“Call Shaindele to come home. She’s with her friend, right around the corner. In the meantime, we can ask a neighbor to watch her,” she said hurriedly, taking the baby from his arms and handing him the phone. “He’s burning up!”

“Hello, is this the Glickstein home? My daughter is studying with Shulamis, Shaindele Lehman. What? She’s not? Can I talk to Shulamis, please? Hello, this is Shaindele’s father, I need to … What do you mean? You have no idea? But I thought … she said … All right, all right. Thank you.”

His face was ashen. “Shulamis says they had a falling-out and haven’t been seeing each other for weeks. She has no idea where Shaindele is.”

“Oh, Yaakov…”

His jaw flexed. “I can’t deal with this now! I’ll ask the neighbor to come and then call Fruma Esther.”

The baby was crying now and exhausted, but fully awake and breathing normally. Whatever it was, it seemed to have passed.

Mrs. Weitz came bustling in. “What’s wrong with the baby?”

They told her. “My Heshie used to get this all the time. It’s from the fever. You need to bring it down. Put him in a cold bath. Put in ice.”

“Until we get him to the hospital, it could happen again,” Yaakov said, considering.

“I’ll call the doctor’s emergency number and see what he says.” Leah dialed.

“Let me help you,” Mrs. Weitz offered kindly, going into the bathroom and filling up the bathtub with tepid water.

“The doctor says to put him on his side and let him rest. Then to try to bring his temperature down immediately. Even if it goes down, he says we should still bring him to the emergency room and have a doctor look at him. But if he has another convulsion and it lasts more than three minutes, we need to call an ambulance.”

“HaShem Yishmor,” Yaakov murmured, white with fear.

They undressed the little boy and put him on his side. Then they lifted him into the tub. At first, he didn’t move, but then he started to splash around sleepily. He even smiled. A stone rolled off their hearts.

“I still think we should take him to see a doctor, Yaakov.”

He nodded, taking out his phone and calling Fruma Esther.

“She’s coming over. She’ll be here in fifteen minutes.”

“Go, go. Poor baby! Not to worry. I’ll watch Chasya.” Mrs. Weitz shooed them out the door.

“Thank you so much, Mrs. Weitz,” Leah said, close to tears at this kindness.

You can never know the whole of a person’s heart, she thought, ashamed now that she had never liked this big, bustling woman with her ugly, short, dark wig covered with an equally ugly hat, whose loud voice echoed through the hallways all day long as she tried to rein in a house full of unruly children.