d: "Schnitt will come in with me
and say: 'I have come back to work.'"

"In this place?" demanded Ersten.

"Ask him that. He will say: 'Yes.'"

"Will he?" cried Ersten, unable to believe his ears.

"That's what he will say--but he won't do it."

"What is it?" exploded the shocked Ersten. "You say he says he will
come back to work in this place, but he won't do it! That is
foolishness!"

"No, it isn't," insisted Johnny. "Now listen carefully. Schnitt says:
'I have come back to work.' You say: 'In this place?' Schnitt says:
'Yes.' Then you tell him that he must take a month to rest up his eyes."

"But must I do his coat cutting for a month yet?" protested the abused
Ersten. "Nobody can do it in New York for my customers but Heinrich
Schnitt and me."

"It may not be a month. Just now he might take some of your more
important work home, where the light is better. That would be working
for you in this place."

"Well, maybe," admitted Ersten puffing out his cheeks in frowning
consideration.

Johnny held his breath as he approached the crucial observation.

"By the time his eyes are rested you may have a better shop for the old
man to work in."

Ersten fixed him with a burning glare.

"I see it!" he ejaculated. "You put this job up to make me sell my
lease!"

Johnny looked him in the eye with a frank smile.

"Of course I did," he confessed. "I didn't know either you or Schnitt
until yesterday."

Ersten knit his bristling brows, but presently grinned.

"You're a smart young man," he complimented. "But I don't promise
Schnitt I move."

"Certainly not," agreed the smart young man, and mopped his brow. The
fight was won! "Here is exactly what you must say"--and he went
patiently over the entire dialogue again, word by word.

Ersten listened carefully with frowns at some parts.

"Well, I try it," he dubiously promised.

They were in front of Schoppenvoll's now; and Johnny, noting Ersten's
fretfulness, proved himself a keen student of psychology by suggesting:
"I'm thirsty for that special drink of yours, Ersten; but suppose we
put it off till after I've brought Schnitt."

"Oh, well, if you say so," returned Ersten with poorly assumed
indifference.

"It's as fine as a frog's feather!" Johnny assured Heinrich Schnitt
half an hour later.

"Will he move?" asked Heinrich.

"Yes, but you mustn't say anything about it"

"Well, I like to know it," returned Heinrich with proper caution.

"I have his pro