Over the little, spent congregation hung a glorious
atmosphere of detachment. These Jews, listening to the
words that had come from the lips of the prophets in Israel,
had been, on this day, thrown back thousands of years, to
the time when the destruction of the temple was as real as
the shattered spires and dome of the cathedral at Rheims.
Old Ben Reitman, faint with fasting, was far removed from
his everyday thoughts of his horses, his lumber mills, his
farms, his mortgages. Even Mrs. Nathan Pereles, in her
black satin and bugles and jets, her cold, hard face usually
unlighted by sympathy or love, seemed to feel something of
this emotional wave. Fanny Brandeis was shaken by it. Her
head ached (that was hunger) and her hands were icy. The
little Russian girl in the seat just behind them had ceased
to wriggle and squirm, and slept against her mother's side.
Rabbi Thalmann, there on the platform, seemed somehow very
far away and vague. The scent of clove apples and ammonia
salts filled the air. The atmosphere seemed strangely
wavering and luminous.
Pages:
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83