He darted out of the show-room and ran to the telephone. In ten minutes he returned, his face bathed in perspiration.

"Anna," he croaked, "you come to work by me. Yes? How much you get by that--that M. Garfunkel?"

"Twenty dollars a month," Anna replied.

"All right, we'll pay you twenty-two," he said. "You're cheap at the price. So I expect you this evening."

He turned to his partner after the girls had gone.

"Mawruss," he said, "put them goods for M. Garfunkel back in stock. I rung up Klinger & Klein and they sold him four thousand. I also rung up the Perfection Cloak and Suit Company--also four thousand; Margolius & Fried--two thousand; Levy, Martin & Co.--three thousand, and so on. The way I figure it, he must of bought a hundred thousand dollars' worth of goods, all in the last few days, and all at ninety days net. He couldn't get a quarter of the goods in that First Avenue building of his, Mawruss, so where is the rest? Auction houses, Mawruss, north, south, east and west, and I bet yer he got the advance checks for each consignment deposited in Montreal right now. I bet yer he didn't even unpack the cases before he reshipped. Tell Miss Cohen to come in and bring her book."

When Miss Cohen took her seat Abe rose and cleared his throat for an epistle worthy of the occasion.

"The Paris. M. Garfunkel, Proprietor," he said. "Gents: Owing to circ.u.mstances which has arose----No. Wait a bit."

He cleared his throat more vigorously.

"The Paris. M. Garfunkel, Proprietor," he said. "Gents: Owing to the fact that the _U_-nited States bankruptcy laws don't go nowheres except in the _U_-nited States, we are obliged to cancel the order what you give us. Thanking you for past favors and hoping to do a strictly-cash business with you in the future, we are truly yours, Potash & Perlmutter."

Miss Cohen shut her book and arose.

"Wait a bit, Miss Cohen. I ain't through yet," Abe said. He tilted backward and forward on his toes for a moment.

"P. S.," he concluded. "We hope you'll like it in Canada."

CHAPTER V

"Things goes pretty smooth for us lately, Mawruss," Abe Potash remarked, shortly after M. Garfunkel's failure. "I guess we are due for a _schlag_ somewheres, ain't it?"

"Always you got to kick," Morris cried. "If you would only listen to what _I_ got to say oncet in a while, Abe, things would always go smooth."

Abe emitted a raucous laugh.

"Sure, I know," he said, "like this here tenement house proposition you was talking to me about, Mawruss. You ain't content we should have our troubles in the cloak and suit business, Mawruss, you got to go outside yet and find 'em. You got to go into the real estate business too."

"Real-estaters ain't got no such trouble like _we_ got it, Abe," Morris retorted. "There ain't no seasons in real estate, Abe. A tenement house this year is like a tenement house last year, Abe, also the year before.

They ain't wearing stripes in tenement houses one year, Abe, and solid colors the next. All you do when you got a tenement house, Abe, is to go round and collect the rents, and when you got a customer for it you don't have to draw no report on him. Spot cash, he pays it, Abe, or else you get a mortgage as security."

"You talk like Scheuer Blumenkrohn, Mawruss, when he comes round here last year and wants to swap it two lots in Ozone Grove, Long Island, for a couple of hundred misses' reefers," Abe replied. "When I speculate, Mawruss, I take a hand at auction pinochle."

"This ain't no speculation, Abe," said Morris. "This is an investment. I seen the house, Abe, six stories and bas.e.m.e.nt stores, and you couldn't get another tenant into it with a shoehorn. It brings in a fine income, Abe."

"Well, if that's the case, Mawruss," Abe rejoined, "why does Harris Rabin want to sell it? Houses ain't like cloaks and suits, Mawruss, you admit it yourself. We sell goods because we don't get no income by keepin' 'em. If we have our store full with cloaks, Mawruss, and they brought in a good income while they was in here, Mawruss, I wouldn't want to sell 'em, Mawruss; I'd want to keep 'em."

"Sure," Morris replied. "But if the income was only four hundred and fifty dollars a month, and next month you got a daughter what was getting married to Alec Goldwa.s.ser, drummer for Klinger & Klein, and you got to give Alec a couple of thousand dollars with her, but you don't have no ready cash, _then_, Abe, you'd sell them cloaks, and so that's why Harris Rabin wants to sell the house."

"I want to tell you something, Mawruss," Abe replied. "Harris Rabin could sell a phonograft to a deef-and-dummy. He could sell moving pictures to a home for the blind, Mawruss. He could also sell anything he wanted to anybody, Mawruss, for you know as well as I do, Mawruss, Harris Rabin is a first-cla.s.s, A-number-one salesman. And so, if he wants to sell his house so cheap there's lots of real-estaters what know a bargain in houses when they see it. We don't, Mawruss. We ain't real-estaters. We're in the cloak and suit business, and why should Harris Rabin be looking for us to buy his house?"

"He ain't looking for us, Abe," Morris went on. "That's just the point.

I was by Harris Rabin's house last night, and I seen no less than three real-estaters there. They all want that house, Abe, and if they want it, why shouldn't we? Ike Magnus makes Harris an offer of forty-eight thousand five hundred while I was sitting there already, but Harris wants forty-nine for it. I bet yer, Abe, we could get it for forty-eight seven-fifty--three thousand cash above the mortgages."

"I suppose, Mawruss, you got three thousand lying loose around your pants' pocket. What?"

"Three thousand to a firm like us is nothing, Abe. I bet yer I could go in and see Feder of the Koscius...o...b..nk and get it for the asking. We ain't so poor, Abe, but what we can buy a bargain when we see it."

Abe shrugged his shoulders.

"Well, Mawruss, if I got to hear about Harris Rabin's house for the rest of my life, all right. I'm agreeable, Mawruss; only, don't ask me to go to no lawyers' offices nor nothing, Mawruss. There's enough to do in the store, Mawruss, without both of us loafing around lawyers'

offices."

A more grudging acquiescence than this would have satisfied Morris, and, without pausing for a cigar, he put on his hat and made straight for Harris Rabin's place of business. The Equinox Clothing Company of which Harris Rabin was president, board of directors and sole stockholder, occupied the third loft of a building on Walker Street. There was no elevator, and as Morris walked upstairs he encountered Ike Magnus at the first landing.

"Hallo, Mawruss!" Ike cried. "Are you buying clothing now? I thought you was in the cloak and suit business."

"Whatever business I'm in, Ike," Morris replied, "I'm in my own business, Ike; and what is somebody else's business ain't my business, Ike. That's the way I feel about it."

He plodded slowly up the next flight, and there stood Samuel Michaelson, another real-estate operator.

"Ah, Mr. Perlmutter!" Samuel exclaimed. "You get around to see the clothing trade once in a while, too. Ain't it?"

"I get around to see all sorts of trade, Mr. Michaelson," Morris rejoined. "I got to get around and hustle to make a living, Mr.

Michaelson, because, Mr. Michaelson, I can't make no living by loafing around street corners and buildings, Mr. Michaelson."

"Don't mention it," said Mr. Michaelson as Morris started up the last flight. When he entered the Equinox Clothing Company's office the clang of the bell drowned out the last words of Marks Henochstein's sentence.

Mr. Henochstein, another member of the real-estate fraternity, was in intimate conference with Harris Rabin.

"I think we got him going," he was saying. "My wife seen Mrs. Perlmutter at a _Kaffeeklatsch_ yesterday, and she told her I made you an offer of forty-eight four-fifty for the house. Last night when he came around to your place I told him the house ain't no bargain for any one what ain't a real-estater, y'understand, and he gets quite mad about it. Also, I watched him when Ike Magnus tells you he would give forty-eight five for it, and he turned pale. If he----"

At this juncture the doorbell rang and Morris entered.

"No, sir_ee_, sir," Harris Rabin bawled. "Forty-nine thousand is my figure, and that ain't forty-eight nine ninety-nine neither."

Here he recognized Morris Perlmutter with an elaborate start and extended his hand in greeting.

"Hallo, Mawruss," he said. "Them real-estaters pester the life out of a feller. 'Tain't no use your hanging around here, Henochstein," he called in sterner tones. "When I make up my mind I make up my mind, and that's all there is to it."

Henochstein turned in crestfallen silence and pa.s.sed slowly out of the room.

"Them sharks ain't satisfied that you're giving away a house, Mawruss,"

Harris went on. "They want it you should let 'em have coupons and trading stamps with it."

"How much did he offer you?" Morris asked.

"Forty-eight five-fifty," Harris Rabin replied. "That feller's got a nerve like a horse."