midnight
he would say , `` they make men fools or devils . '' His temptation lay not that way . When the three first came to the Pipi , Pierre was a miner , simply ; but nearly all his life he had been something else , as many a devastated pocket on the east of the Rockies could bear witness ; and his new career was alien to his soul . Temptation grew greatly on him at the Pipi , and in the days before he yielded to it he might have been seen at midnight in his but playing solitaire . Why he abstained at first from practising his real profession is accounted for in two ways : he had tasted some of the sweets of honest companionship with the Honourable and Shon , and then he had a memory of an ugly night at Pardon 's Drive a year before , when he stood over his own brother 's body , shot to death by accident in a gambling row having its origin with himself . These things had held him back for a time ; but he was weaker than his ruling passion . The Pipi was a young and comparatively virgin field ; the quarry was at his hand .