Dardanella Slavin told him they were happy tears but her 20-month-old son Quinlan was having none of it. He began crying soon after selectman chairman Frank Fenner drew the winning ticket for a 2.1 acre plot of land in Chilmark’s High Meadow development and bawled through much of the remaining lottery draw, drowning out the selectmen in the process.

“He saw me crying and that made him upset,” said a widely grinning Mrs. Slavin after the draw.

Mrs. Slavin, 33, and her husband, Chilmark police officer Sean, 35, are now entitled to buy the plot for $40,000. They will pay construction costs.

The couple has been trying for almost 10 years to buy property in their home town, consistently applying for youth lots.

Mrs. Slavin added that they had gotten used to disappointment and planned accordingly.

“We didn’t want to spend too much time on it in case nothing happened,” she said. Now she said they are eager to start work on a house as soon as possible.

Mr. Slavin calculated that they stood an 18 per cent chance of winning the right to purchase the land and reflected Tuesday night that the odds never get shorter. “It all comes down to chance,” he said.

However, only the most practical observer would fail to see some element of fate in Tuesday’s result. Mrs. Slavin, a chiropractor with a practice in Vineyard Haven who was born and raised in Chilmark, regularly walks her dog on the grounds of the High Meadow development with her husband. And she explained that it was while standing on this very homesite two years ago that her water broke. Shortly after she gave birth to Quinlan.

Tickets in such lotteries are assigned to the six individuals and couples in the lottery based on residence, and on other criteria such as work done for the town.

The Slavins had two of 11 tickets slotted into a papier mache house enthusiastically shaken by the selectmen and then drawn from by Mr. Fenner.

Should the Slavins not go ahead with the purchase, the offer will fall to runners up Emily and Jeffrey Day, a fellow police officer to Mr. Slavin. Also on the ballot were Cameron Perry, Danguole Budris, Lev and Jennie Wlodyka, Jeff Wass and Deborah Silliman.