Except
the sound of his own heavy breathing, all was quiet around him. He
advanced at once to the bureau, starting involuntarily as he brushed by
Mr. Blyth's lay figure with the Spanish hat and the Roman toga; and
cursing it under his breath for standing in his way, as if it had been
a living creature. The door leading from the studio into the passage of
the house was not quite closed; but he never noticed this as he passed
to the bureau, though it stood close to the chink left between the door
and the post. He had the false key in his hand; he knew that he should
be in possession of the Hair Bracelet in another moment; and, his
impatience for once getting the better of his cunning, he pounced on
the bureau, without looking aside first either to the right or the
left.
He had unlocked it, had pulled open the inner drawer, had taken out the
Hair Bracelet, and was just examining it closely by the light of his
taper (after having locked the bureau again)--when a faint sound on the
staircase of the house caught his ear.
At the same instant, a thin streak of candle-light flashed on him
through the narrow chink between the hardly-closed door and the
doorpost. It increased rapidly in intensity, as the sound of
softly-advancing footsteps now grew more and more distinct from the
stone passage leading to the interior of the house.
Pages:
520
521
522
523
524
525
526
527
528
529
530
531
532
533
534
535
536
537
538
539
540
541
542
543
544