Then we had the lottery. Everyone had tickets, and Alice asked Mr. Biggs
to buy one. She let him have it for a shilling, because it was the last,
and we all hoped he would win the Goat. He seemed quite sure now that
Oswald was not kidding, and that the prize was not money. Indeed, Oswald
went so far as to tell him privately that the prize was too big to put
in your pocket, and that if it was divided up it would be spoiled, which
is true of Goats, but not of money.

[Illustration: '"Here is your prize," said Oswald.'--Page 31.]

Everyone was laughing and talking, and wondering anxiously whatever the
prize could possibly be. Oswald carried round the hat, and everyone
drew a number. The winning number was six hundred and sixty-six, and
Albert's uncle said afterwards it was a curious coincidence. I don't
know what it meant, but it made Mrs. Leslie laugh. When everyone had
drawn a number, Oswald rang the dinner-bell to command silence, and
there was a hush full of anxious expectation. Then Oswald said:

'The prize number is six hundred and sixty-six. Who has it?'

And Mr. Biggs took a step forward and held out his paper.

'The prize is yours! I congratulate you,' said Oswald warmly.

Then he went into the stovehouse, and hastily placing a wreath of paper
roses on the Goat's head, that Alice had got ready for the purpose, he
got out the Goat by secretly showing it a bit of cocoanut ice, and led
it by the same means to the feet of the happy winner.

'Here is your prize,' said Oswald, with feelings of generous pride. 'I
am very glad you've got him. He'll be a comfort to you, and make up for
all the trouble you've had over our lottery--raffle, I mean.'

And he placed the ungoated end of the rope in the unresisting hand of
the fortunate detective.

Neither Oswald nor any of the rest of us has ever been able to make out
why everyone should have laughed so. But they did. They said the lottery
was the success of the afternoon. And the ladies kept on congratulating
Mr. Biggs.

At last people began to go, and the detective, so unexpectedly made rich
beyond his wildest dreams, said he, too, must be going. He had tied the
Goat to the greenhouse door, and now he moved away. But we all cried
out:

'You've forgotten your Goat!'

'No, I haven't,' he said very earnestly; 'I shall never forget that Goat
to my dying hour. But I want to call on my aunt just close by, and I
couldn't very well take the Goat to see her.'

'I don't