A Pee and a Poop at Midnight - Barry Rachin (paper ebook reader TXT) 📗

onto the highway. “We’re studying George Elliot... Silas Marner in September.” Calvin taught freshman and sophomore English at the local high school.

“That’s nice,” Tracey replied distractedly. She was still trying to brace herself for the inevitable.

"When Charles Dickens died, the London newspapers proclaimed, 'Britain's greatest storyteller is passed away. Long live George Elliot!'"

"The heir apparent?"

"Toward the end of her life,” Calvin continued, “she wrote a thousand-page manuscript, Daniel Deronda. It was really two books in one - the first half being a traditional English romance, the second a treatise on Cabala, Jewish mysticism."

"Which doesn't make much sense."

"No it doesn't, given the fact that Victorian England was rabidly anti-Semitic, and later, bootlegged printings of the manuscript sometimes edited out the entire Jewish section altogether."

"There must be a reason you're telling me this," Tracey pressed.

"In one of the subplots, Lord Arrowpoint, the wealthiest landowner in the region, hires a penniless Jew, Herr Klesmer, to teach his daughter, Catherine, piano, and the unlikely twosome promptly fall in love. Then, when Lord Arrowpoint threatens to dispossess his only child and leave her destitute if she doesn't renounce the piano teacher, Catherine promptly runs off and marries him."

"And how does that work out?"

"Rather well. The star-crossed lovers live modestly in a tiny cottage and are sublimely happy together with their many children. Eventually, the estranged in-laws came around."

"Curious about the grandchildren," Tracey ventured. "Please, I beg you; don't tell the story of Herr Klesmer and Catherine Arrowpoint at the barbecue!"

"No, I won't."

Tracey blew out her cheeks. "This is just the sort of thing - "

"The British Jews,” Calvin cut her off in mid-sentence, “didn't like the first half of Daniel Deronda any better than their Christian counterparts the latter."

"And so?" They were five minutes away from the Winthrops' cabin.

"Zionists published their own, bastardized version of the book conveniently eliminating the first five hundred pages. It proved a huge hit, not just in England but throughout the Western European Jewish community."

Up ahead a carrion crow was feasting on the entrails of a road-kill possum, whose guts were smeared all over the side of the highway. "Needless to say, you won’t be mentioning that either at the barbecue."

"No, of course not!" In the rear, Teddy had dozed off and was alternately whimpering and snuffling in his sleep.

After a moment, Tracey held her left hand up to the light. "I've decided to wear your ring this afternoon and all the rest of the days of my life, Herr Klesmer."

Calvin studied the engagement ring. It wasn't much of a stone. The ring itself was pitifully non-descript, but it was all he could realistically afford on an untenured teacher’s salary. Mr. Winthrop was sure to let slip a vinegary, snide remark. His wife would positively retch. "Yes, sweet Catherine. I would be honored."

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Publication Date: 08-25-2011

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