The warm sun shone on Sarah’s face, and she opened her eyes. “Oh, I’m so glad it’s today instead of yesterday,” she said, stretching contentedly.
Ella smiled. “Yes, it’s a wonderful feeling to know that Mama will be all right.” She jumped out of bed and ran through the rooms. “Wake up, everybody! Let’s get breakfast!”
Breakfast over, Ella rapped on the table with her spoon. “Listen, everybody,” she declared. “I think we ought to have a schedule.”
“That’s a swell idea,” agreed Sarah.
“What’s a schedule?” Gertie asked.
“It’s a list of things you plan to do. It’ll show all the jobs and who does what and when. You’ll see when we draw it up.”
Dishes were stacked in the sink and beds went unmade while the girls struggled over the schedule. Even Charlie got into the spirit of it. Lying on his tummy on the floor, he imitated his sisters, scribble-scrabbling all over a big sheet of paper.
“Let’s tackle the big jobs first,” Ella began. “Now, let’s see. Mondays we’ll wash.”
“Who’s we?” inquired Henny.
“We means all of us.” Ella was emphatic. “Of course,” she went on, “big things like sheets and tablecloths go to the wet wash laundry. They’ll still have to be dried and ironed at home, but at least we won’t have the job of washing them.”
So they went on straight through the week, marking down the days for things like ironing, polishing furniture, window cleaning, marketing, and so on. When it was finally finished, Henny took one look at the crowded list and let out a howl. “You’ve got enough things there to keep us working twenty-four hours a day! When do we rest?”
Ella pointed to Saturday. “There! The Sabbath! That’s the day of rest, remember?”
Henny grinned. “Thank goodness for that!”
“I know it seems like an awful lot to do,” Ella went on, “but you know what Mama always says—do your work with good will, and it’ll get done twice as fast. You’ll see, there’ll be lots of time left. Mama manages, and she’s only one.”
“Besides, Henny, think of all the practice you’ll be getting,” Sarah added. “When you get married, you’ll know how to do everything.”
“Who needs practice!” scoffed Henny. “I’m going to marry a millionaire and have a different servant for every job.”
“Oh, sure,” Ella commented dryly. She chewed on her pencil. “Somebody will have to spend a good deal of time with Charlie. He needs a lot of care—bathing him, staying with him outdoors, putting him to bed.”
“I’ll do it,” volunteered Henny.
“Oh, that’s swell, Henny,” Ella replied gratefully. “You’re good with him. Better than any of us.”
Ella tacked the schedule up on the kitchen door. “That’s settled. Now, let’s get to work.”
For the next few days things ran very smoothly. The schedule seemed to be working out just fine. Papa asked Ella to make him a copy. “I want to show it to Mama,” he said proudly. As for Mrs. Healy, when she first saw it, she laughed heartily. “I ought to have you make one up for me. Maybe then Grace would take more interest in my housework.”
“But, Mrs. Healy,” Charlotte exclaimed, “she’s always coming up here to help us!”
Grace looked at her mother and laughed. “Well, it’s so jolly up here. With everybody pitching in, it just doesn’t seem like work.”
On Friday morning, when Mrs. Healy and Grace looked in on the family, they found the kitchen as busy as an anthill. “This will be our first Friday night without Mama,” Ella explained. “We want to have everything as nice as when Mama is home. Only there are a million things to do! We’ll never get done!”
“Perhaps I can help,” Mrs. Healy said. “Sarah, what are you fighting with in the chopping bowl?”
“We’re making gefüllte fish.”
“Well, I can’t help you out with that,” Mrs. Healy said. “I never even tasted it, let alone made it.”
“I’ve never made it either,” confessed Ella. “But it belongs on Friday night. I have the recipe, of course, but I only hope it turns out all right. If it does, we’ll bring you some.”
Gertie and Charlotte were sitting on the floor beneath the open window, busily polishing the brassware. Spread out before them on a large sheet of newspaper were all the assorted pieces which added such lustre to Mama’s kitchen. “You two seem to be getting along all right,” Mrs. Healy said, “but why on the floor?”
“The polish smells awful, so Ella said we have to keep away from the food,” replied Charlotte.
“I’ve only asked them a dozen times to go out into the hall or into the dining room, but they won’t,” Ella added. “Afraid they’ll miss something.”
“Where’s Charlie?” Mrs. Healy asked Henny, who was busy shelling peas.
A curly blond head peeked out from under the table. “Here I am. I’m hiding. An’ the kitty’s hiding too.”
The head disappeared. Immediately assorted meows and scuffling erupted from under the table cover. Henny ducked under the table. A moment later she came crawling out, the kitten in her arms, with a protesting Charlie scrambling after.
Henny stroked the kitten. “Poor little thing.” She turned to Charlie. “How would you like it if I pulled your tail?” she scolded.
“I pulled it only a little bit.” Charlie pouted. “An’ anyway, I haven’t got no tail.”
“You do that once more, and I’ll spank you right where the tail would be.”
At the sink, Ella was sprinkling coarse salt in large handfuls over some uncooked meat. “Ella,” Grace cried, aghast. “What are you doing! You’ll burn everyone’s mouth off with all that salt!”
Ella smiled. “It gets washed off later. This is how we make our meat kosher.”
“Oh, that’s how it’s done,” Mrs. Healy said. “I’ve always wondered.”
“That’s only part of it. First you have to soak the meat in cold water for half an hour. Then you wash it off. Next you sprinkle salt all over the meat and place it on a wooden board set on a slant so that the meat can drain freely. After an hour, you rinse it three times in cold water. Then it’s kosher and ready for cooking.”
“It’s quite a job preparing your meat,” Mrs. Healy said.
“Yes,” agreed Henny. “You spend hours fixing it, and then the whole thing is gobbled up in a couple of minutes.”
“Mrs. Healy,” Ella said, “there is one thing you can help me with.”
“Sure. And what’s that?”
“Well,” Ella went on, “I’m not even trying to bake our own challis for the Sabbath like Mama does. I’ll buy those at the bakery. But I would just love to bake a coffeecake. We always have one for breakfast on Saturday. Papa loves it.”
“Then what are we waiting for?” Mrs. Healy said, rolling up her sleeves.
They went to work, and soon the dough was set to rise in a pan on the back of the stove. “I’ve got to go down and attend to my own cooking,” Mrs. Healy told Ella, “but when the dough has risen to twice its size, you call me. Come, Grace, this gives me an idea. We’ll make a coffeecake too.”
The preparations went swiftly. Now the soup was on and the meat ready for roasting. Ella took down the box of matches from the kitchen shelf.
“Lemme light it! Lemme!” Charlie cried.
“No!” Ella answered firmly. “It’s too dangerous. But you can blow out the match afterward.”
Charlie watched Ella strike the match against the side of the box. It was ablaze! Charlie was silent with the wonder of it. Just a second ago it had been a mere stick. Now suddenly and gloriously it had flamed alive! How it glowed! He felt all jumpy with excitement. If only the brightness would last forever! But now Ella was saying, “Well, Charlie. Blow it! Blow it out!”
He puckered his lips and blew. Solemnly he regarded the charred bit that remained in Ella’s hand. Why wouldn’t his mean sisters let him light matches? They did it all the time.
There was the whole boxful on the window sill where Ella had left them. Swiftly Charlie snatched it up and skipped out of the room. Everyone was so busy that no one noticed. Henny, with one ear cocked, could hear Charlie singing happily in Mama’s room. Everything was all right.
Charlie went over to the window and set the precious box down on the sill. Now it was all his to play with! Eagerly, he pulled out a match and scratched it against the sandpapery side of the box. He clutched it so tightly the slender stick snapped. Charlie frowned. “No good!” He tossed the pieces out of the window.
He took a second match. He scraped and scraped, and pretty soon the red and blue tip was all gone. “More no good!” The second match followed the first through the window.
Puzzled, he tried a third one. It burst into flame! His eyes opened wide as he contemplated the magical brightness. All too soon it was burning itself out—it was almost down to his fingers! Quickly he brought another match to it. What a lovely spurty sound it made as it caught fire!
Through the open window, the soft summer breeze pulled fitfully at the crisp white curtains. It occurred so swiftly, Charlie scarcely knew what happened. The flame made a jump toward the curtain and ran up its length.
Frightened, Charlie backed away, the match stump still in his hand. He watched, fascinated, as the curtain seemed to melt away. A little puff of wind snatched up the last bit of lacy whiteness and sent it spinning like a flaming top down to the yard below.
Charlie tiptoed over to the window and peered over the ledge. There was nothing there. He looked up at the bare rod. There was nothing there either—nothing at all! He spread his arms out in a helpless gesture. “All gone!” he announced. Only some ashy specks on the window sill remained. He blew at them and shooed them out. Then he stepped back and studied the window again. He stood very still, his small rounded tummy pushed forward. The window has no clothes on, he decided. What would Mama say when she saw that? She’d be awfully angry. She might even give him a spanking!
But Mama wasn’t here. She was sick in the hospital. Ella was here. She could spank! His eyes went darting round the room. The bed! That was a fine hiding place! Quickly he crawled under. He was safe in his own snug little den.
“Charlie must be up to something. It’s much too quiet in there,” Henny said in the kitchen. “I’d better take a look. Charlie!” she called out. “Charlie, where are you?”
Charlie’s heart went bumpety-bump. It mustn’t do that. It must be still as a mouse, like himself.
Henny’s voice was coming nearer. Now she was in the bedroom. He could see her shoes coming and going. All at once the shoes halted. “What in the world! Hey, Ella—everybody, come in here quick!” Henny yelled.
The startled sisters came running. Henny pointed to the window. “Where’s the curtain?”
“What could have happened to it?” Ella asked, wonderingly.
“Maybe it fell out,” Gertie said.
Sarah and Henny hung over the window ledge. No curtain down there.
Ella’s brows puckered into a frown. “The rod’s still up there. The curtain couldn’t have fallen down. Someone’s taken it off!” She studied the sisters’ faces suspiciously.
“Oh, don’t be silly!” Henny told her. “Why should we want to do that? Maybe it’s Charlie. He might have torn it off somehow. Where is the little rascal, anyway?”
Charlie hardly dared breathe. He flattened his nose against the floor.
“Charlie!” the girls called. They ran all through the house searching for him. “Maybe he went downstairs,” suggested Charlotte. “He could have gone through the parlor.”
“With the curtain?” asked Sarah.
“Why not?” answered Henny. “He—”
Just then Charlie’s nose tickled. He sneezed—a tiny kerchoo! Instantly five girls were down by the bed. Five hands poked under the bedspread. There was the culprit! Henny pulled him out by his heels. Immediately he was surrounded by a forest of accusing fingers. “What have you been up to?” “Where’s the curtain?” “Why are you hiding?”
“Shush, all of you!” Henny silenced her sisters. She made her voice very gentle. “Nobody’s going to hurt you, Charlie,” she said calmly. “Just tell us what happened!”
In a sudden flood of tears, Charlie blubbered out the whole story. The girls looked at one another, shaken. “You must never, never play with matches!” they kept repeating over and over again.
“It’s really all my fault,” Ella reproached herself afterward. “I had no business leaving the matches where he could get at them.”
When Papa heard about it later that evening, he declared, “The angels in heaven are watching over my children with extra special care because they know Mama isn’t here.”
Twilight had come. Now was the moment to welcome the Sabbath. With no Mama there, it was Ella who sang the blessing over the candles.
Praised be Thou, O Lord our God, King of the Universe, Who has sanctified with His commandments, and commanded us to kindle the Sabbath lights.
Listening to the familiar prayer, the children felt drawn close together in peace and love and understanding. Once again the reverent spirit of the Sabbath was upon them.
Happily they awaited Papa’s return from synagogue. He would smile upon them. He would be so pleased with all they had done.
And then Papa came home. “Good Sabbath,” he said quietly as he opened the door. “Good Sabbath,” they replied, and stood in line to receive his blessing.
They waited expectantly for some word of praise, but he said nothing. He just washed his hands and sat down at the head of the table. “Charlie,” he said, drawing his son onto his lap, “do you know that every Friday night, two angels walk home with Papa when he leaves the synagogue?”
Charlie’s eyes grew big. “Two angels!” he repeated.
“Yes,” said Papa, “a good angel and a bad angel, and they walk on each side of the Papa. The good angel is dressed all in white, and he is very beautiful, because he has a kind and loving face. The bad angel is dressed all in black, and you would not like to look at him, for his face is very ugly—dark with anger all the time.
“Now, when the Papa reaches his house, he goes inside alone. The angels stay outside, but they peep in the windows to see how things are. If the house is clean and bright and the family all dressed up in their nice Sabbath clothes; if the candle-sticks are shining and the candles are lit; if the table is nicely set; then the good angel feels so happy he wants to jump for joy. He smiles a big smile, and he says, ‘May all your Sabbaths be so bright and cheerful.’ At this, the bad angel gets very cross, and his ugly face grows even darker with anger. But there is nothing he can do about it, and so, even though he doesn’t want to, he has to give in. He has to say ‘Amen. So be it!’
“Now, if the house is not clean, and the candles are not lit; if the table is not laid with shining dishes, and everybody is sitting around in the same clothes they wore all day, then it is the bad angel who is overjoyed. His mean little eyes glisten in his wicked face, and he rubs his hands together gleefully, and he says, ‘So may all your Sabbaths be!’
“And the poor good angel is sad. He weeps, and the tears run down his cheeks. But still he has to say ‘Amen. So be it!’ ”
Papa’s wide, gentle smile turned full upon all his children. “Charlie, which angel do you think is the happy one tonight?”
“The good angel, Papa! The good angel!” Charlie cried.
“That’s right, Charlie,” said Papa, and the girls’ hearts swelled with pride.
Charlie slipped off Papa’s lap and ran to the window, his eyes searching the darkness outside. “I don’t see the angels, Papa. Why can’t I see the angels?” he asked, disappointedly.
“Only God can see the angels,” Papa said softly. “But they are there all right. Listen hard, Charlie, and maybe you will hear the beating of their wings as they fly away. Ssh-ssh!”
Charlie listened with all his might. He lifted a rapt face to Papa. “I can hear them, Papa,” he whispered.