wruss?" Abe
Potash asked, one morning in February.

"Say," Morris Perlmutter replied, "I didn't even know they had ever made
up since the time they split before, and, furthermore, Abe, I think that
even if the most important news a feller in the newspaper business could
get ahold of to print on his front page was an I.O.M.A. convention,
instead of the greatest war in history, y'understand, he would be giving
his readers a great big jolt compared with the thrill they get when they
read about the troubles people has got in the show business."

"Maybe _you_ think so, Mawruss," Abe said, "but Klaw & Erlanger and the
Shuberts don't think so, and when you consider that them two concerns
control all the theayters in the United States and spends millions of
dollars for advertising, Mawruss, a feller in the newspaper business
don't show such poor judgment to give them boys a little space on the
front page whenever they have their semi-annual split."

"Probably you're right, Abe," Morris said; "but if it was you and me
that had a big fight on with our nearest competitors, Abe, advertising
it in the newspapers would be the last thing we would be looking for."

"The garment business ain't the theayter business, Mawruss," Abe said.
"For instance, being a defendant in a divorce suit don't get any one
nowheres in the garment trade, because if a garment-manufacturer would
have such a person working for him practically the only effect it would
have on his business would be that he would be obliged to neglect it two
or three times a day answering telephone inquiries from his wife as to
just how he was putting in his time, y'understand, and so far as
bringing customers into your place who want to see the lady you got
working for you which all the scandal was printed about in the papers,
Mawruss, it wouldn't make any difference _what_ the evidence was, you
couldn't get your trade interested to the extent even of their coming in
to snoop with no intentions to buy, y'understand. But you take it in the
theayter business and big fortunes has been made out of rotten plays
simply because the theayter-going public wanted to see if the leading
lady looked like the pictures which was printed of her in the papers at
the time the court denied her the custody of the child, understand me."

"Then you think that there's going to be a big rush on the theayters
controlled by Klaw & Erlanger and the Shuberts on account people has
been reading in the pa