Blumenthal (since Mr. Gibney, in the sheer riot of his imagination elected to christen him Blumenthal, the name will probably suit him as well as any other) came close to Mr. Gibney and drew him aside. In a hoarse whisper he desired to know if Mr. Gibney attended the auction with the expectation of bidding on any of the packages offered for sale. Seeking to justify his presence, Mr. Gibney advised that it was his intention to bid in everything in sight; whereupon Blumenthal proceeded to explain to Mr. Gibney how impossible it would be for him, arrayed against the Forty Thieves, to buy any article at a reasonable price. Further: Blumenthal desired to inform Mr. Gibney that his (Mr. Gibney's) efforts to buy in the "old horses" would merely result in his running the prices up, for no beneficent purpose, since it was ever the practice of the Forty Thieves to permit no man to outbid them. Perhaps Mr. Gibney would be satisfied with a fair day's profit without troubling himself to hamper the Forty Thieves and interfere with their combination, and with the words, the king surreptitiously slipped Mr. Gibney a fifty-dollar greenback. Mr. Gibney's great fist closed over the treasure, he having first, by a coy glance, satisfied himself that it was really fifty dollars. He shook hands with the king. He said: "Blumenthal, you're a smart man. I am quite content with this fifty to keep off your course and give you a wide berth to starboard. I'm sensible enough to know when I'm licked, an' a fight without profit ain't in my line. I didn't make my money that way, Blumenthal. I'll cast off my lines and haul away from the dock," and suiting the action to the figure, Mr. Gibney departed. He went first to the Seaboard Drug Store, where he quizzed the druggist for five minutes, after which he continued his cruise. Upon reaching the _Maggie_, he proceeded to relate in detail, and with many additional details supplied by his own imagination, the story of his morning's adventure. "Gib," said McGuffey enviously, "you're a fool for luck." "Luck," said Mr. Gibney, beginning to expand, "is what the feller calls a relative proposition----" "You're wrong, Gib," interposed Captain Scraggs. "Relatives is unlucky an' expensive. Take, f'r instance, Mrs. Scraggs's mother----"