tand that I
claim full commission here from Glaubmann as the only broker in the
transaction!"

"_Nu_, gentlemen," Glaubmann said; "I'll leave this to the lawyers if it
ain't so: From one transaction I can only be liable for one
commission--ain't it?"

Feldman and Goldstein nodded in unison.

"Then all I could say is that yous brokers and drygoods merchants should
fight it out between yourselves," he declared; "because I'm going to
pay the money for the commission into court--and them which is entitled
to it can have it."

"But ain't you going to protect me, Glaubmann?" Ortelsburg demanded.

Glaubmann raised his hand for silence.

"One moment, Ortelsburg," he said. "I think it was you and Kamin told me
that real estate is a game the same like auction pinocle?"

Ortelsburg nodded sulkily.

"Then you fellers should go ahead and play it," Glaubmann concluded.
"And might the best man win!"[B]

[Footnote B: In the face of numerous decisions to the contrary, the
author holds for the purposes of this story that a verbal lease for one
year, to commence in the future, is void.]

CHAPTER SIX

A TALE OF TWO JACOBEAN CHAIRS

NOT A DETECTIVE STORY

"Yes, Mr. Lubliner," said Max Merech as he sat in the front parlour of
Elkan's flat one April Sunday; "if you are going to work to buy
furniture, understand me, it's just so easy to select good-looking
chairs as bad-looking chairs."

"_Aber_ sometimes it's a whole lot harder to sit on 'em comfortably,"
Elkan retorted sourly. On the eve of moving to a larger apartment he and
Yetta had invited Max to suggest a plan for furnishing and decorating
their new dwelling; and it seemed to Elkan that Max had taken undue
advantage of the privilege thus accorded him. Indeed, Polatkin,
Scheikowitz & Company's aesthetic designer held such pronounced views on
interior decoration, and had expressed them so freely to Elkan and
Yetta, that after the first half-hour of his visit the esteem which they
had always felt toward their plush furniture and Wilton rugs had
changed--first to indifference and then, in the case of Yetta, at least,
to loathing.

"I always told you that the couch over there was hideous, Elkan," Yetta
said.

"Hideous it ain't," Max interrupted; "_aber_ it ain't so beautiful."

"Well, stick the couch in the bedroom, then," Elkan said. "It makes no
difference to me."

"Sure, I know," Yetta exclaimed: "but what would we put in its place?"

Elkan shrugged his