For an instant she fancied that the sleeper's breathing stopped, and her heart gave a great bound.

But the breathing went on the next instant--if it had stopped--and dreading the return of the lightning, shrinking from being revealed so near him, and in that act--for which the darkness seemed more fitting--she groped farther, and touched something.

Then, as her fingers closed upon it and grasped it, and his breath rose hot to her burning cheek, she knew that the real danger lay in the withdrawal.
At the first attempt he uttered a kind of grunt and moved, throwing out his hand.

She thought that he was going to awake, and had hard work to keep herself where she was; but he did not move, and she began again with so infinite a precaution that the perspiration ran down her face and her hair within the hood hung dank on her neck.

Slowly, oh so slowly, she drew back the hand, and with it the packet; so slowly, and yet so resolutely, being put to it, that when the dreaded flash surprised her, and she saw his harsh swarthy face, steeped in the mysterious aloofness of sleep, within a hand's breadth of hers, not a muscle of her arm moved, nor did her hand quiver.
It was done--at last! With a burst of gratitude, of triumph, of exultation, she stood erect.