Abe said, "and with strictly first-class hotels it's the same in Europe
as it is in this country, Mawruss; the rates are so fixed that it ain't
necessary for the management to make mistakes in the bill, while the
accounting department always figures the overhead so as to include the
hotel's telephone number, the number of the guest's room, and, in the
case of mountain-resort hotels, the altitude of the hotel above
sea-level."
"Well, that's just what I am driving into, Abe," Morris said. "Even when
hotel bills are submitted weekly and the management has got his signed
checks to show for it, Abe, nobody never realizes that he owes all that
money to a hotel, y'understand, and when at the end of the peace
commission's tenancy the hotel management sends in its final bill, Abe,
there's going to be considerable argument between Mr. Joseph Grew, the
secretary of the commission, and all them Peace Conferencers, expert and
otherwise, as to who ordered what and when, y'understand, which I see by
the newspapers, Abe, that Mr. Grew has already begun an investigation
about who authorized the serving of one hundred bottles tchampanyer wine
on June 14th, and if Mr. Grew couldn't trace the party which signed for
one hundred bottles tchampanyer wine on June 14th, y'understand, what
chance does he have of finding out who is responsible for each and
every one of the hundreds of checks with illegible signatures which is
bound to show up in the final accounting for such articles as scrambled
eggs, bacon, and coffee, which any Peace Conferencers might have signed
for, whether his home town was in a dry state or not, Abe."
"And Mr. Grew wouldn't get no sympathy from the President, neither,
Mawruss," Abe said, "which, when the morning mail arrives at the White
House nowadays just as Mr. Wilson is saying to Mrs. Wilson, '_Some_
coffee, mommer!'--because the average American has got to be home from
Europe at least a month before a good cup of coffee ceases to become a
miracle, Mawruss--it won't take more than two letters from Mr. Grew
asking Mr. Wilson does he remember whether at the conference between
him, Clemenceau, Lord George, Venezuelas, and Baron Ishii, held in
Parlor A on March 22d, did or did not somebody order a rye-bread tongue
sandwich and a split of Evian water, and if so to please sign inclosed
check for same, _non pro tunc_ as of March 22d, 1919, understand me,
before the only effect an envelope addressed in the handwriting of Mr.
Grew will have on Mr. Wilson is that he is going to throw it unopened
into the waste-paper basket without so much as saying, 'I wonder what
that _schlemiel_ wants from me _now_.'"
"As a matter of fact, Abe, the price of food 'ain't interested Mr.
Wilson since a few days ago when he asked Mrs. Wilson, 'How much are we
paying now for coffee, mommer?' and Mrs. Wilson says fifty-eight cents
a pound, and Mr. Wilson says for the love of Mike, and then asks what
she is paying for eggs, and Mrs. Wilson says at Ginsburg's Economy
Market eighty-five cents a dozen, and Mr. Wilson says he would just as
lieve have some hash from last night's rib roast, and Mrs. Wilson says
she doesn't blame him and so would she, but that they are going to have
that rib roast cold for lunch on account Ginsburg is practically
_schenking_ his customers rib roast for fifty-five cents a pound,"
Morris said.
"And how did you come to hear about this conversation, Mawruss?" Abe
asked.
"I didn't hear about it," Morris replied, "but I presume it took place
the morning after the newspapers printed the report of the Federal Trade
Commission about the packing-houses, Abe, because a similar conversation
happened at my breakfast-table that morning, and I presume it also
happened at yours."
"Well, it's time that business men begun to take a little interest in
the cost of what they are eating, Mawruss," Abe said. "On account of the
increase in the price of food, Mawruss, the business man is now paying
more money to all the people which is working for him, except his wife."
"Sure, I know," Morris said, "but the business man which is mean enough
to hold down his wife to twenty dollars a week housekeeping money simply
because the principle of the closed shop and collective bargaining can't
be applied to an American household the way it could to a Turkish
harem, Abe, don't live so well as he used to. Former times when such a
man complained to his wife that the chicken was a little tough,
y'understand, she used to say, 'What do you want for twenty dollars a
week housekeeping money--mocking-birds?' Nowadays, however, the best
that such a man has got to complain about being tough is round steak,
and his wife now says, 'What do you want for twenty dollars a week
housekeeping money--chicken?'"
"And the standard of living for even business men is going down so fast,
Mawruss, that next year when such a man complains that the tripe is
tough, she is going to say, 'What do you expect for twenty dollars a
week housekeeping money--round steak?'" Abe said, "and if them packers
goes on trying to control the entire bill of fare from soup to cereals,
Mawruss, it would only be a matter of a few years when such a husband is
going to complain that the puffed jute is tough, and his wife is going
to ask him, 'What do you expect for twenty dollars a week housekeeping
money--ensilage?' which, if something ain't done pretty soon to stop
dealers boosting the price of food, Mawruss, twenty dollars a week
housekeeping money ain't going to feed a family of hearty-eating
canary-birds."
"I suppose that in the end, Abe, the business man would be obliged to
admit that the high cost of living is just as expensive for his wife as
it is for his other employees," Morris concluded, "and, without the
formality of a strike, the wives of business men will be conceded a new
wage-scale of from thirty to forty dollars, in place of the old scale of
twenty dollars, for a working-week of one hundred and sixty-eight hours,
because it don't make no difference if the Senate confirms the League of
Nations or not, Abe, married business men will never live up to the
clause which provides for an international working-day of eight
hours--anyhow, so far as their wives is concerned."
"That ain't the only clause of the Peace Treaty which wouldn't be lived
up to, Mawruss," Abe said, "because I see that already the Germans is
having their troubles restoring to the British government this here
skull of the Sultan Mkwiwa, Mawruss, which, according to Section Eight,
I think it is, of the Treaty of Peace, was removed from German East
Africa and taken to Germany."
"But the Germans claim that it was never taken from German East Africa,
but was buried there, and they misremember the name of the cemetery,"
Morris declared.
"I know they do, and I couldn't understand their attitude in the matter,
Mawruss," Abe said. "Why don't they go to work and send England any old
skull, which a skull is a skull, ain't it?--and one skull is just as
much like another skull as two pinochle decks with the same backs, and
who is going to check them up on it no matter what kind of a skull they
send? Besides, Mawruss, the people who had pull enough to get that skull
section inserted in the Treaty of Peace is going to be divided into two
classes when that skull arrives in East Africa, _anyway_--namely, those
who will throw a bluff that they recognized the skull as the sultan's
skull as soon as they laid eyes on it, y'understand, and those who will
refuse to concede that any skull is the sultan's skull. There will also,
of course, be a large class of East Africans who won't give a nickel one
way or the other; so if Germany couldn't find the sultan's skull, let
them send England an _ersatz_ sultan's skull with a genwine sultan's
label on it. They've been doing that sort of thing for years with
American safety-razors, American folding-cameras, and American
typewriters; why should they now take it so particular with a German
East African sultan?"
"Then you think there is something suspicious about the way Germany is
acting over this here skull?" Morris suggested.
"I wouldn't call it exactly suspicious, Mawruss," Abe said, "but at the
same time I wouldn't put it beyond the Germans that, after the Allies
gets through discussing together whether or not the sultan's skull is
genwine, they would suddenly awake to the fact that at least two of the
million-mark bills which Germany paid over in the indemnity,
y'understand, are _not_. So, therefore, my advice to England is, examine
the German indemnity carefully, and don't let no returned sultan's skull
distract your attention, even if it would be made of plaster of Paris
with a round hold on top for keeping matches in it, and on the bottom a
sign, reading:
"_Grüss Aus Schveningen_."
XXV
WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO ABOUT IT? THIS INCLUDES LIBELED MILLIONAIRES,
ENFORCED PROHIBITION, AND SHANTUNG
"Well I'll tell you, Mawruss," Abe Potash said, recently, "I doubt very
much if I would be able to say offhand who Arnold Benedict was if I
would be asked such a question by a smart lawyer in a court-room full of
reporters, which, if they hadn't happened to be there at that particular
moment, would of probably gone to their graves without even the faintest
suspicion that you didn't spell _ignorant idealist_ with two l's,
y'understand."
"Still, Abe, you've got to admit that plaintiff in a libel suit don't
deserve much sympathy if he don't post himself before going on the stand
as to the meaning of the libel, so as to anyhow be able to say that it
_was_ a libel and not a compliment, understand me," Morris said.
"He took his lawyers' word for it that it was a libel, Mawruss," Abe
said, "and, anyhow, Mawruss, nobody has got a right to call anybody an
ignorant philantropist even, no matter how ignorant such a philantropist
might be about what the word philantropist would mean."
"And do you _know_ what it means?" Morris asked.
"A philantropist is a feller who gives big sums of moneys to
orphan-asylums, hospitals, and colleges, and if he could afford it he's
a philantropist, Mawruss, and if he couldn't, then he's a sucker, and
that is what is called a philantropist," Abe said, "which, if I didn't
know what it meant, Mawruss, I ain't such an ignorant idealist that I
would use such a word in front of you and expect you not to try to trip
me up on it."
"I see you've also been looking up what ignorant idealist means," Morris
observed.
"And I ain't very peculiar that way, neither, Mawruss," Abe admitted,
"because I bet yer that in the last two days at least five million
people has been looking up in the dictionary what that word idealist
means and not knowing even _then_ what it means, y'understand, and still
that 'ain't prevented them from knocking Mr. Ford, Mawruss."
"But the fact remains, Abe, that them five million people ain't suing
nobody for calling them ignorant idealists," Morris interrupted.
"Also, Mawruss, they ain't running one of the largest industrial plants
in the country on a profit-sharing basis with several thousand
employees," Abe declared, "which there is a whole lot of big
manufacturers in this country who could go on the stand at a moment's
notice and pass a cross-examination with a hundred-per-cent. mark on all
them words which you read in them medical journals you pick up from the
doctor's desk in his private office when he excuses himself for a minute
to answer the 'phone and which you put down so quick and pretend you
'ain't been reading when he comes back again, if you know what I mean.
And furthermore, if these same big manufacturers was elected to the
United States Senate to-morrow they could make a speech against doing
away with child labor in words of six syllables, y'understand, and would
probably make such a speech, because the trouble with most big
manufacturers is not that they are ignorant, understand me, but that
they ain't idealists, Mawruss."
"Just the same, Abe, a man should ought to know what he don't know and
side-step it," Morris said.
"But the way it is in this country, Mawruss, a multimillionaire can't
side-step it. The newspapers won't let him, because if he gets a
reputation for having made fifty million dollars in the safety-pin
business, we would say, for example, and news gets so scarce in the
newspapers that somebody starts a discussion about which is the biggest
musician, Kreisler _oder_ Zimbalist, y'understand, right away the editor
sends out reporters to interview the most prominent men in the country
as to what their opinion is in the matter, and naturally one of the
first men such a reporter would call on is Harris J. Rosenbaum, the
Safety-pin King. Now, what is Rosenbaum going to do under the
circumstances? Is he going to admit to the reporter that up to date he
has been so busy in his safety-pin plant that he 'ain't had time to
post himself as to whether Kreisler and Zimbalist is performers on the
trombone _oder_ the mouth-organ? _Oser!_ He finds out from the reporter
that these two fellers has got a piece-work wage-scale for playing on
the fiddle of five dollars a note, net cash, and he says that both of
them is wonderful fiddlers, y'understand, but that to his mind Kreisler
plays with more of the artistic temperature than Zimbalist, or if he
doesn't actually say so, y'understand, the reporter goes back to his
newspaper and _says_ he said so, and the consequence is that when in
next Sunday's paper Rosenbaum reads,
KREISLER GREATER ARTIST
SAYS SAFETY-PIN KING,
he not only begins to believe that he did say it, but also that it's
funny how a man can go on for years being an expert on fiddle-playing
and only find it out by accident, as it were."
"And I suppose that a few months later, on the strength of what he
_don't_ know about fiddle-playing, Abe," Morris remarked, "Harris J.
Rosenbaum, the Safety-pin King, is running for United States Senator and
comes pretty near getting elected, too."
"There don't seem to be no reason why he wouldn't be," Abe declared,
"because just so long as United States Senators is selected by election
and not by a competitive examination, Mawruss, there will always be a
certain percentage of Harris J. Rosenbaums in the United States Senate,
which you can't keep millionaires out of public office, if they want to
fool away their time in such things, and after all, Mawruss, it ain't
having brains which makes a man a millionaire, it's having a million
dollars."
"Then you don't blame Mr. Ford for the way he has behaved himself, Abe?"
Morris asked.
"Not in the least," Abe said. "Millionaires behave the way their
fellow-countrymen encourages them to behave, Mawruss, which to my mind,
Mawruss, the only way to learn a millionaire like Mr. Ford his place is
not to notice him and, in particular, not to pay no attention to
anything he says, and such a millionaire would quick subside and devote
himself to the manufacture of safety-pins or the best four-cylinder car
for the money in the world, as the case may be, which I see in the paper
that the refusal of the United States Senate to confirm the Treaty of
Peace looks quite certain to them people to whom the winning of the
Willard-Dempsey fight by Jeff Willard looked quite certain, Mawruss."
"Well, to my mind, Abe, them round-robins is right to look into the
Treaty and the League of Nations covenant before they confirm them,"
Morris said. "Also, Abe, you couldn't blame them Senators for getting
indignant about the Shantung settlement."
"Personally I couldn't blame them and I couldn't praise them, Mawruss,
because, like a hundred million other people in this country, not being
in the silk business, Mawruss, I never had the opportunity to find out
nothing about even where Shantung was on the map till they printed such
a map in the papers last week, and if you've got to go and look it up on
a map first to find out whether you should ought to be indignant or not,
Mawruss, you couldn't get exactly red in the face over Japan taking
Shantung, unless you are a Senator from the Pacific coast, where people
have got such a wonderful color in their cheeks that Easterners think
it's the climate, when, as a matter of fact, it is thinking about
Japanese unrestricted immigration that does it."
"But the Senators represents the people which elects them, Abe," Morris
said, "and if it don't take much to make a Californian indignant about
any little thing he suspects Japan is doing, y'understand, then Senator
Hiram Johnson has got a right to go 'round looking permanently purple
over this here Shantung affair. As for the other Senators, Abe, the
theory on which they talk each other deaf, dumb, and blind is that they
are doing a job which it is impossible for the hundred million people of
this country to do for themselves. They are saving their constituents
the trouble of leaving their homes and spending a lot of time on
government-controlled railroads, going to and from Washington to make
their own laws, y'understand. That is what representative government is,
Abe, and if the people of this country couldn't get indignant over what
ain't right in this here Treaty of Peace and League of Nations without
working up such indignation by several days' careful investigation of
the reasons for getting indignant, then it is up to the United States
Senate to get indignant for them, even if the individual Senators has
got to sit up with wet towels 'round their heads and strong black coffee
stewing on the gas-stove, so as not to fall asleep over the job of
letting their feelings get the better of their judgment in working up a
six-hour speech which will give the country the impression that it just
came pouring out on the spur of the moment as a consequence of the
Senators' red-hot indignation about this here Shantung."
"It's too bad that the House of Representatives couldn't be mind-readers
like the Senate, Mawruss, and get off indignant speeches about what is
making certain sections of the country so indignant, Mawruss, that if
their Congressmen is going to really and truly represent them, there
would be a regular epidemic of apoplexy in Washington," Abe said, "which
I am talking about the enforcement of prohibition, Mawruss."
"For myself, Abe, I couldn't understand why it should be necessary to
pass a law to enforce a law," Morris remarked, "because, if that is the
case, what is going to be the end? After they pass this here law to
enforce the prohibition law, are they going to pass another law to
enforce the law to enforce prohibition, or do they expect that this here
enforcement law will enforce itself, and if so, then why couldn't the
prohibition law be enforced without a law to enforce it?"
"To tell you the truth, Mawruss, a dyed-in-wool Dry could be as hopeful
as a man could possibly be on soft drinks, and in his heart of hearts he
must got to know that if Congress would sit from now till the arrival of
_Elia Hanov'e_ and did nothing all that time but pass an endless chain
of enforcement laws, prohibition will never be enforced except in the
proportion of 2.75 enforcement to 97.25 violation, anyhow in those parts
of the country where the hyphen Americans live and like their beverages
with a hyphen in it, because, Mawruss, where a hundred per cent. of the
population of a certain district has been drinking beer and light wines
since 12 A.M. on Rosh Hashonah in the year one up to and including
twelve midnight on June 30, 1919, y'understand, and seeing no harm in
it, understand me, not only would an act of Congress fail to change the
hearts and conscience of such people, but there could be an earthquake,
a cyclone, and anything else which a confirmed Dry would call a judgment
on them people, and still they wouldn't see no harm in it."
"Then what is the country going to do to enforce the prohibition law?"
Morris asked.
"I don't know," Abe said; "but one thing is certain, you can't change
people's habits on and after a certain hour on a certain date by putting
a law into effect on such date. You might just so well expect that, if
the Senate should confirm the provision handing over Shantung to the
Japanese, all the Chinamen in Shantung is immediately going to open
stores for the sale of imitation expensive vases and fake silk
embroidery, start factories for the manufacture of phony Swedish
safety-matches, and do all the other things which Japanese do so
successfully that any reputable business man is willing to take a chance
on getting indignant about Shantung without even asking his stenographer
to look it up for him."
"But I thought you thought that prohibition would be a good thing, Abe?"
Morris said.
"I do," Abe said. "I think brown stewed fish, sweet and sour, the way my
Rosie cooks it, is a good thing, but at the same time, Mawruss, I
realize that my taste in this respect is supported only by what you
might call a very limited public sentiment, consisting of Rosie and me,
y'understand, and the rest of the household couldn't stand to eat it at
all. So, therefore, when we have sweet and sour fish we cook for the
rest of the family eggs or meat, and in that way we have happiness in
the home. Now a country is a home for the people in it, ain't it, and
the main thing is that they should stick together and be happy, and how
could they be happy if even the great majority of the people tells the
rest what they should and shouldn't eat or drink?"
"But you admit that _schnapps_ is harmful, don't you?" Morris insisted.
"And I also admit that sweet and sour fish ain't exactly a health food,
Mawruss," Abe said. "In fact, you wouldn't believe what a lot of
bicarbonate of soda Rosie and me uses up between us after we eat that
fish; but even so, Mawruss, after you have said all you could say
against that fish, the fact remains that Rosie and me, we like it."
"Well, even if the people do like booze, and it does them harm, I say
they shouldn't have it," Morris said.
"I agree with you down to the ground, Mawruss," Abe said. "And I don't
care if it is booze or sweet and sour, you are still right; but if sweet
and sour fish was prohibited, although the fish and the onions and the
sugar and the vinegar which you make it out of _wasn't_, y'understand,
and in spite of the law, Rosie and me liked it and wanted to continue to
eat it, the question then is and the question is going to continue to
be:
"HOW ARE YOU GOING TO STOP IT?"
XXVI
THE APPROACHING ROYAL VISIT
"I see where the King of England, to show his appreciation of what we
done it during the war, Mawruss, is going to send his eldest son, the
King of England, junior, or whatever his name is, to visit us," Abe
Potash said to his partner, Morris Perlmutter.
"Yes?" Morris replied. "Well, why don't the King, senior, come himself?"
"You must think that kings has got nothing better to do with their time
than fool it away on ocean steamers, Mawruss," Abe said. "A king of
England is a very busy man, Mawruss, which I bet yer right now he is
dated up as far ahead as Purim, 1921, laying corner-stones, opening
exhibitions, making the speech of the afternoon or the evening, as the
case may be, at assorted luncheons, teas, and dinners; trying on
uniforms; signing warrants at a fee of two guineas and sixpence--not
including three cents war tax--for the appointment of tea, coffee, or
cocoa manufacturers as purveyors of tea, coffee, or cocoa to the royal
household, y'understand, and doing all the other things which a king
does in England and a prominent Elk does in America."
"Well, anyhow, I suppose the King of England, junior, must of done a lot
of hard work during the war which makes the King, senior, think that it
is time the boy had a vacation."
"_Oser!_" Abe said. "So far as I can make out, the young feller made a
couple of tourist's tours of the battle-fields, Mawruss, and maybe
helped out once or twice with the corner-stone laying; but otherwise,
for all the actual fighting he did, instead of being the King of
England's son during the war, he might just so well have been Mr. Ford's
son."