One room was luxury to them. At home in Austria they had had a corner of a room, and the three other corners were occupied by the carpenter, the stableman, and the potter. In the centre of the room stood the common water-bucket and the common refuse-tub. London had showered money on them and provided them with a whole room. They felt hopeful.
Mr. Kühler made thirteen shillings a week polishing walking-sticks, and when that trade was bad he could sometimes get work as a furrier. He had intended to take his family over to America, but finding work in London, he thought it better to stay there. Besides, he had a grudge against America, for while there he had invented a device for twisting tails of fur, but his invention had been stolen from him and he had missed his chance of making a fortune. America was evil and living was very dear. London was the more comfortable place for the struggle. And in London he had found Abramovich, the friend of his boyhood, the one creature in the world upon whom he relied. He had no reason for his faith. Abramovich had never done him any good, but he was not of those who pass. He might disappear for years, but he always came back again, and time made no difference. He was always the same. If help was needed he gave it, and if he needed help he asked for it. Abramovich was a very strong reason for staying in London. . . . The boys would soon be working and the eldest girl was a beauty. The match-makers would be busy with her. Another two years, and the match-makers would find her a rich man who would help them all and put money into a business. That was Jacob's desire, to have a business of his own, for he loathed working for another man. He could not do it for long. Always he ended with a quarrel, perhaps with blows, or he simply walked out and would not return.
He was a devout Jew and despised Christians, as he despised luxury, pleasure, comfort, not actively nor with any hatred. He simply did not need them. He had lived without them, and he asked nothing of life. He was alive; that was enough. Passions seized him and he followed them. Without passion he never moved, never stirred a finger except to keep himself alive. Passion had chosen his wife for him. Golda, the beautiful, was his wife. In her he was bound more firmly to his race and his faith, and there was no need to look beyond. He was rooted. She had borne him children, but he had no more ambition for them than for himself. Leah, the beauty, should wed a rich man, not for ambitious reasons, but because, in life, beauty and riches were proper mates. There is a certain orderliness about life, and certain things can only be prevented by an irruption of passion. If that happens, then life takes its revenge and becomes hard and bleak, but it is still life, and only a fool will complain. Jacob never complained, and he took his Golda's reproaches in silence, unless she became unjust, and then he silenced her brutally and callously. She bore with him, because she prized his honesty, his steadfast simplicity, and because she knew that his passion had never wakened a profound answer in herself. She had very slowly been roused to love, which had flowered in her with the birth of her youngest child, in whom she had learned a power of acceptance almost equal to her husband's. Like him, she clung to her race and her faith and never looked beyond.