The loft building on Nineteenth Street into which Potash & Perlmutter
proposed to move was an imposing fifteen-story structure. Burnished
metal signs of its occupants flanked its wide doorway, and the entrance
hall gleamed with gold leaf and plaster porphyry, while the uniform of
each elevator attendant would have graced the high admiral of a South
American Navy.
So impressed was Abe with the magnificence of his surroundings that he
forgot to call his floor when he entered one of the elevators, and
instead of alighting at the fifth story he was carried up to the sixth
floor before the car stopped.
Seven or eight men stepped out with him and passed through the door of
H. Rifkin's loft, while Abe sought the stairs leading to the floor
below. He walked to the westerly end of the hall, only to find that the
staircase was at the extreme easterly end, and as he retraced his
footsteps a young man whom he recognized as a clerk in the office of
Henry D. Feldman, the prominent cloak and suit attorney, was pasting a
large sheet of paper on H. Rifkin's door.
It bore the following legend:
CLOSED
BY ORDER OF THE FEDERAL RECEIVER
HENRY D. FELDMAN
Attorney for Petitioning Creditors
Abe stopped short and shook the sticky hand of the bill-poster.
"How d'ye do, Mr. Feinstein?" he said.
"Ah, good morning, Mr. Potash," Feinstein cried in his employer's best
tone and manner.
"What's the matter? Is Rifkin in trouble?"
"Oh, no," Feinstein replied ironically.
Pages:
201
202
203
204
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214
215
216
217
218
219
220
221
222
223
224
225