He paused to fix Abe's attention before finishing his explanation.

"And then, Abe," he continued, "we hire my Minnie's brother, Ferdy, what knows the building business from A to Z, to build it the house for us.

All we would got to do is to put up the four thousand apiece, Abe, and when the house is finished Rashkin says we could sell it like a flash."

"I never sold a flash, Mawruss," Abe said; "and, anyhow, Mawruss, while I ain't saying nothing about your Minnie's family, y'understand, if I would got to go into a deal with a horse-thief like Ferdy Rothschild, y'understand, I would take my money first and deposit it for safety with some of them fellers up in Sing Sing. Such a show I should have of getting it back, Mawruss."

"Lookyhere, Abe," Morris said, "before you would make some cracks about my Minnie's family, how about your Rosie's brother, the one what----"

"S'all right, Mawruss," Abe broke in. "I ain't saying my wife's brother is so much, neither. This is the way I feel about a feller's wife's brother: If he got a little money then he treats you like a dawg, Mawruss, and if he's broke, y'understand, then your wife gives him all your cigars and ties, and if you should happen to have the same size neck, Mawruss, then all your life you are buying collars and shirts for two. No, Mawruss, I ain't got no confidence in anybody's wife's brother, especially, Mawruss, if a feller should make it a dirty failure like Ferdy Rothschild did and then takes all the money and blows it in on the horse-races."

"That's from old times already," Morris protested. "To-day he's a decent, hard-working feller, Abe, and for two years he's been working for the Rheingold Building and Construction Company. What he don't know about putting up tenement houses, Abe, ain't worth knowing."

"And what I don't know about putting up tenement houses, Mawruss," Abe said, "would fill one of them Carnegie Libraries, Mawruss; and also, furthermore, Mawruss, I don't want to know nothing about it, neither.

And also, Mawruss, if you should stand there and talk to me all day it wouldn't make no difference. If you want to build tenement houses, Mawruss, you got my permission; but you could leave me out. I got my own troubles with cloaks."

Morris rose.

"All right, Abe," he said. "I give you your chance, Abe, and you wouldn't take it."

"What d'ye mean, Mawruss?" Abe asked.

"I mean, Abe, that I will go into this alone by myself, and only one thing I beg of you, Abe: don't come to me in six months' time and claim that I wouldn't let you in on a good thing. I have done my best."

The air of simple dignity with which Morris delivered his ultimatum was marred to some extent by a raucous laugh from Abe.

"Don't do me no favors, Mawruss," he jeered. "All I got to say is that if I was you, Mawruss, I would get this here archy-teck and B. Rashkin, and also your brother-in-law, Ferdy, together, and I would make 'em an offer of settlement for, say, three thousand dollars, Mawruss. Because the way I figure it out, this thing would stand you in as much money as that and a whole lot of worry, too."

"You shouldn't be so generous with your advice, Abe," Morris retorted.

"Oh, I don't charge you nothing for it, Mawruss," Abe said, as he turned to the "Arrival of Buyers" column, and, for lack of appropriate rejoinder, Morris snorted indignantly and banged the show-room door behind him.

For the remainder of the afternoon Abe's face wore a malicious grin. It was there when Morris left to keep his appointment at Henry D. Feldman's office, and when he returned four hours later the malice, if anything, had intensified.

"Well, Mawruss," Abe cried, "I suppose you fixed it all up?"

"It don't go so quick, Abe," Morris replied. His manner was as cheerful as only that of a man who has struggled hard to repress a fit of violent profanity can be--for the meeting at Henry D. Feldman's office had been fraught with many nerve-racking incidents. _Imprimis_, there had been Feldman's retainer, a generous one, and then had come the discussion of the building-loan agreement with Milton M. Sugarman, attorney for the I. O. M. A.

Feldman a.s.sured Morris that it was customary for the borrower to pay the fees of the attorney for the lender, incidental to drawing and recording the necessary papers, and Morris had also learned that the high premiums of insurance for the building to be erected would come out of his pocket. Moreover, he had seen B. Rashkin credited with commissions for bringing about Morris' purchase of the lot, and for the first time he had ascertained that he also owed B. Rashkin two hundred and fifty dollars commission for procuring a building loan from the I. O. M. A.

So far he reckoned that his investment exceeded B. Rashkin's by a thousand dollars, and when he considered that B. Rashkin would be his own superintendent of construction, while he, Morris, would be obliged to hire Ferdy Rothschild, at a compensation of seven hundred and fifty dollars, to perform that same office for him, Abe's advice appeared too sound to be pleasant.

"No, Abe," he said, "it don't go so quick. I got another appointment for next week."

Abe grunted.

"All I got to say, Mawruss," he commented, "you shouldn't forget you are a partner in a cloak and suit business."

"Don't worry," Morris replied; "you wouldn't let me forget that, Abe."

He strode off toward the cutting-room and once more Abe resumed his fixed grin.

It must be confessed that through the entire six months of his building operations Morris maintained a stoic calm that effectually hid the storm raging within his breast. All the annoyances incidental to building a house were heaped on Morris, and both he and Rashkin, equally, suffered petty blackmail at the hands of the attorney and the architect for the building-loan mortgagee.

In the meantime Abe's grin gained in breadth and malice, and on more than one occasion Morris had foregone the pleasure of a.s.saulting his partner only by the exercise of remarkable self-control.

"Do me the favor, Abe," he said at length, "and let me in on this joke."

"It ain't no joke, Mawruss," Abe replied. "I thought you found that out already."

"If you mean the house, Abe," Morris answered, "all I got to say is that, if there should be any joke about it, Abe, the joke is on you, for that house is pretty near finished."

"I'm glad to hear it, Mawruss," Abe said. "I suppose Ferdy Rothschild did it a good job on the house."

"Sure, he did," Morris said.

"He didn't get no rake-offs from material men or nothing, Mawruss.

What?" Abe asked.

"Rake-offs!" Morris cried. "What d'ye mean by that?"

"I mean I seen it Gussarow, the gla.s.s man, on the subway last night, Mawruss," Abe explained, "and he says that for every pane of gla.s.s what went into your house, Mawruss, Ferdy Rothschild gets his rake-off."

"Well, what do I care?" Morris retorted. "If Gussarow could stand it, Abe, I can."

"Gussarow can stand it all right, Mawruss," Abe said rea.s.suringly. "All he's got to do is to put it on the bill."

"Well, if he put it on my bill, Abe," Morris replied, "he also put it on Rashkin's bill, because him and me bought the same building material all the way through, and I wouldn't pay no bills till I saw that Rashkin don't get charged less as I do."

This was conclusive, and Abe's grin relaxed for several inches, nor did it resume its normal width until some days later when Morris began to negotiate for his permanent mortgage loan. Once Morris remonstrated with him for his levity.

"Must you go around looking like a crazy idiot, Abe?"

"I must got to laugh, Mawruss," Abe protested, "when I seen it Sam Feder, of the Koscius...o...b..nk, this morning, and he tells it me you got a permanent mortgage from the I. O. M. A. He says Milton M. Sugarman told him you got it ahead of Rashkin, because you got influence as a lodge brother of Sugarman."

"Sure, I did," Morris admitted.

"And then, Mawruss," Abe went on, "Rashkin hears that the I. O. M. A. is going to make you a permanent loan, so he goes to see Sugarman too."

"That's right," Morris agreed.

"And he says to Sugarman that so long as Sugarman is got to search the t.i.tle to your house he wouldn't have to search the t.i.tle to Rashkin's house, because both houses stands on the same piece of property. So he makes a proposition that if Sugarman would charge him only a hundred dollars he would put in an application by the I. O. M. A. for a permanent loan. Otherwise he would get it from a life-insurance company."

Morris nodded ironically.

"And Sugarman says he would do it, I suppose," he broke in. "No, Abe, Sugarman ain't built that way. It costs me five hundred dollars for that loan, Abe."

"I know it did, Mawruss," Abe said, "and Feder says that Sugarman told him he charges you five hundred dollars, and so he don't want to be a hog, Mawruss, and, therefore, he closes with Rashkin for a hundred and fifty."

Morris' jaw dropped and he stared at Abe.