From that point Fanny's thoughts wandered to the brave old
man in the pulpit. She had heard almost nothing of the
service. She looked at him now--at him, and then at his
congregation, inattentive and palpably bored. As always
with her, the thing stamped itself on her mind as a picture.
She was forever seeing a situation in terms of its human
value. How small he looked, how frail, against the
background of the massive Ark with its red velvet curtain.
And how bravely he glared over his blue glasses at the two
Aarons girls who were whispering and giggling together, eyes
on the newcomer.
So this was what life did to you, was it? Squeezed you dry,
and then cast you aside in your old age, a pulp, a bit of
discard. Well, they'd never catch her that way.
Unchurchly thoughts, these. The little place was very
peaceful and quiet, lulling one like a narcotic. The
rabbi's voice had in it that soothing monotony bred of years
in the pulpit. Fanny found her thoughts straying back to
the busy, bright little store on Elm Street, then forward,
to the Haynes-Cooper plant and the fight that was
before her.
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