In his
shirt-sleeves, his arms bare to the elbow, he handles the heavy swivel
knife, pressing the package of carefully arranged leaves forward and under
the blade by almost imperceptible degrees. It is one of the most delicate
operations in the art, and the man has an especial gift for the work. So
sensitive is his strong right hand that as the knife cuts through the
thick pile he can detect the presence of a scrap of thin paper amongst the
tobacco, and not a bit of hardened stem or a twisted leaf escapes him. It
is very hard work, even for a strong man, and the moisture stands in great
drops on his dark forehead as he carefully presses the sharp instrument
through the resisting substance, quickly lifts it up again and pushes on
the package for the next cut.
At a small black table near by sits a Polish girl, poorly dressed, her
heavy red-brown hair braided in one long neat tress, her face deadly
white, her blue eyes lustreless and sunken, her thin fingers actively
rolling bits of paper round a glass tube, drawing them off as the edges
are gummed together, and laying them in a prettily arranged pile before
her. She is Vjera, the shell-maker, invariably spoken of as "poor Vjera."
Vjera, being interpreted from the Russian, means "Faith." There is an odd
and pathetic irony in the name borne by the sickly girl. Faith--faith in
what? In shell-making? In Christian Fischelowitz? In Johann Schmidt, the
Cossack tobacco-cutter, whose real name is lost in the gloom of many dim
wanderings? In life? In death? Who knows? In God, at least, poor
child--and in her wretched existence there is little else left for her to
believe in.
Pages:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25