Phon was a character in his way, and a good one at that; a little wizen, yellow body, with an especially long pig-tail coiled up on his head like a turban; eyes and tongue which were in perpetual motion, and a great affection for the two white men, who treated him with the familiarity of old friendship.
"What are you in such a deuce of a hurry for to-night, Phon?" asked Corbett a little later, when the Chinaman rushed in to take away the remains of dinner.
"S'pose I tell you, you no let me go?" replied the fellow, half interrogatively.
"Go! of course I'll let you go. I couldn't help myself, I suppose. Where are you going to—the hee-hee house?"
"No, no. Hee-hee house no good. No makee money there. Pay all the time. Me go gamble."
"Gamble, you idiot! What, and lose all your pay for a month?"
"'Halo' (anglice not) lose. Debbil come to me last night; debbil say, 'Phon, you go gamble, you win one hundred dollars.' I go win, you see."
"Please yourself. You'll see as much of that hundred dollars as you did of the devil. Who's that calling?"
Phon went out of the tent for a moment and then returned, and holding up the tent flap for someone to enter, said:
"Colonel Cruickshank want to see you. Me go now?"