Page:What will he do with it.djvu/293

Rh the interval of her absence in discussing a meal, which experience had told him Mrs. Crane's new cook would, not unskillfully, though hastily, prepare. Mrs. Crane left him to order the dinner and put on her shawl and bonnet. But, gaining her own room, she rung for Bridgett Greggs; and when that confidential servant appeared, she said: "In the side pocket of Mr, Losely's coat there is a Pocket-book; in it, there are some letters which I must see. I shall appear to go out, leave the street door ajar, that I may slip in again unobserved. You will serve dinner as soon as possible. And when Mr. Losely, as usual, exchanges his coat for the dressing gown, contrive to take out that pocketbook unobserved by him. Bring it to me hers, in this room: you can as easily replace it afterward. A moment will suffice to my purpose."

Bridgett nodded and understood. Jasper, standing by the window, saw Mrs. Crane leave the house, walking briskly. He then threw himself on the sofa and began to doze: the doze deepened and became sleep. Bridgett, entering to lay the cloth, so found him. She approached on tiptoe sniffed the perfume of the pocketbook and saw its gilded corners peep forth from its lair. She hesitated she trembled she was in mortal fear of that truculent slumberer; but sleep lessens the awe thieves feel, or heroes inspire. She has taken the pocket book she has fled with the booty she is in Mrs. Crane's apartment, not five minutes after Mrs. Crane has regained its threshold.

Rapidly the jealous woman ransacked the pocket-book—started to see, elegantly worked with gold threads, in the lining, the words, "Souviens-toi de ta Gabrielle"—no other letters, save the two, of which Jasper had vouchsafed to her but the glimpse. Over these she hurried her glittering eyes; and when she restored them to their place, and gave back the book to Bridgett, who stood by, breathless and listening, lest Jasper should awake, her face was colorless, and a kind of shudder seemed to come over her. Left alone, she rested her face on her hand, her lips moving as if in self-commune. Then noiselessly she glided down the stairs, regained the street, and hurried fast upon her way.

Bridgett was not in time to restore the book to Jasper's pocket, for when she re-entered he was turning round and stretching himself between sleep and waking. But she dropped the book skillfully on the floor, close beside the sofa; it would seem to him, on waking, to have fallen out of the pocket in the natural movements of sleep.

And in fact, when he rose, dinner now on the table, he picked