WAR-TIME SILHOUETTES


I


MR. REISS'S FINAL GRIEVANCE

Mr. Adolf Reiss, merchant, sits alone on a gloomy December afternoon.
He gazes into the fire with jaundiced eyes reflecting on his grievance
against Life. The room is furnished expensively but arranged without
taste, and it completely lacks home atmosphere. Mr. Reiss's room is,
like himself, uncomfortable. The walls are covered with pictures, but
their effect is unpleasing; perhaps this is because they were bought
by him as reputed bargains, sometimes at forced sales of bankrupt
acquaintances Making and thinking about money has not left Mr. Reiss
time to consider comfort, but for Art, in the form of pictures and
other saleable commodities, he has a certain respect. Such things if
bought judiciously have been known to increase in value in the most
extraordinary manner, and as this generally happens long after their
creators are dead, he leaves living artists severely alone. The essence
of successful speculation is to limit your liability.

Mr. Reiss is a short, stoutish, ungainly man past seventy, and he suffers
from chronic indigestion. He is one of those people of whom it is
difficult to believe that they ever were young.