ng!" Fatkin replied firmly; and
after half an hour of more or less acrid discussion Fatkin agreed to
accept Miss Bessie Saphir plus three hundred dollars and a job as
foreman.

* * * * *

An inexplicable phase of the criminal's character is the instinct which
impels him to revisit the scene of his crime; and, whether he was led
thither by a desire to gloat or by mere vulgar curiosity, Philip
Sternsilver slunk within the shadow of an L-road pillar on Allen Street
opposite New Riga Hall promptly at half-past five that evening.

First to arrive was Isaac Seiden himself. He bore a heavily laden
suitcase, and his face was distorted in an expression of such intense
gloom that Sternsilver almost found it in his heart to be sorry for his
late employer.

Mrs. Seiden, Miss Bessie Saphir, and Mrs. Miriam Saphir next appeared.
They were chattering in an animated fashion and passed into the hall in
a gale of laughter.

"Must be he didn't told 'em yet," Sternsilver muttered to himself.

Then came representatives of commission houses and several L to J
customers attired in appropriate wedding finery; and as they entered
the hall Sternsilver deemed that the pertinent moment for disappearing
had arrived. He left hurriedly before the advent of two high-grade
salesmen, or he might have noticed in their wake the dignified figure
of Hillel Fatkin, arrayed in a fur overcoat, which covered a suit of
evening clothes and was surmounted by a high silk hat. Hillel walked
slowly, as much in the realization that haste was unbecoming to a
bridegroom as on account of his patent-leather shoes, which were half a
size too small for him; for the silk hat, fur overcoat, patent-leather
shoes, and dress suit were all hired, and formed Combination Wedding
Outfit No. 6 in the catalogue of the Imperial Dress-suit Parlour on
Rivington Street. It was listed at five dollars a wedding, but the
proprietress, to whom Hillel had boasted of his rabbinical ancestry,
concluded to allow him a clerical discount of 20 per cent. when he
hesitated between his ultimate selection and the three dollar
Combination No. 4, which did not include the fur overcoat.

The extra dollar was well invested, for the effect of Combination No. 6
upon Miss Bessie Saphir proved to be electrical. At first sight of it,
she dismissed forever the memory of the fickle Sternsilver, who, at the
very moment when Bessie and Hillel were plighting their tro