No answer. Recognising the hopelessness of putting questions to her now, he gathered the various articles together and put them back into the bag.
"I'm afraid you will have to dine alone."
That was all he said to her. With the bag in his hand he left the room, leaving her in a heap upon the floor. He sneaked rather than walked out of the hotel. Supposing they caught him red-handed, with that thing in his hand? He only began to breathe freely when he was out in the street.
Possibly no man in Paris spent the night of that twentieth of June more curiously than Mr. Burgoyne. When he returned it was four o'clock in the morning, and broad day. He was worn-out, haggard, the spectre of a man. In the bedroom he found his wife just as he had left her, in a heap upon the floor, but fast asleep. She had removed none of her clothes, not even her bonnet or her gloves. She had been crying--apparently had cried herself to sleep. As he stood looking down at her he realised how he loved her--the woman, the creature of flesh and blood, apart entirely from her moral qualities. He placed the bag within his trunk and locked it up. Then, kneeling beside his wife, he stooped and kissed her as she slept. The kiss aroused her. She woke as wakes a child, and, putting her arms about his neck, she kissed him back again. Not a word was spoken. Then she got up. He helped her to undress, and put her into a bed as though she were a child. Then he undressed himself, and joined her. And they fell fast asleep locked in each other's arms.
That night they returned to London. The bag went with them. On the morning after their arrival, Mr. Burgoyne took a cab into the city, the fatal bag beside him on the seat. He drove straight to Mr. Staunton's office. When he entered, unannounced, his father-in-law started as though he were a ghost.
"Burgoyne! What brings you here? I hope there's nothing wrong?"
Mr. Burgoyne did not reply at once. He placed the bag--Minnie's bag--upon the table. He kept his eyes fixed upon his father-in-law's countenance.
"Burgoyne! Why do you look at me like that?"
"I have something here I wish to show you." That was Mr. Burgoyne's greeting. He opened the bag, and turned its contents out upon the table. "Not a bad haul from Breton peasants,--eh?"
Mr. Staunton stared at the heap of things thus suddenly disclosed.