"That only goes to show how much Mr. McAdoo knows about pinochle, Abe," Morris said, "because unless, Gott soll huten, a feller should drop dead immediately after he cashes in his chips, y'understand, money which you win at pinochle ain't an asset, Abe, it's a loan, and sooner or later you are going to pay it back with interest."
"You argue with Mr. McAdoo!" Abe advised him. "Why, as I understand it, if you are having the game up at your own house, Mawruss, and you happen to draw out ahead you ain't even allowed to deduct nothing for electric light and the delicatessen supper, so strict the government is."
"But do you mean to say that if you have a regular Saturday-night pinochle game and you make a few dollars one Saturday night and drop it the next and so forth, Abe, that the government wouldn't allow you to deduct your losings from your winnings?" Morris asked.
"That's the idee," Abe said. "When you cash in at the end of each game, Mawruss, that constitutes a separate transaction under 'H. Other Income (including income from partnerships, fiduciaries, except that reported under E, F, and G),' and you don't get no allowances for nothing."
"Well, that settles it," Morris said. "For the fiscal year January first, nineteen eighteen, to December thirty-first, nineteen eighteen, I play pinochle two-handed with my wife, Abe, and then I've always got the come-back that I answered 'No' to question eight, 'Did your wife (or husband) or dependent children derive income from sources independent of your own?'"
"I don't think that Mr. McAdoo would hold that you've got to report money which you win from your wife," Abe said.
"Why not?" Morris asked.
"Because Mr. McAdoo is a married man himself, Mawruss, and he knows that such moneys ain't income," Abe concluded. "They're paper profits, and you never collect on them."
THE END