"Why, Lesengeld and me was lodge brothers together in the I. O. M. A. before I went out to the Pacific Coast years ago already," Scharley declared. "I guess he's often spoken to you about Jake Scharley, ain't it?"
"Maybe he did, Mr. Scharley, aber he's dead schon two years since already," Mrs. Lesengeld said, and then added the pious hope, "olav hasholom."
"You don't say so," Scharley cried in shocked accents. "Why, he wasn't no older as me already."
"Fifty-three when he died," Mrs. Lesengeld said. "Quick diabetes, Mr. Scharley. Wouldn't you step inside?"
Scharley and Williams passed into the front room, which was used as a living room and presented an appearance of remarkable neatness and order. In the corner stood an oil stove on which two saucepans bubbled and steamed, and as Mrs. Lesengeld turned to follow her visitors one of the saucepans boiled over.
"Oo-ee!" she exclaimed. "Mein fisch."
"Go ahead and tend to it," Scharley cried excitedly; "don't mind us. It might get burned already."
He watched her anxiously while she turned down the flame.
"Brown stewed fish sweet and sour, ain't it?" he asked, and Mrs. Lesengeld nodded as she lowered the flame to just the proper height.
"I thought it was," Scharley continued. "I ain't smelled it in forty years already. My poor mother, olav hasholom, used to fix it something elegant."