"That's a real-estater for you," Abe said. "Henochstein's got it pretty
good nerve, Mawruss, but this feller acts so independent like a doctor
or a lawyer."
Morris nodded and started to hang up his hat and coat, but even as his
hand was poised half-way to the hook it became paralyzed. Simultaneously
Abe looked up from the column of the Daily Cloak and Suit Record and
Miss Cohen, the bookkeeper, stopped writing; for the hum of sewing
machines, which was as much a part of their weekday lives as the beating
of their own hearts, had suddenly ceased.
Abe and Morris took the stairs leading to the upper floor three at a
jump, and arrived breathlessly in the workroom just as fifty-odd
employees were putting on their coats preparatory to leaving.
"What's the matter?" Abe gasped.
"Strike," Goldman, the foreman, replied.
"A strike!" Morris cried. "What for a strike?"
Goldman shrugged his shoulders.
"Comes a walking delegate by the opposite side of the street and makes
with his hands motions," he explained. "So they goes out on strike."
Few of the striking operators could speak English, but those that did
nodded their corroboration.
"For what you strike?" Morris asked them.
"Moost strike," one of them replied. "Ven varking delegate say moost
strike, ve moost strike."
Sadly Abe and Morris watched their employees leave the building, and
then they repaired to the show-room.
"There goes two thousand dollars, Mawruss," Abe said.
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