Five Thousand an Hour

by George Randolph Chester

  "I'll sign an agreement to that effect," he promptly promised.

  "And how much do you offer us for the property?"

  "Two hundred thousand," he returned, making a conservative guess at the amount they must have paid for the two options.

  A deepening of the quinine expression told him that he had undershot the mark.

  "Two hundred and ten thousand," he quickly amended.

  A chocolate-cream expression struggled feebly with the quinine; and Johnny, who could translate the lines of the human countenance into dollars and cents with great accuracy, knew instantly that their two options had cost them thirty thousand dollars, and that he was offering the four ladies a profit of one thousand two hundred and fifty dollars' worth of gowns or diamonds each.

  "That will be the most I can give," he still further amended. "I am prepared to write you a check at any moment."

  "I think I can call a meeting at once," she informed him, and did so by telephone.

  Mrs. Sheats, who came over presently, was an angular woman who kept the expression of her mouth persistently sweet, no matter what her state of mind might be; and she was very glad indeed that, so long as Miss Purry insisted on permitting a building of any sort to be erected opposite the Slosher residence, they were protecting that estimable lady in her absence by insuring a structure of dignity and class.

  Mrs. Kettle, who was a placid lady of mature flesh and many teeth, and who carried ounces upon ounces of diamonds without visible effort, bewailed the innovation that Miss Purry was forcing on them, but felt a righteous glow that, under the circumstances, they were doing so nobly on behalf of Mrs. Slosher.

  Mrs. Mason, who was a little, dry, jerky woman whose skin creaked when she rubbed it, whose voice scratched and whose whole personality suggested the rasp of saw-filing, was in her own confession actuated by less affectionate motives.

  "I'm glad of it!" she snapped. "Mrs. Slosher is always talking about their superb river view and the general superiority of the Slosher location, the Slosher residence, the Slosher everything! I'm glad of it!"

  The other ladies felt that Mrs. Mason was very catty.

  At four o'clock that afternoon Johnny entered in his book:

  "May third. To seven hours—nine hours behind schedule—$35,000. To Purry speculation, $210,000."

  To offset this was:

  "May third. To a chance, $0."

  CHAPTER XI. IN WHICH JOHNNY EXECUTES SOME EXCEEDINGLY RAPID BUSINESS DEALS

  Sitting tight and watching the hands of his watch go round, with a deficit of five thousand dollars an hour piling up against him, was as hard work as Johnny Gamble had ever done; and yet he knew that, if he succumbed to impatience and went to the De Luxe Apartments Company before they came to him, he would relinquish a fifty per cent, advantage. He saw another day slipping past him, with a total deficit of sixteen hours behind his schedule—or an appalling shortage of eighty thousand dollars—when, at one o'clock on Thursday, the expected happened—and a brisk little man, with a mustache which would have been highly luxuriant if he had not kept it bitten off as closely as he could reach it, dropped in, inquired for Loring, jerked a chair as close to him as he could get it and said, in one breath: "Want to sell your river-view property?"

  "Certainly," replied Loring, in whose name the property stood. "Mr. Gamble is handling that for me. Mr. Chase, Mr. Gamble."

  Mr. Chase, holding to his chair, jumped up, hurried over to Johnny and once more jerked the chair close up.

  "How much do you want for it?" he asked.

  "Two hundred and seventy-five thousand."

  "Too much. I understand it's restricted to apartment-house purposes alone?"

  "Yes."

  "Not less than ten stories, and a minimum rental of three thousand dollars a suite?"

  "Yes."

  "You can't sell it for that price with those restrictions."

  "We can build on it," replied Johnny calmly.

  "You won't," asserted Mr. Chase with equal conviction. "You bought it to sell. I'll give you two hundred and fifty thousand."

  "No," refused Johnny quite bravely, though with a panicky feeling as he thought of that appallingly swift schedule.

  "All right," said Chase. "I'll hold the offer open at that figure for forty-eight hours. I think you'll come to it."

  "I doubt it," responded Johnny, smiling; but he was afraid he would.

  In less than an hour he received an unexpected call from Mrs. Guff, who was in such secret agitation that she quivered like jelly whenever she breathed.

  "Mr. Guff and myself have decided to take Miss Purry's river-view property off your hands, Mr. Gamble," was the glad tidings she conveyed to him, smiling to share his delight. "We can't think of letting that river view slip by us."

  "I'm glad to hear it," he announced with gratification, as he thought of Mr. Chase. "Have you secured the consent of your partners in the option to waive the apartment-house requirements?"

  "Oh, no!" she ejaculated, shocked that any one should think that possible. "We have decided to build the apartment-house and to live there."

  "To live there!" he repeated, remembering the elaborate Guff residence.

  "Yes, indeed!" she enthusiastically exclaimed. "You know the property slopes down to the river beautifully, and exquisite, private, terraced gardens could be built there. We could take the entire lower floor of the apartment building for ourselves, with a private driveway arched right through it; and we could take the first three floors of the rear part for our own use, with wonderful Venetian balconies overlooking the terraces and the river. The remaining apartments would have entrances on the two front corners, leaving us all the effect of a Venetian palace. Don't you think that's clever?"

  "It is clever!" he repeated with smiling emphasis, and mentally raising Chase's ultimatum ten per cent.

  "I suppose you'll want to charge us more for the property than you paid for it," she suggested with a faint hope that maybe he might not, since he had bought it so recently—and through them.

  "That's what I'm in business for," he blandly acknowledged. "I can let you have the property for two hundred and seventy-five thousand dollars."

  "How much did you say?" she gasped.

  "Two hundred and seventy-five thousand."

  "Why, it's an outrage!" she puffed. "You paid only two hundred and ten thousand for it yesterday."

  "I'm not telling you its cost to me yesterday, but its value to- day," he reminded her.

  Mrs. Guff had helped her husband to his business success in the early days—and she had driven bargains with supply men which had made them glad when she was ill.

  "You may keep the property," she wheezed. "Nobody will pay that price—not even William Slosher; and he'll buy anything if his wife pouts for it in the ridiculous French clothes she's brought back with her."

  "So the Sloshers are back?" he guessed, with an understanding, at last, of her agitation.

  "They came last night," she admitted, inflating with a multitude of feelings. "The most ungrateful people in the world! So far from being thankful for the time and pains and money we spent to protect them, they're viciously angry and are making threats—positive threats—that they will disgrace the entire neighborhood!"

  "Do you refuse this property at two hundred and seventy-five thousand?" Mr. Gamble interestedly wanted to know.

  "Certainly I do!" she emphatically declared, positive that no human being would pay that absurd increase in valuation.

  "Then the price is withdrawn," he told her; and she left him, puzzling mightily over that last remark.

  Johnny Gamble was a man of steady nerves, yet even he fidgeted until three o'clock for fear Mr. Slosher would not call him up. At that hour, however, Mr. Slosher called in person, accompanied by his wife. There is no need to describe Mr. Slosher, who was merely an elderly gentleman of much vigor and directness; and it is impossible to describe Mrs. Slosher, who was never twice alike, anyhow, being merely the spirit of a beautiful ever cha
nging youth in a body of beautiful ever changing habiliments.

  "What do you want for the river-view property you have just purchased?" Mr. Slosher demanded.

  "I don't know," confessed Johnny, laughing. "The valuation is going up so rapidly that I can't keep track of it myself. Mrs. Guff was just in, asking the price."

  Mrs. Slosher tapped the toe of a beautiful satin carriage slipper impatiently upon the floor, and a very bright red spot glowed on each cheek; but she did not say a word. She only looked at her husband. Mr. Gamble had a queer idea that her mere gaze could, on an occasion like this, burn holes through a cake of ice. Certain it is that Mr. Slosher turned quickly to her—and then, as if he had been galvanized, turned back to Johnny.

  "I'll give you until to-morrow night to secure your highest offer and then I'll add five per cent, to it," he stated.

  "You understand the restrictions, I suppose?" ventured Johnny.

  "Perfectly. My kind neighbors have handed me a ten-story apartment- house, with a minimum rental per suite of three thousand dollars a year. I'm going to build their neighborhood ornament and fill it with high-toned niggers!"

  Mrs. Slosher smiled. She was a beautiful young woman. To youth belongs much.

  Johnny Gamble, caught amidships, as it were, snorted.

  "Well, I don't live out there," he said.

  Mr. Slosher smiled.

  "That is all, I believe," he announced as he assisted Mrs. Slosher to her feet with that punctilious gallantry which defies a younger man to do it better.

  At four o'clock Jim Guff called Mr. Gamble on the telephone.

  "Hello, Gamble!" he hailed in an entirely new voice. "You're a robber!"

  "You flatter me," returned Johnny quite comfortably. "Is there anything I can do for you in that line?"

  "A whole lot," replied Guff. "I'll accept the price you gave Mrs. Guff on that river-view site."

  "Too late," answered Johnny cheerfully. "I withdrew that offer before Mrs. Guff left the office. Mr. and Mrs. Slosher have been in since then."

  Jim Guff's voice cracked as he hastily said:

  "I'll meet any offer he makes you and tack a five-thousand-dollar bonus to it."

  Johnny called up the De Luxe Apartments. Company and secured the ear of Mr. Chase.

  "I withdraw my offer of two hundred and seventy-five thousand for that river-view property," he stated." What is the best bid you will make me above that figure?"

  "I'm not inclined to scramble for it," immediately claimed Mr. Chase, who was aware at the time that he was telling a point-blank lie.

  "Very well, then," said Johnny, wondering how he was to get a definite figure without committing himself. "I'll have to drop you out of my calculations."

  "When must you know?"

  "To-morrow morning."

  "You're bluffing!" charged Mr. Chase scornfully.

  "I have two very earnest bidders for the property," insisted Johnny with dignity—and completed his bluff, if Chase cared to regard it that way, by hanging up his receiver.

  Before he left the office he entered in his books:

  "May 4. Sold; but I don't know who to or at what price. Close to schedule, though."

  He entered the next day in advance:

  "May 5. The Babies' Fund Fair—Holiday. Nothing doing."

  CHAPTER XII. IN WHICH JOHNNY EVEN DOES BUSINESS AT THE BABIES' FUND FAIR

  "I wish I could write poetry," regretted Johnny, looking across at Constance Joy in the violet booth.

  "Why don't you try it?" asked Polly Parsons, following his gaze and comprehending his desire perfectly, for she, too, was a rabid Constancite.

  "I did," he confessed with a disappointed laugh. "I hadn't the nerve to be mushy enough, though—and nothing else seems to be real poetry. I got one line that listened like the goods, but I couldn't match it up: 'As I lie awake and look at the stars—' Pretty good start, eh? How do you find a rhyme for it?"

  "You go down through the alphabet," Polly advised him, rather proud to be able to answer him so promptly. "Bars, cars, fars, jars—that way, you know. How I found out is that Sister Winnie writes so much poetry."

  "She's a great kid," laughed Johnny. "Where is she?"

  "Round here some place, giving orders to Sammy Chirp. Why are you loafing this afternoon? You're supposed to be making five thousand dollars an hour, but I don't see any chance for it here."

  "It's a holiday," he retorted. "You're loafing yourself. I see it's on the program that you're to sell a quarter's worth of violets and a smile, for five dollars a throw at the boutonniere booth. Notice how I said boutonniere?"

  "You got it out of a book," charged Polly disdainfully. "I called Constance over from the candy booth to take my place because a gray- haired rusher came back seven times to have me pin violets on his coat—and I couldn't smile any more. There he goes now. That's his second trip for Constance."

  "This is a cruel world. I suppose it would fuss her all up if I dropped him out of a window," Johnny observed wistfully.

  "Constance doesn't need help. Just watch her!" And Polly grinned appreciatively as Constance, recognizing and sorting the tottering lady-killer at a glance, took his money handed him a nosegay and a pin, and returned to the back of the booth to arrange her stock:

  A huge blot of orange and a thin streak of lavender paused on the other side of the palms. Johnny wondered to see these two enemies together, but no man could know the satisfaction they took in it.

  "The violet booth," read the big blot of orange, adjusting her gold lorgnette to the bridge of her globular nose and consulting her catalogue. "Friday afternoon: Polly Parsons and Mrs. Arthur Follison. That is not Mrs. Follison in the booth, is it?"

  "Oh, no, Mrs. Guff!" protested the thin streak of lavender in a rasping little lavender voice. "Mrs. Follison, though not a doll- face—indeed, far from it—is of most aristocratic bearing."

  "I suppose that person in the booth, then, is the adopted actress," guessed Mrs. Guff. "Any one can tell that's beauty and movement of the professional type."

  Johnny looked at Polly with hasty concern, but that young lady was enjoying the joke on Constance and gripped his arm for silence.

  "One can quite understand how poor Billy Parsons might become infatuated with her doll-face," returned Miss Purry pityingly, since she was herself entirely free from the crime of doll-facedness; "but that the Parsons should adopt such a common person merely because Billy died before he could marry her was inconsiderate of the rest of our class."

  "The artfulness of her!" exclaimed the thick one, lorgnetting the graceful Constance with a fishy eye as the temporary flower girl joyously greeted Ashley Loring and Val Russel and Bruce Townley, pinned bouquets upon them and exchanged laughing banter with them.

  "Dreadful!" agreed the shocked thin one. "Those are the very wiles by which doll-faced stage women insnare our most desirable young men."

  Constance looked about just then in search of Polly, and her eyes lighted as they saw Johnny standing with her.

  "Oh, Polly!" she called.

  "Coming, Constance!" returned the hearty and cheery voice of Polly from just behind the critics.

  The ladies in lavender and orange were still gasping when Johnny Gamble passed them with Polly. He had made up his mind about the river-front property.

  Loud acclaim hailed Polly and Johnny, for where they went there was zest of life; and the boys, knowing well that Johnny never wore flowers, made instant way for him at the violet booth.

  "I'll take some blue ones, lady," announced Johnny gamely, intending to wear them with defiance.

  "I'll give you the nearest we have, mister," laughed Constance, and promptly decorated him.

  Since this was the closest her face and eyes had ever been to him, he forgot to pay her and had to be reminded of that important duty by Polly and all the boys in unison. There was a faint evasive trace of perfume about her, more like the freshness of morning or the delicacy of starlight than an actual essence, he vaguely thought with a
groping return to his poetic inclination. He felt the warmth of her velvet cheek, even at its distance of a foot away, and there seemed to be a pulsing thrill in the very air which intervened. For a startled instant he found himself gazing deep down into her brown eyes. In that instant her red lips curved in a fleeting smile—a smile of the type which needs moist eyes to carry its tenderness. It was all over in a flash, only a fragment of a second, which seemed a blissful pulsing eternity; and at its conclusion he thought that her finger quivered as it brushed his own, where he held out the lapel of his coat, and her cheek paled ever so slightly—but these were dreams, he knew.

  "I'm next, I think," grated a usually suave voice which now had a decided tinge of unpleasantness; and Paul Gresham, selecting a bunch of violets from the tray, held them out toward Constance, impatient to end the all too pretty tableau.

  "Next and served," Polly briskly told him; and, taking the boutonniere from his fingers, she whisked it into place and pinned it and extracted his money—all apparently in one deft operation.

  "Thanks," said Gresham, blinking with the suddenness of it all and sweeping with a glance of gloomy dissatisfaction, Polly, the bouquet, Constance and Johnny. "I thought you were to be in the caramel booth, Constance."

  "I'm just going back," she informed him, pausing to straighten Johnny's lapel, patting it in place and stepping back to view the result with a critical eye. It seemed to need another coaxing bend and another pat, both of which she calmly delivered.

  A handsome passing couple caught Johnny's eye—a keen and vigorous- looking elderly gentleman, and Springtime come among them in the pink and white of apple blossoms—sweet and fresh and smiling; as guileless as the May itself, but competent!

  "Excuse me," said Johnny, and tore himself away from the girl whose natural beauty made Mrs. Slosher an exquisite work of art. "Beg your pardon, Mr. Slosher."

  Mr. Slosher turned and smiled.

  "Hello, Mr. Gamble!" he greeted him, while Mrs. Slosher gave him a bright and cheery little nod. "I played old-fashioned army poker with Colonel Bouncer and Ben Courtney and Mort Washer and Joe Close last night—and the old robbers skinned me out of thirty-two dollars. They spoke of you during the game and I guess you could get backing to any amount in that crowd."