"We"ll consider that a bargain," offered Gamble.
"All right," returned Courtney, smiling. "We"ll shake hands on it in the good old-fashioned way." And they did so, under Colonel Bouncer"s earnestly interested approval.
"Tell him your troubles," urged the colonel. "If it were my case, Ben, I"d be yelling for help as long as I had breath in my body."
"It"s very simple," explained Courtney. "I imagined that a big hotel at the new terminal station would be the best investment in New York. I spoke to a number of my financially active friends about it and they were enthusiastic. I had verbal promises in one day"s work of all the money necessary to finance the thing. I found that the big vacant plot across from the station was held at a prohibitive price. Mallard & Tyne had, with a great deal of labor, collected the selling option on the adjoining block, fronting the terminal. They held it at two and a quarter millions. My friends, at an infernal luncheon, authorized me, quite orally, indeed, to secure the cheaper site without a moment"s delay, especially since it was rumored that Morton Washer was contemplating the erection of a hotel upon that very spot."
"I see the finish," laughed Johnny. "Mad with fear, you dashed right down there and broke yourself! Then Union Pacific fell off an eighth; they killed an insurrecto in Mexico; the third secretary of a second-rate life-insurance company died and Wall Street put c.r.a.pe on the door. All your friends got cold feet and it was the other fellow who had urged you to buy that property. The colonel says you dropped a hundred and twenty-five thousand. That"s a stiff option. Can"t you get any of it back?"
"Get it back!" groaned Courtney. "They"re after the balance. It wasn"t an option--it was a contract. If I don"t pay the remainder at the end of the ninety days they"ll sue me; and I have several million dollars"
worth of property that I can"t hide."
Gamble shrugged his shoulders resignedly.
"Your only chance is to build or sell," he decided. "It"s your property, all right. Have you offered it?"
"Old Mort Washer wants it--confound him! I"ve discovered that the day after I bought this ground he told my friends that he intended to buy the big piece and build in compet.i.tion; and they ran like your horse--Angora--last Sat.u.r.day, Gamble. Now Washer offers to buy this ground for two and an eighth millions--just the amount for which I will be sued."
"Leaving you to try to forget the hundred and twenty-five thousand you"ve already spent," figured Gamble. "Nice cheery thought of Washer"s! Of course you applauded?"
"With a brick--if I"d had one!" declared Courtney still angry.
Johnny smiled and looked thoughtfully out over the sunlit greensward.
There were electrifying plays down there; but, "fan" though he was, he did not see them. Something in the tingle of it, however, seemed to quicken his faculties.
"Sell me that block, Mr. Courtney," he suggested with a sudden inspiration.
The mad mob rose to its feet just then and pleaded with Sweeney to "Hit "er out!" Shrieks, howls and bellows resounded upon every hand; purple-faced fans held their clenched fists tight to their b.r.e.a.s.t.s so that they could implore the louder.
"On what terms?" shouted Courtney into Johnny"s ear.
"I"ll take over your contract," yelled Johnny beneath Courtney"s hat brim.
"On what terms?" repeated Courtney at the top of his voice.
"Bless your heart, Sweeney, slam it!" shrieked the now crimson-visaged colonel. He was standing on his chair, with distended eyes, and waving his hat violently.
"Your original price!" loudly called Johnny. "Pay you fifteen thousand now, fifty thousand in thirty days and the balance in sixty."
Sweeney fanned. The atrocious tumult was drowned, in the twinkling of an eyelash, in a dismal depthless gulf of painful silence. One could have heard a mosquito wink.
"Where"s my security?" bellowed Courtney in Johnny"s ear, so vociferously that all the grandstand turned in that direction and three park policemen headed for the riot.
"Just come outside and I"ll tell you," whispered Johnny with a grin.
"Ashley, how do you like your car?" asked Polly in the groaning calm which followed Sweeney"s infamous strike-out.
"I"m just designing a private medal for the builder," replied Loring.
"Self-cranker, isn"t it?"
"Self-cranker, automatic oiler, and supplies its own gasolene. Why?"
"Well, Constance is talking of buying one, and mine is a little too muscular for her. Suppose you take her for a spin after the game and deliver her safely to her Aunt Pattie. I"ll take the boys back in my car."
"I"m cheating you in the exchange, but my conscience doesn"t hurt me in the least," accepted Loring with alacrity.
"I"ve never been in your car, Ashley," insinuated Gresham. "You might invite me to try it out too."
"At five-thirty to-morrow evening," Ashley coolly advised him. "I"d be very glad to have you come along now; but the car is engaged for a strictly private demonstration."
Since the others were prepared to guy him unmercifully if he persisted, Gresham hinted no more and, very much to his discomfort, saw Loring gaily drive away with Constance.
On Riverside Drive, Loring spent the first fifteen minutes in extolling the virtues of his car and Constance listened with patient attention; but during the first convenient silence she surprised Loring with a bit of crisp business talk.
"Would you mind telling me the history of Mr. Gamble"s partnership with Mr. Collaton?" she asked.
"I guess I heard what you said," he returned doubtfully, and he looked at her in astonishment. "Of course you know that Johnny is a client of mine."
"I know that he is a friend of yours also," she reminded him.
"On that basis I"ll tell you anything you want to know," laughed Loring. "Johnny was doing an excellent business in real estate speculation when this man Collaton came to him with an enormous irrigation scheme. They formed a partnership. Collaton went out West to superintend the reclaiming of some thousands of acres of arid land, while Johnny stayed here to sell rose-bordered farms to romantic city home seekers. Collaton spent money faster than Johnny could get it, and operations had to be discontinued. Johnny has been paying the debts of the concern ever since. Every time he thinks he has them cleared off, a new set bobs up; and, since the books and all the papers are lost, he can"t prove or disprove anything. Johnny can"t even dissolve the partnership so long as there are indefinite outstanding accounts. Now, Constance, I"m not a good lawyer or I would not, even in strict confidence like this, say the following, to wit and namely: I think Collaton is a plain ordinary sneak-thief."
They were both silent for a little time.
"Doesn"t it seem rather strange that the people who hold claims against Mr. Gamble should just happen to attach his bank-account on the very day he was expected to make a deposit, and for the identical amount?"
Constance asked in a puzzled way.
Loring gave her a startled glance.
"It does seem strange," he admitted.
"It would almost seem as if these people had been informed by some one who knew Mr. Gamble"s circ.u.mstances quite intimately," she went on.
"That is a very delicate matter to discuss," Loring, with professional caution, gravely reminded her, fearing that she might mention Gresham"s name.
"You are quite right," she agreed. "What does Mr. Gamble think about it all?"
"Johnny does a lot of thinking and a lot of talking, but you can"t hear what he thinks," replied Loring with a smile. "He is outwardly a.s.suming--and where Collaton is certain to have it repeated to him--that Collaton was merely unfortunate; but I believe he is only waiting for a proof--and then I imagine he will drop on Collaton and whoever is helping him like a ton of pig-iron."
"I hope he does!" declared Constance with such sudden vindictiveness that Loring laughed.
"You seem to have acquired a violent partisanship," he charged her with a curious smile.
"Yes, I have," she admitted with a slight flush. "I like fair play. I believe I have a very even temper, but it angers me to see any one so open and manly and generous as Mr. Gamble made a victim of mean trickery."
"He"s a handsome boy too," commented Loring, grinning.