In other words, I allow you five minutes; at the close of that time you
will have chosen between restitution and ruin."
He remained apparently lost in thought. He was a big, stout man, and
with one blow of his powerful fist could easily have settled me. It was
the last thing in his mind. At length he lifted his head,--"Rosalie!"
he called.
At the word, a light foot pattered along a stone floor within, and in a
moment a little woman stood in an arch raised by two steps from our own
level. Carrying a candle, she descended and tripped toward him. She was
not pretty, but sprightly and keen, as the perpetual attrition of life
must needs make her, and wore the everlasting grisette costume, which
displays the neatest of ankles, and whose cap is more becoming than
wreaths of garden millinery. I am too minute, I see, but it is second
nature. The two commenced a vigorous whispering amid sundry gestures and
glances. Suddenly the woman turned, and, laying the prettiest of little
hands on my sleeve, said, with a winning smile,--
"Is it a crime of _lese-majeste_?"
This was a new idea, but might be useful.
"Not yet," I said; "two minutes more, and I will not answer for the
consequence."
Other whispers ensued.
"Monsieur," said the man, leaning on one arm over the counter, and
looking up in my face, with the most engaging frankness,--"it is true
that I have such a diamond; but it is not mine. It is left with me to be
delivered to the Baron Stahl, who comes as an agent from his court for
its purchase.
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