; while on Sundays yet they play in
some vacant lots which Adelstern gets left on his hands from boom times
already, up in the Bronix somewheres."

"_Aber_ we got stuck _mit_ only improved property," Birsky protested,
"on Ammerman Avenue, a five-story, twelve-room house _mit_ stores,
which we bought from Finkman at the end of the boom times already, and
which we couldn't give it away free for nothing even; and what for a
baseball game could you play it on the roof of a new-law house on a lot
thirty-three by ninety-nine?"

"Such objection is nothing, Mr. Birsky," Eschenbach rejoined, "because
for five dollars a month the landlord here lets you use the roof
lunch-hours; and for a start I would get Adelstern he should lend you
his lots. Later you could get others, Mr. Birsky, because Mr. Adelstern
ain't the only one which gets stuck from boom times _mit_ Bronix lots
already. I bet yer there is hundreds of real-estate speculators which
stands willing to hire vacant lots for baseball Sundays, and they
wouldn't charge you more as a couple dollars, neither."

"Well," Birsky said, handing his visitor a cigar, "maybe you are right,
Mr. Eschenbach; but, anyhow, Mr. Eschenbach, we got here an elegant
line of popular-price goods which I should like for you to give a look
at."

"I got plenty time to look at your line, Mr. Birsky," Eschenbach
assured him. "I would be in town several days yet already; and before I
go, Mr. Birsky, I would like to see it if Adelstern's idees would work
out here."

"_Aber_ we are running our society on our own idees, Mr. Eschenbach,"
Zapp said.

"Quite right, too," Eschenbach agreed; "but I don't mind telling you,
Mr. Birsky, that Adelstern's baseball team is originally my idee, Mr.
Birsky--and if you don't mind, Mr. Birsky, I would like to look over
your employees and see if I couldn't pick out nine good men."

"For my part," Birsky said, rising to his feet, "you could pick out
twenty, Mr. Eschenbach."

Forthwith they proceeded to the rear of the loft, where the hundred odd
members of the mutual aid society were engaged in the manifold
employments of a cloak and suit factory, and the smiles and nods with
which they greeted their treasurer rekindled in Birsky and Zapp the
glow of virtue that to some degree had abated at Eschenbach's refusal
to examine their sample line.

"You see, Mr. Eschenbach," Birsky said proudly, "what a good feeling
the operators has for us. And you wouldn't believe how