“But, Johnny; you couldn’t build a hotel in forty days!”

“Build it!  I don’t want to.  I only want to promote it.”

“Does a promoter never build?” asked Polly.

“Not if he can escape,” replied Johnny.  “All a promoter ever wants to do is to collect the first ninety-nine years’ profits and promote something else.  Drive me up to the address on that real estate sign and I’ll pay you whatever the clock says and let you go.”

“The clock says a one-pound box of chocolates,” she promptly estimated.  “Wait, though.  I did send for some!” And she looked back into the tonneau.  “Why, drat it all!  I mislaid Sammy!” she gasped.

CHAPTER VI

IN WHICH CONSTANCE DECIDES ON A FAIR GAME

By three o’clock Johnny Gamble had acquired so much hotel information that his head seemed stuffed.  Every bright-eyed financier in the city had nursed the happy thought of a terminal hotel and had made tentative plans—­and had jerked back with quivering tentacles; for all the property in that neighborhood was about a thousand degrees Fahrenheit.  The present increase of value and that of the next half-century had been gleefully anticipated, and the fortunate possessor of a ninety-nine-year lease on a peanut stand felt that he was providing handsomely for his grandchildren.

Mr. Gamble detailed these depressing facts to his friend Loring with much vigor and picturesqueness.

“The trouble with New York is that everybody wants to collect the profits that are going to be made,” Loring sagely concluded.

“It’s the only way they can get even,” Johnny informed him.  “Well, that’s the regular handicap.  Guess I’ll have to take it.”

“You don’t mean to try to promote a hotel against such inflated values!” protested Loring.

“Why not?” returned Johnny.  “That section has to have a hotel.  The sporty merchants of the Middle West will pay the freight.”

“I guess so,” agreed Loring thoughtfully.  “Well, good luck to you, Johnny!  By the way, President Close of the Fourth National, has called you up twice this afternoon.  I suppose he’s gone, by now.”

“No, I think he stays to sweep out for the gold-dust,” surmised Johnny, and telephoned to the bank.  Mr. Close, however, had gone home an hour before.

“He’s sensible,” approved Loring, putting away his papers.  “This weather would tempt a mole outdoors.  I’m going to the ball game.  Better come along.”

“Too frivolous for me,” declared Johnny, eying his little book regretfully.  “There’s a thirty-five-thousand-dollar day almost gone.  All I can credit myself with is a flivver.  I’m going to stay right here on the job and figure hotel.”

At three-thirty Loring returned.

“So you’re not going to the game, Johnny?” he observed with a sly smile.

“At five thousand an hour!  Nev-ver!”