The address of young Lackman was the Hotel de Soto; and as he heard this, Peter's heart gave a leap.
"These people are spending lots of money for printing," said McGivney, "and we hear this fellow Lackman is putting it up.
Young Lackman conducted a school for boys, and when one of the boys did wrong, the teacher would punish himself instead of the boy!
Peter must pretend to be interested in this kind of "education," said McGivney, and he must learn at least the names of Lackman's books.
He had done his best, he declared; he had inquired at the desk, and waited and waited, but the hotel people had failed to notify him of Lackman's arrival.
He told about the sums he had been making and was expecting to make; he told about Lackman, and showed Nell the newspaper with pictures of the young millionaire and his school.
Peter had been made so bold by Nell's flattery and what she had said about his importance, that he did not go back to McGivney to take his second scolding about the Lackman case.
But young Lackman was a real millionaire, McGivney positively assured him; and so Peter was free to admire him in spite of all his freak ideas, which the rat-faced man explained with intense amusement.