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!"

"Too bad," regretted Loring still smiling. "I just saw Constance and
Polly. They're going out."

Johnny promptly slammed several sheets of figures into a drawer.

"Is there room for me in your car?" he asked anxiously.

"Val Russel and Bruce Townley are with me. There's plenty of room--
but you really ought to stay here and figure on your hotel," Loring
advised him.

"I can figure any place," stated Johnny briskly, and put away his
little book. "Are we ready?"

The eyes of Constance Joy lighted with pleasure as she saw the group
which filed into the box adjoining the one in which she sat with
Polly Parsons, Paul Gresham, Colonel Bouncer, and Sammy Chirp; and
Gresham watched her discontentedly as she shook hands with Gamble.
He did not like the cordiality of that hand-shake, nor yet the
animation of her countenance. Neither did he like her first
observation, which consisted not of any remarks about health or the
weather, but about Johnny's intimate personal affairs.