The luck suddenly declared openly for Ellis, the Dummy and Vandover merely fighting for second place.

Ellis held his lead; at one o'clock he was nearly fifty dollars ahead of the game.

The profound silence of the room seemed to widen about them.

After midnight the noises in the hotel, the ringing of distant call bells, the rattle of dishes from the kitchens, the clash of closing elevator doors, gradually ceased; only at long intervals one heard the hurried step of a bell-boy in the hall outside and the clink of the ice in the water pitcher that he was carrying.

Outside a great quiet seemed in a sense to rise from the sleeping city, the noises in the streets died away.