The End of Everything (New Yiddish Library Series) by David Bergelson

the sky’s rim was a wash of intense red up into which the refinery’s giant chimney poked like a festive exclamation point. Extraordinarily slowly, the weary horses dragged their way up this residentially developed hill, their heads continually bowed to the ground. And the surrounding houses with their alien appearance awakened a very particular kind of disquiet, the mournful Friday evening disquiet of an observant Jew who’d been delayed in returning home in time to welcome the Sabbath, who in the sanctified twilight was still lugging himself and his wagon through the deep mud on the country roads, hauling himself onward slowly and calling to mind:
    There in the brightly lit synagogue in his shtetl, observant Jews were already swaying in prayer, swaying together in unison as they full-throatedly followed the cantor’s lead:
    —Give thanks unto the Lord for He is good, for His mercy endureth forever …
    With brightly illuminated, new-fangled windows, Nokhem Tarabay’s big house occupied the full breadth of the farthest alley in the village, wordlessly communicating its master’s patently obvious rhetorical question:
    —I don’t understand: if God is good and one earns well and enjoys good health, why shouldn’t one live in worldly comfort and ease? Why should one live worse than the Gentile landowners?
    The semicircular courtyard in which her weary conveyance stopped, the open verandah, the high, white-painted front door with its nickel name-plate, all were spotless and neat.
    When she finally rang the bell at this front door, the short, perpetually cheerful Nokhem Tarabay, bareheaded and wearing a little black frock coat, immediately ran out to receive her, bowing with his little feet pressed elegantly together.
    — Jaśniewielmożna Panna Hurvits has delayed her arrival by fully two hours.
    Continually tugging his shirt cuffs from under his coat sleeves, he went on chattering to her in the brightly lit entrance hall while a smartly dressed maid helped her off with her outdoor things:
    —The invitation explicitly stated that all guests were to arrive at four o’clock, and now she’d see for herself: his pocket watch was always accurate, and at present it showed exactly six, which even for Mirel wasn’t very polite. But she might be certain: he’d always been a good friend to her and to Reb Gedalye, and he wouldn’t be so much as a single minute late for her wedding.
    In the entrance hall, which overflowed with coats of all kinds, she adjusted her hair in front of the huge mirror, glanced at her face and her décolletage, and forced herself to smile at Tarabay who was standing behind her:
    —He might certainly believe her: it wasn’t her fault …
    But even in the first brightly lit room into which, having taken her arm, Tarabay led her, she was suddenly aware of the alluring power of her graceful figure in its close-fitting cream wool gown. Her gratified heart abruptly swelled with intoxicating pride.
    —She’d actually done well to arrive only now … uncommonly well …
    She seated herself in one of the low chairs of a suite in a corner of the room opposite Tarabay’s shrewd, truculent wife, felt many of the guests’ glances turn to her, and smilingly answered all their questions:
    —Yes … Her mother was a stay-at-home; she’d always been a stay-at-home.
    From time to time she stole a glance into the crowded depths of the room and saw:
    Heads bent together, glanced sideways at her, and whispered to each other as they did so:
    —Who? … Mirel Hurvits? … From which shtetl?
    Among two such bent heads, seated on a sofa next to the locked French doors, were her former fiancé’s two sisters, whose noses were already pinched in superior disapproval, as though someone were preparing at any moment to approach and remind them:
    —Only ten years before, their father had been a pauper.
    Despite being completely drunk, one of the guests, a heavy-set Pole with a boorish, unshaven face, remembered