The Competitive Nephew Part 15

"And we would call him Pesach," Hillel said to his mother-in-law shortly after the birth of his heir, "after your Uncle Pesach Gubin."

"My Uncle Pesach Gubin!" Mrs. Miriam Saphir protested. "What are you talking nonsense, Hillel? That lowlife is Mrs. Seiden's uncle, not my uncle."

"Your cousin, then," Hillel continued. "What's the difference if he's your cousin _oder_ your uncle--we would call the boy after him, anyhow."

"Call the boy after that drinker--that b.u.m! What for? The feller ain't no relation to me at all. Why should we call the precious lamb after Beckie Seiden's relations?"

"Do you mean to told me," he said, "that Pesach Gubin ain't no relation to Bessie at all?"

Mrs. Saphir nodded and blushed.

"The way families is mixed up nowadays, Hillel," she said, "it don't do no harm to claim relation with some people."

Her face commenced to resume its normal colour.

"Especially," she added, "if they got money."

CHAPTER FOUR

SERPENTS' TEETH

"All right, Max," cried Samuel Gembitz, senior member of S. Gembitz & Sons; "if you think you know more about it as I do, Max, go ahead and make up that style in all them fancy shades. But listen to what I'm telling you, Max: black, navy blue, brown, and smoke is plenty enough; and all them copenhoogens, wisterias, and tchampanyers we would get stuck with, just as sure as little apples."

"That's what you think, pop," Max Gembitz replied.

"Well, I got a right to think, ain't I?" Samuel Gembitz retorted.

"Sure," Max said, "and so have I."

"After me," Samuel corrected. "I think first and then you think, Max; and I think we wouldn't plunge so heavy on them 1040's. Make up a few of 'em in blacks, navies, browns, and smokes, Max, and afterward we would see about making up the others."

He rose from his old-fas.h.i.+oned Windsor chair in the firm's private office and put on his hat--a silk hat of a style long obsolete.

"I am going to my lunch, Max," he said firmly, "and when I come back I will be here. Another thing, Max: you got an idee them 1040's is a brand-new style which is so original, understand me, we are bound to make a big hit with it at seven-fifty apiece--ain't it?"

Max nodded.

"Well, good styles travels fast, Max," the old man said; "and you could take it from me, Max, in two weeks' time Henry Schrimm and all them other fellers would be falling over themselves to sell the self-same garment at seven dollars."

He seized a gold-mounted, ebony cane, the gift of Harmony Lodge, 100, I.O.M.A., and started for the stairway, but as he reached the door he turned suddenly.

"Max," he shouted, "tell them boys to straighten up the sample racks.

The place looks like a pigsty already."

As the door closed behind his father Max aimed a kick at the old-fas.h.i.+oned walnut desk and the old-fas.h.i.+oned Windsor chair; and then, lighting a cigarette, he walked hurriedly to the cutting room.

"Lester," he said to his younger brother, who was poring over a book of sample swatches, "what do you think now?"

"Huh?" Lester grunted.

"The old man says we shouldn't make up them 1040's in nothing but black, navy, brown, and smoke!"

Lester closed the book of sample swatches and sat down suddenly.

"Wouldn't that make you sick?" he said in tones of profound disgust. "I tell you what it is, Max, if it wouldn't be that the old man can't run the business forever, I'd quit right now. We've got a killing in sight and he Jonahs the whole thing."

"I told you what it would be," Max said. "I seen Falkstatter in Sarahcuse last week; and so sure as I'm standing here, Lester, I could sold that feller a two-thousand dollar order if it wouldn't be for the old man's back-number ideas. Didn't have a single pastel shade in my trunks!"

"Where is he now?" Lester asked.

"Gone to lunch," Max replied.

Lester took up the sample swatches again and his eyes rested lovingly on a delicate shade of pink.

"I hope he chokes," he said; but even though at that very moment Samuel Gembitz sat in Hammersmith's restaurant, his cheeks distended to the bursting point with _gefullte Rinderbrust_, Lester's prayer went unanswered. Indeed, Samuel Gembitz had the bolting capacity of a boa-constrictor, and, with the aid of a gulp of coffee, he could have swallowed a grapefruit whole.

"Ain't you scared that you would sometimes hurt your di-gestion, Mr.

Gembitz?" asked Henry Schrimm, who sat at the next table.

Now this was a sore point with Sam Gembitz, for during the past year he had succ.u.mbed to more than a dozen bilious attacks as a result of his voracious appet.i.te; and three of them were directly traceable to _gefullte Rinderbrust_.

"I ain't so delicate like some people, Henry," he said rather sharply.

"I don't got to consider every bit of meat which I am putting in my mouth. And even if I would, Henry, what is doctors for? If a feller would got to deny himself plain food, Henry, he might as well jump off a dock and _fertig_."

Henry Schrimm was an active member of as many fraternal orders as there are evenings in the week, and he possessed a ready sympathy that made him invaluable as a chairman of a sick-visiting or funeral committee; for at seven P.M. Henry could bring himself to the verge of tears over the bedside of a lodge brother, without unduly affecting his ability to relish a game of auction pinochle at half-past eight, sharp.

"Jumping off a dock is all right, too, Mr. Gembitz," he commented, "but you got your family to consider."

"You shouldn't worry about my family, Henry," Gembitz retorted. "I am carrying good insurance; and, furthermore, I got my business in such shape that it would go on just the same supposing I should die to-morrow."

"_Gott soll huten_, Mr. Gembitz," Henry added piously as the old man disposed of a dishful of gravy through the capillary attraction of a hunk of spongy rye bread.

"Yes, Henry," Gembitz continued, after he had licked his fingers and submitted his bicuspids to a process of vacuum cleaning, "I got my business down to such a fine point which you could really say was systematic."

"That's a good thing, Mr. Gembitz," Henry said, "because, presuming for the sake of argument, I am only saying you would be called away, Mr.

Gembitz, them boys of yours would run it into the ground in no time."

"What d'ye mean, run it into the ground?" Gembitz demanded indignantly.

"If you would got the gumption which my boys got it, Schrimm, you wouldn't be doing a business which the most you are making is a couple thousand a year."

"Sure, I know," Henry replied. "If I would got Lester's gumption I would be sitting around the Harlem Winter Garden till all hours of the morning; and if I would got Sidney's gumption I would be playing Kelly pool from two to four every afternoon. And as for Max, Mr. Gembitz, if I would got his gumption I would make a present of it to my worst enemy. A boy which he is going on forty and couldn't do nothing without asking his popper's permission first, Mr. Gembitz, he could better do general house-work for a living as sell goods."

Gembitz rose from his table and struggled into his overcoat speechless with indignation. It was not until he had b.u.t.toned the very last b.u.t.ton that he was able to enunciate.

"Listen here to me, Schrimm!" he said. "If Lester goes once in a while on a restaurant in the evening, that's his business; and, anyhow, so far what I could see, Schrimm, it don't interfere none with his designing garments which you are stealing on us just as soon as we get 'em on the market. Furthermore, Schrimm, if Sidney plays Kelly pool every afternoon, you could bet your life he also sells him a big bill of goods, also. You got to entertain a customer oncet in a while if you want to sell him goods, Schrimm; and, anyhow, Schrimm, if it would be you would be trying to sell goods to this here Kelly, you wouldn't got sense enough to play pool with him. You would waste your time trying to learn him auction pinochle."