Page:E Nesbit - Man and Maid (1906).djvu/61

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try to win his wager. He would try to spend the night in the Musée Grévin. Perhaps something could be arranged before that. If one knew the place thoroughly! A little scare would serve Edward right for being the man to whom that last glance of Rose’s had been given.

Vincent dined lightly, but with conscientious care—and as he dined, he thought. Something might be done by tying a string to one of the figures, and making it move, when Edward was going through that impossible night among the effigies that are so like life—so like death. Something that was not the devil said: “You may frighten him out of his wits.” And the devil answered: “Nonsense! do him good. He oughtn’t to be such a schoolgirl.”

Anyway, the five pounds might as well be won to-night as any other night. He would take a great coat, sleep sound in the place of horrors, and the people who opened it in the morning to sweep and dust would bear witness that he had passed the night there. He thought he might trust to the French love of a sporting wager to keep him from any bother with the authorities.

So he went in among the crowd, and looked