Miriam the wife of Ephraim, two little children, an orphan boy of their people, Epraim’s uncle Jackrael Israel, a white-haired old man, his wife Hester, a Jew from Cutch, one Hyem Benjamin, and Ephraim, Priest and Butcher, made up the list of the Jews in Shushan.  They lived in one house, on the outskirts of the great city, amid heaps of saltpetre, rotten bricks, herds of kine, and a fixed pillar of dust caused by the incessant passing of the beasts to the river to drink.  In the evening the children of the City came to the waste place to fly their kites, and Ephraim’s sons held aloof, watching the sport from the roof, but never descending to take part in them.  At the back of the house stood a small brick enclosure, in which Ephraim prepared the daily meat for his people after the custom of the Jews.  Once the rude door of the square was suddenly smashed open by a struggle from inside, and showed the meek bill-collector at his work, nostrils dilated, lips drawn back over his teeth, and his hands upon a half-maddened sheep.  He was attired in strange raiment, having no relation whatever to duster coats or list slippers, and a knife was in his mouth.  As he struggled with the animal between the walls, the breath came from him in thick sobs, and the nature of the man seemed changed.  When the ordained slaughter was ended, he saw that the door was open and shut it hastily, his hand leaving a red mark on the timber, while his children from the neighbouring house-top looked down awe-stricken and open-eyed.  A glimpse of Ephraim busied in one of his religious capacities was no thing to be desired twice.

Summer came upon Shushan, turning the trodden waste-ground to iron, and bringing sickness to the city.

‘It will not touch us,’ said Ephraim confidently.  ’Before the winter we shall have our synagogue.  My brother and his wife and children are coming up from Calcutta, and then I shall be the priest of the synagogue.’

Jackrael Israel, the old man, would crawl out in the stifling evenings to sit on the rubbish-heap and watch the corpses being borne down to the river.

‘It will not come near us,’ said Jackrael Israel feebly, ’for we are the People of God, and my nephew will be priest of our synagogue.  Let them die.’  He crept back to his house again and barred the door to shut himself off from the world of the Gentile.

But Miriam, the wife of Ephraim, looked out of the window at the dead as the biers passed and said that she was afraid.  Ephraim comforted her with hopes of the synagogue to be, and collected bills as was his custom.

In one night, the two children died and were buried early in the morning by Ephraim.  The deaths never appeared in the City returns.  ’The sorrow is my sorrow,’ said Ephraim; and this to him seemed a sufficient reason for setting at naught the sanitary regulations of a large, flourishing, and remarkably well-governed Empire.