Five Thousand an Hour | Page 5

own and a tidy fortune besides. Your only chance
is to have that enormous land deal turn out a winner."
"It's worse than Lady S. Tore up my ticket long ago."
"Quite a plunge on a long shot, with a welsher like Collator! making
the book," commented Loring. "He stripped you clean."
"I have my appetite," insisted Gamble with a grin. His cheeks were
ruddy and his skin as flawless as a babe's, and his eyes-- exceptionally
large--were as clear as they were direct.
"An appetite like yours only makes it worse to be broke," laughed
Loring.
"There's a plenty of money in New York if I want any," responded
Gamble. "I don't need money, anyhow, Ashley. I have my mother
fixed- -and there's nobody else. Besides, I'm not broke. I have a
hundred. Do you know a good horse?"
"Nautchautauk," advised Loring, and they both turned in the direction
of the betting shed. "The price will probably be short; but I look on it as
an investment."

"You can't invest a hundred dollars," argued Gamble.
"You don't mean to say that a hundred's all you have in the world!"
returned Loring. "I thought you'd saved a good deal more than that out
of the wreck."
"I did; but my brother was broke," replied Gamble carelessly, and
stopped in front of a blackboard. The price on Nautchautauk was one
and a half to two. "I don't want a bet," he remarked, shaking his head at
the board; "I need an accident. I wonder if that goat Angora has horns
and a beard?"
"People try fifty-to-one shots just before they cut their throats," warned
Loring.
"Hide my safety-razor then. Angora carries my hundred. I'll feed a
sawbuck apiece to ten books."
Loring lost sight of him for a few moments, but found him outside, by
and by, in conversation with "Colonel" Bouncer, a heavily-jowled man
with grizzled hair and very friendly eyes which, however, could look
quite cold enough on occasion. The colonel was staring up at the box
occupied by the young lady to whom Loring had bowed.
"Bless my soul, I'm getting near-sighted!" he was saying as Loring
joined them. "Isn't that Paul Gresham up there with Miss Joy?"
"Is that her name?" asked Gamble eagerly. "Well, I believe it."
The colonel turned from him impatiently.
"You know Gresham, don't you, Loring? Is that he up there in that
box?"
"That is Saint Paul all right," answered Loring with a smile, as he
glanced up at the prim and precise Gresham, who had now succeeded
in fencing Miss Joy in a corner, away from the other young men.
"Thanks," said the colonel, and walked away abstractedly, his eyes still

turning in the direction of the box, although he did not even start to go
up into the grandstand.
"The colonel is still bargain-hunting," observed Loring with a laugh.
"His shoe-manufacturing business has increased to the point that he
must have more space--and he must have it at once. The only available
ground is Gresham's adjoining property, which Gresham long ago gave
up trying to sell him. The colonel is crazy to buy it now, but he's afraid
to let Gresham know he must have it, for fear Saint Paul will run up the
price on him. In consequence, he trails the man round like a love-sick
boy after an actress. When he finds Gresham he only looks at him--and
goes away. That's only half of the laugh, however. Gresham wants to
sell as badly as the colonel wants to buy, but he doesn't know where to
find a fancy market. Queer case, isn't it?"
"Yes," replied Gamble. "Who's Miss Joy?"
"For heaven's sake, Johnny, don't say you're hit too--even at long
distance!"
"Hit!" repeated Gamble--"I'm flattened out. I'm no lady-fusser, Ashley,
but I'm going to buy a new necktie."
"You don't even know she's rich, do you?" asked Loring, looking at
him with a curious smile.
"Of course I do!" asserted Johnny. "I saw her eyes. Who is she?"
"That's Miss Constance Joy--an orphan worth an exact million dollars;
although I believe there is some sort of a string to it," Loring told him.
"She lives with her aunt, who is Mrs. Pattie Boyden, and she's so pretty
that even women forgive her. Anything else you want to know?"
"Yes. Why do I want to bite Paul Gresham?"
"Hush!" admonished Loring. "He is the remnant of one of our very best
imported families, and he needs the money. He sells a piece of father's
property every year, and he haunts Miss Joy like a pestilence. I think

he's mixed up in her million some way or other. Aunt Pattie approves
of him very much; she is strong for family."
"I'll bite him yet," decided Gamble. "Say, Loring, how am I going to