And now that he has the wherewithal--quick! a hotel. He knows of one close by in the Rue d’Amsterdam. He is dying of hunger. But before sitting down to table, he must put his suit-case in safety. A waiter carries it upstairs before him; three flights; a passage; a door which he locks upon his treasure. He goes down again. Sitting at table in front of a beefsteak, Bernard did not dare examine the pocket-book. (One never knows who may be watching you.) But his left hand amorously caressed it, lying snug in his inside pocket. “How to make Edouard understand that I’m not a thief--that’s the trouble. What kind of fellow is Edouard? Perhaps the suit-case may shed a little light upon that. Attractive--so much is certain. But there are heaps of attractive fellows who have no taste for practical joking. If he thinks his suit-case has been stolen, no doubt he’ll be glad to see it again. If he’s the least decent he’ll be grateful to me for bringing it back to him. I shall easily rouse his interest. Let’s eat the sweet quickly and then go upstairs and examine the situation. Now for the bill and a soul-stirring tip for the waiter.” A minute or two later he was back again in his room. “Now, suit-case, a word with you!... A morning suit, not more than a trifle too big for me, I expect. The material becoming and in good taste. Linen; toilet things. I’m not very sure that I shall give any of all this back. But what proves that I’m not a thief is that these papers interest me a great deal more than anything else. We’ll begin by reading this.” This was the note-book into which Edouard had slipped Laura’s melancholy letter. We have already seen the first pages; this is what followed. XI EDOUARD’S JOURNAL: GEORGE MOLINIER _Nov. 1st._--A fortnight ago ... --it was a mistake not to have noted it down at once. It was not so much that I hadn’t time as that my heart was still full of Laura--or, to be more accurate, I did not wish to distract my thoughts from her; moreover, I do not care to note anything here that is casual or fortuitous, and at that time I did not think that what I am going to relate could lead to anything, or be, as people say, of any consequence; at any rate, I would not admit it to myself and it was, in a way, to prove the unimportance of this incident that I refrained from mentioning it in my journal. But I feel more and more--it would be vain to deny it--that it is Olivier’s figure that has now become the magnet of my thoughts, that their current sets towards him and that without taking him into account I shall be able neither to explain nor to understand myself properly. I was coming back that morning from Perrin’s, the publisher’s, where I had been seeing about the press copies of the fresh edition of my old book. As the weather was fine, I was dawdling back along the quays until it should be time for lunch.