Quest took down a volume from the swinging book-case by his side, and drew the reading lamp a little closer to his right shoulder.

Before he opened the volume, however, he looked for a few moments steadfastly out across the sea of roofs, the network of telephone and telegraph wires, to where the lights of Broadway seemed to eat their way into the sky.

Around him, the night life of the great city spread itself out in waves of gilded vice and black and sordid crime.

Its many voices fell upon deaf ears.

Until long past midnight, he sat engrossed in a scientific volume..