Potash & Perlmutter: Their Copartnership Ventures and Adventures. Glass Montague

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      When Mr. Siegmund Lowenstein, proprietor of the O'Gorman-Henderson Dry-Goods Company of Galveston, Texas, entered Potash & Perlmutter's show-room, he expected to give only a small order. Mr. Lowenstein usually transacted his business with Abe Potash, who was rather conservative in matters of credit extension, more especially since Mr. Lowenstein was reputed to play auction pinochle with poor judgment and for high stakes.

      Therefore, Mr. Lowenstein intended to buy a few staples, specialties of Potash & Perlmutter, and to reserve the balance of his spring orders for other dealers who entertained more liberal credit notions than did Abe Potash. Much to his gratification, however, he was greeted by Morris Perlmutter.

      "Ah, Mr. Perlmutter," he said; "glad to see you. Is Mr. Potash in?"

      "He's home, sick, to-day," Morris replied.

      Mr. Lowenstein clucked sympathetically.

      "You don't say so," he murmured. "That's too bad. What seems to be the trouble?"

      "He's been feeling mean all the winter," Morris replied. "The doctor says he needs a rest."

      "That's always the way with them hard-working fellers," Mr. Lowenstein went on. "I'm feeling pretty sick myself, I assure you, Mr. Perlmutter. I've been working early and late in my store. We never put in such a season before, and we done a phenomenal holiday business. We took stock last week and we're quite cleaned out. I bet you we ain't got stuck a single garment in any line—cloaks, suits, clothing or furs."

      "I'm glad to hear it," Morris said.

      "And we expect this season will be a crackerjack, too," he continued. "I had to give a few emergency orders to jobbers down South before I left Galveston, we had such an early rush of spring trade."

      "Is that so?" Morris commented. "I wish we could say the same in New York."

      "You don't tell me!" Mr. Lowenstein rejoined. "Why, I was over by Garfunkel and Levy just now, and Mr. Levy says he is almost too busy. I looked over their line and I may place an order with them, although they ain't got too good an assortment, Mr. Perlmutter."

      "Far be it from me to knock a competitor's line, Mr. Lowenstein," Morris commented, "but I honestly think they get their designers off of Ellis Island."

      "Well," Mr. Lowenstein conceded, "of course I don't say they got so good an assortment what you have, Mr. Perlmutter, but they got a liberal credit policy."

      "Why, what's the matter with our credit policy?" Morris asked.

      "Nothing," Mr. Lowenstein replied. "Only a merchant like me, what wants to enlarge his business, needs a little better terms than thirty days. Ain't it? I'm improving my departments all the time, and I got to buy more fixtures, lay in a better stock and even build a new wing to my store building. All this costs money, Mr. Perlmutter, as you know, and contractors must be paid strictly for cash. Under the circumstances, I need ready money, and, naturally, the house what gives me the most generous credit gets my biggest order."

      "Excuse me for a moment," Morris broke in, "I think I hear the telephone."

      He walked to the rear of the store, where the telephone bell had been trilling impatiently.

      "Hello," he said, taking the receiver off the hook.

      "Hello," said a voice from the other end of the line. "Is this Potash & Perlmutter?"

      "It is," said Morris.

      "Well, this is Garfunkel & Levy," the voice went on. "We understand Mr. Lowenstein, of Galveston, is in your store. Will you please and call him to the 'phone for a minute?"

      "This ain't no public pay station," Morris cried. "And besides, Mr. Lowenstein just left here."

      He banged the receiver onto the hook and returned at once to the front of the store.

      "Now, Mr. Lowenstein," he said, "what can I do for you?"

      And two hours later Mr. Lowenstein left the store with the duplicate of a twenty-four-hundred-dollar order in his pocket, deliveries to commence within five days; terms, ninety days net.

      "Well, Abe," Morris said the next day as his partner, Abe Potash, entered the show-room, "how are you feeling to-day?"

      "Mean, Mawruss," Abe replied. "I feel mean. The doctor says I need a rest. He says I got to go away to the country or I will maybe break down."

      "Is that so?" said Morris, deeply concerned. "Well, then, you'd better go right away, before you get real serious sick. Why not fix it so you can go away to-morrow yet?"

      "To-morrow!" Abe exclaimed. "It don't go so quick as all that, Mawruss. You can't believe everything the doctors tell you. I ain't exactly dead yet, Mawruss. I'm like the feller what everybody says is going to fail, Mawruss. They give him till after Christmas to bust up, and then he does a fine holiday trade, and the first thing you know, Mawruss, he's buying real estate. No, Mawruss, I feel pretty mean, I admit, but I think a good two-thousand-dollar order would put me all right again, and so long as we wouldn't have no more trouble with designers, Mawruss, I guess I would stay right too."

      "Well, if that's the case," said Morris, beaming all over, "I guess I can fix you up. Siegmund Lowenstein, of Galveston, was in here yesterday, and I sold him a twenty-four-hundred-dollar order, including them forty-twenty-two's, and you know as well as I do, Abe, them forty-twenty-two's is stickers. We got 'em in stock now over two months, ever since Abe Magnus, of Nashville, turned 'em back on us."

      Abe's reception of the news was somewhat disappointing to Morris. He showed no elation, but selected a slightly-damaged cigar from the K. to O. first and second credit customers' box, and lit it deliberately before replying.

      "How much was that last order he give us, Mawruss?" he asked.

      "Four hundred dollars," Morris replied.

      "And what terms?" Abe continued.

      "Five off, thirty days."

      "And what terms did you quote him yesterday?" asked Abe inexorably.

      "Ninety days, net," Morris murmured.

      Abe puffed vigorously at his cigar, and there was a long and significant silence.

      "I should think, Abe," Morris said at length, "the doctor wouldn't let you smoke cigars if you was nearly breaking down."

      "So long as you sell twenty-four hundred dollars at ninety days to a crook and a gambler like Siegmund Lowenstein, Mawruss," Abe replied, "one cigar more or less won't hurt me. If I can stand a piece of news like that, Mawruss, I guess I can stand anything. Why didn't you give him thirty days' dating, too, Mawruss?"

      At once Morris plunged into a long account of the circumstances attending the СКАЧАТЬ