Part 22 (1/2)
”Max Fried, of the A La Mode Store, was in here a few minutes since, Mawruss,” said Abe Potash, to his partner, Morris Perlmutter, after the latter had returned from lunch one busy August day, ”and bought a couple of hundred of them long Trouvilles. He also wanted something to ask it of us as a favor, Mawruss.”
”Sixty days is long enough, Abe,” said Morris, on the principle of ”once bitten, twice shy.” ”For a man what runs a little store like the A La Mode on Main Street, Buffalo, Abe, Max don't buy too few goods, neither.
Ain't it?”
”Don't jump always for conclusions, Mawruss,” Abe broke in. ”This ain't no credit matter what he asks it of us. His wife got a sister what they wanted to make from her a teacher, Mawruss, but she ain't got the head.
So, Max thinks we could maybe use her for a model. Her name is Miss Kreitmann and she's a perfect thirty-six, Max says, only a little fat.”
”And then, when she tries on a garment for a customer,” Morris rejoined, ”the customer goes around telling everybody that we cut our stuff too skimpy. Ain't it? No, Abe, we got along so far good with the models what we got, and I guess we can keep it up. Besides, if Max is so anxious to get her a job, why don't he take her on himself, Abe?”
”Because she lives here in New York with her mother,” Abe explained; ”and what chance has a girl got in Buffalo, anyway? That's what Max says, and he also told it me that she got a very fine personality, and if we think it over maybe he gives us an introduction to Philip Hahn, of the Flower City Credit Outfitting Company. That's a million-dollar concern, Mawruss. I bet yer they're rated J to K, first credit, and Philip Hahn's wife is Miss Kreitmann's mother's sister. Leon Sammet will go crazy if he hears that we sell them people.”
”That's all right, Abe,” said Morris. ”We ain't doing business to spite our compet.i.tors; we're doing it to please our customers so that they'll buy goods from us and maybe they'll go crazy, too, when they see her face, Abe.”
”Max Fried says she is a good-looker. Nothing extraordinary, y'understand, but good, snappy stuff and up to date.”
”You talk like she was a garment, Abe,” said Morris.
”Well, you wouldn't buy no garment, Mawruss, just because some one told you it was good. Would you? So, Max says he would bring her around this afternoon, and if we liked her Hahn would stop in and see us later in the day. He says Hahn picks out never less than a couple of hundred of one style, and also Hahn is a liberal buyer, Mawruss.”
”Of course, Abe,” Morris commenced, ”if we're doing this to oblige Philip Hahn----”
”We're doing it to oblige Philip Hahn and Max Fried both, Mawruss,” Abe broke in. ”Max says he ain't got a minute's peace since Miss Kreitmann is old enough to get married.”
”So!” Morris cried. ”A matrimonial agency we're running, Abe. Is that the idea?”
”The idea is that she should have the opportunity of meeting by us a business man, Mawruss, what can give her a good home and a good living, too. Max says he is pretty near broke, buying transportation from Buffalo to New York, Mawruss, so as he can bust up love matches between Miss Kreitmann and some good-looking retail salesman, Mawruss, what can dance the waltz A Number One and couldn't pay rent for light housekeeping on Chrystie Street.”
”Well, Abe,” Morris agreed, with a sigh of resignation, ”if we got to hire her as a condition that Philip Hahn gives us a couple of good orders a season, Abe, I'm agreeable.”
”Naturally,” Abe replied, and carefully selecting a slightly-damaged cigar from the M to P first and second credit customers' box, he fell to a.s.sorting the sample line against Philip Hahn's coming that afternoon.
His task was hardly begun, however, when the store door opened to admit Max Fried and his sister-in-law. Abe immediately ceased his sample-a.s.sorting and walked forward to greet them.
”h.e.l.lo, Max,” he said.
Max stopped short, and by the simple process of thrusting out his waist-line a.s.sumed a dignity befitting the ceremony of introduction.
”Mr. Potash,” he said severely, ”this is Miss Gussie Kreitmann, my wife's sister, what I talked to you about.”
Abe grinned shyly.
”All right,” he said, and shook hands with Miss Kreitmann, who returned his grin with a dazzling smile.
”Mr. Fried tells me you like to come to work by us as a model. Ain't it?” Abe continued in the accents of the sucking dove. ”So, I guess you'd better go over to Miss Cohen, the bookkeeper, and she'll show you where to put your hat and coat.”
”Oh, I ain't in no hurry,” Miss Kreitmann replied. ”To-morrow morning will do.”
”Sure, sure,” Abe murmured. He was somewhat shocked by Miss Kreitmann's appearance, for while Max Fried's reservation, ”only a little fat,” had given him some warning, he was hardly prepared to employ so p.r.o.nounced an Amazon as Miss Kreitmann. True, her features, though large, were quite regular, and she had fine black eyes and the luxurious hair that goes with them; but as Abe gazed at the convex lines of her generous figure he could not help wondering what his partner would say when he saw her.