Summary

The short story begins with the narrator telling the reader that he has visited an old man named Simon Wheeler. This visit comes at the request of a friend who wanted the narrator to ask about Leonidas W. Smiley. The narrator lets the reader know that he suspected his friend of setting him up to hear a long and boring story from the old man about Jim Smiley, a notorious gambler from the area.

The narrator, finding Simon Wheeler napping in a tavern at a mining camp, is greeted cheerfully by the old man. Then, it is conveyed that his friend's request for information about Leonidas W. Smiley, who was said to have been a minister, at one time living in the camp. Upon hearing this request, Wheeler traps the narrator in a corner and tells a story. At that time...