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130 A Business with a Greenhorn How Mr. Tummler, a Business Broker, “Loined” a Greenhorn Who Got Merry Wid a Goil for Business. Retold Here in His Own Words You was saying how America was a lend of business? Never mine! Det’s how it’s suppose to be. But a fella getting merry wid a goil for business? Det, you’ll poddon me, is mean end doity. Now, I ain’t preaching no morality here, but I am telling you it’s a fect; when nine-end-ninety procent of grinnhorns in dis country is getting merry for business, it is making me med! End if I am meeting op wid such a kind of grinnhorn, belive me he don’t get off dry. You live it to me! Wanna hear a good one? Listen! One day I am sitting rond in mine office mailing de post when a grinnhorn come in. Yong fella, just a boychick. Him wid his wife—end what a wife!—a doll, pitchers end crimm. So, coming in he says, “Hiye! You Mr. Tummler Business Broker?” “Siddon! Yeh, so what’s de good void?” So he put his cods on de table end stotted telling me so-end-so, abot how he was a new boy just ten yiss in de country, by trade a knee-pents maker, abot how he fall in loff wid a goil which she was a woiking goil which got a tousend dollar in kesh, so den he got merry wid de goil, so now he was looking for a business so dey can make a living widdout boddering woiking in a shop because he got de rheumatism bad like you don’t wanna know, end so on. Minnwhile, I am giving de liddle woman de once-over, end I says to him, “So what business you got in mine, mister?” “Stationery!” he says, because det’s de kind of business he got in mine. Den he come out wid how wid a stationery store she can help out in de store. I minn, how you like det for a smotty-pents grinnhorn wid a noive? Because it ain’t enough he got his hends on soch a poifec peach to make whoopee wid plus make hay wid her tousend dollar in kesh, but he wants she should woik so he can sid rond wid his pels all day playing pinochle, end so on—because, mister, I know my pipple! Tinks I: You want A BUSINESS WITH A GREENHORN | 131 stationery? I give you stationery! Busted bladder widdout a pot is all de stationery you gonna get outta me, bub! Because I gonna fix it so you wish you was dead, mec. Because you gonna get a laundry, jeck. Wid me, you gonna be a laundrymen. End why a laundry? Because it so heppen I got a laundry on my hends to sell den. So I says to my grinnhorn: “What ye wanna bodder anyway wid a stationery store for,” I says, “pudding in a eighteen-hour day, looking out in case some schoolboy run in end swipe a penny-candy off de counter, end so on? You live it to me—because I can let you have a nice business , a laundry op in de Bvonx, det way you gonna woik reggler hours, end live like a king!” So den I take out a pencil end figger it out for him—so much de rent, so much de shoit-ironer, de femmily-ironer, de delivery boy, de laundry bill, end so on, which live you in de bleck wid over toity bucks a vick, clear—so what you want more? “How much it gonna cost?” So I says: “A tousend , we got us a bargain, only live it to me—for you, I’ll do it for eight honderd . All you gotta do,” I says, “is hend over de jeck, pick up de key, end you gonna be alright, mec. You do it blind. Minnwhile,” I says, “so long, pel, end come beck in tree more days, on account I ain’t got no more time now—so bye-bye!” Me? I get myself over to my laundrymen right away end tell him mazl tov: because God just finish sending a pigeon my way, a grinnhorn, so seeing how he got a chence now of getting rid of de laundry at a good price, provided he was a mentsh he’d know what to do abot it, end...

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