twelve o'clock
She sold five shares of stock on which she had been receiving an annual dividend of ten per cent. , in order to get funds for this desperate gambling venture , in which over five hundred dollars had now been absorbed . Pale and nervous , she made her appearance at the breakfast-table on the next morning , unable to take a mouthful of food . It was in vain that her anxious daughters urged her to eat . A little after twelve o'clock she was at the policy-office . The drawn numbers for the morning were already in . Her combination was 4 , 10 , 40 . With an eagerness that could not be repressed , she caught up the slip of paper containing the thirteen numbers out of seventy-five , which purported to have been drawn that morning somewhere in `` Kentucky , '' and reported by telegraph -- caught it up with hands that shook so violently that she could not read the figures .