HOW I WAS BEAT.
Sam Houstin and Harry Monell were in business with me working the Missouri Pacific, and we were very successful, making a great deal of money. During the summer we played the bank, and in the winter operated on the river and Southern roads. Immediately after the big fire we resolved to go to Chicago, but, at the last minute, Houstin was unable to go; but I told him he should be in with the play, and share the profits as if he was along.
Monell and I started, and made a few hundred dollars, and when Houstin joined us he received his share of the spoils. We were all stopping at the Tremont House, on Lake Street. We made a little money, and one Sunday morning I arose early, and resolved to go out on the road about twenty miles. While waiting for breakfast I made the acquaintance of a gentleman from Texas, who had just sold some cattle that he had brought with him. We had a cocktail together, and I sent the porter to awaken my partners, whom I duly introduced to the stranger, letting them know that he had money, and to keep a sharp lookout on him until Monday morning. When I returned at night I found that my partners had beat the Texan, and he had Houstin locked up in jail. I carried him down a good supper from a restaurant, and then hunted up the Texan, who told me that he had started in betting, and at first won and then lost $7,600, and that his only object in arresting Houstin was to scare him so as to get his money back. The other man he could not find. He said he had gambled when in Texas, but these fellows were too smart for him, and that he could not afford to lose that money.
When the case was called for trial, the Judge dismissed it on the ground that they were all gamblers. Nothing was said about the settlement of the game for a couple of days, when one morning they both arose, paid their bills, and skipped, and I never received a cent of that money. I have since learned that Monell is doing time at Sing Sing, along with "Paper Collar Joe," while Houstin is an old man trying to lead a square life, I understand, down in Florida. The late Sherman Thurston once said to me, "George, those fellows are rotten apples;" but I did not heed his advice, and let them alone.