The stranger showed his prize to the crowd that clustered around him, and business was increased wonderfully, for it had apparently been proven that the game was conducted fairly.
"Now watch him," Dan said, as the stranger walked away with his prize ostentatiously displayed, and the two boys followed a short distance off, until they saw him halt behind a booth, where he turned the article won over to a barker who had approached.
"That's the way it is done," Dan said, "and when we come back you'll see the same watch on the layout."
Teddy was rapidly being initiated in the tricks of the fakirs, and the more he saw the more firmly was he resolved not to follow the business longer than the present week, although he believed his own game to be an honest one.
The cheap jewelry dealer; the man who had been selling the remnants of a stock of knives made by a manufacturer who "had bankrupted himself by putting into them too expensive material;" the fakir with the dolls which were to be knocked down by balls thrown from a certain distance, with a prize of one cigar if the customer could tumble two over, and the peanut-candy dealer were visited in turn, and then the boys were attracted by the sound of Hazelton's voice.
He was plying his peculiar trade again, and by the appearance of the crowd was meeting with great success.
"Let's see how he gets out of it this time," Teddy suggested, and Dan agreed.
The fakir had arrived at that point where he was giving away the supposed watches, and the boys listened until they saw his preparations for departure.
"What beats me is how he gets clear every time," Dan whispered. "I should think after he had swindled four or five hundred, some of them would lay for a chance to get even with him."
"He says they do, an' that's why he left his satchel with me."