at delight and pleasure of
the others in the car, rose up and embraced and kissed first his
daughter, then Otto and then Otto's mother. And every once in a while
he beamed down the line of his party and said: "This is a happy day!"

And he made them all come into the sitting-room back of the shop. "Wait
here," he commanded. "No one must move!"

He went down to the cellar, presently to reappear with a dusty bottle
of Johannisberger Cabinet. He pointed proudly to the seal. "Bronze!"
he exclaimed. "It is wine like gold. It must be drunk slowly." He
drew the cork and poured the wine with great ceremony, and they all
drank with much touching of glasses and bowing and exchanging of good
wishes, now in German, now in English, again in both. And the last
toast, the one drunk with the greatest enthusiasm, was Brauner's
favorite famous "Arbeit und Liebe und Heim!"

From that time forth Hilda began to look at Otto from a different point
of view. And everything depends on point of view.

Then--the house in which Schwartz and Heilig had their shop was burned.
And when their safe was drawn from the ruins, they found that their
insurance had expired four days before the fire. It was Schwartz's
business to look after the insurance, but Otto had never before failed
to oversee. His mind had been in such confusion that he had forgotten.

He stared at the papers, stunned by the disaster. Schwartz wrung his
hands and burst into tears. "I saw that you were in trouble," he
wailed, "and that upset me. It's my fault. I've ruined us both."

There was nothing left of their business or capital, nothing but seven
hundred dollars in debts to the importers of whom they bought.

Heilig shook off his stupor after a few minutes. "No matter," he
said. "What's past is past."

He went straightway over to Second Avenue to the shop of Geishener, the
largest delicatessen dealer in New York.

"I've been burned out," he explained. "I must get something to do."

Geishener offered him a place at eleven dollars a week. "I'll begin in
the morning," said Otto. Then he went to Paul Brauner.

"When will you open up again?" asked Brauner.

"Not for a long time, several years. Everything's gone and I've taken
a place with Geishener. I came to say that--that I can't marry your
daughter."

Brauner did not know what answer to make. He liked Otto and had
confidence in him. But the masses of the people build their little
fortunes a