The Competitive Nephew Part 55

"A fine diamond!" Daiches exclaimed. "What d'ye mean?"

"I mean, if you wouldn't say nothing to Borrochson about them diamonds what I stuck it in my waistcoat pocket before he seen 'em, as soon as we close the deal I give you one. Because if you should say something to Borrochson, it would bust up the deal; and might he would sue me in the courts for the diamonds already."

A shrewd glitter came into Daiches' eyes.

"That's where you make it a mistake, Mr. Wolfson," he said. "If you give it me the diamond now, Mr. Wolfson, I sure wouldn't say nothing to Borrochson about it, because I run it the risk of losing the diamond if I do. But if you wouldn't give it me the diamond till after the deal is closed, then you wouldn't need to give it me at all; y'understand?"

Wolfson stopped short in the middle of the sidewalk.

"You are a fine schwindler!" he said.

"Whether I am a schwindler or I ain't a schwindler, Mr. Wolfson, is got no effect on me," Daiches replied stolidly; "for otherwise, if I don't get it the diamond right this minute I will go back and tell it all about the diamonds to Borrochson."

Wolfson clenched his right fist and grasped Daiches by the shoulder with his left hand.

"You dirty dawg!" he began, when a tall, slender person b.u.mped into him. The intruder was muttering to himself and his face was ghastly with an almost unnatural whiteness.

"Rubin!" Wolfson cried, and stared after the distracted Rubin who seemed to stagger as he half ran down the street.

"Leggo from my arm," Daiches said, "or I'll----"

Wolfson came to himself with a start. After all, Rubin would be around the next day to buy back his safe, and Wolfson argued that he might as well be rid of Daiches.

"All right, Daiches," he said, "I'll give you a diamond."

He stopped under a lamppost and carefully placed the six diamonds in a little row on the flat of his hand between his second and third fingers. Then he selected the smallest of the six stones and handed it to Daiches.

"Take it and should you never have no luck so long as you wear it," he grunted.

"Don't worry yourself about that, Mr. Wolfson," Daiches said with a smile. "I ain't going to wear it; I'm going to sell it to-morrow."

He folded it into a piece of paper and placed it in his greasy wallet, out of which he extracted a card.

"Here is also my card, Mr. Wolfson," he said with a smile. "Any time you want some more work done by safes, let me know; that's all."

When Borrochson and Wolfson met the next afternoon in the office of the latter's attorney, Henry D. Feldman, they wasted no courtesy on each other.

"Feldman has sent up and searched the Register's office for chattel mortgages and conditional bill-off-sales, and he don't find none,"

Wolfson announced. "So everything is ready."

"I'm glad to hear it," Borrochson said. "When I get into a piece of business with a bloodsucker like you, Wolfson, I am afraid for my life till I get through."

"If I would be the kind of bloodsucker what you are, Borrochson,"

Wolfson retorted, "I would be calling a decent, respectable man out of his name. What did I ever done to you, Borrochson?"

"You tried your best you should do me, Wolfson," Borrochson replied.

"You judge me by what you would have done if you had been in my place, Borrochson," Wolfson rejoined.

"Never mind," Borrochson said. "Now we will close the whole thing up, and I want it distinctively understood that there should be no comebacks, Wolfson. You seen it my stock and fixtures, also my safe?"

"Sure I seen it and examined everything, and I don't take your word for nothing, Borrochson," Wolfson declared as they were summoned into the presence of Feldman himself.

There Borrochson executed a bill-of-sale of the stock, fixtures, and safe, in which he swore that he was their sole owner.

"It is distinctively understood," Borrochson said, as he dipped his pen in the ink to sign the affidavit, "that I don't guarantee nothing but what I am the owner of the goods. Quality and quant.i.ty he got to judge it for himself."

Mr. Feldman bowed.

"In the absence of a specific warranty the same doctrine applies in this as in any other case," he replied sonorously, "and that is the doctrine of _caveat emptor_."

"Caviare?" Wolfson murmured in complete mystification. "What for caviare is that?"

"_Caveat_, not caviare," Feldman replied. "_Caveat emptor_ means 'Let the purchaser beware.'"

Wolfson heaved a deep sigh.

"I bet yer it applies in this case," he commented; "if ever a purchaser had to beware it is in this case."

Borrochson grunted and then pocketed Wolfson's certified check for the balance of the purchase price, including the four hundred dollars due for the safe. A minute later he departed, leaving Feldman alone with his client.

"Mr. Feldman," he said as soon as Borrochson had gone, "supposing a feller thinks that a safe has got diamonds into it, and supposing I got that safe, but I know there ain't no diamonds into it because I took 'em out already. And supposing that feller doesn't think that I know there was diamonds into the safe because them diamonds was supposed to be in a secret apartment what he only is supposed to know it. Supposing he buys the safe from me, thinking them diamonds is still into it, and pays me six hundred dollars for a safe what is only worth fifty. Would there be any comeback?"

"Decidedly not. And I sincerely hope you haven't been buying any such safe."

"_Gott soll huten!_" Wolfson exclaimed.

"No, indeed, there will be no recourse to the vendor," Feldman replied.

"The doctrine of _caveat emptor_ would apply in that case, too."

Wolfson was effusive in his thanks and hastened to return to his recently acquired jewellery business.

When he left the elevated station on the way to the store Wolfson glanced around him for the haggard features and the attenuated form of Rubin, but without avail. He unlocked the store door and immediately made a thorough examination of the stock and fixtures. Nothing was missing, and, after consulting the figures furnished him by Borrochson, he succeeded in opening the combination lock of the Rubin safe. He took out the top drawer on the left-hand side and scrutinized it carefully.

No one could have detected the secret slide, which was now replaced.

Nevertheless, he found that, unless the drawer was handled with the utmost delicacy, the secret slide invariably jerked out, for the slightest jar released the controlling spring.

"The wonder is to me," he muttered, "not that Daiches and me discovered it, but that Borrochson shouldn't have found it out."

He pondered over the situation for several minutes. If Rubin came in to buy the safe, he argued, the first thing he would do would be to look at the drawer, and in his feverish haste the slide would be bound to open. Once Rubin saw that the diamonds were missing the jig would be up and he, Wolfson, would be stuck with the safe. At length he slapped his thigh.

"I got it," he said to himself. "I'll shut the safe and lock it and claim I ain't got the combination. Borrochson must have changed it when he bought it at Rubin's bankruptcy sale, and so Rubin couldn't open it without an expert, anyhow. And I wouldn't bargain with Rubin, neither.

He wants the safe for five hundred dollars; he shall have it."

After emptying it of all its contents he closed and locked the safe and sat down to await developments. Four o'clock struck from the clock tower on Madison Square and Rubin had not arrived yet, so Wolfson lit a fresh cigar and beguiled his vigil with a paper he had found under the safe.

"I guess I'll lock up and go to my dinner," he said at eight o'clock.