eleven o'clock
Take two men and put them on good horses , send them forth into the wilds to face all conditions of weather and inconveniences , and if they are not fast friends at the end of the journey , rest assured that they never will be . For all his aversion to cards , there was a bit of the gamester in Hillard ; as , once in his office , he decided on the fall of a coin not to withdraw his personal from the paper . He was quite positive that he would never hear that Voice again , but having thrown his dice he would let them lie . Now , at eleven o'clock that same morning two distinguished Italians sat down to breakfast in one of the fashionable hotels . The one nor the other had ever heard of Hillard , they did not even know that such a person existed ; and yet , serenely unconscious , one was casting his life-line , as the palmist would say , across Hillard 's . The knots and tangles were to come later . `` The coffee in this country is abominable ! ''