The Rise of David Levinsky Part 57

Huntington."

"What do you mean?" he said, with a cryptic laugh

I made a clean breast of it

Perhaps he was flattered by my picture of him as an inaccessible magnate; perhaps he simply appreciated the joke of the thing and the energy and tenacity I had brought to it, but he let me narrate the adventure in detail.

I told him the bare truth, and I did so with conscious simple-heartedness, straining every nerve to make a favorable impression

As he listened he repeatedly broke into laughter, and when I had finished he said to his son: "Sounds like a detective story, doesn't it?"

But his demeanor was still enigmatic, and I anxiously wondered whether I impressed him as an energetic business man or merely as an adventurer, a crank, or even a crook

"All I ask for is an opportunity to show you my samples, Mr.

Huntington," I said.

"Well," he answered, deliberately, "there can be no harm in that."

And after a pause, "You've bagged your game so far as that's concerned."

And he merrily made me an appointment for the next morning

About a month later I came across Loeb on Broadway, New York

"By the way," he said, in the course of our brief talk, with a twinkle in his eve, "did you sell anything to Huntington?"

"Huntington? St. Louis? Why, he really is a hard man to reach," I answered, glumly.

At that very moment my cutters were at work on a big order from Huntington, largely for copies from Loeb's styles. I had filled a test order of his so promptly and so completely to his satisfaction, and my prices were so overwhelmingly below those in Loeb's bill, that the St. Louis buyer had wired me a "duplicate" for eight hundred suits

There was a buyer in Cleveland, a bright, forceful little man who would not let a salesman quote his price until he had made a guess at it. His name was Lemmelmann. He was an excellent business man and a charming fellow, but he had a weakness for parading his ability to estimate the price of a garment "down to a cent." The salesmen naturally humored this ambition of his and every time he made a correct guess they would applaud him without stint, and I would follow their example. On one occasion I came to Cleveland with two especially prepared compliments in my mind

"Every human being has five senses," I said to the little buyer.

"You have six, Mr. Lemmelmann. You were born with a price sense besides the ordinary five."

"My, but it's a good one," he returned, jovially

"Yes, you have more senses than anybody else, Mr.

Lemmelmann," I added.

"You're the most sensible man in the world."

"Why--why, you can send stuff like that to Puck or Judge and get a five-dollar bill for it. How much will you charge me? Will that do?" he asked, handing me a cigar

The two compliments cemented our friends.h.i.+p. At least, I thought they did

Another buyer, in Atlanta, Georgia, had a truly wonderful memory.

He seemed to remember every sample he had ever seen--goods, lines, tr.i.m.m.i.n.gs, price, and all. He was an eccentric man.

Sometimes he would receive a crowd of salesmen in rapid succession, inspect their merchandise and hear their prices without making any purchase. Later, sometimes on the same day, he would send out orders for the "numbers" that had taken his fancy

While showing him my samples one morning I essayed to express amazement at his unusual memory. But in this case I mistook my man

"If everybody had your marvelous memory there would be little work for bookkeepers," I jested

Whereupon he darted an impatient glance at me and growled: "Never mind my memory. You sell cloaks and suits, don't you? If you deal in taffy, you'll have to see the buyer of the candy department."

CHAPTER VI

HUNTINGTON was a rising man and the other cloak-buyers were watchng him.

When it became known that there was a young manufacturer named Levinsky with whom he was placing heavy orders I began to attract general attention. My reputation for selling "first-rate stuff" for the lowest prices quoted spread. Buyers would call at my rookery of a shop before I had time to seek an interview with them. The appearance of my place and the crudity of my office facilities, so far from militating against my progress, helped to accelerate it. Skeptical buyers who had doubted my ability to undersell the old-established houses became convinced of it when they inspected my primitive-looking establishment.

The place became far too small for me. I moved to much larger quarters, consisting of the two uppermost floors and garret of a double tenement-house of the old type. A hall bedroom was converted into an office, the first separate room I ever had for the purpose, and I enjoyed the possession of it as much as I had done my first check-book. I had a lounge put in it, and often, at the height of the manufacturing season, when I worked from daybreak far into the night and lived on sandwiches, I would, instead of going home for the night, s.n.a.t.c.h three or four hours' sleep on it.

The only thing that annoyed me was a faint odor of mold which filled my bedroom-office and which kept me in mind of the Margolises' old apartment.

There was the pain of my second love-affair in that odor, for, although I had not seen Dora nor heard of her for more than two years, I still thought of her often, and when I did her image still gave me pangs of yearning.

There was an air of prosperity and growth about my new place, but this did not interfere with the old air of skimpiness and cheapness as to running expenses and other elements that go to make up the cost of production

Bender's salary had been raised substantially, so much so that he had resigned his place as evening-school teacher, devoting himself exclusively to my shop and office. He was provokingly childish as ever, but he had learned a vast deal about the cloak business, its mechanical branch as well as the commercial end of it, and his usefulness had grown enormously

One morning I was hustling about my garret floor, vibrating with energy and self-importance, when he came up the stairs, saying: "There is a woman on the main floor who wants to see you. She says you know her." Was it Dora? I descended the stairs in a flutter

I was mistaken. It was Mrs. Chaikin. She looked haggard and more than usually frowsy. The cause of her pitiable appearance was no riddle to me. I knew that her husband's partner had made a mess of their business and that Chaikin had lost all his savings. "Does she want a loan?" I speculated

My first impulse was to take her to my little office, but I instantly realized that it would not be wise to flaunt such a mark of my advancement before her. I offered her a chair in a corner of the room in which I found her

"How is Chaikin? How is Maxie?"

"Thank G.o.d, Maxie is quite a boy," she answered, coyly. "Why don't you come to see him? Have you forgotten him? He has not forgotten you. Always asking about 'Uncle Levinsky.' Some little children have a better memory than some grown people."

Having delivered this thrust, she swept my shop with a sepulchral glance, followed by a succession of nods. Then she said, with a grin at once wheedling and malicious: "There are two more floors, aren't there? And I see you're very busy, thank G.o.d. Plenty of orders, hey? Thank G.o.d. Well, when Chaikin gets something started and there is n.o.body to spoil it, it's sure to go well. Isn't it?"

"Chaikin is certainly a fine designer," I replied, noncommittally, wondering what she was driving at

"A fine designer! Is that all?" she protested, with exquisite sarcasm. "And who fixed up this whole business? styles got the business started and gave it the name it has? Only 'a fine designer,'

indeed! It's a good thing you admit that much at least. Well, but what's the use quarreling? I am here as a friend, not to make threats. That's not in my nature."

She gave me a propitiating look, and paused for my reply. "What do you mean, Mrs. Chaikin?" I asked, with an air of complaisant perplexity

"'What do you mean?'" she mocked me, suavely. "Poor fellow, he doesn't understand what a person means. He has no head on his shoulders, the poor thing. But what's the good beating about the bush, Levinsky? I am here to tell you that we have decided to come back and be partners again."

I did not burst into laughter. I just looked her over, and said, in the calmest and most business-like manner: "That's impossible, Mrs.

Chaikin. The business doesn't need any partner."

"Doesn't need any partner! But it's ours, this business, as much as yours; even more. It is our sweat and our blood. Why, you hadn't a cent to your name when we started it, and you know it. And what did you have, pray? Did you know anything about cloaks? Could you do anything without Chaikin?"

"We won't argue about it, Mrs. Chaikin."