midnight
He had started off in the bank with just as high ideals as Nelson 's , and with a sweetheart just as true as Frankie ; but years of disappointment had crushed both his hopes and his ideals , until now he lived for the petty and illusive pleasures of the moment ; drink , gambling , and other demoralizing `` recreations . '' Sid Levison , and other bankclerks like him , were abandoned to a life of waste because they had never been given a fair chance . Had they been honestly paid for service in the early years of their banking life they might have spent , at first , all of their salary and done considerable mischief to themselves and others , but when they came out of their youthful nightmare the future would not have been blank and lustreless -- as it often is to Sid Levisons , as matters stand . They open their eyes for a moment to the impossibilities of their situation , and close them again with a sigh or an oath , hating the light of common day , so cold and blinding in comparison with the witching glow of midnight flame . Bill Watson and those other young poker-players were following in the way of their paying-teller , innocently , naturally . Every day they are following in that way , and the bank is perfectly willing that they should . Does not a man become dependent upon the bank in proportion as he loses his own self-dependence , and in proportion as a man is dependent upon his employer is he not subject to the whims of that employer ?