She looked at him haughtily. He realized that he had rarely seen so beautiful a girl. There was a look of high courage about her that particularly appealed to him. She had long Oriental eyes of jade green. He amended his guess as to her age. She must be seven and twenty he told himself.
“It is my duty to call the police and have you arrested,” she exclaimed.
“That is the usual procedure,” he agreed.
She stood there irresolute.
“I wonder what makes you steal!”
“Abstract,” he corrected, “collect, borrow, annex—but not steal.”
She took no notice of his interruption.
“It isn’t as though you were ill or starving—that might be some sort of excuse—but you are well dressed. I’ve done a great deal of social work among the poor and often I’ve met the wives of thieves and have actually found myself pitying men who have stolen for bread.”
“Jean Valjean stuff,” he smiled, “it has elements of pathos. Jean got nineteen years for it if you remember.”
She paid no heed to his flippancy.