"Benjamin Cleveland.
"To Algernon Smythe, Esq., Park Row, New York City."
When he had handed this to the operator, and seen him tick it off upon his wonderful little instrument, he felt quieter, and sat down to await the reply.
We will not attempt to depict Ben's thoughts as he sat there. Suffice it for us to know that they were one great swell of triumph, and the pictures of future happiness that floated before his fancy were gorgeous with crimson and gold. Just as the hands of the clock announced ten o'clock, the operator called to him, and with the remark that the matter had been expeditiously attended to, handed him the following dispatch:
"Park Row, New York City, }
October 2d, 10.45 A.M. }
"Dear boy, we all sympathize with you. Your dispatch came to hand fifteen minutes ago. You have lost by thirty minutes. Money has been paid to Smythe.
"John Hough, stake-holder.
"Augustus Wasson, referee."
Ben read it, and reread it, and read it over and over again. The date caught his eye, "10.45 A.M." He looked at the clock in the rotunda; it was but ten o'clock and five minutes then. He called the operator's attention to it.
"Oh, yes; you see the difference between New York and New Orleans time is sixty-two minutes. When it is nine-thirty here, it is a little past ten-thirty there. A great many people who don't think of this, are surprised to receive dispatches ahead of time, as they think. And it's laughable to see their astonishment sometimes." And the clerk laughed in verification of it.
But Ben heard him not. His mind was in a whirl. His body trembled. His legs refused their support and he would have fallen to the floor had not an attendant caught him.