The Foreigner | Page 4

the cordwood camps, would disappear,
leaving behind him only his empty space upon the floor and his debt
upon the books, which Rosenblatt kept with scrupulous care.
Occasionally it happened, however, that, as in all bookkeeping, a

mistake would creep in. This was unfortunately the case with young
Jacob Wassyl's account, of whose perfidy Paulina made loud
complaints to his friends, who straightway remonstrated with Jacob
upon his return from the camp. It was then that Jacob's indignant
protestations caused an examination of Rosenblatt's books, whereupon
that gentleman laboured with great diligence to make abundantly clear
to all how the obliteration of a single letter had led to the mistake. It
was a striking testimony to his fine sense of honour that Rosenblatt
insisted that Jacob, Paulina, and indeed the whole company, should
make the fullest investigation of his books and satisfy themselves of his
unimpeachable integrity. In a private interview with Paulina, however,
his rage passed all bounds, and it was only Paulina's tearful entreaties
that induced him to continue to act as her agent, and not even her tears
had moved him had not Paulina solemnly sworn that never again would
she allow her blundering crudity to insert itself into the delicate finesse
of Rosenblatt's financial operations. Thenceforward all went
harmoniously enough, Paulina toiling with unremitting diligence at her
daily tasks, so that she might make the monthly payments upon her
house, and meet the rapacious demands of those terrible English people,
with their taxes and interest and legal exactions, which Rosenblatt, with
meritorious meekness, sought to satisfy. So engrossed, indeed, was that
excellent gentleman in this service that he could hardly find time to
give suitable over-sight to his own building operations, in which, by the
erection of shack after shack, he sought to meet the ever growing
demands of the foreign colony.
Before a year had gone it caused Rosenblatt no small annoyance that
while he was thus struggling to keep pace with the demands upon his
time and energy, Paulina, with lamentable lack of consideration, should
find it necessary to pause in her scrubbing, washing, and baking, long
enough to give birth to a fine healthy boy. Paulina's need brought her
help and a friend in the person of Mrs. Fitzpatrick, who lived a few
doors away in the only house that had been able to resist the Galician
invasion. It had not escaped Mrs. Fitzpatrick's eye nor her kindly heart,
as Paulina moved in and out about her duties, that she would ere long
pass into that mysterious valley of life and death where a woman needs
a woman's help; and so when the hour came, Mrs. Fitzpatrick, with fine
contempt of "haythen" skill and efficiency, came upon the scene and

took command. It took her only a few moments to clear from the house
the men who with stolid indifference to the sacred rights of privacy due
to the event were lounging about. Swinging the broom which she had
brought with her, she almost literally swept them forth, flinging their
belongings out into the snow. Not even Rosenblatt, who lingered about,
did she suffer to remain.
"Y're wife will not be nadin' ye, I'm thinkin', for a while. Ye can just
wait till I can bring ye wurrd av y're babby," she said, pushing him, not
unkindly, from the room.
Rosenblatt, whose knowledge of English was sufficient to enable him
to catch her meaning, began a vigorous protest:
"Eet ees not my woman," he exclaimed.
"Eat, is it!" replied Mrs. Fitzpatrick, taking him up sharply. "Indade ye
can eat where ye can get it. Faith, it's a man ye are, sure enough, that
can niver forget y're stomach! An' y're wife comin' till her sorrow!"
"Eet ees not my--" stormily began Rosenblatt.
"Out wid ye," cried Mrs. Fitzpatrick, impatiently waving her big red
hands before his face. "Howly Mother! It's the wurrld's wonder how a
dacent woman cud put up wid ye!"
And leaving him in sputtering rage, she turned to her duty, aiding, with
gentle touch and tender though meaningless words, her sister woman
through her hour of anguish.
In three days Paulina was again in her place and at her work, and within
a week her household was re-established in its normal condition. The
baby, rolled up in an old quilt and laid upon her bed, received little
attention except when the pangs of hunger wrung lusty protests from
his vigorous lungs, and had it not been for Mrs. Fitzpatrick's frequent
visits, the unwelcome little human atom would have fared badly
enough. For the first two weeks of its life the motherly-hearted Irish
woman gave an hour every day to the bathing and dressing of the babe,
while Irma, the little girl of Paulina's household, watched in wide-eyed
wonder and delight; watched to