Forthwith, the auctioneer announced a week's adjournment of the four sales, and Philip resumed his wedding ring with a parting diabolical grin at Goldblatt, and left the auction-room. He went to the nearest telephone pay station and rang up the Goldblatt residence, but for over half an hour he received only Central's assurance that as soon as there was an answer she would call him.
"But, Central," he protested, "there's got to be somebody there. They can't all be out."
And Philip was right. There were two people sitting in the front parlour of the Goldblatt residence, and another and more interested person stooped in the back parlour, with her ear to the crack of the sliding doors which divided the two rooms. The telephone bell trilled impatiently at brief intervals, but all three were oblivious to its appeal; for the two persons in the front parlour were engaged in conversation of an earnest character, and the person in the rear room would not have missed a word of it for all the telephones in the world.
"Yes, Fannie," said one of the two persons, "I come back to you, anyhow, and I come back for good."
He placed his arms around her ample waist.
"I assure you, Fannie," he concluded, "them dollar-a-day American-plan hotels in the northern-tier counties is nothing but poison to a feller. I am pretty near starved."
"Why didn't you say so at first?" Fannie replied, rising from the couch where she had been sitting with Feigenbaum. "I got some fine gefüllte Fische in the ice-box."
Whereupon Birdie answered the 'phone.
"Hallo!" came a voice from the other end of the wire. "Where was you all the time? I got some good news for you."
"I've got some good news for you, too," Birdie replied. "Fannie and Mr. Feigenbaum are engaged."