"I don't doubt your word for a minute, Elkan," Marcus Polatkin said the following morning when Elkan related to him the events of the preceding night; "aber you couldn't blame Sammet none. Concerns like Sammet Brothers, which they are such dirty crooks that everybody is got suspicions of 'em, y'understand, must got to pay their bills prompt to the day, Elkan; because if they wouldn't be themselves good collectors, understand me, they would bust up quick."
"Sammet Brothers ain't in no danger of busting up," Elkan declared.
"Ain't they?" Marcus rejoined. "Well, you would be surprised, Elkan, if I would tell you that only yesterday already I am speaking to a feller by the name Hirsch, which works for years by the Hamsuckett Mills as city salesman, understand me, and he says that the least Sammet Brothers owes them people is ten thousand dollars."
"That shows what a big business they must do," Elkan said.
"Yow—a big business!" Marcus concluded. "This here Hirsch says not only Sammet Brothers' business falls off something terrible, y'understand, but they are also getting to be pretty slow pay; and if it wouldn't be that the Hamsuckett people is helping 'em along, verstehst du, they would of gone up schon long since already."
"And a good job too," Elkan said. "The cloak-and-suit trade could worry along without 'em, Mr. Polatkin; but anyhow, Mr. Polatkin, I ain't concerned with Sammet Brothers. The point is this: Dishkes says he has got a good stand there on Amsterdam Avenue, and if he could only hold on a couple months longer he wouldn't got no difficulty in pulling through."
Polatkin shrugged his shoulders.
"For my part," he said, "it wouldn't make no difference if Dishkes busts up now oder two months from now."
"But the way he tells me yesterday," Elkan replied, "not only he wouldn't got to bust up on us if he gets his two months' extension, but he says he would be doing a good business at that time."