THE MUSICIAN
billiard-room. She had not, however, taken two steps therein when a fearful panic seized her, for what should she behold but the stout form of my rare old dad the emperor leaning over the table, apparently in the act of making a brilliant stroke. A few seconds' consideration, however, served to convince the vengeful creature that he was fast asleep. Gnashing her teeth at the old gentleman, she hurried across the room and entered the library, in which my good mother was seated, reading. But so absorbed was the good lady in her book that she took no notice whatever of the agile intruder, as she entered by one door and swiftly left by the other. She now successively passed through the state ball-room, the music-room, the third best drawing-room, the second best ball-room, and the state bed-room, and mounting the back stairs, came to the suite of rooms occupied by the nurses, and eventually reached the nurses' dining-hall, into which my nursery led, without having excited any one's observation.
'Opening my door very quietly, she peeped in. All was dark inside except for the glimmer of a night-light which shone on the frilling of my cradle and on the form of the nurse then in office, who had fallen asleep over her supper of stewed apples. Creeping in quietly, the evil-minded woman lifted my sleeping form from the cradle, so gently that she did not awaken me, and, holding me closely to her, once more successfully passed through all the apartments
