The sport was gone, the fun of the thing; it became merely official business.

To appropriate a pair of smuggled emeralds was a first-class sporting proposition, with a humorous twist.

As it stood now, he would be picking Hawksley's pocket; and he wasn't rogue enough for that.

Hang the luck! Emeralds, rubies, sapphires, pearls, and diamonds! No doubt many of them with histories--in a bag hung to his neck--and all these thousands of miles! Not since the advent of the Gaekwar of Baroda into San Francisco, in 1910, had so many fine stones passed through that port of entry.
But why hadn't Hawksley inquired about them?
Stoic indifference?
A good loser?
How had he got through the customs without a lot of publicity?
The Russian consul of the old regime probably; and an appraiser who was a good sport.

To have come safely to his destination, and then to have lost out! The magnificent careless generosity of putting the wallet behind Kitty's flatirons, to be hers if he didn't pull through! Why, this fiddling derelict was a man! Stood up and fought Karlov with his bare fists; wasn't ashamed to weep over his mother's photograph; and fiddled like Heifetz.