Page:The Popular Magazine v72 n1 (1924-04-20).djvu/85

 “Er—now—my secretary is a little deef. We're having his ears repaired next week. He didn't get your name off the wire this morning.”

“I'm Channing Lamont,” the other explained, taking the hint. “I want to speak with you on a confidential matter,” he added with a look in my direction.

“Talk freely,” Ottie invited. “This here is Joe O'Grady, a pal of mine. Joe wouldn't think no more of opening his mouth to pass a secret than I would of trying to catch a sardine in the middle of the Atlantic with my bare hands. From looking at you,” he rushed on, “I won't make no positive guarantee, but if I won't boil off ten or fifteen pounds of that excess baggage you're carrying around”

“One minute!” Lamont interrupted in a voice that matched his complexion. “You're evidently laboring under a false impression. I didn't come up here to reduce my avoirdupois, young man!”

“Ha-ha!” Scandrel guffawed. “Pardon my social error, er—what did you come up for?”

Lamont helped himself from his cigar case but neglected to pass it around.

“I'll explain as briefly as possible. First of all, have you ever heard of Tarkington van Riker?”

I had the bulge on Ottie there.

Any one whose literary education had not been neglected when it came to the daily newspapers had heard of Tarkington van Riker. The young man mentioned had been a sensation in Wall Street where, as a bucket-shop plunger, he had made and lost fortunes with the nonchalant ease of a colored hall boy matching pennies with the janitor. From what I remembered reading, Van Riker had been a clerk in a Stock Exchange house and had started his career by a three-dollar stock purchase that hadn't stopped growing until his winnings ran to the four-figure mark and the bottom had fallen out of the market.

Being busted meant as much to Tarkington van Riker as a run in a silk stocking to the wife of a hosiery manufacturer. After his first financial flop he sold a couple of dress suits and with the proceeds went back to take another tumble out of the ticker. From then on it was a case of him having it or not having it. A scenic railway was straight compared with Van Riker's ups and downs.

Channing Lamont acquainted Scandrel with these facts.

“Yeah? So this Van Riker's in Wall Street, is he? What do you want me to do—buy some of his stocks?”

Lamont glared.

“This Van Riker buccaneer is in love with my daughter Alice. Do you get that?—he's in love with my daughter Alice!”

“Well, what does that make me?” Ottie snickered.

“And my daughter Alice,” Lamont roared, “is in love with him!”

Scandrel looked at me and winked.

“I hear them tell how these things do happen now and then. What else?”

Lamont jammed his cigar back in his face.

“From information my daughter Alice dropped the other night at dinner I have learned that Van Riker is coming up here next week. After his last fiasco in the Street, his physician has advised a complete rest and change.”

“He'll get the change all right if he comes across with it!”

“My daughter Alice,” Lamont went on, “is also coming up here next week, ostensibly to visit her aunt who has a bungalow over at Rosewood. Do you grasp the plot?”

“Certainly. What do you think I am—thick? Er—I get it all. You want me to see that your daughter Alice and the Van Riker party don't lose no time in getting together for a fling at this pastime known as matrimony. Am I right or wrong?”

Channing Lamont climbed out of his chair. He threw the cigar away, bit the end from a fresh one and broke that in half.

“That's the very thing I don't want you to do! My daughter might be a silly, irresponsible girl but I don't intend to stand back and let her marry a common gambler like this Van Riker. I want you to do everything in your power to head them off. I want you to keep tabs on Van Riker and make certain that while he's here he isn't with her. I don't want him to see her. Nip this romance in the bud, keep them apart and I'll be willing to double the amount Van Riker pays you for the period of his rest cure!”

Ottie rubbed his hands like a secondhand clothes dealer at the sight of a bargain in a fur-lined coat.

“Fair enough! I'll step on love's young scheme like a grape! Just leave this to me, Mr.—now—Lamont. Knocking the man