midnight
`` Sam ! '' she cried , `` save me again ! '' Tansey rounded the table , and flung himself , with superb nerve , upon the Mexican . Just then a clangour began ; the clocks of the city were tolling the midnight hour . Tansey clutched at Torres , and , for a moment , felt in his grasp the crunch of velvet and the cold facets of the glittering gems . The next instant , the bedecked caballero turned in his hands to a shrunken , leather-visaged , white-bearded , old , old , screaming mummy , sandalled , ragged , and four hundred and three . The Mexican woman was crawling to her feet , and laughing .