“So you was only kidding me along when you told me to see them real-estaters, hey?” Louis demanded.

“Sure,” Abe and Morris replied.

“Then you was the ones what got kidded,” Louis said, “for the last time
I was in town I took your advice.  Do you know a feller called
Michaelson?  And two other fellers by the name of Henochstein and
Magnus?”

Abe nodded.

“Well, them three fellers took that house off of my hands and paid me six hundred dollars to boot, over and above the seven hundred and fifty I sunk in it.”

Abe and Morris puffed vigorously at their cigars.

“And what’s more,” Louis went on, “they introduced me to Harris Rabin, of the Equinox Clothing Company.  I guess you know him, too, don’t you?”

Morris admitted sullenly that he did.

“He’s got a daughter, Miss Miriam Rabin,” Louis concluded.  “Her and me is going to announce our engagement in next Sunday’s Herald.”

He paused and watched Morris and Abe, to see the news sink in.

“And as soon as we’re married,” he said, “back to the road for mine, but not with Potash & Perlmutter.”

“I guess you’re mistaken, Louis,” Abe cried.  “I guess you got a contract with us what will stop you going on the road for another year yet.”

“Back up, Abe,” Louis said.  “That there contract says I can’t work as a salesman for any other house for a year.  But Rabin and me is going as partners together in the cloak and suit business, and if there’s anything in that contract about me not selling cloaks as my own boss I’ll eat it.”

Abe went to the safe for the contract.  At last he found it, and after reading it over he handed it to Morris.

“You eat it, Mawruss,” he said.  “Louis is right.”

CHAPTER VI

“After all, Mawruss,” Abe declared as he glanced over the columns of the Daily Cloak and Suit Record, “after all a feller feels more satisfied when he could see the customers himself and find out just exactly how they do business, y’understand.  Maybe the way we lost Louis Mintz wasn’t such a bad thing anyhow, Mawruss.  I bet yer if Louis would of been selling goods for us, Mawruss, we would of been in that Cohen & Schondorf business too.  Me, I am different, Mawruss.  So soon as I went in that store, Mawruss, I could see that them fellers was in bad.  I’m very funny that way, Mawruss.”

“You shouldn’t throw no bouquets at yourself because you got a little luck, Abe,” Morris commented.

“Some people calls it luck, Mawruss, but I call it judgment, y’understand.”

“Sure, I know,” Morris continued, “but how about Hymie Kotzen, Abe?  Always you said it that feller got lots of judgment, Abe.”

“A feller could got so much judgment as Andrew Carnegie,” Abe retorted, “and oncet in a while he could play in hard luck too.  Yes, Mawruss, Hymie Kotzen is certainly playing in hard luck.”