"Mistake?" Abe exclaimed. "When it's in our favour, Mawruss, it ain't no mistake!"
"It's a mistake, anyhow, no matter in whose favour it is," said Morris. "Miss Cohen's footing was wrong. She gets carelesser every day."
"I'm surprised to hear you that you should talk that way, Mawruss," Abe rejoined. "Miss Cohen's been with us for five years, and we ain't lost nothing by her, neither. You know as well as I do, Mawruss, her uncle, Max Cohen, is a good customer of ours. Only last week he bought of us a big bill of goods, Mawruss."
"Just the same, Abe," Morris went on, "if we get a bright young man in there, instead of Miss Cohen, it would be a big improvement. We ought to get some one in there what can manage a double entry, and can run a card-index for our credits."
Abe puffed vigorously at his cigar.
"I suppose, Mawruss, if we got a card-index and we sell a crook a bill of goods," he commented, "and the crook busts up on us, Mawruss, that card-index is going to stop him from sticking us—what? Well, Mawruss, if you want to put in a young feller and fire Miss Cohen, go ahead—I'm satisfied."
As if to clinch the matter before his partner could retract this somewhat grudging consent, Morris Perlmutter stalked out of the sample-room and made resolutely for the glass-enclosed office, where Miss Cohen was busy writing in a ledger. She looked up as he entered, and surveyed him calmly with her large black eyes.
"Oh, Mr. Perlmutter!" she said when he came within ear-shot, "Uncle Max was round to the house last night, and he wants you should duplicate them forty-twenty-twos in his last order and ship at once."
Morris stopped short. This was something he had not foreseen, and all his well-formulated plans for the firing of Miss Cohen were shattered at once.
"Oh!" he said lamely. "Thank you, Miss Cohen; I'll make a memorandum of it." He went over to the commercial agency book and scanned three or four pages with an unseeing eye. Then he repaired to the sample room, where Abe sat finishing his cigar.