"Me! ven?" exclaimed Yankelé indignantly.
"Why, this very night. When you asked young Weinstein for his dead father's clothes!"
"But he had already given them away!" protested the Pole.
"What of that? If anyone had given away my clothes, I should have demanded compensation. You must really be above rebuffs of that kind, Yankelé, if you are to be my son-in-law. No, no, I remember the dictum of the Sages: 'To give your daughter to an uncultured man is like throwing her bound to a lion.'"
"But you have also seen me schnorr mid success," remonstrated the suitor.
"Never!" protested Manasseh vehemently.
"Often!"
"From whom?"
"From you!" said Yankelé boldly.
"From me!" sneered Manasseh, accentuating the pronoun with infinite contempt. "What does that prove? I am a generous man. The test is to schnorr from a miser."
"I vill schnorr from a miser!" announced Yankelé desperately.
"You will!"
"Yes. Choose your miser."
"No, I leave it to you," said da Costa politely.
"Vell, Sam Lazarus, de butcher shop!"
"No, not Sam Lazarus, he once gave a Schnorrer I know elevenpence."
"Elevenpence?" incredulously murmured Yankelé.
"Yes, it was the only way he could pass a shilling. It wasn't bad, only cracked, but he could get no one to take it except a Schnorrer. He made the man give him a penny change though. 'Tis true the man afterwards laid out the shilling at Lazarus's shop. Still a really great miser would have added that cracked shilling to his hoard rather than the perfect penny."
"No," argued Yankelé, "dere vould be no difference, since he does not spend."
"True," said da Costa reflectively, "but by that same token a miser is not the most difficult person to tackle."
"How do you make dat out?"
"Is it not obvious? Already we see Lazarus giving away elevenpence. A miser who spends nothing on himself may, in exceptional cases, be induced to give away something. It is the man who indulges himself in every luxury and gives away nothing who is the hardest to schnorr from. He has a use for his money – himself! If you diminish his store you hurt him in the tenderest part – you rob him of creature comforts. To schnorr from such a one I should regard as a higher and nobler thing than to schnorr from a mere miser."
"Vell, name your man."
"No – I couldn't think of taking it out of your hands," said Manasseh again with his stately bow. "Whomever you select I will abide by. If I could not rely on your honour, would I dream of you as a son-in-law?"
"Den I vill go to Mendel Jacobs, of Mary Axe."
"Mendel Jacobs – oh, no! Why, he's married! A married man cannot be entirely devoted to himself."
"Vy not? Is not a vife a creature comfort? P'raps also she comes cheaper dan a housekeeper."
"We will not argue it. I will not have Mendel Jacobs."
"Simon Kelutski, de vine-merchant."
"He! He is quite generous with his snuff-box. I have myself been offered a pinch. Of course I did not accept it."
Yankelé selected several other names, but Manasseh barred them all, and at last had an inspiration of his own.
"Isn't there a Rabbi in your community whose stinginess is proverbial? Let me see, what's his name?"
"A Rabbi!" murmured Yankelé disingenuously, while his heart began to palpitate with alarm.
"Yes, isn't there – Rabbi Bloater!"
Yankelé shook his head. Ruin stared him in the face – his fondest hopes were crumbling.
"I know it's some fishy name – Rabbi Haddock – no it isn't. It's Rabbi Remorse something."
Yankelé saw it was all over with him.
"P'raps you mean Rabbi Remorse Red-herring," he said feebly, for his voice failed him.
"Ah, yes! Rabbi Remorse Red-herring," said Manasseh. "From all I hear – for I have never seen the man – a king of guzzlers and topers, and the meanest of mankind. Now if you could dine with him you might indeed be called a king of Schnorrers."
Yankelé was pale and trembling. "But he is married!" he urged, with a happy thought.
"Dine with him to-morrow," said Manasseh inexorably. "He fares extra royally on the Sabbath. Obtain admission to his table, and you shall be admitted into my family."
"But you do not know the man – it is impossible!" cried Yankelé.
"That is the excuse of the bad Schnorrer. You have heard my ultimatum. No dinner, no wife. No wife – no dowry!"
"Vat vould dis dowry be?" asked Yankelé, by way of diversion.
"Oh, unique – quite unique. First of all there would be all the money she gets from the Synagogue. Our Synagogue gives considerable dowries to portionless girls. There are large bequests for the purpose."
Yankelé's eyes glittered.
"Ah, vat gentlemen you Spaniards be!"
"Then I daresay I should hand over to my son-in-law all my Jerusalem land."
"Have you property in de Holy Land?" said Yankelé.
"First class, with an unquestionable title. And, of course, I would give you some province or other in this country."
"What!" gasped Yankelé.
"Could I do less?" said Manasseh blandly. "My own flesh and blood, remember! Ah, here is my door. It is too late to ask you in. Good Sabbath! Don't forget your appointment to dine with Rabbi Remorse Red-herring to-morrow."
"Good Sabbath!" faltered Yankelé, and crawled home heavy-hearted to Dinah's Buildings, Tripe Yard, Whitechapel, where the memory of him lingers even unto this day.
Rabbi Remorse Red-herring was an unofficial preacher who officiated at mourning services in private houses, having a gift of well-turned eulogy. He was a big, burly man with overlapping stomach and a red beard, and his spiritual consolations drew tears. His clients knew him to be vastly self-indulgent in private life, and abstemious in the matter of benevolence; but they did not confound the rôles. As a mourning preacher he gave every satisfaction: he was regular and punctual, and did not keep the congregation waiting, and he had had considerable experience in showing that there was yet balm in Gilead.
He had about five ways of showing it – the variants depending upon the circumstances. If, as not infrequently happened, the person deceased was a stranger to him, he would enquire in the passage: "Was it man or woman? Boy or girl? Married or single? Any children? Young 'uns or old 'uns?"
When these questions had been answered, he was ready. He knew exactly which of his five consolatory addresses to deliver – they were all sufficiently vague and general to cover considerable variety of circumstance, and even when he misheard the replies in the passage, and dilated on the grief of a departed widower's relict, the results were not fatal throughout. The few impossible passages might be explained by the mishearing of the audience. Sometimes – very rarely – he would venture on a supplementary sentence or two fitting the specific occasion, but very cautiously, for a man with a reputation for extempore addresses cannot be too wary of speaking on the spur of the moment.
Off obituary lines he was a failure; at any rate, his one attempt to preach from an English Synagogue pulpit resulted in a nickname. His theme was Remorse, which he explained with much care to the congregation.
"For instance," said the preacher, "the other day I was walking over London Bridge, when I saw a fishwife standing with a basket of red-herrings. I says, 'How much?' She says, 'Two for three-halfpence.'