"
"Do you mind telling me what you do propose to do, then?" she
continued still without looking at him, still without the
slightest note of appeal in her tone.
He withdrew the bracelet from his pocket and balanced it upon his
finger.
"I am going to say that I took it for a joke," he declared.
She hesitated.
"Mrs. Fitzgerald's sense of humor is not elastic," she warned
him.
"She will be very angry, of course," he assented, "but she will
not believe that I meant to steal it."
The girl moved slowly a few steps away.
"I suppose that I ought to thank you," she said, still with
averted face and sullen manner. "You have really been very
decent. I am much obliged."
"Are you not coming down?" he asked.
"Not at present," she answered. "I am going to my room."
He looked around the landing on which they stood, at the
miserable, uncarpeted floor, the ill-painted doors on which the
long-forgotten varnish stood out in blisters, the jumble of
dilapidated hot-water cans, a mop, and a medley of brooms and
rags all thrown down together in a corner.
"But these are the servants' quarters, surely," he remarked.
"They are good enough for me; my room is here," she told him,
turning the handle of one of the doors and disappearing. The
prompt turning of the key sounded, he thought, a little
ungracious.
With the bracelet in his hand, Tavernake descended three more
flights of stairs and entered the drawing-room of the private
hotel conducted by Mrs.
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