"Stung again!" said McGlory gloomily, taking a handful of tickets from his pocket and tossing them into the air. "I might just as well say moo and chase myself. Sixty pesos gone where the woodbine twineth, and McGlory's got another lesson in the way luck's cut him out of her herd. Mebby it's just as well. I've got about as much use for a motor launch as a yaller dog for the tin can tied to the end of his tail, but the notion that I wanted the thing sure hit me hard."
"You ought to put a curb on those notions of yours, Joe," said Matt. "They seem to be pretty expensive."
"Shucks! Well, I get a couple o' square miles of fun nursing the notions along, anyways. It's hoping for things that makes a feller feel good; he never steps so high, wide, and handsome after he gets 'em. Now——"
Just here there came an excited chirp, followed by a shrill cackle of joy. A Chinese boy, not more than fifteen or sixteen, broke through the disappointed throng of whites, his queue flying, and his blue silk blouse fluttering.
"My gottee! Hoop-a-la! My ticket him seventy-tlee! My gottee chug-chug boatee."
"Happy days!" scowled McGlory, his eyes on the young Chinaman. "If that washee-washee yaller mug hasn't pulled down the prize I'm a sick Injun. And here's me with sixty tickets, and him with only one! Speak to me about that! What sort of a low-down thing is luck, anyway, to pass up a respectable white, with sixty chances, and dump that boat onto a Chink with only one! Sufferin' sister! Let's go some place, Matt, where we can be away from the crowd and by ourselves. I'm in a mood for reflection—like old Jack Bisbee was when the government mule kicked at him and set off a box of dynamite. I've got it in the neck, as per usual, and I want to say things to myself."
"Wait a minute, Joe," returned Matt. "Let's watch the Chinaman."
The man who had "bossed" the drawing examined the Chinaman's ticket.
"It's seventy-three, all right," he remarked. "Where you gettee, Charley?"
"'Melican man no gottee dol pay fo' laundry," the Celestial answered; "him givee China boy ticket."