"Of course I did," he confessed. "I didn't know either you or Schnitt until yesterday."

Ersten knit his bristling brows, but presently grinned.

"You're a smart young man," he complimented. "But I don't promise Schnitt I move."

"Certainly not," agreed the smart young man, and mopped his brow. The fight was won! "Here is exactly what you must say"--and he went patiently over the entire dialogue again, word by word.

Ersten listened carefully with frowns at some parts.

"Well, I try it," he dubiously promised.

They were in front of Schoppenvoll's now; and Johnny, noting Ersten's fretfulness, proved himself a keen student of psychology by suggesting: "I'm thirsty for that special drink of yours, Ersten; but suppose we put it off till after I've brought Schnitt."

"Oh, well, if you say so," returned Ersten with poorly a.s.sumed indifference.

"It's as fine as a frog's feather!" Johnny a.s.sured Heinrich Schnitt half an hour later.

"Will he move?" asked Heinrich.

"Yes, but you mustn't say anything about it"

"Well, I like to know it," returned Heinrich with proper caution.

"I have his promise," a.s.serted Johnny.

"Then he moves," declared Heinrich, fully satisfied.

The mediator conveyed Heinrich to Ersten's with much the same feeling that he would have endured in carrying a full plate of soup--and he had that feeling all through the conference.

"h.e.l.lo, Heinrich!" greeted Ersten with indifference.

"h.e.l.lo, Louis!" returned Schnitt with equal nonchalance; then he a.s.sumed a rigid pose and recited: "I have come back to work."

"In this place?" asked Ersten, with parrotlike perfection.

A lump came into Heinrich Schnitt's throat. He struggled with that lump, but the simple word "Yes" would not come.

"I say yes; but I don't--"

Johnny jerked him violently by the sleeve.

"He said 'Yes'," he informed Ersten.

"Well, maybe," Ersten was decent enough to admit.

There was an uncomfortable pause in which the two men evinced a slight disposition to glare at each other.

"Mr. Schnitt's eyes are bad," suggested Johnny hopefully.

"My eyes are like a young man's!" a.s.serted Schnitt, his pride coming uppermost.

"He needs a month to rest them," insisted the buffer, becoming a trifle panic-stricken; and he tapped the sole of Ersten's shoe with his foot.

"Must it take a month, Heinrich?" implored Ersten, taking the cue.

"Well, how soon you move?" inquired Schnitt.

"I don't promise I move!" flared Ersten.

"I never come back--"

"Till his eyes are better," hastily interrupted Johnny. "Look here, you fellows! You're balling up this rehearsal! Now let's get together.

Schnitt, you'll come back to work in this place, won't you?"

"Well, I say it anyhow," admitted Schnitt reluctantly.

"Ersten, you offer him a month to rest his eyes, don't you?"

"I don't promise him I move!" bristled Ersten.

"We understand that," soothed Johnny, "all of us. Schnitt, you'll take some of Mr. Ersten's work home with you from this place, won't you?"

"Sure, I do that," consented Schnitt eagerly. "Louis, what is in the shop?"

Ersten had a struggle of his own.

"All what was in when you left," he bravely confessed. "That coat for Mrs. Follison gives me trouble for a week!"

"She's got funny shoulders," commented Schnitt with professional impersonality. "It's the left one. You cut it--Let me see it."

There was a sibilant sound as of many suppressed sighs of relief when Heinrich walked into the cutting room, but no man grinned or gave more than a curt nod of greeting--for the forbidding eye of Louis Ersten glared fiercely upon them. He strode across to the table held sacred to himself and spread down a piece of cloth, bounded by many curves.

Heinrich Schnitt gave it but one comprehensive glance.

"Na, na, na!" he shrilly commented. "Here it is wrong!" And, grabbing up a slice of chalk, he made a deft swoop toward the material. Suddenly his arm stayed in mid air and he laid down the chalk with a muscular effort. "I think I take this home," he firmly announced.

"Heinrich, you come back after the work. Just now we go with Mr. Gamble to Schoppenvoll's and have a gla.s.s of Rheinthranen!" Ersten said.

"The Rheinthranen!" repeated Heinrich in awe; and for the first time his eyes moistened. "Louis, we was always friends!" And they shook hands.

Johnny Gamble, keen as he was, did not quite understand it; but, nevertheless, he had penetration enough to stroll nonchalantly out into the show-room, where Louis and Heinrich presently joined him, chattering like a Kaffe-klatsch; and they all walked round to Schoppenvoll's.

While Schnitt thanked Johnny for his interference until that modest young man blushed, Ersten argued seriously in whispers with Shoppenvoll to secure a bottle of the precious wine that only he and Schoppenvoll and Kurzerhosen had a right to purchase. Johnny drank his with dull wonder. It tasted just like Rhine wine!

While Heinrich Schnitt was back in the cutting room, carefully selecting every coat in the shop to take home with him, Ersten drew Johnny near the door.

"I fool him!" he announced with grinning cuteness. "I move right away.

You get my lease for the best price what that smart-Aleck Lofty offered me. And another word: Whenever you want a favor you come to me!"