streaming all over his face, sandwiched in the whole mass. He would bellow out in a voice louder than all the others, "Green Dragon 400!"
"Hey . . . open . . . there!" the stake holder, also with his face covered with perspiration, would sing out as he lifted the lid. "Tien-men leh (which made Ah Q lose with the Green Dragon)! Chiao-hui leh! Jen and Ch'uang-t'ang have no stakes on them. Hand over Ah Q's coppers!"
"Ch'uang-t'ang 100 . . . 150!"
To the tune of such chanting, Ah Q's money would gradually find its way to the loin purse of another, whose face was also streaming with perspiration. In the end, he would squeeze outside the crowd and stand there looking on, following with personal interest the ups and downs of some one else; and thus he continued until the game was ended. It was not until then that he would leave, all unwilling, and return to T'uku Temple. On the following day, he would go to work with eyes swollen from the lack of sleep.
But the truth of the saying, "How was it to be concluded that the loss of the old man's horse at the border country was not actually blessing?"7 was borne out when Ah Q had one unfortunate streak of winning, which proved to be for his own ill luck.
