Potash & Perlmutter Part 71

"Right away, Mr. Klinger, right away," Max cried as he hurried off the offending dish, and once more Sol subsided into a melancholy silence.

"Don't take it so hard, Sol," Abe said. "We got bad weather like this _schon_ lots of times yet, and none of us busted up. Ain't it?"

"The weather is nix, Abe," Sol replied. "If it's wet to-day then it's fine to-morrow, and if a concern ain't buying goods now--all right.

They'll buy 'em later on. Ain't it? _But_, Abe, the partner which you got it to-day, Abe, that's the same partner which you got it to-morrow, and that sucker Klein, Abe, he eats me up with expenses. What that feller does with his money, Abe, I don't know."

"Maybe he buys oitermobiles, Sol," Abe suggested.

"Supposing I did buy last spring an oitermobile, Abe," Sol retorted.

"That is the least. I bet yer that feller Klein spends enough on taxicab rides for customers, and also one or two of 'em which she ain't customers, as he could buy a _dozen_ oitermobiles already. No, Abe, that ain't the point. The first year Klein and me goes as partners together, he overdraws me two hundred and fifty dollars. _Schon gut._ If the feller is a little extravagent, y'understand, he's got to make it up next year."

Sol paused to investigate the roast beef which Max had brought, and being apparently satisfied, he proceeded with his narrative.

"Next year, Abe," he continued, "Klein not only ain't made up the two hundred and fifty, Abe, but he gets into me three hundred dollars more.

Well, business is good, y'understand, and so I don't kick and that's where I am a great big fool, Abe, because every year since then, Abe, that sucker goes on and on, until to-day our balance sheet shows I got five thousand more invested in the business as Klein got it. And if I would tell him we are no longer equal partners, Abe, he would go right down to Henry D. Feldman, and to-morrow morning there would be a receiver in the store."

Sol plunged his fork into the slice of roast beef as though it were Klein himself, and he hacked at it so viciously that the gravy flew in every direction.

"Max," he roared, clapping his handkerchief to his face, "what the devil you are bringing me here--soup?"

It was at least five minutes before Sol had exhausted his stock of profanity, and when at length the tablecloth was changed and Abe had ministered to the front of his coat with a napkin dipped in water, Sol ceased to upbraid the waiter and resumed his tirade against his partner.

"Yes, Abe," he said, "you are in luck. You got a partner, y'understand, which he is a decent respectable feller. I bet yer Mawruss would no more dream of overdrawing you, than he would fly in the air."

"Wait till they gets to be popular, Sol," Abe replied. "You could take it from me, Sol, Mawruss would be the first one to buy one of them airyplanes, just the same like he bought that oitermobile yet."

"That's all right," Sol said. "Mawruss is a good live partner. He sees people round him--good, decent, respectable people, mind you--is buying oitermobiles, Abe, and so he thinks he could buy one, too. There ain't no harm in that, Abe, so long as he keeps inside his drawing account, but so soon as one partner starts to take more as the other money out of the business, Abe, then there is right away trouble. But certainly, Abe, Mawruss wouldn't do nothing like that."

"Sure not," Abe replied, "because in the first place, Sol, he knows I wouldn't stand for it, and in the second place, Mawruss ain't out to do me, y'understand. I will say for Mawruss this, Sol. Of course a partner is a partner, Sol, and the best of partners behaves like cut-throats at times, but Mawruss was always white with me, Sol, and certainly I think a whole lot of that feller. Just to show you, Sol, I got Miss Cohen to fix it up for us a statement of our drawing account which I got it right here in my breast pocket, and I ain't even looked at it at all, so sure I am that everything is all O. K."

"I bet yer you overdrew _him_ yet," Sol observed.

"Me, I ain't such a big spender, Sol," Abe replied as he unfolded the statement. "I don't even got to look at the statement, because I know we drew just the same amount. Yes,--here it is Sol. Me, I drew six thousand two hundred dollars, and Mawruss drew--six thousand two hundred and----.

_Well, what do you think for a sucker like that?_"

"Why, what's the matter, Abe?" Sol cried.

Abe's face had grown white and his eyes glittered with anger.

"That's a loafer for you!" he went on. "That feller actually pocketed fifty-two dollars of my money."

"Fifty-two dollars?" Sol repeated. "What are you making such a fuss about fifty-two dollars for?"

"With you I suppose fifty-two dollars is nothing, Sol?" Abe retorted. "I suppose you could pick up fifty-two dollars in the streets, Sol. What?

Wait till I see that robber to-morrow. I'll fix him. Actually, I thought that feller was above such things, Sol."

"Don't excite yourself, Abe," Sol began.

"I ain't excited, Sol," Abe replied. "I ain't a bit excited. All I would do is I will go back to the store and draw a check for fifty-two dollars. I wouldn't let that beat get ahead of me not for one cent, Sol.

If I would sit down with my eyes closed for five minutes, Sol, that loafer would do me for my s.h.i.+rt. I must be on the job all the time, Sol, otherwise that feller would have me on the streets yet."

For a quarter of an hour longer Abe reviled Morris, until Sol was moved to protest.

"If I thought that way about my partner, Abe," he said, "I'd go right down and see Feldman and have a dissolution yet."

"That's what I will do, Sol," Abe declared. "Why should I tie myself up any longer with a cutthroat like that? I tell you what we'll do, Sol.

We'll go over to the store and see what else Miss Cohen found it out. I bet you he rings in a whole lot of items on me with the petty cash while I was away on the road."

Together they left Hammersmith's and repaired at once to Potash & Perlmutter's place of business. As they entered the show-room Miss Cohen emerged from her office with a sheet of paper in her hand.

"Mr. Potash," she said, "when you were in Chicago last fall you drew on the firm for a hundred dollars, and by mistake I credited it to you on your expense account. It ought to have been charged on your drawing account. So that makes your total drawing account sixty-three hundred dollars."

Abe stopped short and looked at Sol.

"What was that you said, Miss Cohen?" he asked.

"I said that I made a mistake in that statement, and you're overdrawn on Mr. Perlmutter forty-eight dollars," Miss Cohen concluded.

"Then hurry up quick, Miss Cohen," Abe cried, "and draw a check in my personal check book on the Koscius...o...b..nk to Potash & Perlmutter for forty-eight dollars and see that it's deposited the first thing to-morrow morning."

He handed Sol a cigar.

"Yes, Sol," he said, "if Mawruss would find it out that I am overdrawn on him forty-eight dollars, he would abuse me like a pickpocket. That feller never gives me credit for being square at all, Sol. I would be afraid for my life if he would get on to that forty-eight dollars. Why, the very first thing you know, Sol, he would be going around telling everybody I was a crook and a cutthroat. That's the kind of feller Mawruss is, Sol. I could treat him always like a gentleman, Sol, and if the smallest little thing happens to us, 'sucker' is the least what he calls me."

At this juncture the green baize doors leading into the hall burst open and Morris himself leaped into the show-room. His necktie was perched rakishly underneath his right ear, and his collar was of the moisture and consistency of a used wash rag. His clothes were dripping, for he carried no umbrella, and his hair hung in damp strands over his forehead. Nevertheless he was grinning broadly, as without a word he ran up to Abe and seized his hand. For two minutes Morris shook it up and down and then he collapsed into the nearest chair.

"Well, Mawruss," Abe cried, "what's the matter? Couldn't you say nothing? What did you come downtown again for? You should have stayed uptown with Minnie."

"S'all right, Abe," Morris gasped. "S'all over, too. The doctor says instead I should be making a nuisance of myself uptown, I would be better off in the store here. He was there before I could get home."

"Who was there?" Abe asked. "The doctor?"

"_Not_ the doctor," Morris went on. "The boy was there. Minnie is doing fine. The doctor said everything would be all right."

"That's good. That's good," Abe murmured.

"Y'oughter seen him, Abe. He weighed ten pounds," Morris continued. "I bet yer he could holler, too,--like an auctioneer already. Minnie says also I shouldn't forget to tell you what we agreed upon."

"What we agreed upon?" Abe repeated. "Why we ain't agreed upon nothing, so far what I hear, Mawruss. What d'ye mean--what we agreed upon?"

"Not _you_ and me, Abe," Morris cried. "_Her_ and me. We agreed that if it was a boy we'd call him Abraham P. Perlmutter already."

He slapped Abe on the back and laughed uproariously, while Abe looked guilty and blushed a deep crimson.

"Abraham Potash Perlmutter," Morris reiterated. "That's one fine name, Sol."

It was now Sol's turn to take Morris' hand and he squeezed it hard.

"I congradulate you for the boy and for the name both," he said.