ition, Mr. Polatkin. Because the
way property is so dead nowadays all the real estaters tries to be a
_Shadchen_, understand me; so if you wouldn't want Miss Maslik to slip
through Elkan's fingers, write him this afternoon yet. I got a fountain
pen right here."

As he spoke he produced a fountain pen of formidable dimensions and
handed it to Polatkin.

"I'll take the letter along with me and mail it," Rashkind continued as
Marcus made a preliminary flourish.

"Tell him," Rashkind went on, "that the girl is something which you
could really call beautiful."

"I wouldn't tell him nothing of the sort," Polatkin said, "because, in
the first place, what for a _Schreiber_ you think I am anyway? And, in
the second place, Rashkind, Elkan is so full of business, understand me,
if I would write him to come home on account this here Miss Maslik is
such a good-looker he wouldn't come at all."

Rashkind shrugged.

"Go ahead," he said. "Do it your own way."

For more than five minutes Polatkin indited his message to Elkan and at
last he inclosed it in an envelope.

"How would you spell Bridgetown?" he asked.

"Which Bridgetown?" Rashkind inquired--"Bridgetown, Pennsylvania, _oder_
Bridgetown, Illinois?"

"What difference does that make?" Polatkin demanded.

"About the spelling it don't make no difference," Rashkind replied.
"Bridgetown is spelt B-r-i-d-g-e-t-a-u-n, all the world over; _aber_ if
it's Bridgetown, Pennsylvania, that's a very funny quincidence, on
account I am just now talking to a feller which formerly keeps a store
there by the name Flixman."

"Do you mean Julius Flixman?" Marcus asked as he licked the envelope.

"That's the feller," Rashkind said with a sigh as he pocketed the letter
to Elkan. "It's a funny world, Mr. Polatkin. Him and me comes over
together in one steamer yet, thirty years ago; and to-day if that
feller's worth a cent he's worth fifty thousand dollars."

"Sure, I know," Marcus agreed; "and _Gott soll hueten_ you and I should
got what he's got it. He could drop down in the streets any moment,
Rashkind." Rashkind nodded as he rose to his feet.

"In a way, it's his own fault," he said, "because a feller which he
could afford to ride round in taxicabs yet ain't got no business walking
the streets in his condition. I told him this morning: 'Julius,' I says,
'if I was one of your heirs,' I says to him, 'I wouldn't want nothing
better as to see you hanging round the real-estate exchange, l