalion used to take every beautiful object that he saw in the possession of the enemy and send it to his wife. He would pick out messengers and exempt them from their army duties for a few days to take his booty back to his wife. “Once he sent me with all kinds of food and drink, silver vessels and cloth, and gave me permission to stay at home for a few days. I said to my comrades, ‘For a year or more I have not seen my wife and children, and now that I am going to visit them I have no presents to bring.’ There was a certain soldier there, a Gentile of peasant stock — I used to write letters for him to his father and mother. It happened that his mother had sent him a pot of butter that day. He gave me the butter and said, ‘Take it, brother, take it and give it to your wife, to spread on the bread for your children.’ When I came to the colonel’s wife and brought her the gifts from her husband, she saw the pot in my hand. ‘What is that in your hand?’ said she. ‘A little piece of butter,’ said I, ‘which I am bringing to my wife to spread on the bread for our little children.’ Said she, ‘Tonight I am making a banquet for the important people of the town, and I should like to have an extra piece of butter in the house. You take this piece of cloth and give me the butter.’ I found it hard, for I wanted to please my wife and children. But the lady took the pot from me and gave me the cloth. So I said to myself: So be it.”

Before I left the tailor, I told him to fix a time and keep to his word. I myself do not place a great value on my time, but I value a man’s honor, for if he breaks his word his honor is soiled; and even more, he is a craftsman and I have a great respect for the honor of craftsmen, and I do not wish to see them doing wrong. The cloth I found in the shop was not so good as the tailor’s, and it cost more, but I did not go to look for other shops, for there would be no end to the matter: however fine the goods, you can always find better. After I had paid for the material, the shopkeeper’s wife asked me, To which tailor are you giving the cloth to make you a coat?” “I have just come from Schuster,” I replied. “A fine tailor you have found!” said the shopkeeper’s wife. “May the Lord not punish me for my words — he’s nothing but a puffed-up pauper. All Schuster has to boast of is that he once lived in Germany. Heavens above, who didn’t live in Germany? I know people who were in Paris. And if he was in Berlin, what about it? Perhaps Hindenburg commissioned him to make him a tefillin sack? Ha, ha, ha. Let me send for my own tailor and you will see the difference between one tailor and another.” “I do not want to have him waste his time for nothing,” said I. “What d’you mean for nothing?” exclaimed the shopkeeper’s wife. “Isn’t that what he’s there for? Feivel, Feivel,” cried the woman to her husband, “why don’t you say something? Just you listen to what my husband says. Sometimes a man says a thing a thousand women can’t say!” Said her husband, “After all, the gentleman has just come from Schuster, and found him suitable.” “What d’you mean, found him suitable?” said his wife. “What does a man know? They tell him that’s a tailor, and he believes them. If the world depended only on men, the human race would have died out already. I am surprised they didn’t tell you anything in the hotel. Wasn’t it Dolik who sent your honor to my shop?” “Not at all,” I replied, “it was Schuster who sent me to you.” “Schuster? But whenever anyone comes to him he offers them his own cloth.” “And has he cloth to sell?” “He had.” “And now?” “Now, O sir, he has nothing left. And whatever he has left he needs for himself.” “Why for himself?” I asked. “Because he has a sick wife at home. She is sick with asthma, and he puts his cloth under her head, for all the pillows he has are not enough. You should thank the Almighty, sir, that you didn’t take his cloth. Surely you haven’t come here to take the pillow from under a sick woman’s head. I hear that your honor comes from the Land of Israel. It’s very hot there. Burns like fire. There’s a lad who’s come back from there, no doubt you’ve seen him. He’s dark and he has a double forelock. He works at repairing the roads. Now that boy says it’s just the same there as here, and the same here as there. In fact, it’s hotter there than here, but for most of the day there’s a wind blowing that softens the heat a little; and here it’s different — when it’s hot a man can’t stand the heat. But who’d believe him? He’s a communist, half a Bolshevik, or perhaps more than half, and that’s why they put him out of there, for the Land of Israel was given only for the Zionists. But what do the Zionists get out of it all? They get killed there. One lad from our town was there — really you can’t call him a lad, for he got married there. Anyway, that lad I was talking about, Daniel Bach’s brother — that’s the one-legged fellow who goes about with a wooden leg — was killed there for nothing. He was standing one night on guard and an Arab passed by, so the Arab took it into his head to fire a bullet at him, and he did and killed him. And the English look on and say nothing. And surely the English are not just goyim who hate Jews, so why do they say nothing? What do you think, sir, is there any remedy for the Land of Israel? My father, may he rest in peace, used to say that if it was a good thing for us, our Emperor would say to the Turk, ‘Listen!’ and the Turk would immediately give him the whole of the Land of Israel. Since you’re in a hurry, sir, I don’t want to hold you up, but what I ask you is this: If you have to get a suit made you should know that we have all kinds of fine cloth in our shop.”

Her husband spoke up. “I used to know his grandfather, may he rest in peace,” said he. “He held me at my circumcision.” His wife interrupted him. “So now you’ve finished singing the praises of his grandfather?” cried she. “And is that all his grandfather did for you? Didn’t he give you a present at your wedding, a spicebox of pure silver? Before the Russians marched in and took it away, it used to stand in our house.” “Now you’ve already told about it and didn’t let me tell,” replied her husband. “My husband’s a modest man,” said the shopkeeper’s wife, “and he leaves others to praise him, but I say if you don’t praise yourself, others certainly won’t praise you.” Said the shopkeeper, “His grandfather, may he rest in peace, used to send a wedding present to everyone he had held on his knees at circumcision.” “To everyone?” said his wife, clenching her hands together. “Anyway, the present he gave you was better than anyone else’s, for he gave you a box of pure silver. Just wait, your honor, and my husband will bring you your roll of cloth to the tailor.” “There is no need,” I said. “If you don’t want to trouble my husband,” said the shopkeeper’s wife, “here is Ignatz; he will bring it.” “I want to accustom myself to carry my own cloth,” I replied. “What d’you mean, you want to accustom yourself?” said the woman. “Will you really carry a parcel in the marketplace?” “That was what I intended when I bought cloth to make a coat,” I replied. “And what difference does it make to me if I carry my coat afterwards, or if I carry it now?”

When I left the shop, it was still day. Although the time had come for the sun to disappear, there was no sign of evening.

The sun stood stuck to the sky, like an inseparable part of it, and a kind of warmth tempered the air. This air, as well as the light of the sun, changed the faces of the passers-by, and they became more pleasant to each other. People I did not know nodded their heads and greeted me. Along came Ignatz and followed me, wanting to carry my parcel. Shopkeepers looked at me and the parcel in my hand. The shops were many and the customers were few, and anyone who bought something in one shop aroused the resentment of the other shopkeepers. On the way I came across that young man of whom the shopkeeper’s wife had spoken. I had seen him many times before, and I was fond of him. I must say he was not dark, but sunburnt, and his forelock was not double; that woman had been chattering nonsense, for what is the meaning of a double forelock? This forelock I’m speaking of gave him a manly look. I do not like men who have nothing on their head but their forelock like the peacock who covers his ugly feet with his beautiful feathers. But it was not so with that young man, Yeruham Freeman; he had something else besides his forelock. You could see that painful things had happened to him and he had pushed them away from his heart, just as he pushes his forelock away from his forehead. His face was lean, like the rest of the people of Szibucz nowadays, and he had a small dimple in his right cheek. People usually call a mark like that a charm spot, and in fact it added charm to his face and contradicted all the indignation in his eyes.