so many dead, so and so many wounded! And all the trouble was caused by
the Enemy.


XI.

There were other inimical forces, too, besides the police and the Enemy,
more uncanny and less palpable forces. When I dragged behind the
nursemaid who held my younger brother by the hand, sometimes I heard a
shout behind me, and if I turned round would see a grinning boy, making
faces and shaking his fist at me. For a long time I took no particular
notice, but as time went on I heard the shout oftener and asked the maid
what it meant. "Oh, nothing!" she replied. But on my repeatedly asking
she simply said: "It is a bad word."

But one day, when I had heard the shout again, I made up my mind that I
would know, and when I came home asked my mother: "What does it mean?"
"Jew!" said Mother. "Jews are people." "Nasty people?" "Yes," said
Mother, smiling, "sometimes very ugly people, but not always." "Could I
see a Jew?" "Yes, very easily," said Mother, lifting me up quickly in
front of the large oval mirror above the sofa.

I uttered a shriek, so that Mother hurriedly put me down again, and my
horror was such that she regretted not having prepared me. Later on she
occasionally spoke about it.


XII.

Other inimical forces in the world cropped up by degrees. When you had