She was not accustomed to waken in the night , and she had the impression of having been awakened by some noise . She listened breathlessly . Her room was directly over the dining-room , and an empty stovepipe hole opened up through the ceiling of the latter at the head of her bed . There was no mistake about it . Something or some person was moving about stealthily in the room below . It was n't the cat -- Miss Calista had shut him in the woodshed before she went to bed , and he could n't possibly get out . It must certainly be a beggar or tramp of some description . Miss Calista might be given over to nervousness in regard to imaginary thieves , but in the presence of real danger she was cool and self-reliant . As noiselessly and swiftly as any burglar himself , Miss Calista slipped out of bed and into her clothes . Then she tip-toed out into the hall . The late moonlight , streaming in through the hall windows , was quite enough illumination for her purpose , and she got downstairs and was fairly in the open doorway of the dining-room before a sound betrayed her presence . Standing at the sideboard , hastily ransacking the neat contents of an open drawer , stood a man 's figure , dimly visible in the moonlight gloom . As Miss Calista 's grim form appeared in the doorway , the midnight marauder turned with a start and then , with an inarticulate cry , sprang , not at the courageous lady , but at the open window behind him . Miss Calista , realizing with a flash of comprehension that he was escaping her , had a woman-like impulse to get a blow in anyhow ; she grasped and hurled at her unceremonious caller the first thing that came to hand -- a bottle of peppermint essence that was standing on the sideboard . The missile hit the escaping thief squarely on the shoulder as he sprang out of the window , and the fragments of glass came clattering down on the sill . The next moment Miss Calista found herself alone , standing by the sideboard in a half-dazed fashion , for the whole thing had passed with such lightning-like rapidity that it almost seemed as if it were the dissolving end of a bad dream . But the open drawer and the window , where the bits of glass were glistening in the moonlight , were no dream . Miss Calista recovered herself speedily , closed the window , lit the lamp , gathered up the broken glass , and set up the chairs which the would-be thief had upset in his exit . An examination of the sideboard showed the precious five hundred safe and sound in an undisturbed drawer . Miss Calista kept grim watch and ward there until morning , and thought the matter over exhaustively .
In the end she resolved XXXXX keep her own counsel .
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