The Dance of the Demons by Esther Singer Kreitman

Author:Esther Singer Kreitman
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: The Feminist Press at CUNY
Published: 2018-03-15T00:00:00+00:00

XI

Soon after Deborah had taken her leave, a few more comrades—men and women, most of them very young—arrived alone, rapping at the door in the same prearranged fashion. Before long Bailka’s little room was shrouded with smoke, and the air became unbearably hot and stuffy. Simon’s cheeks flushed a peculiar red, and he kept struggling to overcome his suffocating little cough. For his sake, the company stubbed their half-finished cigarettes, but the window had to remain closed and veiled. The frail, grim-lipped little girl jotted down the minutes of the meeting in shorthand, and also took down some dictation from Simon. Bailka distributed the little packages of propaganda leaflets which Simon had brought in the lining of his coat, and with monotonous insistence she warned each comrade to use the utmost care in passing on this illegal literature to the public. One by one the comrades said good-night, going abroad at the peril of their lives, until only Bailka and Simon remained, together with another comrade who had come up from the country especially to attend the meeting.

They had tea, and here the brewing of it was a complicated process. Bailka was preoccupied with improvising a bed on the floor-boards. In the end she managed to share out equally the two pillows, the quilt and their three overcoats in accordance with the best Socialist principles.

She turned the light out, removed the heavy cloth from the window and admitted the frosty night air through a tiny chink at the top. Now that the room was in darkness it seemed to be bigger and loftier. Simon settled down on his back, with legs propped up, in anticipation of a sleepless night. Bailka stretched her overcoat to its full length and patted it, as if to coax it into growing; but in the end she was obliged to curl herself up instead. The hour was late and not a sound was to be heard.

How she had grown, Simon’s thoughts turned to Deborah. She was no longer a child, but a woman, a tempting and sensible little woman at that. He wondered: had it ever occurred to her that it was only for the sake of seeing her that he used to frequent their house at R—? Would she guess now?

“What a splendid Romeo I would make!” he suddenly interrupted his own train of thought to indulge in self-mockery. “Well, well, Romeo, it’s a good job for you that your Juliet doesn’t care a hang for you, never did and never will. Credit her with more sense than that!”

But after all it was only natural for a poor fool to fall in love the moment the doctor told him that, for the sake of his health, he must cut women out of his life. Now to be sure, was the ideal time to fall in love; he was overwhelmed with work, and on the verge of a physical breakdown. Ideal! Damn those gaolers! They had well-nigh knocked the life out of him during his last term in prison, and here he was actually thinking of love, romance….

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