"Now, Potash," he said, "you know whatever I buy in staples you get the
preference; but when anybody's got a specialty like that Arverne Sacque,
what's the use of talking?"

He shook hands cordially.

"I'll be around to see you in about a week," he said, and the next
moment the door closed behind him.

"Well, Mawruss, that settles it," said Abe, putting on his hat. "When we
lose a good customer like Ike Herzog, I gets busy right away."

"Where are you going, Abe?" Morris asked.

Abe struggled into his overcoat and seized his umbrella.

"Round to Sammet Brothers," he replied. "I'm going to get that young
feller away from them if I got to pay 'em a thousand dollars to boot."

Leon Sammet, head of the copartnership of Sammet Brothers, sat in the
firm's sample room and puffed gloomily at a Wheeling stogy. His brother,
Barney Sammet, stood beside him reading aloud from a letter which he
held in his hand.

"'Gents,'" he said, "'your shipment of the fourteenth instant to hand,
and in reply will say we ain't satisfied with nothing but style
forty-one-fifty. Our Miss Kenny is a perfect thirty-six, and she can't
breathe in them Empires style 3022, in sizes 36, 38 or 40. What is the
matter with you, anyway? We are returning them via Eagle Dispatch. We