"If you get a letter from Tsan Ti, promise me to say 'manana' and give it the cut direct."
"What chance is there of our receiving a letter from the mandarin? He's on his way West with the Eye of Buddha, and Grattan is on his way no one knows where with a glass imitation. Both of them are satisfied, and I guess you and I, Joe, haven't any cause for complaint. The mandarin is too busy traveling to write any letters."
"Well," insisted McGlory, "give me your solemn promise you won't pay any attention to a letter from the mandarin if you receive one. If you're so plumb certain he won't write, why not promise?"
"It's a go," laughed Matt, "if that will make you feel any easier in your mind."
"It does, a heap. I'd rather have measles than another attack of mandarinicutis, complicated with rubyitis, and——"
"Oh, splash!" interrupted Matt. "We've been well paid for all the time we were ailing with those two troubles. Give your hair a lick and a promise, and let's go down to breakfast. They'll be ringing the last bell on us if we wait much longer."
"Lead on, Macduff!" answered McGlory, throwing himself around in the air and then striking a pose, with one arm up, like Ajax defying the lightning. "Remember Monte Cristo like that, pard?" he asked. "'The world is mine!' That's how I feel. Us for New York, with fifteen hundred of the mandarin's dinero in our clothes! Oh, say, I'm a brass band and I've just got to toot!"
The cowboy "tooted" all the way downstairs and into the office; then, as they passed the desk on their way to the dining room, the rejoicing died on the cowboy's lips.
"Just a minute, Motor Matt!" called the clerk, leaning over the desk and motioning.