I guess it depends on how you display your modal. But you could set the timeout in the event listener?
Here is a JSFiddle to demonstrate how you can achieve it. Basically you add the timeout in the function that will be executed when the event happens.
// Select the element you want to click and add a click event
$("#your-link").click(function(){
// This function will be executed when you click the element
// show the element you want to show
$("#the-modal").show();
// Set a timeout to hide the element again
setTimeout(function(){
$("#the-modal").hide();
}, 3000);
});
If the event you listen for is a click on a link you could have to prevent the default action too by using event.preventDefault(). You can find more info on that here
I hope this helps.
