"Don't you believe it, Abe," Max said. "Those two yokels both had big families and they didn't do such a big business either. But they managed to make a good living, and last week I hear they sold out to some city dry goods man for forty thousand dollars."
Abe paused with a loaded knife in midair.
"Forty thousand dollars between two ain't much, Max," he said.
"It's more than I've got, anyhow," Max rejoined as he rose to his feet.
"You got lots of time to make money, Max," Abe concluded. "Come round and see us when you get time, won't you?"
Max nodded; and as he walked down the street to make a further canvass of the garment trade he passed the broad windows of the dairy lunchroom, where Morris was regaling Sam Green with a popular-price meal.
"Yes, Sam," Morris said as he caught sight of Max Kirschner's dejected figure, "you're lucky when you consider some people. You are still a young man and it ain't too late for you to start in as a new beginner somewhere. A young man could always make a living anyhow."
"Sure," Sam agreed, "but why should I start in as a new beginner, Mawruss? I already got an established business, y'understand; and if I could get a feller with a headpiece, Mawruss—never mind he ain't got so much money—with a couple thousand dollars, we could run that feller from Sarahcuse out of town."
"What feller from Sarahcuse?" Morris asked.
"Ain't I told you?" Sam continued. "I thought I says that the reason the bank shuts down on me is a feller from Sarahcuse buys out them two suckers, Van Buskirk and Patterson, and he's going to operate the store as a branch house."