Then she sees the cards on the table and asks again about this game where you play cards with yourself and mebbe win a thousand dollars cold.  She wants to know if you actually get the thousand in cash, and Egbert says: 

“Sure!  A thousand that any bank in town would accept at par.”

She picks up the deck and almost falls, but thinks better of it.

“Could I play with my own cards?” she wants to know, looking suspicious at these.  Egbert says she sure can.  “And in my own home?” asks Cora.

“Your own house or any place else,” says Egbert, “and any hour of the day or night.  Just call me up when you feel lucky.”

“We could embellish our little nook with many needful things,” says Cora.  “A thousand dollars spent sensibly would do marvels.”  But after fiddling a bit more with the cards she laid ’em down with a pitiful sigh.

Cousin Egbert just looked at her, then looked away quick, as if he couldn’t stand it any more, and says:  “War is certainly what that man Sherman said it was.”

Then he watches Sandy Sawtelle cashing in his chips and is kind of figuring up his total losses; so I can’t resist handing him another.

“I don’t know what us Mes-dames would of done without your master mind,” I says; “and yet I’d hate to be a Belgian with the tobacco habit and have to depend on you to gratify it.”

“Well,” he answers, very mad, “I don’t see so many of ’em getting tobacco heart with the proceeds of your fancy truck out in them booths either!”

“Don’t you indeed?” I says, and just at the right moment, too.  “Then you better take another look or get your eyes fixed or something.”

For just then Sandy stands up on a chair and says: 

“Ladies and gents, a big pile of valuable presents is piled just at the right of the main entrance as you go out, and I hope you will one and all accept same with the welcome compliments of me and old Jerry, that I had to take eleven stitches in the hide of.  As you will pass out in an orderly manner, let every lady help herself to two objects that attract her, and every gent help himself to one object; and no crowding or pulling I trust, because some of the objects would break, like the moustache cup and saucer, or the drainpipe, with painted posies on it, to hold your umbrels.  Remember my words—­every lady two objects and every gent one only.  There is also a new washboiler full of lemonade that you can partake of at will, though I guess you won’t want any—­and thanking you one and all!”

So they cheer Sandy like mad and beat it out to get first grab at the plunder; and just as Cousin Egbert thinks he now knows the worst, in comes the girls that had the booths, bringing all the chips Buck Devine had paid ’em—­two hundred and seventy-eight dollars’ worth that Egbert has to dig down for after he thinks all is over.