Mawruss, she gets sick on us and
dies, with a professor and two trained nurses at my expense, and that's
the way it goes, Mawruss."

He rose to his feet and helped himself to a cigar from the L to N first
and second credit customers' box.

"No, Mawruss," he concluded, "if you can't sell a man goods on their
merits, Mawruss, you'll never get him to take them because your wife is
related by marriage to his wife. Ain't it? We got a good line, Mawruss,
and we stand a show to sell our goods without no theayters nor dinners
nor nothing."

Morris shrugged his shoulders. "All right, Abe," he said, "you can do
what you like about it, but I already bought it two tickets for Saturday
night."

"Of course, if you _like_ to go to shows, Mawruss," Abe declared as he
rose to his feet, "I can't stop you. Only one thing I got to say it,
Mawruss--if you think you should charge that up to the firm's expense
account, all I got to say is you're mistaken, that's all."

Abe strode out of the show-room before a retort could formulate itself,
so Morris struggled into his overcoat instead and made for the store
door. As he reached it his eye fell on the clock over Wasserbauer's Cafe
on the other side of the street. The hands pointed to two o'clock, and
he broke into a run, for the Southwestern Flyer which bore the person of
James Burke was due at the Grand Central Station at two-ten. Fifteen
minutes later Morris darted out of the subway exit at Forty-second
Street and imminently avoided being run down by a hansom. Indeed, the
vehicle came to a halt so suddenly that the horse reared on its
haunches, while a flood of profanity from the driver testified to the
nearness of Morris' escape. Far from being grateful, however, Morris
paused on the curb and was about to retaliate in kind when one of the
two male occupants of the hansom leaned forward and poked a derisive
finger at him.

"What's the hurry, Morris?" said the passenger.

Morris looked up and gasped, for in that fleeting moment he recognized
his tormentor. It was Frank Walsh, and although Morris saw only the
features of his competitor it needed no Sherlock Holmes to deduce that
Frank's fellow-passenger was none other than James Burke, buyer for the
Small Drygoods Company.

Two hours later he returned to the store, for he had seized the
opportunity of visiting some of the firm's retail trade while uptown,
and when he came in he found Abe sorting a pile of misses' reefers.

"Well, M