Resisting pressure to stay all night at Marchmont, on the score of having to be at work early next morning, Heberdon got back to his own rooms about midnight. He had been in pretty good feather all evening; with the delightful secret he possessed, he did not find his relatives so tiresome; indeed, there was something distinctly humorous to him in the idea of the successful hold-up man taking his ease in the crême de la crême of respectable society.
crême de la crêmeBut while he diverted himself, his mind had been ever busy with the little satchel at home. How much did it contain?—ten thousand, twelve, fifteen? He could scarcely restrain his impatience to return and count it. At the dinner table, just to be on the safe side, he related a little incident that was supposed to have occurred t
