With Oregon State Lottery ticket in hand, Alice Krumm stood staring at the winning numbers posted on the cash register. So close . . . but not quite. The ticket she had just bought was only one digit away from the twenty-dollar winning number. For once in her life, Alice wanted to be a winner instead of a near-miss.
Alice struggled with her greed for a long minute before finally giving in. Creeping around behind the baked beans and canned goods, she altered her lottery ticket with a ballpoint pen to win the twenty dollars, then returned to the counter to collect her ill-gotten prize.
But she should have worked a little harder on her forgery. The clerk spotted it immediately and called the police. The dishonest lottery player was arrested on the spot and charged with fraud.
Then the arresting officer made an interesting discovery. He found the real number under her bad forgery. His revelation made her feel even dumber.
Had she looked farther up the chart of winning numbers, she would have discovered that her original ticket number had also been a winner—for five thousand dollars!