“There’s this,” I said, touching the gold-mesh purse, but not picking it up. “I see there’s money in it; but it has not been opened. Then there’s this,” I added, indicating the pearl necklet; “and this,” which was the brooch. “The rings,” I continued, “I don’t know anything about. There are three here. That’s all I remember seeing; but I didn’t notice in particular.” She said, in a breathless whisper, “That’s all there were.” “Then may I ask if you mean to let me go?” “How can I stop you?” “Oh, in two or three ways. You could call your servants, or you could ring up the police—” Her big, burning eyes were fixed on me hypnotically. The color began to come back to her cheeks, but she trembled still. “How—how did you get in?” I explained to her. “And the only thing I’ve taken,” I went on, “is the food I ate and the wine I drank; but if you knew how much I needed them—” “Were you hungry?” “I hadn’t eaten anything for two days, and very little for two days before that.” “Then you’re not—you’re not one of those gentleman burglars who do this sort of thing out of bravado?” “As we see in novels or plays. I don’t think you’ll find many of them about. I’m a burglar,” I pursued, “or I—I meant to be one—but I’m not a gentleman.” “You speak like a gentleman.” “Unfortunately, a gentleman is not made by speech. A gentleman could never be in the predicament in which you’ve caught me.” “Well, then, you were a gentleman once.” “My father was a gentleman—and is.” “English?” “I’d rather not tell you. Now that I’ve restored the things, if you’ll give me your word that I sha’n’t be molested I shall—” “You sha’n’t be molested, only—” As she hesitated I insisted, “Only what, may I ask?” Her manner was a mixture of embarrassment and pity. She had not hitherto taken her eyes from me since we had begun to speak. Now she let them wander away; or, rather, she let them shift away, to return to me swiftly, as if she couldn’t trust me without watching me. By this time she was trembling so violently, too, that she was obliged to grasp the back of a chair to steady herself. She was too little to be tall, and yet too tall to be considered little. The filmy thing she wore, with its long, loose sleeves, gave her some of the appearance of an angel, only that no angel ever had this bright, almost hectic color in the cheeks, and these scarlet lips. “Was it,” she asked, speaking, as we both did, in low tones, and rapidly—“was it because you—you had no money that you did this?” I smiled faintly. “That was it exactly; but now—” “Then won’t you let me give you some?” I still had enough of the man about me to straighten myself up and say: “Thanks, no. It’s very kind of you; but—but the reasons which make it impossible for me to—to steal it make it equally impossible for me to take it as a gift.” “But why—why was it impossible for you to steal it, when you had come here to do it?”