Elkan Lubliner, American Part 36

"Out from here, you dirty loafer you!" she shrieked, and grabbed a calcimining brush from one of the many paintpots that bestrewed the hallway. Glaubmann bounded down the front stoop to the sidewalk just as Mrs. Kovner made a frenzied pa.s.s at him with the brush; and consequently, when he entered Kent J. Goldstein's office on Na.s.sau Street an hour later, his black overcoat was speckled like the hide of an axis deer.

"Goldstein," he said hoa.r.s.ely, "is it a.s.sault that some one paints you from head to foot with calcimine?"

"It is if you got witnesses," Goldstein replied; "otherwise it's misfortune. Who did it?"

"That she-devil--the wife of the tenant in that house I sold Lubliner,"

Glaubmann replied. "I think we're going to have trouble with them people, Goldstein."

"You will if you try to sue 'em without witnesses, Glaubmann," Goldstein observed; "because suing without witnesses is like trying to play pinocle without cards. It can't be done."

Glaubmann shook his head sadly.

"I ain't going to sue 'em," he said. "I ain't so fond of lawsuits like all that; and, besides, a little calcimine is nothing, Goldstein, to what them people can do to me. They're going to claim they got there a year's verbal lease."

Goldstein shrugged his shoulders.

"That's all right," he commented. "They want to gouge you for fifty dollars or so; and, with the price you're getting for the house, Glaubmann, you can afford to pay 'em."

"Gouge nothing!" Glaubmann declared. "They just got done there a couple hundred dollars' painting and plumbing, y'understand, and they're going to stick it out."

Goldstein pursed his lips in an ominous whistle.

"A verbal lease, hey?" he muttered.

Glaubmann nodded sadly.

"And this time there is witnesses," he said; and he related to his attorney the circ.u.mstances under which the original lease was made, together with the incident attending Kovner's visit to Ortelsburg's house.

"It looks like you're up against it, Glaubmann," Goldstein declared.

"But couldn't I claim that I was only bluffing the feller?" Glaubmann asked.

"Sure you could," Goldstein replied; "but when Kovner went to work and painted the house and fixed the plumbing he called your bluff, Glaubmann; so the only thing to do is to ask for an adjournment to-morrow."

"And suppose they won't give it to us?" Glaubmann asked.

Goldstein shrugged his shoulders.

"I'm a lawyer, Glaubmann--not a prophet," he said; "but if I know Henry D. Feldman you won't get any adjournment--so you may as well make your plans accordingly."

For a brief interval Glaubmann nodded his head slowly, and then he burst into a mirthless laugh.

"Real estate," he said, "that's something to own. Rheumatism is a fine a.s.set compared to it; in fact if some one gives me my choice, Goldstein, I would say rheumatism every time. Both of 'em keep you awake nights; but there's one thing about rheumatism, Goldstein"--here he indulged in another bitter laugh--"you don't need a lawyer to get rid of it!" he said, and banged the door behind him.

If there was any branch of legal practice in which Henry D. Feldman excelled it was conveyancing, and he brought to it all the histrionic ability that made him so formidable as a trial lawyer. Indeed, Feldman was accustomed to treat the conveyancing department of his office as a business-getter for the more lucrative field of litigation, and he spared no pains to make each closing of t.i.tle an impressive and dramatic spectacle.

Thus the _mise-en-scene_ of the Lubliner closing was excellent. Feldman himself sat in a baronial chair at the head of his library table, while to a seat on his right he had a.s.signed Kent J. Goldstein. On his left he had placed Mr. Jones, the representative of the t.i.tle company, a gaunt, sandy-haired man of thirty-five who, by the device of a pair of huge horn spectacles, had failed to distract public attention from an utterly stupendous Adam's apple.

Next to the t.i.tle company's representative were placed Elkan Lubliner and his partners, and it was to them that Henry D. Feldman addressed his opening remarks.

"Mr. Lubliner," he said in the soft accents in which he began all his crescendos, "the examination of the record t.i.tle to Mr. Glaubmann's Linden Boulevard premises has been made at my request by the Law t.i.tle Insurance and Guaranty Company."

He made a graceful obeisance toward Mr. Jones, who acknowledged it with a convulsion of his Adam's apple.

"I have also procured a survey to be made," Feldman continued; and, amid a silence that was broken only by the heavy breathing of Barnett Glaubmann, he held up an intricate design washed with watercolour on glazed muslin.

"Finally I have done this," he declared, and his brows gathered in a tragic frown as his glance swept in turn the faces of Kent J. Goldstein, Benno Ortelsburg, J. Kamin, and Glaubmann--"I have procured an inspector's report upon the occupation of the _locus in quo_."

"Oo-ee!" Glaubmann murmured, and Louis Stout exchanged triumphant glances with Polatkin and Scheikowitz.

"And I find," Feldman concluded, "there is a tenant in possession, claiming under a year's lease which will not expire until October first next."

Mr. Jones nodded and cleared his throat so noisily that, to relieve his embarra.s.sment, he felt obliged to crack each of his knuckles in turn. As for Ribnik and Tarnowitz, they sat awestruck in the rear of Feldman's s.p.a.cious library and felt vaguely that they were in a place of wors.h.i.+p.

Only Kent J. Goldstein remained unimpressed; and in order to show it he scratched a parlour match on the leg of Feldman's library table; whereat Feldman's _ex-cathedra_ manner forsook him.

"Where in blazes do you think you are, Goldstein?" he asked in colloquial tones--"in a barroom?"

"If it's solid mahogany," Goldstein retorted, "it'll rub up like new. I think you were talking about the tenancy of the premises here."

Feldman choked down his indignation and once more became the dignified advocate.

"That is not the only objection to t.i.tle, Mr. Goldstein," he said. "Mr.

Jones, kindly read the detailed objections contained in your report of closing."

Mr. Jones nodded again and responded to Feldman's demand in a voice that profoundly justified the size of his larynx.

"Description in deed dated January 1, 1783," he began, "from Joost van Gend to William Wauters, is defective; one course reading 'thence along said ditch north to a white-oak tree' should be 'south to a white-oak tree.'"

"Well, what's the difference?" Goldstein interrupted. "It's monumented by the white-oak tree."

"That was cut down long ago," Mr. Jones said.

"Not by me!" Glaubmann declared. "I give you my word, gentlemen, the trees on the lot is the same like I bought it."

Feldman allowed his eyes to rest for a moment on the protesting Glaubmann, who literally crumpled in his chair.

"Proceed, Mr. Jones," Feldman said to the t.i.tle company's representative, who continued without further interruption to the end of his list. This included all the technical objections which Glaubmann had feared, as well as a novel and interesting point concerning a part.i.tion suit in Chancery, brought in 1819, and affecting Glaubmann's chain of t.i.tle to a strip in the rear of his lot, measuring one quarter of an inch in breadth by seven feet in length.

"So far as I can see, Feldman," Goldstein commented as Mr. Jones laid down his report, "the only objection that will hold water is the one concerning Max Kovner's tenancy. As a matter of fact, I have witnesses to show that Kovner has always claimed that he didn't hold a lease."

For answer, Feldman touched the b.u.t.ton of an electric bell.

"Show in Mr. and Mrs. Kovner," he said to the boy who responded. "We'll let them speak for themselves."

This, it would appear, they were more than willing to do; for as soon as they entered the room and caught sight of Glaubmann, who by this time was fairly cowering in his chair, they immediately began a concerted tirade that was only ended when Goldstein banged vigorously on the library table, using as a gavel one of Feldman's metal-tipped rulers.