ink isn’t good for the ring-worm, and my five fingers shall leave a mark on her face worse than any of Gabriel’s ring-worms.  But I have washed my hands of her; she can go her way and I’ll go mine.  I’ve taken an oath I’ll have nothing to do with her and her children—­no, not if I live a thousand years.  It’s all through Milly’s ignorance she has had such heavy losses.”

“What!  Mr. Phillips’s business been doing badly?  I’m so sorry.”

“No, no! my family never does bad business.  It’s my Milly’s children.  She lost two.  As for my Leah, God bless her, she’s been more unfortunate still; I always said that old beggar-woman had the Evil Eye!  I sent her to Liverpool with her Sam.”

“I know,” murmured Esther.

“But she is a good daughter.  I wish I had a thousand such.  She writes to me every week and my little Ezekiel writes back; English they learn them in that heathen school,” Malka interrupted herself sarcastically, “and it was I who had to learn him to begin a letter properly with ’I write you these few lines hoping to find you in good health as, thank God, it leaves me at present;’ he used to begin anyhow—­”

She came to a stop, having tangled the thread of her discourse and bethought herself of offering Esther a peppermint.  But Esther refused and bethought herself of inquiring after Mr. Birnbaum.

“My Michael is quite well, thank God,” said Malka, “though he is still pig-headed in business matters!  He buys so badly, you know; gives a hundred pounds for what’s not worth twenty.”

“But you said business was all right?”

“Ah, that’s different.  Of course he sells at a good profit,—­thank God.  If I wanted to provoke Providence I could keep my carriage like any of your grand West-End ladies.  But that doesn’t make him a good buyer.  And the worst of it is he always thinks he has got a bargain.  He won’t listen to reason, at all,” said Malka, shaking her head dolefully.  “He might be a child of mine, instead of my husband.  If God didn’t send him such luck and blessing, we might come to want bread, coal, and meat tickets ourselves, instead of giving them away.  Do you know I found out that Mrs. Isaacs, across the square, only speculates her guinea in the drawings to give away the tickets she wins to her poor relations, so that she gets all the credit of charity and her name in the papers, while saving the money she’d have to give to her poor relations all the same!  Nobody can say I give my tickets to my poor relations.  You should just see how much my Michael vows away at Shool—­he’s been Parnass for the last twelve years straight off; all the members respect him so much; it isn’t often you see a business man with such fear of Heaven.  Wait! my Ezekiel will be Barmitzvah in a few years; then you shall see what I will do for that Shool.  You shall see what an example of Yiddshkeit I will give to a link generation.  Mrs.