Wednesday the Rabbi got wet

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

Rabbi Small saw Marcus Aptaker in the course of his regular pastoral visit to the hospital.

"How do you do. Rabbi. It's nice of you to stop by," Aptaker said politely.

"How are you feeling?" the rabbi asked gently as he drew a chair toward the bed.

Aptaker thawed a little. "All right, I guess, but kind of weak."

"Was this something sudden, or had you been ailing for some time?"

Aptaker shook his head wearily. "I don't know, maybe it was coming on and I didn't realize it, they say it's due to tension, well, I guess a man in business these days has plenty of tension, especially in the retail drug business where you don't know when you open in the morning that some crazy hippy isn't going to come in and take a shot at you. You learn to live with it, but I suppose it's building up all the time. Of course, the letter I got from you peopla didn't help any."

"A letter from us?" the rabbi asked, puzzled. "You mean from the temple? What kind of a letter?"

"The letter from your board of directors. You're a member, aren't you?"

"I— I attend the meetings by invitation of the president. I'm not actually a member."

"You mean you don't vote?"

"Yes, when I'm present I vote, but—"

"Well, the letter said it was by unanimous vote of the board, so you must’vevoted for it."

"Believe me, I know nothing about any letter sent you, Mr. aptaker. What did it say?"

"It said that you people couldn't renew my lease on account you were selling the block."

"I didn't even know you had asked for a renewal of your lease."

"Oh yes, Rabbi. See, when my lease was close to expiring, I wrote to Mr. Goralsky asking for a renewal. So he wrote back that I'd been a good tenant, and he was willing to give me a new lease on the same basis as the old one for five years and five years' option and that he'd send out the lease forms for me to sign."

"And he didn't?"

"Oh, he sent them out all right," said Marcus. "But there was this clause saying that I had to take out insurance for my plate glass, well, we'd crossed out that clause on previous leases, because I always took care of the plate glass myself. So I wrote him and asked he should cross out that clause."

"And he refused?"

Aptaker shook his head grimly. "No, he died. I was going to write to his son, Ben, but then I got this notice from the lawyers saying the property had been willed to the temple, so I wrote to you people and I didn't hear a word for weeks. It didn't bother me, you understand, because where it's an organization I figure there's bound to be some delay, and besides, I had sent the temple a copy of Goralsky's letter, then yesterday, I get an answer. It's from Chester Kaplan— he's your president, isn't he?— and he says the property has been sold to William Safferstein and I should contact him."

"And did you?" the rabbi asked.

"I only got it yesterday. Besides, what's the use where he's been after me to sell him my store?"

"Safferstein wants to buy your store?"

"He wanted to. Now he doesn't have to bother, he can just wait a couple of months for my lease to expire and just take it over."

"But why would Mr. Safferstein want your store? He's in the real estate business."

"Well, he does, the last few months he must have asked me a dozen times. See, he's got this brother-in-law who's a pharmacist, and he's always hitting him up for a loan which he never pays back, and being it's his wife's brother, he can't turn him down. So he got the idea of buying my store and setting him up in business for himself. Now, if he's hot after my store, why would he extend my lease?"

"But if you haven't asked him..."

Aptaker shook his head. "No need to, and if I did, it wouldn't be asking. It would be begging, he'd just turn me down."

"But if Safferstein came to see you several times when you'd refused the first time..."

Aptaker grinned. "That's different, that's business, maybe you wouldn't know, being a rabbi, but it's like this. Suppose somebody says he wants to buy your store, you don't ask how much he's offering because you don't want to appear too eager. Besides, you wouldn't want it to get around that you were interested in selling because that might suggest that business wasn't too good and it could hurt your credit. So you kind of fence with him. 'Why should I want to sell a good business?' Or 'Why do you want to buy a drugstore when you're not even a pharmacist?' See, you don't talk serious at first, well, every time he comes in, like to buy a paper or a pack of cigarettes, he raises the question, he doesn't mind my putting him off because he's a businessman, too, so he knows the score. But then he comes to see me at home, that means he's serious. So I’ve got to talk serious, too."

Aptaker had been lying on his back, but now he turned over on his side to face the rabbi directly. "I explained to him why I can't deal with him. You see. I don't think of it as my store to do with what I please. I got it from my father and I feel I should pass it on to my son. I mean, it's not a job that you can walk away from. Where you've got something you've worked for all your life and your father before you, and you've trained your son to take it over, you don't just sell it to some stranger because he offers you a few thousand bucks. It's a family thine. So I told him I'd have to talk it over with my son and see how he felt."

"And Safferstein would come in and ask if you'd heard from your son?"

"That's right, Rabbi. But a thing like this, you can't just write a letter. You got to sit down and talk it over."

"So when Safferstein would inquire, you'd tell him you hadn't heard yet."

"Uh-huh. Because what I had in mind was maybe to take a weekend off and go see Arnold in Philadelphia where he's working."

"But wasn't he here a few days ago?"

Aptaker's face reddened. "Yeah, but we didn't have a chance to talk. Something came up and he had to go back to Philadelphia."

"And now?"

"Well, now it makes no difference," Marcus said gloomily. "My lease will expire and maybe Safferstein will make me some kind of offer for my stock. More likely, I'll have to sell it to the auctioneers."

"Have you got the correspondence on all this, Mr. aptaker? I mean the request for renewal and—"

"Sure. I'm a very systematic man, Rabbi. I got a file of all the letters I received and carbons of the letters I sent."

"Could I see it?"

"Why not? You think you can do something?" Marcus asked eagerly, then regretfully, "Believe me, it's hopeless. It's all perfectly legal. It's just my tough luck that Goralsky died when he did."

"Still, I'd like to see the correspondence if I may."

"You're welcome to it. Rabbi. When I get out of here, remind me."

"Couldn't I see it before then? Perhaps your wife..."

"All right. It's in a folder in the store. When Rose comes tonight, I'll tell her to dig it out for you."