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contents of both boxes.” I leaned across the counter and whispered in his ear: “And if things go right, this could be a daily chore for you—at the same rate of pay.”
    “I'm more than happy to be of service, sir,” he assured me with a greedy grin on his face.
    “Somehow I thought you might be,” I replied.
    Then I went off to wake Harvey, took him down to the restaurant for a breakfast of orange juice and tea, and walked back into the lobby at about a quarter to nine. It was filled to overflowing with coolies and their backers, all lined up to lay their bets with the clerk.
    At nine o'clock sharp, we all walked outside, where Harvey and 23 other rickshaw pullers lined up across the broad street. Then it was just a matter of setting the conditions, which turned out to be twice around the block, or just under half a mile. Harvey was pawing at the ground with his feet, and his eyes were bright and excited, and I thought he might break out whinnying any second.
    There must have been a good five hundred people crowded up and down the street, not all of them Chinamen, and finally we let Bet-A-Million Reynolds fire the gun that started the race.
    Harvey opened up a quick two lengths on his field before they hit the first corner, and was leading by twenty yards when they passed the finish line the first time. They disappeared from sight around the corner a second time, and when they hit the homestretch Harvey was only leading by a length—but as he passed by he winked at me, and I realized he was just trying not to discourage the competition from trying him again. He won by about half a length, and before I could go to the desk to pick up our winnings, Sir Reginald Thurmund and Ambassador Gerhardt Guenther were demanding a rematch that night.
    I hemmed and hawed as if I thought Harvey was too tuckered out to run again, and finally let them talk me into it, for midnight, sharp. We told the crowd when to come back, and then Harvey and me went to the desk and picked up 37,000 beautiful British pounds, counted it a couple of times and stood there admiring it for a few minutes, and then put it back in the safe.
    “Easiest money I ever made for a rickshaw ride!” he laughed.
    “We should just about double it tonight,” I said, “and then we'll start running you in handicaps.”
    “Handicaps?”
    “Yeah,” I said. “After this weekend we'll never get another even race, so you'll probably have to tote weights in your rickshaw, just like a racehorse.”
    “Make the race downhill and the weights might actually help me go faster,” he suggested.
    “That little law of physics ain't exactly lost on me,” I replied. “Ain't no law says you have to run the same course every time out.”
    Well, we loafed around the hotel for most of the afternoon, but when I saw Harvey smiling at a couple of early-blooming flowers of the night I sent him to his room for a nap, and then, just to make sure that he couldn't give in to temptation, I took them off to my own room for the next couple of hours, where I got me an education in various Chinese arts that were even more complicated than fan-tan.
    I could have spent another few hours saving Harvey from further temptation, and generous Christian gentleman that I am I was all set to do so, but at about seven o'clock he pounded on my door to say that he was going down to the restaurant to grab some dinner. I didn't want his stomach to go cramping up on him, so I took my leave of my lovely companions and went with him to supervise.
    “I'll have a thick steak, and make sure that it's rare,” said Harvey as the waiter approached us.
    “Belay that order,” I said. “He'll have two glasses of orange juice and a cup of coffee.”
    “Preacher,” he said irritably, “sooner or later you got to let me eat something solid or I ain't gonna have the energy to run. I'm starving!”
    “You can't run a full stomach,” I told him sternly.
    “I can't run on one that's been empty for a day and a