midnight
`` Suits me , '' said Jerry . `` Ill take the first trick . '' Phil 's snoring something like fifty-nine seconds later was sufficient answer . All was still , and Jerry set about to await midnight , when he could hope for a brief snooze . After a while the silence began to wear on his nerves and in every night noise he fancied he heard steps . He sat still and watchful , hardly breathing at times , his finger poised above a push button that would ring a bell where Mr. Fulton lay stretched out on a pallet on the floor of the tiny cabin . But midnight came and nothing had happened .