"By the name Robitscher?" Elkan asked.
"That's the feller," Polatkin answered. "Ribnik says you promised Robitscher the decorations from the house you are buying."
"What d'ye mean I promised him the decorations from the house I am buying?" Elkan exclaimed in anguished tones. "In the first place, I ain't promised him nothing of the kind; and, in the second place, I ain't even bought the house yet."
"That part will be fixed up all right," Polatkin replied, "because Mr. Glaubmann rings up half an hour ago, and he says that so soon as we need him and the lawyer we should telephone for 'em."
For a brief interval Elkan choked with rage.
"Say, lookyhere, Mr. Polatkin," he sputtered at last, "who is going to live in this house – you oder me?"
"You are going to live in the house, Elkan," Polatkin declared, "because me I don't need a house. I already got one house, Elkan, and I ain't twins exactly; and also them fellers is very plain about it, Elkan, which they told me and Scheikowitz up and down, that if you wouldn't buy the house they wouldn't confirm us the orders."
At this juncture Scheikowitz entered the office. From the doorway of the showroom he had observed the discussion between Elkan and his partner; and he had entirely deserted his prospective customers to aid in Elkan's coercion.
"Polatkin is right, Elkan!" he cried. "You got to consider Louis Stout also. Kamin said he would never forgive us if the deal didn't go through."
Elkan bit his lips irresolutely.
"I don't see what you are hesitating about," Polatkin went on. "Yetta likes the house – ain't it?"
"She's crazy about it," Elkan admitted.
"Then what's the use talking?" Scheikowitz declared; and he glanced anxiously toward Tarnowitz and Kamin, who were holding a whispered conference in the showroom. "Let's make an end and get the thing over. Telephone this here Glaubmann he should come right over with Ortelsburg and the lawyer."
"But ain't I going to have no lawyer neither?" Elkan demanded.
"Sure you are," Scheikowitz replied. "I took a chance, Elkan, and I telephoned Henry D. Feldman half an hour since already. He says he would send one up of his assistants, Mr. Harvey J. Sugarberg, right away."
When it came to drawing a real-estate contract there existed for Kent J. Goldstein no incongruities of time and place. Kent was the veteran of a dozen real-estate booms, during which he had drafted agreements at all hours of the day and night, improvising as his office the back room of a liquor saloon or the cigar counter of a barber shop; and, in default of any other writing material, he was quite prepared to tattoo a brief though binding agreement with gunpowder on the skin of the vendor's back.
Thus the transaction between Glaubmann and Elkan Lubliner presented no difficulties to Kent J. Goldstein; and he handled the details with such care and dispatch that the contract was nearly finished before Harvey J. Sugarberg remembered the instructions of his principal. As attorney for the buyer, it was Henry D. Feldman's practice to see that the contract of sale provided every opportunity for his client lawfully to avoid taking title should he desire for any reason, lawful or unlawful, to back out; and this rule of his principal occurred to Harvey just as he and Goldstein were writing the clause relating to incumbrances.
"The premises are to be conveyed free and clear of all incumbrances," Kent read aloud, "except the mortgage and covenant against nuisances above described and the present tenancies of said premises."
He had brought with him two blank forms of agreement; and as he filled in the blanks on one of them he read aloud what he was writing and Harvey Sugarberg inserted the same clause in the other. Up to this juncture Harvey had taken Kent's dictation with such remarkable docility that Elkan and his partners had frequently exchanged disquieting glances, and they were correspondingly elated when Harvey at length balked.
"One moment, Mr. Goldstein," he said – and, but for a slight nervousness, he reproduced with histrionic accuracy the tone and gesture of his employer – "as locum tenens for my principal I must decline to insert the phrase, 'and the present tenancies of said premises.'"
Kent wasted no time in forensic dispute when engaged in a real-estate transaction, though, if necessary, he could make kindling of the strongest rail that ever graced the front of a jury-box.
"How 'bout it, Glaubmann?" he said. "The premises is occupied – ain't they?"
Glaubmann flapped his right hand in a gesture of laissez-faire.
"The feller moves out by the first of next month," he said; and Kent turned to Elkan.
"Are you satisfied that the tenant stays in the house until the first?" he asked. "That will be three days after the contract is closed."
Elkan shrugged his shoulders.
"Why not?" he said.
"All right, Mr. – Forget your name!" Kent cried. "Cut out 'and the present tenancies of said premises.'"
At this easy victory a shade of disappointment passed over the faces of Harvey Sugarberg and his clients, and the contract proceeded without further objection to its rapid conclusion.
"Now then, my friends," Kent announced briskly, "we're ready for the signatures."
At this, the crucial point of all real-estate transactions, a brief silence fell upon the assembled company, which included not only the attorneys and the clients, but Ortelsburg, Kamin, Tarnowitz and Ribnik as well. Finally Glaubmann seized a pen, and, jabbing it viciously in an inkpot, he made a John Hancock signature at the foot of the agreement's last page.
"Now, Mr. Lubliner," Kent said – and Elkan hesitated.
"Ain't we going to wait for Louis Stout?" he asked; and immediately there was a roar of protest that sounded like a mob scene in a Drury Lane melodrama.
"If Louis Stout ain't here it's his own fault," Ortelsburg declared; and Ribnik, Tarnowitz, and Kamin glowered in unison.
"I guess he's right, Elkan," Polatkin murmured.
"It is his own fault if he ain't here," Scheikowitz agreed feebly; and, thus persuaded, Elkan appended a small and, by contrast with Glaubmann's, a wholly unimpressive signature to the agreement. Immediately thereafter Elkan passed over a certified check for eight hundred dollars, according to the terms of the contract, which provided that the title be closed in twenty days at the office of Henry D. Feldman.
"Well, Mr. Lubliner," Glaubmann said, employing the formula hallowed by long usage in all real-estate transactions involving improved property, "I wish you luck in your new house."
"Much obliged," Elkan said; and after a general handshaking the entire assemblage crowded into one elevator, so that finally Elkan was left alone with his partners.
Polatkin was the first to break a silence of over five minutes' duration.
"Ain't it funny," he said, "that we ain't heard from Louis?"
Scheikowitz nodded; and as he did so the elevator door creaked noisily and there alighted a short, stout person, who, having once been described in the I. O. M. A. Monthly as Benjamin J. Flugel, the Merchant Prince, had never since walked abroad save in a freshly ironed silk hat and a Prince Albert coat.
"Why, how do you do, Mr. Flugel?" Polatkin and Scheikowitz cried with one voice, and Mr. Flugel bowed. Albeit a tumult raged within his breast, he remained outwardly the dignified man of business; and, as Elkan viewed for the first time Louis Stout's impressive partner, he could not help congratulating himself on the mercantile sagacity that had made him buy Glaubmann's house.
"And this is Mr. Lubliner?" Flugel said in even tones.
"Pleased to meet you," Elkan said. "I had dinner with your partner only yesterday."
Flugel gulped convulsively in an effort to remain calm.
"I know it," he said; "and honestly the longer I am in business with that feller the more I got to wonder what a Schlemiel he is. Actually he goes to work and tries to do his own partner without knowing it at all. Mind you, if he would be doing it from spite I could understand it; but when one partner don't know that the other partner practically closes a deal for a tract of a hundred lots and six houses in Johnsonhurst, and then persuades a prospective purchaser that, instead of buying in Johnsonhurst, he should buy in Burgess Park, understand me, all I got to say is that if Louis Stout ain't crazy the least he deserves is that the feller really and truly should buy in Burgess Park."
"But, Mr. Flugel," Elkan interrupted, "I did buy in Burgess Park."
"What!" Flugel shouted.
"I say that I made a contract for a house out there this morning only," Elkan said.
For a few seconds it seemed as though Benjamin J. Flugel's heirs-at-law would collect a substantial death benefit from the I. O. M. A., but the impending apoplexy was warded off by a tremendous burst of profanity.
"Aber, Mr. Flugel," Scheikowitz protested, "Louis tells us only last Saturday, understand me, you told him that Johnsonhurst you wouldn't touch at all, on account such lowlifes like Rabiner and Pasinsky lives out there!"
"I know I told him that," Flugel yelled; "because, if I would say I am going to buy out there, Stout goes to work and blabs it all over the place, and the first thing you know they would jump the price on me a few thousand dollars. He's a dangerous feller, Louis is, Mr. Scheikowitz!"
Elkan shrugged his shoulders.
"That may be, Mr. Flugel," he said, "but I signed the contract with Glaubmann for his house on Linden Boulevard – and that's all there is to it!"
Polatkin and Scheikowitz nodded in melancholy unison.
"Do you got the contract here?" Flugel asked; and Elkan picked up the document from his desk, where it had been placed by Goldstein.
"You paid a fancy price for the house," Flugel continued, as he examined the agreement.
"I took your partner's advice, Mr. Flugel," Elkan retorted.
"Why, for eighteen thousand five hundred dollars, in Johnsonhurst," Flugel continued, "I could give you a palace already!"
He scanned the various clauses of the contract with the critical eye of an experienced real-estate operator; and before he had completed his examination the elevator door again creaked open.
"Is Glaubmann gone?" cried a voice from the interior of the car, and the next moment Kovner alighted.
Flugel looked up from the contract.
"Hello, Kovner," he said, "are you in this deal too?"
"I ain't in any deal," Kovner replied. "I am looking for Barnett Glaubmann. They told me in his office he is coming over here and would be here all the morning."
"Well, he was here," Elkan replied, "but he went away again."
Kovner sat down without invitation.
"It ain't no more as I expected," he began in the dull, resigned tones of a man with a grievance. "That swindler has been dodging me for four months now, and I guess he will keep on dodging me for the rest of the year that he claims I got a lease on his house for."
"What house?" Flugel asked.
"The house which I am living in it," Max replied – "on Linden Boulevard, Burgess Park."
"On Linden Boulevard, Burgess Park!" Flugel repeated. "Why, then it's the same house – ain't it, Lubliner?"
Elkan nodded, and as he did so Flugel struck the desk a tremendous blow with his fist.
"Fine!" he ejaculated.
"Fine!" Kovner repeated. "What the devil you are talking about, fine? Do you think it's fine I should got to live a whole year in a house which the least it must got to be spent on it is for plumbing a hundred dollars and for painting a couple hundred more?"
"That's all right," Flugel declared with enthusiasm. "It ain't so bad as it looks; because if you can show that you got a right to stay in that house for the rest of the year, understand me, I'll make a proposition to you."
"Show it?" Kovner exclaimed. "I don't got to show it, because I couldn't help myself, Mr. Flugel. Glaubmann claims that I made a verbal lease for one year, and he's right. I was fool enough to do so."
Flugel glanced inquiringly at Polatkin and Scheikowitz.
"How about that?" he asked. "The contract don't say nothing about a year's lease."
"I know it don't," Elkan replied, "because when our lawyer raises the question about the tenant Glaubmann says he could get him out at any time."
"And he can too," Kovner declared with emphasis, but Flugel shook his head.
"No, he can't, Kovner," he said; "or, anyway, he ain't going to, because you are going to stay in that house."
"With the rotten plumbing it's got?" Kovner cried. "Not by a whole lot I ain't."
"The plumbing could be fixed and the painting also," Flugel retorted.
"By Glaubmann?" Kovner asked.
"No, sir," Flugel replied; "by me, with a hundred dollars cash to boot. I would even give you an order on my plumber he should fix up the plumbing and on my house painter he should fix up the painting, Kovner; aber you got to stick it out that you are under lease for the rest of the year."
"And when do I get the work done?" Kovner demanded.
"To-day," Flugel announced – "this afternoon if you want it."
"But hold on there a minute!" Elkan protested. "If I am going to take that house I don't want no painting done there till I am good and ready."
Flugel smiled loftily at Elkan.
"You ain't going to take that house at all," he said, "because the contract says that it is to be conveyed free and clear, except the mortgage and a covenant against nuisances. So you reject the title on the grounds that the house is leased for a year. Do you get the idee?"
Elkan nodded.
"And next Sunday," Flugel continued, "I wish you'd take a run down with me in my oitermobile to Johnsonhurst. It's an elegant, high-class suburb."
Insomnia bears the same relation to the calling of real-estate operators that fossyjaw does to the worker in the match industry; and, during the twenty days that preceded the closing of his contract with Elkan, Barnett Glaubmann spent many a sleepless night in contemplation of disputed brokerage claims by Kamin, Stout and Ortelsburg. Moreover, the knowledge that Henry D. Feldman represented the purchaser was an influence far from sedative; and what little sleep Glaubmann secured was filled with nightmares of fence encroachments, defects in the legal proceedings for opening of Linden Boulevard as a public highway, and a score of other technical objections that Feldman might raise to free Elkan from his contract.
Not once, however, did Glaubmann consider the tenancy of Max Kovner as any objection to title. Indeed, he was so certain of Kovner's willingness to move out that he even pondered the advisability of gouging Max for twenty-five or fifty dollars as a consideration for accepting a surrender of the verbal lease; and to that end he avoided the Linden Boulevard house until the morning before the date set for the closing of the title.
Then, having observed Max board the eight-five train for Brooklyn Bridge, he sauntered off to interview Mrs. Kovner; and as he turned the corner of Linden Boulevard he sketched out a plan of action that had for its foundation the complete intimidation of Mrs. Kovner. This being secured, he would proceed to suggest the payment of fifty dollars as the alternative of strong measures against Max Kovner for allowing the Linden Boulevard premises to fall into such bad repair; and he was so full of his idea that he had begun to ascend the front stoop of the Kovner house before he noticed the odour of fresh paint.
Never in the history of the Kovner house had the electric bell been in working order. Hence Glaubmann knocked with his naked fist and left the imprint of his four knuckles on the wet varnish just as Mrs. Kovner flung wide the door. It was at this instant that Glaubmann's well-laid plans were swept away.
"Now see what you done, you dirty slob you!" she bellowed. "What's the matter with you? Couldn't you ring the bell?"
"Why, Mrs. Kovner," Glaubmann stammered, "the bell don't ring at all. Ain't it?"
"The bell don't ring?" Mrs. Kovner exclaimed. "Who says it don't?"
She pressed the button with her finger and a shrill response came from within.
"Who fixed it?" Glaubmann asked.
"Who fixed it?" Mrs. Kovner repeated. "Who do you suppose fixed it? Do you think we got from charity to fix it? Gott sei Dank, we ain't exactly beggars, Mr. Glaubmann. Ourselves we fixed it, Mr. Glaubmann – and the painting and the plumbing also; because if you would got in savings bank what I got it, Mr. Glaubmann, you wouldn't make us so much trouble about paying for a couple hundred dollars' repairs."
"Aber," Glaubmann began, "you shouldn't of done it!"
"I know we shouldn't," Mrs. Kovner replied. "We should of stayed here the rest of the year with the place looking like a pigsty already! Aber don't kick till you got to, Mr. Glaubmann. It would be time enough to say something when we sue you by the court yet that you should pay for the repairs we are making here."
Glaubmann pushed his hat back from his forehead and wiped his streaming brow.
"Nu, Mrs. Kovner," he said at last, "it seems to me we got a misunderstanding all round here. I would like to talk the matter over with you."
With this conciliatory prelude he assumed an easy attitude by crossing his legs and supporting himself with one hand on the freshly painted doorjamb, whereat Mrs. Kovner uttered a horrified shriek, and the rage which three weeks of housepainters' clutter had fomented in her bosom burst forth unchecked.
"Out from here, you dirty loafer you!" she shrieked, and grabbed a calcimining brush from one of the many paintpots that bestrewed the hallway. Glaubmann bounded down the front stoop to the sidewalk just as Mrs. Kovner made a frenzied pass at him with the brush; and consequently, when he entered Kent J. Goldstein's office on Nassau Street an hour later, his black overcoat was speckled like the hide of an axis deer.
"Goldstein," he said hoarsely, "is it assault that some one paints you from head to foot with calcimine?"
"It is if you got witnesses," Goldstein replied; "otherwise it's misfortune. Who did it?"
"That she-devil – the wife of the tenant in that house I sold Lubliner," Glaubmann replied. "I think we're going to have trouble with them people, Goldstein."
"You will if you try to sue 'em without witnesses, Glaubmann," Goldstein observed; "because suing without witnesses is like trying to play pinocle without cards. It can't be done."
Glaubmann shook his head sadly.
"I ain't going to sue 'em," he said. "I ain't so fond of lawsuits like all that; and, besides, a little calcimine is nothing, Goldstein, to what them people can do to me. They're going to claim they got there a year's verbal lease."
Goldstein shrugged his shoulders.
"That's all right," he commented. "They want to gouge you for fifty dollars or so; and, with the price you're getting for the house, Glaubmann, you can afford to pay 'em."
"Gouge nothing!" Glaubmann declared. "They just got done there a couple hundred dollars' painting and plumbing, y'understand, and they're going to stick it out."
Goldstein pursed his lips in an ominous whistle.
"A verbal lease, hey?" he muttered.
Glaubmann nodded sadly.
"And this time there is witnesses," he said; and he related to his attorney the circumstances under which the original lease was made, together with the incident attending Kovner's visit to Ortelsburg's house.
"It looks like you're up against it, Glaubmann," Goldstein declared.
"But couldn't I claim that I was only bluffing the feller?" Glaubmann asked.
"Sure you could," Goldstein replied; "but when Kovner went to work and painted the house and fixed the plumbing he called your bluff, Glaubmann; so the only thing to do is to ask for an adjournment to-morrow."
"And suppose they won't give it to us?" Glaubmann asked.
Goldstein shrugged his shoulders.
"I'm a lawyer, Glaubmann – not a prophet," he said; "but if I know Henry D. Feldman you won't get any adjournment – so you may as well make your plans accordingly."
For a brief interval Glaubmann nodded his head slowly, and then he burst into a mirthless laugh.
"Real estate," he said, "that's something to own. Rheumatism is a fine asset compared to it; in fact if some one gives me my choice, Goldstein, I would say rheumatism every time. Both of 'em keep you awake nights; but there's one thing about rheumatism, Goldstein" – here he indulged in another bitter laugh – "you don't need a lawyer to get rid of it!" he said, and banged the door behind him.
If there was any branch of legal practice in which Henry D. Feldman excelled it was conveyancing, and he brought to it all the histrionic ability that made him so formidable as a trial lawyer. Indeed, Feldman was accustomed to treat the conveyancing department of his office as a business-getter for the more lucrative field of litigation, and he spared no pains to make each closing of title an impressive and dramatic spectacle.
Thus the mise-en-scène of the Lubliner closing was excellent. Feldman himself sat in a baronial chair at the head of his library table, while to a seat on his right he had assigned Kent J. Goldstein. On his left he had placed Mr. Jones, the representative of the title company, a gaunt, sandy-haired man of thirty-five who, by the device of a pair of huge horn spectacles, had failed to distract public attention from an utterly stupendous Adam's apple.
Next to the title company's representative were placed Elkan Lubliner and his partners, and it was to them that Henry D. Feldman addressed his opening remarks.
"Mr. Lubliner," he said in the soft accents in which he began all his crescendos, "the examination of the record title to Mr. Glaubmann's Linden Boulevard premises has been made at my request by the Law Title Insurance and Guaranty Company."
He made a graceful obeisance toward Mr. Jones, who acknowledged it with a convulsion of his Adam's apple.
"I have also procured a survey to be made," Feldman continued; and, amid a silence that was broken only by the heavy breathing of Barnett Glaubmann, he held up an intricate design washed with watercolour on glazed muslin.
"Finally I have done this," he declared, and his brows gathered in a tragic frown as his glance swept in turn the faces of Kent J. Goldstein, Benno Ortelsburg, J. Kamin, and Glaubmann – "I have procured an inspector's report upon the occupation of the locus in quo."
"Oo-ee!" Glaubmann murmured, and Louis Stout exchanged triumphant glances with Polatkin and Scheikowitz.
"And I find," Feldman concluded, "there is a tenant in possession, claiming under a year's lease which will not expire until October first next."
Mr. Jones nodded and cleared his throat so noisily that, to relieve his embarrassment, he felt obliged to crack each of his knuckles in turn. As for Ribnik and Tarnowitz, they sat awestruck in the rear of Feldman's spacious library and felt vaguely that they were in a place of worship. Only Kent J. Goldstein remained unimpressed; and in order to show it he scratched a parlour match on the leg of Feldman's library table; whereat Feldman's ex-cathedra manner forsook him.
"Where in blazes do you think you are, Goldstein?" he asked in colloquial tones – "in a barroom?"
"If it's solid mahogany," Goldstein retorted, "it'll rub up like new. I think you were talking about the tenancy of the premises here."
Feldman choked down his indignation and once more became the dignified advocate.
"That is not the only objection to title, Mr. Goldstein," he said. "Mr. Jones, kindly read the detailed objections contained in your report of closing."
Mr. Jones nodded again and responded to Feldman's demand in a voice that profoundly justified the size of his larynx.
"Description in deed dated January 1, 1783," he began, "from Joost van Gend to William Wauters, is defective; one course reading 'thence along said ditch north to a white-oak tree' should be 'south to a white-oak tree.'"
"Well, what's the difference?" Goldstein interrupted. "It's monumented by the white-oak tree."
"That was cut down long ago," Mr. Jones said.
"Not by me!" Glaubmann declared. "I give you my word, gentlemen, the trees on the lot is the same like I bought it."
Feldman allowed his eyes to rest for a moment on the protesting Glaubmann, who literally crumpled in his chair.
"Proceed, Mr. Jones," Feldman said to the title company's representative, who continued without further interruption to the end of his list. This included all the technical objections which Glaubmann had feared, as well as a novel and interesting point concerning a partition suit in Chancery, brought in 1819, and affecting Glaubmann's chain of title to a strip in the rear of his lot, measuring one quarter of an inch in breadth by seven feet in length.
"So far as I can see, Feldman," Goldstein commented as Mr. Jones laid down his report, "the only objection that will hold water is the one concerning Max Kovner's tenancy. As a matter of fact, I have witnesses to show that Kovner has always claimed that he didn't hold a lease."
For answer, Feldman touched the button of an electric bell.
"Show in Mr. and Mrs. Kovner," he said to the boy who responded. "We'll let them speak for themselves."
This, it would appear, they were more than willing to do; for as soon as they entered the room and caught sight of Glaubmann, who by this time was fairly cowering in his chair, they immediately began a concerted tirade that was only ended when Goldstein banged vigorously on the library table, using as a gavel one of Feldman's metal-tipped rulers.
"That'll do, Goldstein!" Feldman said hoarsely. "I think I can preserve order in my own office."
"Why don't you then?" Goldstein retorted, as he leaned back in his chair and regarded with a malicious smile the damage he had wrought.
"Yes, Mr. Glaubmann," Kovner began anew, "you thought you got us helpless there in your house; but – "
"Shut up!" Feldman roared again, forgetting his rôle of the polished advocate; and Goldstein fairly beamed with satisfaction.
"Don't bully your own witness," he said. "Let me do it for you."
He turned to Kovner with a beetling frown.
"Now, Kovner," he commenced, "you claim you've got a verbal lease for a year of this Linden Boulevard house, don't you?"
"I sure do," Kovner replied, "and I got witnesses to prove it."
"That's all right," Goldstein rejoined; "so long as there's Bibles there'll always be witnesses to swear on 'em. The point is: How do you claim the lease was made?"
"I don't claim nothing," Kovner replied. "I got a year's lease on that property because, in the presence of my wife and his wife, Mr. Goldstein, he says to me I must either take the house for a year from last October to next October or I couldn't take it at all."
Feldman smiled loftily at his opponent.
"The art of cross-examination is a subtle one, Goldstein," he said, "and if you don't understand it you're apt to prove the other fellow's case."
"Nevertheless," Goldstein continued, "I'm going to ask him one more question, and that is this: When was this verbal agreement made – before or after you moved into the house?"
"Before I moved in, certainly," Kovner answered. "I told you that he says to me I couldn't move in unless I would agree to take the place for a year."
"And when did you move in?" Goldstein continued.
"On the first of October," Kovner said.
"No, popper," Mrs. Kovner interrupted; "we didn't move in on the first. We moved in the day before."
"That's right," Kovner said – "we moved in on the thirtieth of September."
"So," Goldstein declared, "you made a verbal agreement before September thirtieth for a lease of one year from October first?"
Kovner nodded and Goldstein turned to Henry D. Feldman, whose lofty smile had completely disappeared.
"Well, Feldman," he said, "you pulled a couple of objections on me from 'way back in the last century, understand me; so I guess it won't hurt if I remind you of a little statute passed in the reign of Charles the Second, which says: 'All contracts which by their terms are not to be performed within one year must be in writing and signed by the party to be charged.' I mean the Statute of Frauds."
"I know what you mean all right," Feldman replied; "but you'll have to prove that before a court and jury. Just now we are confronted with Kovner, who claims to have a year's lease; and my client is relieved from his purchase in the circumstances. No man is bound to buy a lawsuit, Goldstein."
"I know he ain't," Goldstein retorted; "but what's the difference, Feldman? He'll have a lawsuit on his hands, anyhow, because if he don't take title now, understand me, I'll bring an action to compel him to do so this very afternoon."
At this juncture a faint croaking came from the vicinity of Louis Stout, who throughout had been as appreciative a listener as though he were occupying an orchestra chair and had bought his seat from a speculator.
"Speak up, Mr. Stout!" Feldman cried.
"I was saying," Louis replied faintly, "that with my own ears I heard Glaubmann say to Kovner that he's got a verbal lease for one year."
"And when was this?" Feldman asked.
"About three weeks ago," Stout replied.
"Then, in that case, Mr. Goldstein," Feldman declared, "let me present to you another proposition of law."
He paused to formulate a sufficiently impressive "offer" as the lawyers say, and in the silence that followed Elkan shuffled to his feet.
"It ain't necessary, Mr. Feldman," he said. "I already made up my mind about it."
"About what?" Louis Stout exclaimed.
"About taking the house," Elkan replied. "If you'll let me have the figures, Mr. Feldman, I'll draw a check and have it certified and we'll close this thing up."
"Aber, Elkan," Louis cried, "first let me communicate with Flugel."
"That ain't necessary neither," Elkan retorted. "I'm going to make an end right here and now; and you should be so good, Mr. Feldman, and fix me up the statement of what I owe here. I want to get through."
Polatkin rose shakily to his feet.
"What's the matter, Elkan?" he said huskily. "Are you crazy, oder what?"
"Sit down, Mr. Polatkin," Elkan commanded, and there was a ring of authority in his tone that made Polatkin collapse into his chair. "I am buying this house."
"But, Elkan," Louis Stout implored, "why don't you let me talk to Flugel over the 'phone? Might he would got a suggestion to make maybe."