THE
EINHORNS
629
told what he must do, warned to layoff the bottle
till
night. He
went away, hitch-gaited, talking to himself in words of menace, to
start
his
tasks. Mrs. Einhorn really was not a good housekeeper even
though she complained about the floor of the toilet or the old man's
spitting. But Einhorn was a thoughtful proprietor and saw to it
that everything was kept humming, running, flushing and constantly
improved-rats killed, cement laid in the backyard, machines cleaned
and oiled, porches retimbered, tenants sanitary, garb.age cans covered,
screens patched, flies sprayed. He was able to tell you how fast pests
multiplied, how much putty to buy for a piece of glazing, the right
prices of nails or clothesline or fuses and many such things; as
much as any ancient senator knew of husbandry before such con–
cerns came to be thought wrong. Then, when everything was under
control, he had himself taken into his office on the specially con–
structed chair with cackly castors. I had to dust the desk and get him
a coke to drink with his second cigarette, and he was already on his
mail when I got back. His mail was large-he had to have a lot
of it, and from many kinds of correspondents in all parts of the
country.
Let it be hot-for I'm reporting on summers, during vacations,
when I spent full time with him-and he was wearing his vest in
the office. The morning, this early, was often gentle prairie weather,
long before the rugged grind; it was like the naivety you get to
expect in the hardest, toughest-used people when you've been with
them long enough. I refer to business and heat of a Chicago sum–
mer afternoon. But it was breathing-time. The Commissioner hadn't
finished dressing yet; he went into the mild sun of the street in his
slippers; his galluses hung down, and the smoke of his Claro passed
up and back above his white hair, while
his
hand was sunk com–
fortable and deep below his waistband. And Einhorn, away back, the
length of the office, slit open his letters, made notes for replies, dip–
ped into his files or passed things on for me to check on- me, the
often stumped aide, trying to get straight what he was up to in
his numerous small swindles. In this respect there was hardly any–
thing he didn't get into, like ordering things on approval he didn't
intend to pay for-stamps, little tubes of lilac perfume, packages of
linen sachet, Japanese paper roses that opened in water and all the
sort of items advertised in the back pages of the Sunday supplement.
