The Competitive Nephew Part 38

"Ain't it funny," he said, "how just so soon as anybody sees me they think I am going to do something charitable? As a matter of fact, Mr.

Lesengeld, I am coming here to see you on a business matter which really it ain't my business at all."

Lesengeld grudgingly held open the door, and Max squeezed past him.

"You got a comfortable place here, Mr. Lesengeld," he began, "plain and old-fas.h.i.+oned, but comfortable."

Lesengeld removed some dusty papers from a chair.

"It suits me," he said. "Take a seat, Mr. ----"

"Schindelberger," Max said as he sat down.

"Used to was Schindelberger, Steinfeld & Company in the underwear business?"

Max nodded and his smile began to fade.

"My partner Belz got a couple of the composition notes in the middle compartment in our safe for six years already," Lesengeld continued.

"He keeps 'em for sowveneers, on account the feller he took 'em off of--a relation from his wife's--was no good, neither. Which you was telling me you wanted to see me about a business matter."

Max Schindelberger cleared his throat.

"Anybody could have reverses in business," he said.

"Sure, I know," Lesengeld commented. "Only there is two kinds of reverses, Mr. Schindelberger, reverses from up to down and reverses from down to up, like when a feller couldn't pay his composition notes, Mr. Schindelberger, and two years later is buying elevator apartments yet in his wife's name, Mr. Schindelberger." He tapped the desk impatiently. "Which you was saying," he added, "that you wanted to see me about a business matter."

Max coughed away a slight huskiness. When he had started from his luxuriously appointed office on lower Na.s.sau Street to visit Mr.

Lesengeld on East Broadway, he had felt a trifle sorry for Lesengeld, so soon to feel the embarra.s.sment and awkwardness incidental to meeting for the first time, and all combined under one frockcoat, the District Grand Master of the I.O.M.A., the President of the Bella Hirshkind Home for Indigent Females, and director and trustee of three orphan asylums and of an eye, ear, and throat infirmary. With the first reference to the defunct underwear business, however, Max began to lose the sense of confidence that the dignity of his various offices lent him; and by the time Lesengeld had mentioned the elevator apartment houses he had a.s.sumed to Max all the majesty of, say, for example, the Federal Grand Master of the I.O.M.A., with Jacob H. Schiff and Andrew Carnegie thrown in for good measure.

"The fact is," Max stammered, "I called to see you about the three-thousand dollar mortgage you are holding on Rudnik's house--the second mortgage."

Lesengeld nodded.

"First mortgages I ain't got any," he said, "and if you are coming to insinivate that I am a second-mortgage shark, Mr. Schindelberger, go ahead and do so. I am dealing in second mortgages now twenty years already, and I hear myself called a shark so often, Mr. Schindelberger, that it sounds like it would be a compliment already. I come pretty near getting it printed on my letterheads."

"I didn't said you was a second-mortgage shark, Mr. Lesengeld; a man could be a whole lot worse as a second-mortgage shark, understand me, and do a charity once in awhile, anyhow. You know what it stands in _Gemara_ yet?"

Schindelberger settled himself in his chair preparatory to intoning a Talmudical quotation, but Lesengeld forestalled him.

"Sure, I know," he said, "it stands in _Gemara_ a whole lot about charity, Mr. Schindelberger, but it don't say no more about second mortgages as it does about composition notes, for instance. So if you are coming to me to ask me I should give Rudnik an extension on his Clinton Street house, you could learn _Gemara_ to me till I would become so big a _Melammed_ as you are, understand me, and it wouldn't make no difference. I never extend no mortgages for n.o.body."

"But, Mr. Lesengeld, you got to remember this is an exception, otherwise I wouldn't bother myself I should come up here at all. I am interesting myself in this here matter on account Rudnik is an old man, understand me, and all he's got in the world is the Clinton Street house; and, furthermore, he will make a will leaving it to the Bella Hirshkind Home for Indignant Females, which if you want to go ahead and rob a lot of poor old widders of a few thousand dollars, go ahead, Mr.

Lesengeld."

He started to rise from his chair, but he thought better of it as Lesengeld began to speak.

"Don't make me no bluffs, Schindelberger," Lesengeld cried, "because, in the first place, if Rudnik wills his house to the Bella Hirshkind Home, what is that my business? And, in the second place, Belz's wife's mother's a cousin got a sister which for years, Belz, makes a standing offer of five hundred dollars some one should marry her, and finally he gets her into the Home as single as the day she was born already."

"One or two ain't widders," Schindelberger admitted, "but they're all old, and when you say what is it your business that Rudnik leaves his house to charity, sure it ain't. _Aber_ it's your business if you try to take the house away from charity. Even if you would be dealing in second mortgages, Mr. Lesengeld, that ain't no reason why you shouldn't got a heart once in a while."

"What d'ye mean, I ain't got a heart?" Lesengeld demanded. "I got just so much a heart as you got it, Mr. Schindelberger. Why, last night I went on a moving pictures, understand me, where a little girl gets her father he should give her mother another show, _verstehst du_, and I a.s.sure you I cried like a baby, such a soft heart I got it." He had risen from his chair and was pacing excitedly up and down the little room. "The dirty dawg wants to put her out of the house already on account she is kissing her brother which he is just come home from twenty years on the Pacific Coast," he continued; "and people calls me a shark yet, Mr. Schindelberger, which my wife and me is married twenty-five years next _Succos Halamode_ and never so much as an unkind breath between us."

"That's all right, Mr. Lesengeld," Schindelberger said. "I don't doubt your word for a minute, but when it comes to foreclosing a mortgage on a house which it, so to speak, belongs to a home for poor widders and a couple of old maids, understand me, then that's something else again."

"Who says I'm going to foreclose the mortgage?" Lesengeld demanded.

"You didn't said you was going to foreclose it," Schindelberger replied, "but you says you ain't never extended no mortgages for n.o.body."

"Which I never did," Lesengeld agreed; "but that ain't saying I ain't never going to. Seemingly, also, you seem to forget I got a partner, Mr. Schindelberger, which people calls him just so much a shark as me, Mr. Schindelberger."

"_Aber_ you are just telling me your partner is putting into the Bella Hirshkind Home a relation from his wife's already, and if he wouldn't be willing to extend the mortgage, Mr. Lesengeld, who would? Because I needn't got to tell you, Mr. Lesengeld, the way business is so rotten nowadays people don't give up so easy no more; and if it wouldn't be that the Bella Hirshkind Home gets from somebody a whole lot of a.s.sistance soon it would bust up sure, and Belz would quick find himself stuck with his wife's relation again, and don't you forget it."

"But----" Lesengeld began.

"But nothing, Mr. Lesengeld!" Schindelberger cried. "Here's where the Bella Hirshkind Home is got a show to make a big haul, so to speak, because this here Rudnik has got something the matter with his liver which it is only a question of time, understand me, on account the feller is an old bachelor without anybody to look after him, and he eats all the time twenty-five-cent regular dinners. I give him at the outside six months."

"But are you sure the feller makes a will leaving his house to the Bella Hirshkind Home?" Lesengeld asked.

"What d'ye mean, am I sure?" Schindelberger exclaimed. "Of course I ain't sure. That's why I am coming up here this morning. If you would extend first the mortgage on that house, Mr. Lesengeld, Rudnik makes the will, otherwise not; because it would cost anyhow fifteen dollars for a lawyer he should draw up the will, ain't it, and what's the use we should spend the money if you take away from him the house?"

"But if I would extend first the mortgage, Schindelberger, might the feller wouldn't make the will maybe."

Schindelberger clucked his tongue impatiently.

"Just because I am so charitable I don't got to be a fool exactly," he said. "If you would extend the mortgage, Mr. Lesengeld, I would bring Rudnik up here with a lawyer, and before the extension agreement is signed Rudnik would sign his will and put it in your safe to keep."

Lesengeld hesitated for a minute.

"I'll tell you, Schindelberger," he said at length; "give me a little time I should think this matter over. My partner is up in the Bronix and wouldn't be back till to-morrow."

"But all I want is your word, Mr. Lesengeld," Schindelberger protested, "because might if I would go back and tell Rudnik you wouldn't extend the mortgage he would go right away to the river and jump in maybe."

"Yow, he would jump in!" Lesengeld cried. "Only the other day I seen on a moving pictures a fillum which they called it Life is Sweet, where an old man eighty years old jumps into the river on account his grandson died in an elegant furnished apartment already; and when a young feller rescues him he gives him for ten thousand dollars a check, which I wouldn't believe it at all if I didn't seen the check with my own eyes yet. I was terrible broke up about the grandson, Mr. Schindelberger, _aber_ when I seen the check I didn't got no more sympathy for the old man at all. Fifty dollars would of been plenty, especially when the young feller turns out to be the son of the old man's boy which he ain't heard from in years."

"Sure, I know," Schindelberger agreed, "_aber_ such things only happen in moving pictures, Mr. Lesengeld, and if Rudnik would jump in the river, understand me, the least that happens him is he would get drownded and the Bella Hirshkind Home would go _Mechulla_ sure."

"Well, I'll tell you," Lesengeld said; "you could say to Rudnik that I says I would extend the mortgage supposing my partner is agreeable, on consideration he would leave the house to the Bella Hirshkind Home, and Rudnik is to pay three hundred and fifty dollars to my lawyer for drawing the extension agreement."

"_Aber_, Mr. Lesengeld----" Schindelberger began. He was about to protest against the size of the bonus demanded under the guise of counsel fee when he was interrupted by a resounding, "_Koos.h.!.+_" from Lesengeld.

"That is my last word and the very best I could do," Lesengeld concluded, "except I would get my lawyer to fix up the will and _schenk_ it to you free for nothing."

"I don't know what comes over you lately, Belz," Lesengeld complained the following morning. "Every day you come down looking like a bear _mit_ a spoiled tail."

"I got a right to look that way," Belz replied. "If you would got such a wife's relation like I got it, Lesengeld, there'd be no sitting in the same office with you at all. When it isn't one thing it's another.

Yesterday my wife's mother's a sister's cousin gets a day off and comes round and gets dinner with us. I think I told you about her before--Miss Blooma Duckman. Nothing suits that woman at all. The way she acts you would think she lives in the bridal soot at the Waldorfer, and she gets my wife so mad, understand me, that she throws away a whole dish of _Tzimmus_ in the garbage can already--which I got to admit that the woman is right, Lesengeld--my wife don't make the finest _Tzimmus_ in the world."