“Oh, I’ve got lots of time,” Walsh explained.  “I was just reminding you, that’s all.  Wasserbauer’s got a few good specialties on his bill-of-fare that don’t improve with waiting.”

“All right,” Mr. Small said.  “If that’s the case go ahead and have your lunch.  I won’t detain you none.”

He put his hand on Abe’s shoulder, and the little procession passed into the store with Abe and Mr. Small in the van, while Frank Walsh constituted a solitary rear-guard.  He sat disconsolately on a pile of piece goods as the four others went into the show-room.

“Sit down, Mr. Small,” Abe said genially.  “Mr. Berkowitz, take that easy chair.”

Then Morris produced the “gilt-edged” cigars from the safe, and they all lit up.

“First thing, Mr. Small,” Abe went on, “I should like to know where I seen you before.  Of course, I know you’re running a big business in Walla Walla, Washington, and certainly, too, I know your face.”

“Sure you know my face, Abe,” Mr. Small replied.  “But my name ain’t familiar.  The last time you seen my face, Abe, was some twenty years since.”

“Twenty years is a long time,” Abe commented.  “I seen lots of trade in twenty years.”

“Trade you seen it, yes,” Mr. Small said, “but I wasn’t trade.”

He paused and looked straight at Abe.  “Think, Abe,” he said.  “When did you seen me last?”

Abe gazed at him earnestly and then shook his head.  “I give it up,” he said.

“Well, Abe,” Mr. Small murmured, “the last time you seen me I went out to buy ten dollars’ worth of schnapps.”

“What!” Abe cried.

“But that afternoon there was a sure-thing mare going to start over to Guttenberg just as I happened to be passing Butch Thompson’s old place, and I no more than got the ten dollars down than she blew up in the stretch.  So I boarded a freight over to West Thirtieth Street and fetched up in Walla Walla, Washington.”

“Look a-here!” Abe gasped.  “You ain’t Scheuer Smolinski, are you?”

Mr. Small nodded.

“That’s me,” he said.  “I’m Scheuer Smolinski or Sidney Small, whichever you like.  When me and Jake Berkowitz started this here Small Drygoods Company we decided that Smolinski and Berkowitz was too big a mouthful for the Pacific Slope, so we slipped the ‘inski’ and the ‘owitz.’  Scheuer Small and Jacob Burke didn’t sound so well, neither.  Ain’t it?  So, since there ain’t no harm in it, we just changed our front names, too, and me and him is Sidney Small and James Burke.”

Abe sat back in his chair too stunned for words, while Morris pondered bitterly on the events of Saturday night.  Then the prize was well within his grasp, for even at that late hour he could have persuaded Mr. Burke to reconsider his decision and to bring Mr. Small over to see Potash & Perlmutter’s line first.  But now it was too late, Morris reflected, for Mr. Small had visited Klinger & Klein’s establishment and had no doubt given the order.