"Max Fried, of the A La Mode Store, was in here a few minutes since,
Mawruss," said Abe Potash, to his partner, Morris Perlmutter, after the
latter had returned from lunch one busy August day, "and bought a couple
of hundred of them long Trouvilles. He also wanted something to ask it
of us as a favor, Mawruss."
"Sixty days is long enough, Abe," said Morris, on the principle of "once
bitten, twice shy." "For a man what runs a little store like the A La
Mode on Main Street, Buffalo, Abe, Max don't buy too few goods, neither.
Ain't it?"
"Don't jump always for conclusions, Mawruss," Abe broke in. "This ain't
no credit matter what he asks it of us. His wife got a sister what they
wanted to make from her a teacher, Mawruss, but she ain't got the head.
So, Max thinks we could maybe use her for a model. Her name is Miss
Kreitmann and she's a perfect thirty-six, Max says, only a little fat."
"And then, when she tries on a garment for a customer," Morris
rejoined, "the customer goes around telling everybody that we cut our
stuff too skimpy. Ain't it? No, Abe, we got along so far good with the
models what we got, and I guess we can keep it up. Besides, if Max is so
anxious to get her a job, why don't he take her on himself, Abe?"
"Because she lives here in New York with her mother," Abe explained;
"and what chance has a girl got in Buffalo, anyway? That's what Max
says, and he also told it me that she got a very fine personality, and
if we think it over maybe he gives us an introduction to Philip Hahn, of
the Flower City Credit Outfitting Company. That's a million-dollar
concern, Mawruss. I bet yer they're rated J to K, first credit, and
Philip Hahn's wife is Miss Kreitmann's mother's sister. Leon Sammet will
go crazy if he hears that we sell them people."
"That's all right, Abe," said Morris. "We ain't doing business to spite
our competitors; we're doing it to please our customers so that they'll
buy goods from us and maybe they'll go crazy, too, when they see her
face, Abe."
"Max Fried says she is a good-looker. Nothing extraordinary,
y'understand, but good, snappy stuff and up to date."
"You talk like she was a garment, Abe," said Morris.
"Well, you wouldn't buy no garment, Mawruss, just because some one told
you it was good. Would you? So, Max says he would bring her around this
afternoon, and if we liked her Hahn would stop in and see us later in
the day. He says Hahn picks out never less than a couple of hundred of
one style, and also Hahn is a liberal buyer, Mawruss."
"Of course, Abe," Morris commenced, "if we're doing this to oblige
Philip Hahn----"
"We're doing it to oblige Philip Hahn and Max Fried both, Mawruss," Abe
broke in. "Max says he ain't got a minute's peace since Miss Kreitmann
is old enough to get married."
"So!" Morris cried. "A matrimonial agency we're running, Abe. Is that
the idea?"
"The idea is that she should have the opportunity of meeting by us a
business man, Mawruss, what can give her a good home and a good living,
too. Max says he is pretty near broke, buying transportation from
Buffalo to New York, Mawruss, so as he can bust up love matches between
Miss Kreitmann and some good-looking retail salesman, Mawruss, what can
dance the waltz A Number One and couldn't pay rent for light
housekeeping on Chrystie Street."
"Well, Abe," Morris agreed, with a sigh of resignation, "if we got to
hire her as a condition that Philip Hahn gives us a couple of good
orders a season, Abe, I'm agreeable."
"Naturally," Abe replied, and carefully selecting a slightly-damaged
cigar from the M to P first and second credit customers' box, he fell to
assorting the sample line against Philip Hahn's coming that afternoon.
His task was hardly begun, however, when the store door opened to admit
Max Fried and his sister-in-law. Abe immediately ceased his
sample-assorting and walked forward to greet them.
"Hello, Max," he said.
Max stopped short, and by the simple process of thrusting out his
waist-line assumed a dignity befitting the ceremony of introduction.
"Mr. Potash," he said severely, "this is Miss Gussie Kreitmann, my
wife's sister, what I talked to you about."
Abe grinned shyly.
"All right," he said, and shook hands with Miss Kreitmann, who returned
his grin with a dazzling smile.
"Mr. Fried tells me you like to come to work by us as a model. Ain't
it?" Abe continued in the accents of the sucking dove. "So, I guess
you'd better go over to Miss Cohen, the bookkeeper, and she'll show you
where to put your hat and coat."
"Oh, I ain't in no hurry," Miss Kreitmann replied. "To-morrow morning
will do."
"Sure, sure," Abe murmured. He was somewhat shocked by Miss Kreitmann's
appearance, for while Max Fried's reservation, "only a little fat," had
given him some warning, he was hardly prepared to employ so pronounced
an Amazon as Miss Kreitmann. True, her features, though large, were
quite regular, and she had fine black eyes and the luxurious hair that
goes with them; but as Abe gazed at the convex lines of her generous
figure he could not help wondering what his partner would say when he
saw her.
As a matter of fact, at that precise moment Morris was taking in the
entire situation from behind a convenient rack of raincoats, and was
mentally designing a new line of samples to be called The P & P System.
He figured that he would launch it with a good, live ad in the Daily
Cloak and Suit Record, to be headed: Let 'Em _All_ Come. We Can Fit
_Everybody_. _Large_ Sizes a Specialty.
"Do you think you will like it here?" Abe hazarded.
"Oh, sure," Max replied for his sister-in-law. "This ain't the first
time she works in a cloak and suit house. She helps me out in the store
whenever she comes to Buffalo. In fact, she knows part of your line
already, Abe, and the rest she learns pretty quick."
"You won't find me slow, Mr. Potash," Miss Kreitmann broke in. "Maybe I
ain't such a good model except for large sizes, but I learned to sell
cloaks by my brother-in-law and by my uncle, Philip Hahn, before I could
talk already. What I want to do now is to meet the trade that comes into
the store."
"That's what you're going to do," Abe said. "I will introduce you to
everybody."
The thought that this would be, perhaps, the only way to get rid of her
lent fervor to his words, and Max shook him warmly by the hand.
"I'm much obliged," he said. "Me and Philip Hahn will be in sure in a
couple of hours, and Gussie comes to work to-morrow morning."
Once more Abe proffered his hand to his new model, and a moment later
the door slammed behind them.
"So, that's the party, is it?" said Morris, emerging from his
hiding-place. "What's she looking for a job by us for, Abe? She could
make it twice as much by a circus sideshow or a dime museum."
"Philip Hahn will be here in a couple of hours, Mawruss," Abe replied,
avoiding the thrust. "I guess he's going to buy a big bill of goods,
Mawruss."
"I hope so, Abe, because it needs quite a few big bills to offset the
damage a model like this here Miss Kreitmann can do. In fact, Abe," he
concluded, "I'd be just as well satisfied if Miss Kreitmann could give
us the orders, and we could get Philip Hahn to come to work by us as a
model. I ain't never seen him, Abe, but I think he's got a better shape
for the line."
A singular devotion to duty marked every action of Emanuel Gubin,
shipping clerk in the wholesale cloak and suit establishment of Potash &
Perlmutter. That is to say, it had marked every action until the
commencement of Miss Kreitmann's incumbency. In the very hour that
Emanuel first observed the luster of her fine black eyes his heart gave
one bound and never more regained its normal gait.
As for Miss Kreitmann, she saw only a shipping clerk, collarless,
coatless and with all the grime of his calling upon him. Two weeks
elapsed, however, and one evening, on Lenox Avenue, she encountered
Emanuel, freed from the chrysalis of his employment, a natty,
lavender-trousered butterfly of fashion. Thereafter she called him
Mannie, and during business hours she flashed upon him those same black
eyes with results disastrous to the shipping end of Potash &
Perlmutter's business.
Packages intended for the afternoon delivery of a local express company
arrived in Florida two weeks later, while the irate buyer of a Jersey
City store, who impatiently awaited an emergency shipment of ten heavy
winter garments, received instead half a hundred gossamer wraps designed
for the sub-tropical weather of Palm Beach.
"I don't know what's come over that fellow, Mawruss," Abe said at last.
"Formerly he was a crackerjack--never made no mistakes nor nothing; and
now I dassen't trust him at all, Mawruss. Everything we ship I got to
look after it myself, Mawruss. We might as well have no shipping clerk
at all."
"You're right, Abe," Morris replied. "He gets carelesser every day. And
why, Abe? Because of that Miss Kreitmann. She breaks us all up, Abe. I
bet yer if that feller Gubin has took her to the theayter once, Abe, he
took her fifty times already. He spends every cent he makes on her, and
the first thing you know, Abe, we'll be missing a couple of pieces of
silk from the cutting-room. Ain't it?"
"He ain't no thief, Mawruss," said Abe, "and, besides, you can't blame a
young feller if he gets stuck on a nice girl like Miss Kreitmann,
Mawruss. She's a smart girl, Mawruss. Mendel Immerglick, of Immerglick &
Frank, was in here yesterday, Mawruss, and she showed him the line,
Mawruss, and believe me, Mawruss, Immerglick says to me I couldn't have
done it better myself."
"Huh!" Morris snorted. "A young feller like Immerglick, what buys it of
us a couple of hundred dollars at a time, she falls all over herself to
please him, Abe. And why? Because Immerglick's got a fine _mus_tache and
is a swell dresser and he ain't married. But you take it a good customer
like Adolph Rothstein, Abe, and what does she do? At first she was all
smiles to him, because Adolph is a good-looking feller. But then she
hears him telling me a hard-luck story about his wife's operation and
how his eldest boy Sammie is now seven already and ain't never been sick
in his life, and last month he gets the whooping cough and all six of
Adolph's boys gets it one after the other. Then, Abe, she treats Adolph
like a dawg, Abe, and the first thing you know he looks at his watch and
says he got an appointment and he'll be back. But he don't come back at
all, Abe, and this noontime I seen Leon Sammet and Adolph in
Wasserbauer's Restaurant. They was eating the regular dinner _with
chicken_, Abe, and I seen Leon pay for it."
Abe received his partner's harangue in silence. His eyes gazed vacantly
at the store door, which had just opened to admit the letter-carrier.
"Suppose we do lose a couple of hundred dollars trade," he said at
length; "one customer like Philip Hahn will make it up ten times,
Mawruss."
"Well, you'll lose him, too, Abe, if you don't look out," said Morris,
who had concluded the reading of a typewritten letter with a scrawled
postscript. "Just see what he writes us."
He handed over the missive, which read as follows:
MESSRS. POTASH & PERLMUTTER.
_Gents:_ We are requested by Mrs. Kreitmann of your city to ask
about a young fellow what works for you by the name of Emanuel
Gubin. Has he any future, and what is his prospects? By doing so
you will greatly oblige
Truly yours,
THE FLOWER CITY CREDIT OUTFITTING CO.
Dic. PH/K
P. S. I don't like such monkey business. I thought you knew it. I
don't want no salesman. What is the matter with you anyway?
PHILIP HAHN.
Abe folded up the letter, and his mouth became a straight line of
determination under his stubby mustache.
"I guess I fix that young feller," he cried, seizing a pen. He wrote:
FLOWER CITY CREDIT OUTFITTING COMPANY.
_Gents:_ Your favor of the 14th inst. received and contents noted
and in reply would say the young fellow what you inquire about
ain't got no future with us and the prospects is he gets fired on
Saturday. We trust this is satisfactory.
Truly yours,
POTASH & PERLMUTTER.
On Saturday afternoon Morris Perlmutter was putting on his hat and coat
preparatory to going home. He had just fired Mannie Gubin with a relish
and satisfaction second only to what would have been his sensations if
the operation had been directed toward Miss Kreitmann. As he was about
to leave the show-room Abe entered.
"Oh, Mawruss," Abe cried, "you ought to see Miss Kreitmann. She's all
broke up about Mannie Gubin, and she's crying something terrible."
"Is she?" Morris said, peering over his partner's shoulder at the
grief-stricken model, who was giving vent to her emotions in the far
corner of the salesroom. "Well, Abe, you tell her to come away from them
light goods and cry over the blue satinets. They don't spot so bad."
Miss Gussie Kreitmann evidently knew how to conceal a secret sorrow,
for outwardly she remained unchanged. She continued to scowl at those of
her employers' customers who were men of family, and beamed upon the
unmarried trade with all the partiality she had displayed during Mannie
Gubin's tenure of employment. Indeed, her amiability toward the
bachelors was if anything intensified, especially in the case of Mendel
Immerglick.
Many times he had settled lunch checks in two figures, for Miss
Kreitmann's appetite was in proportion to her size. Moreover, a
prominent Broadway florist was threatening Mendel with suit for flowers
supplied Miss Kreitmann at his request. Nor were there lacking other
signs, such as the brilliancy of Mendel's cravats and the careful
manicuring of his nails, to indicate that he was paying court to Miss
Kreitmann.
"I think, Abe," Morris said finally, "we're due for an inquiry from the
Flower City Company about Immerglick & Frank."
"I hope not, Mawruss," Abe replied. "I never liked them people, Mawruss.
In fact, last week Mendel Immerglick struck me for new terms--ninety
instead of sixty days--and he wanted to give me a couple of thousand
dollar order. I turned him down cold, Mawruss. People what throw such a
bluff like Mendel Immerglick don't give me no confidence, Mawruss. I'm
willing to sell him up to five hundred at sixty days, but that's all."
"Oh, I don't know, Abe," Morris protested. "A couple of bright boys
like Mendel Immerglick and Louis Frank can work up a nice business after
a while."
"Can they?" Abe rejoined. "Well, more likely they work up a nice line of
credit, Mawruss, and then, little by little, they make it a big failure,
Mawruss. A feller what curls his mustache like Mendel Immerglick ain't
no stranger to auction houses, Mawruss. I bet yer he's got it all
figured out right now where he can get advance checks on consignments."
"I think you do the feller an injury, Abe," said Morris. "I think he
means well, and besides, Abe, business people is getting so conservative
that there ain't no more money in failures."
"I guess there's enough for Mendel Immerglick," Abe said, and dismissed
the subject.
Two weeks later the anticipated letter arrived in the following form:
MESSRS. POTASH & PERLMUTTER.
_Gents:_ Mrs. Kreitmann of your city requests us to ask you about
one of your customers by the name of Mr. Mendel Immerglick, of
Immerglick & Frank. We drew a report on him by both commercial
agencies and are fairly well satisfied, but would be obliged if
you should make inquiries amongst the trade for us and greatly
oblige
Yours truly,
THE FLOWER CITY CREDIT OUTFITTING CO.
Dic. PH/K
P. S. I hear it this fellow is a good bright young fellow. I will
be in N. Y. next month and expect to lay in my spring goods.
PHILIP HAHN.
"Well, Mawruss," Abe said, as he finished reading the letter, "I'm sorry
to get this letter. I don't know what I could tell it him about this
fellow Immerglick. Now, if it was a responsible concern like Henry
Feigenbaum, of the H. F. Cloak Company, it would be different."
"Henry Feigenbaum!" Morris exclaimed. "Why, he's only got one eye."
"I know it, Mawruss," Abe replied, "but he's got six stores, and they're
all making out good. But, anyhow, Mawruss, I ain't going to do nothing
in a hurry. I'll make good inquiries before I answer him."
"What's the use of making inquiries?" Morris protested. "Tell him it's
all right. I got enough of this Miss Kreitmann already, Abe. She's
killed enough trade for us."
"What!" Abe cried. "Tell him it's all right, when for all I know Mendel
Immerglick is headed straight for the bankruptcy courts, Mawruss. You
must be crazy, Mawruss. Ain't Hahn said he's coming down next month to
buy his spring goods? What you want to do, Mawruss? Throw three to five
thousand dollars in the street, Mawruss?"
"You talk foolishness, Abe," Morris rejoined. "Once a man gets married,
his wife's family has got to stand for him. Suppose he does bust up;
would that be our fault, Abe? Then Philip Hahn sets him up in business
again, and the first thing you know, Abe, we got two customers instead
of one. And I bet yer we could get Philip Hahn to guarantee the account
yet."
"Them theories what you got, Mawruss, sounds good, but maybe he busts up
_before_ they get married, and then, Mawruss, we lose Philip Hahn's
business and Max Fried's business, and we are also out a sterling silver
engagement present for Miss Kreitmann. Ain't it?"
He put on his hat and coat and lit a cigar.
"I guess, Mawruss, I'll go right now," he concluded, "and see what I can
find out about him."
In three hours he returned and entered the show-room.
"Well, Abe," Morris cried, "what did you find out? Is it all right?"
Abe carefully selected a fresh cigar and shook his head solemnly.
"Nix, Mawruss," he said. "Mendel Immerglick is nix for a nice girl like
Miss Kreitmann."
He took paper out of his waistcoat pocket for the purpose of refreshing
his memory.
"First, I seen Moe Klein, of Klinger & Klein," he went on. "Moe says he
seen Mendel Immerglick, in the back of Wasserbauer's Cafe, playing
auction pinochle with a couple of loafer salesmen at three o'clock in
the afternoon, and while Moe was standing there already them two
low-lives set Immerglick back three times on four hundred hands at a
dollar a hundred, _double double_."
"And what was Moe doing there?" Morris asked.
"I wasn't making no investigation of Moe, Mawruss," Abe replied.
"Believe me, I got enough to do to find out about Immerglick. Also, Moe
tells me that Immerglick comes into their place and wants to buy off
them three thousand dollars at ninety days."
"And did they sell him?" Morris asked.
"Did they _sell_ him?" Abe cried. "If you was to meet a burglar coming
into the store at midnight with a jimmy and a dark lantern, Mawruss, I
suppose you'd volunteer to give him the combination of the safe. What?
No, Mawruss, they didn't sell him. Such customers is for suckers like
Sammet Brothers, Mawruss. Leon Sammet says they sold him three thousand
at four months. Also, Elenbogen sold him a big bill, same terms,
Mawruss. But big houses like Wechsel, Baum & Miller and Frederick
Stettermann won't sell him at any terms, Mawruss."
"If everybody was so conservative like Wechsel, Baum & Miller," said
Morris, "the retailers might as well go out of business."
"Wait a bit, Mawruss," Abe replied. "That ain't all. Louis Frank's wife
is a sister to the Traders' and Merchants' Outlet, of Louisville--you
know that thief, Marks Leshinsky; and Louis Frank's uncle, Mawruss, is
Elkan Frank & Company, them big swindlers, them auctioneers, out in
Chicago."
Abe sat down and dipped his pen in the inkwell with such force that the
spotless surface of Morris' shirt, which he had donned that morning,
assumed a polkadot pattern. It was, therefore, some minutes before Abe
could devote himself to his task in silence. Finally, he evolved the
following:
THE FLOWER CITY CREDIT OUTFITTING CO.
_Gents_: Your favor of the 16th inst. received and contents
noted, and in reply would say our Mr. Potash seen the trade
extensively and we are sorry to say it in the strictest
confidence that we ain't got no confidence in the party you name.
You should on no consideration do anything in the matter as all
accounts are very bad. We will tell your Mr. Hahn the particulars
when he is next in our city.
Yours truly,
POTASH & PERLMUTTER.
"It ain't no more than he deserves, Mawruss," Abe commented after Morris
had read the letter.
"No," Morris admitted, "but after the way Miss Kreitmann got that feller
Gubin in the hole and the way she treated Adolph Rothstein, Abe, it
ain't no more than she deserves, neither."
For several days afterward Miss Kreitmann went about her work with
nothing but scowls for Potash & Perlmutter's customers, married and
unmarried alike.
"The thing goes too far, Abe," Morris protested. "She kills our entire
trade. Hahn or no Hahn, Abe, I say we should fire her."
Abe shook his head. "It ain't necessary, Mawruss," he replied.
"What d'ye mean?"
"The girl gets desperate, Mawruss. She fires herself. She told me this
morning she don't see no future here, so she's going to leave at the end
of the week. She says she will maybe take up trained nursing. She hears
it that there are lots of openings for a young woman that way."
Morris sat down and fairly beamed with satisfaction.
"That's the best piece of news I hear it in a long time, Abe," he said.
"Now we can do maybe some business."
"Maybe we can," Abe admitted. "But not with Philip Hahn."
"Why not?" Morris cried. "We done our best by him. Ain't we? Through him
we lost it a good customer, and we got to let go a good shipping clerk."
"Not a _good_ shipping clerk, Mawruss," Abe corrected.
"Well, he was a good one till Miss Kreitmann comes."
Abe made no reply. He took refuge in the columns of the Daily Cloak and
Suit Record and perused the business troubles items.
"Was it our fault that Immerglick is N. G., Abe?" Morris went on. "Is
it----"
"Ho-ly smokes!" Abe broke in. "What d'ye think of that?"
"What do I think of what?" Morris asked.
"Immerglick & Frank," Abe read aloud. "A petition in bankruptcy was this
day filed against Immerglick & Frank, doing business as the 'Vienna
Store.' This firm has been a heavy purchaser throughout the trade during
the past two months, but when the receiver took possession there
remained only a small stock of goods. The receiver has retained counsel
and will examine Louis Frank under Section 21 A of the Bankruptcy Act.
It is understood that Mendel Immerglick, the senior partner, sailed for
Hamburg last week on the Kaiserin Luisa Victoria and intends to remain
in Germany for an indefinite time."
Abe laid down the paper with a sigh of relief.
"If that don't make us solid with Philip Hahn, Mawruss," he said,
"nothing will."
Miss Kreitmann left at the end of the week, and Abe and Morris wasted no
time in vain regrets over her departure, but proceeded at once to assort
and make up a new line of samples for Philip Hahn's inspection. For
three days they jumped every time a customer entered the store, and Abe
wore a genial smile of such fixity that his face fairly ached.
At length, on the Thursday following Miss Kreitmann's resignation,
while Abe was flicking an imaginary grain of dust from the spotless
array of samples, the store door burst open and a short, stout person
entered. Abe looked up and, emitting an exclamation, rushed forward with
both arms extended in hearty greeting.
"_Mis_ter Hahn," he cried, "how _do_ you do?"
The newcomer drew himself up haughtily, and his small mustache seemed to
shed sparks of indignation.
Abe stopped short in hurt astonishment.
"Is th-there a-anything the matter?" he faltered.
"Is there anything the matter!" Mr. Hahn roared. "Is there anything the
matter! That's a fine question for _you_ to ask."
"W-w-why?" Abe stuttered. "Ain't everything all right?"
Mr. Hahn, with an effort that bulged every vein in his bald forehead,
subsided into comparative calm.
"Mr. Potash," he said, "I bought from you six bills of goods in the last
few months. Ain't it?"
Abe nodded.
"And I never claimed no shortages and never made no kicks nor nothing,
but always paid up prompt on the day like a gentleman. Ain't it?"
Abe nodded again.
"And this is what I get for it," Mr. Hahn went on bitterly. "My own
niece on my wife's side, I put her in your care. I ask you to take it an
interest in her. You promise me you will do your best. You tell me and
Max Fried you will look after her"--he hesitated, almost overcome by
emotion--"like a father. You said that when I bought the second bill.
And what happens? The only chance she gets to make a decent match, you
write me the feller ain't no good. Naturally, I think you got some
sense, and so I busts the affair up."
"Well," Abe said, "I did write you he wasn't no good, and he wasn't no
good, neither. Ain't he just made it a failure?"
Mr. Hahn grew once more infuriated.
"A failure!" he yelled. "I should say he did make a failure. _What_ a
failure he made! Fool! Donkey! The man got away with a hundred thousand
dollars and is living like a prince in the old country. And poor Gussie,
she loved him, too! She cries night and day."
He stopped to wipe a sympathetic tear.
"She cries pretty easy," Abe said. "She cried when we fired Mannie
Gubin, too."
Hahn bristled again.
"You insult me. What?" he cried. "You try to get funny with me. Hey? All
right. I fix you. So far what I can help it, never no more do you sell
me or Max or anybody what is friends of ours a button. Not a button!
Y'understand?"
He wheeled about and the next moment the store door banged with
cannon-like percussion. Morris came from behind a rack of raincoats and
tiptoed toward Abe.
"Well, Abe," he said, "you put your foot in it that time."
Abe mopped the perspiration from his brow and bit the end off a cigar.
"We done business before we had Philip Hahn for a customer, Mawruss,"
he said, "and I guess we'll do it again. Ain't it?"
* * * * *
Six months later Abe was scanning the columns of the Daily Cloak and
Suit Record while Morris examined the morning mail.
"Yes, Mawruss," he said at length. "Some people get only what they
deserve. I always said it, some day Philip Hahn will be sorry he treated
us the way he did. I bet yer he's sorry now."
"So far what I hear, Abe," Morris replied, "he ain't told us nor nobody
else that he's sorry. In fact, I seen him coming out of Sammet Brothers'
yesterday, and he looked at me like he would treat us worser already, if
he could. What makes you think he's sorry, Abe?"
"Well," Abe went on, "if he _ain't_ sorry he _ought_ to be."
He handed the Daily Cloak and Suit Record to Morris and indicated the
New Business column with his thumb.
"Rochester, N. Y.," it read. "Philip Hahn, doing business here as the
Flower City Credit Outfitting Company, announces that he has taken into
partnership Emanuel Gubin, who recently married Mr. Hahn's niece. The
business will be conducted under the old firm style."
Morris handed back the paper with a smile.
"I seen Leon Sammet on the subway this morning and he told me all about
it," he commented. "He says Gubin eloped with her."
Abe shook his head.
"You got it wrong, Mawruss. You must be mistaken," he concluded. "_She_
eloped with Gubin."