Dick Hamilton's Fortune Part 11

To those who have read some of my other books he will not be a stranger, for he was none other than Larry Dexter, whose various adventures I have described in "The Great Newspaper Series," starting with "From Office Boy to Reporter."

"Which one is the millionaire's son, with money to burn?" Larry asked, with a laugh that showed in his eyes. He was a little older than d.i.c.k.

"I suppose I am," answered the wealthy youth.

"I'm from the _Leader_," said Larry Dexter. "I've been sent to get your impressions of New York, and to ask whether you find it a good place to spend money. Do you mind talking for publication?"

There was such a winning way about this reporter, so different from that noticeable in many of the newspaper men d.i.c.k had been inflicted with, that the millionaire's son liked him at once. Larry did not take it for granted that d.i.c.k must submit to the questions, but, in a gentlemanly way, asked for permission to "write him up."

"I don't know that I can tell you anything that will be of interest to the paper," said d.i.c.k, "but I'll do my best."

"That's a relief," returned Larry. "I just came from a crusty old man--a professor who has discovered a new way of making milk keep--and he was so grouchy I couldn't get a word out of him. It's a big change to find somebody who will talk."

"Please don't make up a lot of silly, sensational stuff?" pleaded d.i.c.k.

"I'm tired of all that. I'm no different from other fellows."

"Oh, yes, you are!" interrupted Larry with a laugh. "You have millions of money, and you'll find that makes all the difference in the world. It will gain you friends, position--in fact, almost anything. At least so they tell me," he added with another smile. "I never had a million myself. But now let's get down to business. What do you think of New York? Can you spend money here as fast as you want to?"

"He came pretty near spending it faster than he wanted to last night,"

put in "Bricktop."

"How was that?" asked Larry quickly, feeling that there was "in the air," so to speak, a story out of the usual run.

Thereupon d.i.c.k told about the attempted bond swindle.

"Say, this is great!" exclaimed Larry. "This is the best yet! This beats having you talk about New York. Do me a favor, will you?"

"What is it?" inquired d.i.c.k. "If it's to buy some gilt-edged bonds, I'm afraid I'll have to decline."

"No, it's only this. Don't say anything about this bond business to any other reporters."

"I'm not likely to, unless they ask me to," replied d.i.c.k. "But why?"

"Because I want to get a beat out of it."

"A beat?" inquired "Bricktop," while the other boys looked puzzled.

"Yes. An exclusive story. I don't want the reporters for any other papers to get hold of it. If I have it all alone in the _Leader_ it will be a feather in my cap. News that no other paper has is the very best kind."?

"Gilt-edged, I suppose," put in d.i.c.k.

"That's it," replied Larry quickly. "Now don't tell any other reporters, will you?"

"Well, if they come here and ask about it, I can't say it wasn't so."

"No, I suppose not," a.s.sented Larry. "But, I tell you what you can do."

"What?"

"Go for a walk, and don't come back to the hotel until after my paper is out with the story. We publish in the afternoon and go to press about noon for the first edition. Would it be asking too much of you to do that?"

"No, for we were going out anyhow."

"Then come with me," suggested Larry. "I'll take you to the _Leader_ office and have a man show you how we make a newspaper. I guess no other reporters will come in there to get the story out of you," and he laughed in delight at the "beat" he had secured.

d.i.c.k and his friends were only too glad to get a chance to see a big paper printed, and soon they were on their way to the _Leader_ office, escorted by Larry.

"If any other reporters see me they'll think I'm taking some young men's club on a tour of the city," the young journalist remarked, as the little throng walked along. "Well, if they do, it will be a good way to throw them off the scent."

Larry reported to his city editor about having most unexpectedly come across a "big" story in connection with the young millionaire, and was told to "let it run for all it's worth."

"I'll see to it that the modern Croesus and his friends are entertained," said Mr. Newton, another reporter, who was told by Mr.

Emberg, the city editor, to show d.i.c.k and his chums around the newspaper plant.

It was getting close to edition time, and they noticed, with much amazement, how the reporters came hurrying in with the news they had gathered; how they sat down at typewriters and rattled it off; how it was corrected and edited; sent to the composing room in pneumatic tubes; set up on type-setting machines that seemed almost human; the type put into "forms" or strong steel frames; how a soft sheet of wet paper was pressed on the type and baked by steam until it took every impression and was the exact counterpart of a printed page.

The boys watched and saw that these baked sheets of paper, called "matrices," were sent to the stereotyping room, where, bent into a half-circle in a machine, they were filled with hot melted lead, which, hardening, took every impression of the cardboard.

Then the curved metal plates, each one representing a page of the paper, were clamped on a big press, that worked with a noise like thunder, and, in an instant, it seemed, white paper from a big roll, which was fed it at one end, came out printed, pasted, and folded newspapers at the other end of the machine.

A grimy boy gathered up an armful of them, as they kept piling up at the foot of a chute, which extended somewhere up inside the press. Mr.

Newton, who had escorted d.i.c.k and his friends about, took up one of the journals.

"There you are!" he shouted, above the rumble and roar of the press, as he handed d.i.c.k a paper.

The wealthy youth unfolded it. On the front page was the story of himself and "Colonel Dendon." It was under a "scare" head, which announced:

ATTEMPTED SWINDLE OF YOUNG MILLIONAIRE!

SHARPER TRIES TO SELL TO d.i.c.k HAMILTON, WHO RECENTLY INHERITED VAST WEALTH, WORTHLESS BONDS!

DETECTIVE ACTS IN TIME

"Humph!" murmured d.i.c.k, when he saw what a big story Larry had made of it. "If my father saw this he'd be worried."

"You're getting more famous than ever!" exclaimed Walter Mead.

"Looks so," admitted the young millionaire. "Well, I'm glad Larry got his beat, anyhow."

And it was a beat, for, when d.i.c.k got back to the hotel, the manager told him half the newspapers in New York had been calling him up to ask about the story.

CHAPTER IX

A CIRCUS COMES TO TOWN