Abe whistled involuntarily.
"I should think two thousand would be plenty," he suggested.
Max Cohen turned on him with another glare.
"What!" he shrieked. "Am I a beggar? Should I give my niece a miserable two thousand dollars? Ain't I got no pride? I got to make it five thousand!" He paused while his imagination dwelt on the magnitude of this colossal sum. "Five thousand dollars!" he shrieked again, "and business the way it is!"
Mr. Perlmutter laid a soothing palm on Cohen's shoulder.
"But, Mr. Cohen," he said, "what can we do? Why should you tell us all this?"
Mr. Cohen shook off Morris's caress.
"You're right," he said. "Why should I tell you all this? I didn't come here to tell you this. I come here to tell you something else. I come here to tell you to cancel all orders what I give you. Also, if you or your salesman come by my place ever again, look out; that's all. The way I feel it now, I'll murder you!" He turned to leave. "And another thing," he concluded. "One thing, you can depend on it. So far what I can help it, you don't sell one dollar's worth of goods to any of my friends, never no more!"
Again the door banged explosively, and Mr. Cohen was gone.
For ten minutes there was an awed silence in the sample room. At length Abe looked at his partner with a sickly smile.