about ten o'clock
They lifted him in and obligingly blew out the lights so that the police could not see its number , and Stuff drove Hefty proudly home . `` I guess I 'm even with that cop now , '' said Hefty as he stood at the door of the studio building perspiring and happy ; `` but if them cops ever find out who the Black Knight was , I 'll go away for six months on the Island . I guess , '' he added , thoughtfully , `` I 'll have to give them two prizes up . '' It was about ten o'clock on the night before Christmas , and very cold . Christmas Eve is a very-much-occupied evening everywhere , in a newspaper office especially so , and all of the twenty and odd reporters were out that night on assignments , and Conway and Bronson were the only two remaining in the local room . They were the very best of friends , in the office and out of it ; but as the city editor had given Conway the Christmas-eve story to write instead of Bronson , the latter was jealous , and their relations were strained . I use the word `` story '' in the newspaper sense , where everything written for the paper is a story , whether it is an obituary , or a reading notice , or a dramatic criticism , or a descriptive account of the crowded streets and the lighted shop-windows of a Christmas Eve .