ash up after the trip, y'understand, it would be a whole lot better
as meeting him at the railroad depot and starting right in with the
speeches."

"What do you mean--give him a chance to wash up?" Morris asked. "Don't
you suppose he had a chance to wash up on the train, or do you think him
and Mrs. Wilson sat up all night in a day-coach?"

"I don't care if they had a whole section," Abe retorted; "it ain't the
easiest thing in the world to step off a train in a stovepipe hat, with
a clean shave, after a twenty-hour trip, even if it would of been one of
them eighteen-hour limiteds even, and begin right away to get off a lot
of _schmooes_ about he don't know how to express the surprise and
gratification he feels at such an enthusiastic reception, in especially
as he probably lay awake half the night trying to memorize the bigger
part of the speech following the words, 'and now, gentlemen, I wouldn't
delay you no longer.' So that's why I say if they would have let him go
to his hotel first, y'understand, why, then he--"

"But Mr. and Mrs. Wilson ain't putting up at no hotel. They are staying
with a family by the name of Murat," Morris explained.

"Relations to the Wilsons maybe?" Abe inquired.

"Not that I heard tell of," Morris replied.

"Well, whoever they are they've got my sympathy," Abe said; "because
once, when the Independent Order Mattai Aaron held its annual Grand
Lodge meeting in New York, me and Rosie put up the Grand Master, by the
name Louis M. Koppelman, used to was Koppelman & Fine, the Fashion
Store, Pottstown, Pennsylvania, and the way that feller turned the house
upside down, if he would have stayed another week with us, understand
me, I would have hired a first-class A number one criminal lawyer to
defend me and wired the relations for instructions as to how to ship the
body home."

"I bet yer the Murats feel honored to got Mr. and Mrs. Wilson staying
with them," Morris said.

"For the first few days maybe," Abe admitted, "but wait till a couple
weeks go by! I give them until January 1, 1919, and after that Mr. and
Mrs. Murat would be signaling each other to come up-stairs into the
maid's room and be holding a few ain't-them-people-got-no-home
conversations. Also, Mawruss, for the rest of their married life,
Mawruss, every time the tropic of who invited them in the FIRST place
comes up at meal-times, y'understand, either Mr. or Mrs. Murat is going
to get up from the table and lock themselves up