But the confidence of his bolts and bars, the recollection of his unusual measures of safety, reassured him somewhat.
It was, therefore, with a degree of composure he approached the door and satisfied himself that the bar and the locks had been undisturbed.
With equal assurance he rolled the bedstead from the radiator and pressed the button which operated the concealed spring, with a deliberation in which no suggestion of uneasiness appeared.
A quick revolution or so and the inner recess was revealed.
To his rapid accounting the quantity of bags was the same, and their relative positions, which he had so carefully arranged the night before, were undisturbed--but this one, that within easiest reach! What was it caused those sharp suggestions in its accustomed rotundity--those angular points?
With a cry such as must have been forced from the Jew of old, compelled by the rough levies of his time to part at once with his teeth and his treasure, Raikes grasped the bag, which came away in his clutch with the agonizing lightness that had preceded his first loss.
Quickly he unfastened the mouth of the fateful packet and inverted it over the table.
The next instant there rattled to view a soulless, sodden shower of lack-luster, heart-breaking coals.
(To be continued on Dickey No. 2, Series B.)
"Ah, ha!" exclaimed Dennis, "an' it's there ye are again," as the familiar phrase at the bottom of bosom No. 1 met his glance.
But it did not exasperate him on this occasion, for the young man, true to his determination to be liberal with himself, had still bosoms No. 2 and No. 3 at his disposal.
As he was about to separate No. 2 from its duplicate, his eyes, glancing aimlessly about for the moment, caught sight of a trim female figure sitting not far away on a bench diagonally opposite.
Hovering near her, a man, of a species Dennis had not seen before on the street corners of New York, seemed determined to intrude upon her attention.
Convinced of his purpose, the lady, for such she unmistakably appeared, rose from the seat as the fellow was about to raise his hat as a preliminary to further overtures, and sought another bench directly opposite the one from which Dennis had been a witness to her apparent persecution.