"It is a pleasure to meet you, sir," said Jack, pleasantly, removing his hat and bowing to the young woman. "You are Mr.—"
"Dobbins, sir," returned the old man, effusively. "Joshua Dobbins. I thought I was going some on the money question, with seven gold mines in Nevada, but I must take off my hat to you, sir. Any man who has the nerve to buy New York—heavens!"
The old fellow took off his hat and mopped his brow, which had begun to perspire freely.
"Oh, I don't take any credit to myself for that," said Jack, modestly. "When a boy has a great-grandfather who dies and leaves forty million dollars to him in trust for fifty years before he was born, and that money accumulates until the unborn beneficiary is twenty-one years old, it means a rather tidy stockingful, I admit, but it isn't as if I'd made the money myself."
"Fuf-forty million accumulating interest for seventy-one years!" gasped Dobbins.
"Compound," said Jack, smiling sweetly at the girl at his side. "That's the deuce of it. I—I've got to do something to keep the income invested, and New York real estate, being the most expensive thing in sight, I've gone in for that as being the easiest way out."
"I—I suppose you are living here now?" asked Mr. Dobbins.
"No," said Jack. "Personally I don't care particularly for New York. I am just in town for a few days, stopping at the Waldorf."
"Why, so are we," interrupted the girl.
"Then," said Jack, gallantly, "the Waldorf possesses even greater attractions than I had supposed."