XV
POTASH AND PERLMUTTER ON PEACE WITH VICTORY AND WITHOUT BROKERS, EITHER
"An offer is anyhow an offer, even if it is turned down, Mawruss," Abe Potash said, the day after Germany proposed terms of peace, "which that time I sold Harris Immerglick them lots in Brownsville, Mawruss, the first proposition he made me I pretty near threw him down the freight-elevator shaft, and when we finally closed the deal I couldn't tell exactly how much I made on them lots – figuring what I paid in taxes and assessments while I owned 'em, but it must have been, anyhow, five hundred dollars, Mawruss, from the way Immerglick gives me such a cutthroat looks whenever he sees me nowadays."
"Everybody ain't so easy as Harris Immerglick," Morris Perlmutter commented.
"Maybe not," Abe admitted. "But Harris Immerglick didn't want them lots not nearly as bad as the Kaiser wants peace, Mawruss, so while the parties to the proposed contract seems to be at present too wide apart to make a deal likely, Mawruss, at the same time I look to see the Kaiser offer a few concessions."
"Perhaps you're right, Abe," Morris said, "but while the Kaiser may have control of enough property so as to throw in a little here and a little there, y'understand, in the end it will be the boot money which will count, Abe, and before this deal is closed, Abe, you could bet your life that not only would the parties of the first part got to give up Belgium, Servia, Rumania, Poland, and Alsace-Lorraine, but they would also got to pay billions and billions of dollars in cash or certified check upon the delivery of the deed and passing of title under the said contract, and don't you forget it. So if some of them railroad presidents which is now drawing a hundred thousand a year salary, Abe, has got any hopes that President Wilson would hold up taking over the railroads pending negotiations for peace, y'understand, they must be blessed with sanguinary dispositions, Abe, because it's going to take a long time yet the Kaiser would concede enough to justify the Allies in so much as hesitating on even a single pair of soldiers' pants."
"Say, if anybody thinks the government would let go the railroads when we make peace with Germany, Mawruss, he don't know no more about railroads as he does about governments," Abe declared, "because this war which the government has got with the railroads, meat-packers, oil trusts, and coal-mine owners wouldn't end when we've licked Germany any more than it begun when Von Tirpitz started his submarine campaign. Yes, Mawruss, if we wouldn't leave off fighting Germany till it's agreed that no fellers like Von Tirpitz, Von Buelow, Von Bethmann-Hollweg, and all them other Vons can use German subjects and German property for their own personal purposes, why it's a hundred-to-one proposition that we ain't going to leave off fighting the railroads till it's agreed that them Von Tirpitzes, Von Buelows, and Von Hindenbergs of the American railroads couldn't use the transportation business of this country for stock-gambling purpose as though the railroads was gold and silver mining prospects somewhere out in Nevada and didn't have a thing to do with the food and coal supply of the nation."
"Wait a moment," Morris said, "and I'll ask Jake, the shipping-clerk, to bring you in a button-box. We 'ain't got no soap-boxes."
"That ain't no soap-box stuff, Mawruss," Abe retorted. "If the government should do the same thing to the meat-packers as they did to the railroads, Mawruss, the arguments of them soap-box orators wouldn't have a soap-box to stand on."
"Well, if the government thinks it is necessary in order to carry on the war, Abe," Morris said, "it will grab the meat business like it has taken over the railroads, but we've got enough to do to supply our soldiers with ammunition without we would spend any time stopping the ammunition of them soap-box fellers."
"Of course I may be wrong, Mawruss," Abe admitted, "but the way I look at it, the war ain't an excuse for not cleaning up at home. On the contrary, Mawruss, I think it is an opportunity for cleaning up, and when I see in the papers where people writes to the editors that the prohibitionists, the women suffragists, and the union laborers should ought to be ashamed of themselves for putting up arguments when the country is so busy over the war, I couldn't help thinking that there must be people over in Germany which is writing to the Tageszeitung and the Freie Presse that the German Social Democrats and Liberals should ought to be ashamed of themselves for putting up arguments about the Kaiser giving them popular government when Germany is so busy over the war. In other words, it's a stand-off, Mawruss, with the exception that the Kaiser 'ain't made no speeches so far that Germany would never make peace with America till the millions of American women which 'ain't got the vote has some say as to how the war should be carried on and what the terms of peace should be."
"Do you mean to say that women not having the vote puts our government in the same class with Germany?" Morris demanded.
"I mean to say that the proposition of German men having the vote sounds just so foolish to the Kaiser as the proposition of American women having the vote does to this here Eli U. Root," Abe retorted, "and while there is only one Kaiser in Germany, Mawruss, we've got an awful lot of Roots in America, so until Congress gives women the vote, Mawruss, the Kaiser will continue to have an elegant come-back at President Wilson for that proclamation of his."
"Well, I'll tell you, Abe," Morris said, "I read this here proclamation of Mr. Wilson's when it was published in the papers, and while I admit that it didn't leave so big an impression on me as if it would of been a murder or a divorce case, y'understand, yet as I recollect it, Abe, there was enough room in it, so that if the German terms of peace was sufficiently liberal, y'understand, the German popular government needn't got to be so awful popular but what it could get by, understand me."
"That's my idee, too," Abe declared, "and while I ain't so keen like this here Lord Handsdown or Landsdown, or whatever the feller's name is, that we should jump right in and ask the Kaiser if that's the best he could do and how long would he give us to think it over, y'understand, yet you've got to remember that we've all had experiences with fellers like Harris Immerglick, Mawruss, and if the Allies would go at this thing in a business-like way, y'understand, it might be a case of going ahead with our business, which is war, and at the same time keeping an eye on the brokers in the transaction."
"I don't want to wake you up when you've got such pleasant dreams, Abe," Morris interrupted, "but the Allies is going to need all the eyes they've got during the next year or so, and a few binoculars and periscopes wouldn't go so bad, neither."
"All right," Abe said, "then don't keep an eye on the brokers, but just the same we could afford to let the matter rest, because you know what brokers are, Mawruss: when it comes to putting through a swap, the principals could be a couple of hard-boiled eggs that would sooner make a present of their properties to the first-mortgagees than accept the original terms offered, y'understand, but the brokers never give up hope."
"What are you talking about – brokers?" Morris exclaimed. "There ain't no brokers in a peace transaction."
"Ain't there?" Abe retorted. "Well, if this here Czernin ain't the broker representing Austria and Germany, what is he? I can see the feller right now, the way he walks into Trotzky & Lenine's office with one of them real-estater smiles that looks as genwine as a twenty-dollar fur-lined overcoat.
"'Wie gehts, Mr. Trotzky!' he says, like it's some one he used to every afternoon drink coffee together ten years ago and has been wondering ever since what's become of him that he 'ain't seen him so long. Only in this case it happens to be Lenine he's talking to.
"'Mr. Trotzky ain't in. This is his partner, Mr. Lenine,' Lenine says.
"'Not Barnett Lenine used to was November & Lenine in the neckwear business?' Czernin says.
"'No,' Lenine says, and although Czernin tries to look like he expected as much, it kind of takes the zip out of him, anyhow.
"'Let's see,' he says, 'this must be Chatskel Lenine, married a daughter of old man Josephthal and has got a sister living in Toledo, Ohio, by the name Rifkin. The husband runs a clothing-store corner of Tenth and Main, ain't it?'
"This time he's got him cornered, and Lenine has to admit it, so Czernin shakes hands with him and gives him the I.O.M.A. grip, with just a suggestion of the Knights of Phthias and Free Sons of Courland.
"'My name is Czernin – Sig Czernin,' he says. 'I see you don't remember me. I met you at the house of a party by the name Linkheimer or Linkman, I forget which, but the brother, Harris Linkheimer – I remember now, it was Linkheimer – went to the Saint Louis Exposition and was never heard of afterward.'
"'My tzuris!' Lenine says, but this don't feaze Czernin.
"'You see,' he says, 'I never forget a face.'
"'And you 'ain't got such a bad memory for names, neither,' Lenine tells him.
"'That ain't neither here nor there,' Czernin says, 'because if your name would be O'Brien or something Swedish, even, I got here a proposition, Mr. Lenine, which it's a pleasure to me that I got the opportunity of offering it to you, and even if I do say so myself, y'understand, such a gilt-edged proposition like this here ain't in the market every day.'
"And that's the way Czernin sprung them peace propositions on Lenine & Trotzky, and it don't make no difference that in this particular instance it's practically a case of Lenine & Trotzky accepting whatever proposition the Kaiser wants to put to them, y'understand, when it comes to dickering with the Allies which can afford to act so independent to the Kaiser that if Czernin is lucky he won't get thrown down-stairs more than a couple of times, y'understand. He will come right back with the names and family histories of a few more common acquaintances and a couple of more concessions on the part of Germany, time after time, until it'll begin to look like peace is in sight."
"I wish you was right, Abe," Morris said, "but I think you will find that this here peace contract will be in charge of the diplomats and not the real-estaters."
"Well, what's the difference?" Abe asked.
"Probably there ain't any," Morris admitted, "because their methods is practically the same, which when countries goes to war on account of treaties they claim the other country broke, y'understand, it's usually just so much the fault of the diplomats which got 'em to sign the treaties originally, as when business men get into a lawsuit over a real-estate contract, it is the fault of the real-estate brokers in the transaction. So therefore, Abe, unless we want to make a peace treaty with Germany which would sooner or later end up in another war, y'understand, the best thing for America to do is to depend for peace not on brokers oder diplomats, but on airyoplanes and guns with the right kind of soldiers to work 'em. Furthermore, after we've got the Germans back of the Rhine will be plenty of time to talk about entering into peace contracts with the Kaiser, because then there will be nothing left for the Rosher to dicker about, and all we will have to do in the way of diplomacy will be to say, 'Sign here,' and he'll sign there."
XVI
POTASH AND PERLMUTTER ON KEEPING IT DARK
"I got a circular letter from this here Garfield where he says we should keep the temperature of our rooms down to sixty-eight degrees," Abe Potash remarked during the recent below-zero spell in New York.
"What do you mean – down to sixty-eight degrees?" Morris Perlmutter said. "If a feller which lives in a New York City apartment-house nowadays could get the temperature of his rooms as high as down to forty-eight degrees, y'understand, it's only because some of the tenants 'ain't come across with the janitor's present yet and he still has hopes. Yes, Abe, a circular like that might do some good in Pasadena oder Pallum Beach, y'understand, but it's wasted here in New York."
"There's bound to be a whole lot of waste in them don't-waste-nothing circulars," Abe commented, "because plenty of people is getting letters from the Food Conservation Commission to go slow on sugar which 'ain't risked taking even a two-grain saccharin tablet in years already, and the chances is that there has been tons and tons of circulars sent out to other people which on account of their livers oder religions wouldn't on any account eat the articles of food which the circulars begs them on no account to eat, y'understand."
"And next year them circulars will be still less necessary because enough people is going to get rheumatism from living in cold rooms to cut down the consumption of red meats over fifty per cent.," Morris observed.
"Well, something has got to be done to make people go slow on using up coal, Mawruss," Abe said, "which the way it is now, Mawruss, twice as much coal is burned in one night to manufacture electricity for a sky sign saying that 'Toasted Sawdust Is the Perfect Breakfast Food' on account it is made only from the best grades of Tennessee yellow pine, y'understand, as would run an airyoplane-factory for a week, understand me, and children is fooling away their time in the streets because if coal is used to heat the school buildings, y'understand, there wouldn't be enough left for the really important things like lighting up the fronts of vaudeville theayters with the names of actors or telling lies about the mileage of automobile tires by means of a couple of million electric lights every night from sunset to sunrise, understand me."
"Still there's a good deal to be said on the other side, Abe," Morris retorted, "which if the new coal regulations is going to make an end of the sky signs, it will cut off practically all the reading that most New-Yorkers do outside of the newspapers, y'understand. Then again there's a whole lot of people aside from stockholders in electric-lighting companies which used to make a good living out of them sky signs. For instance, what's going to become of the fellers that manufactured them and the firm of certified public accountants nebich which lost the job of adding up the figures on the meters, because while any Schlemiel with a good imagination would be trusted to read the ordinary meter, Abe, the job of figuring the damages on a sky sign which is eating up a couple of million kilowatt-years every twenty minutes is something else again."
"And yet, Mawruss, while I 'ain't got such a soft heart that I could even have sympathy for an electric-lighting company, understand me, still I am sorry to see them sky signs go," Abe said, "because lots of fellers from the small towns, members of rotary clubs and the like, used to get a great deal of pleasure from seeing a kitten made out of three hundred thousand electric bulbs playing with a spool of silk made out of five hundred and fifty thousand bulbs, and there was something very fascinating about watching that automobile tire which used to light up and go out every once in a while somewheres around the upper end of Times Square."
"Sure, I know," Morris said. "But if you was spending your good money for such an advertised tire, Abe, it wouldn't be very fascinating to watch it blow out every once in a while on account the manufacturer had to skimp the rubber in order to pay the electric-light bills, Abe, and if any of them members of rotary clubs is in the dry-goods business and has to pay fancy prices for spool silk, Abe, they are oser going to thank the salesmen for the good time they put in while in New York rubbering at his firm's sky sign, because you know as well as I do, Abe, when it comes right down to it, nothing costs a customer so much as free entertainment."
"Of course, Mawruss," Abe said, "the idee of them electric sky signs is not to entertain, but to advertise, and as an advertising man told me the other day, Mawruss, the advertised article is just as low in price as the same article would be if unadvertised, the reason being that the advertised article's output is greater and that he wanted me to advertise in the Daily Cloak and Suit Record."
"Well, certainly, if the output is greater the cost of production is or should ought to be less," Morris observed, "so I think the feller was right at that, Abe."
"That's what I told him," Abe continued, "but I also said that if I would put for fifty cents a day an advertisement in the paper, y'understand, my partner would never let me hear the end of it."
"Is that so!" Morris exclaimed. "Since when did I kick that we shouldn't do no advertising?"
"Never mind," Abe retorted. "I heard you speak often about advertising the same like you done just now about sky signs, which it is already a back-number idee that advertising raised the price of goods to the customer and – "
"Listen!" Morris interrupted. "If I would got it such a back-number idees like you, Abe, I would put myself into a home for chronic Freemasons or something, which I always was in favor of advertising, except that I believe there is advertising and advertising, Abe, and when an advertisement only makes you think of what it costs, instead of what it advertises, like sky signs, y'understand, to me it ain't an advertisement at all. It's just a warning."
"Did I say it wasn't?" Abe asked. "The way you talk, Mawruss, you would think I was in favor of electric signs, whereas I believe that in times like these a very little publicity goes an awful long ways, Mawruss, which if them Congressmen down in Washington was requested by the Coal Commission to keep it a trifle dark and not use up so much candle-power in advertising the mistakes that has been made by some fellers now working for the government which 'ain't had as much experience in covering up their tracks as, we would say, for example, a Congressman, Mawruss, that wouldn't do no harm, neither."
"It ain't a question of covering tracks, Abe," Morris declared, "because them business men which is now working for the government are perfectly honest, although they do make mistakes in their jobs and get rattled easy on the witness-stand, which if such fellers was dishonest, Abe, even a Congressman would know enough not to advertise it."
"As a matter of fact, Mawruss," Abe declared, "them Congressmen ain't calculating to advertise anybody or anything but themselves. Yes, Mawruss, the way some United States Senators acts you would think they was trying to get a national reputation as first-class, cracker-jack, A-number-one police-court lawyers, and the expert manner in which they can confuse and worry a high-grade Diston who is sacrificing his time and money to help out the government and make him appear a crook, y'understand, must be a source of great satisfaction to the folks back home – in Germany.
"And it certainly ain't helping to win the war any, Mawruss, which most people would get the idee from reading the accounts of it in the newspapers that Mr. Hoover was tried by the United States Senate and found guilty of boosting the price of sugar in the first degree."
"Well, in that case, Abe," Morris suggested, "even if we are a little short of fuel it would of been better for the sugar situation, and maybe also the wool uniforms also, if, instead of getting publicity through investigations, y'understand, the United States Senate would fix up an electric sign for the front of the Capitol at Washington and make Senator Reed the top-liner in big letters like Eva Tanguay or Mr. Louis Mann, because here in America we've got incandescent bulbs to burn, Abe, but we have only one Hoover, and we should ought to take care of him."
"Understand me, Mawruss," Abe declared, emphatically, "it ain't that I object to a certain amount of light being thrown on the mistakes that is made in running the war, if it wasn't that they keep everything so dark about the progress that is also made – the submarines we are sinking, the number of soldiers we've got it in France, and what them boys is doing over there, and while I know there's good reasons for it, maybe it's like this here Broadway proposition – it pays to keep it dark, but it might pay better to keep it light, which I understand that all the lighting company saves in coal by cutting out the sky signs is less than thirty tons a night."
"Thirty tons a night would warm a whole lot of people, Abe," Morris said.
"Sure, I know," Abe agreed. "But even at ten dollars a ton, Mawruss, it would be only a saving of three hundred dollars, which I bet yer some restaurants on Broadway has lost that much money apiece since the lighting orders went into effect."
"That may be," Morris admitted, "but what the Coal Commission is trying to save ain't money, Abe. It's coal. And that is one of the points about this war that people 'ain't exactly realized yet. Money ain't what it once used to was before this war, Abe. You can still make it, lose it, spend it, and save it, but you couldn't sweeten your coffee with it or heat your house with it till there's sugar and coal enough to go around. Also it's only a question of time when money won't get you to Pallum Beach in the winter or Maine in the summer unless the government official in charge of the railroads thinks it is necessary, and also if this war only goes on long enough and wool gets any scarcer, Abe, money won't buy you a new pair of pants even until you can put up a good enough argument with it to convince a government pants inspector that it's a case of either buying a new pair of pants or a frock-coat to make the old ones decent, understand me."
"But the papers has said right straight along that money would win this war, Mawruss," Abe said.
"Yes, and it could lose it, too, according to the way it is spent," Morris continued, "and particularly right now when money can still buy things which the government needs for the soldiers, y'understand, money is a dangerous article in the hands of some people who think that the feller which don't feel the high price of sugar is more privileged to eat it than the feller which could barely afford it."
"Even so," Abe remarked, "it seems to me that not spending money must be an easy way to be patriotic."
"And some fellers is just natural-born patriots that way," Morris added, "and if they ain't, y'understand, the war is going to make them. It's going to give the rich man the same chance to be a good sitson as the poor man, and it's made a fine start by taking the lights off of Broadway so that you couldn't tell it from a respectable street, like Lexington Avenue."
"Couldn't a street be lighted up and still be respectable?" Abe asked.
"Yes, and a rich man could spend his money foolishly and also be respectable," Morris agreed, "but not in war-times."