He stood there, counting on his fingers like a schoolboy, frowning as he counted. One–two–three. 168 The third day–that was the third day. And he was Number One. And he had lost!
Out in the office of the lodging-place a lamp burned smokily at the elbow of an old man who read a paper by its light.
“This should be the twenty-eighth, according to my reckoning,” said Slavens, appearing before him and speaking without prelude.
The old man looked up, unfriendly, severe.
“You’re purty good at figures,” said he.
He bumped his bony shoulders over his paper again.
Undaunted, Slavens asked him the hour. The old clerk drew out a cheap watch and held it close to his grizzled face.
“Time for all honest men but me and you to be in bed, I reckon. It’s a quarter to one.”
A quarter to one! Next morning–no; that very morning at nine o’clock, Peterson would step up to the window of the land-office in Meander and file on Claim Number One–his claim–Dr. Warren Slavens’ claim, the seed of his dead hope. That is, if the long chance that lay between him and that hour should be allowed to pass unimproved.