"You really kept nothing from me, Barbara?"
"Nothing, love."
"And you are keeping nothing from me now?"
"Nothing, love."
I did not press her farther. Her smiling eyes looked into mine, and I had received incontestible proof that she was lying to my face.
[CHAPTER VIII.]
I was an inveterate smoker, and at this period my favorite habit was a consolation to me. I smoked at all hours of the day, and Barbara had encouraged me, saying that she loved the smell of a cigar. But on the morning following the conversation I have just recorded she complained that my cigar made her ill, and I went into the boulevard to smoke it. When I had thrown away the stump I returned to the hotel to attend to my trunks, which were not yet unpacked. These trunks were in a small ante-room, the key of which I had put in my pocket. I had adopted this precaution in order that they should not be in Barbara's sight, that she should not be left alone with them, and that when I unpacked them she should not see what they contained. Upon my return to the hotel Barbara was in her bed-room, attending to her toilet, and Annette was with her. It was Barbara's first visit to Paris, and we had arranged to make the round of its principal attractions.
The first trunk I opened was that in which I had deposited the five bottles of brandy I had found among Barbara's dresses. To my astonishment they were gone.
I was positive I had placed them there, but to make sure I searched my second trunk, with the same result. The bottles had been abstracted. By whom, and by what means?