E. W. Hornung_A J Raffles 02 (14 page)

"The bathroom, eh?" Raffles echoed with professional interest.
"And you followed us on foot across the park?"

"Of course."

"And then in a cab?"

"And afterwards on foot once more."

"The simplest skeleton would let you in down below."

I saw the lower half of Lord Ernest's face grinning in the light
of the candle set between them on the ground.

"You follow every move," said he; "there can be no doubt you are
one of the fraternity; and I shouldn't wonder if we had formed
our style upon the same model. Ever know A. J. Raffles?"

The abrupt question took my breath away; but Raffles himself did
not lose an instant over his answer.

"Intimately," said he.

"That accounts for you, then," laughed Lord Ernest, "as it does
for me, though I never had the honor of the master's
acquaintance. Nor is it for me to say which is the worthier
disciple. Perhaps, however, now that your friend is handcuffed
in mid-air, and you yourself are at my mercy, you will concede me
some little temporary advantage?"

And his face split in another grin from the cropped moustache
downward, as I saw no longer by candlelight but by a flash of
lightning which tore the sky in two before Raffles could reply.

"You have the bulge at present," admitted Raffles; "but you have
still to lay hands upon your, or our, ill-gotten goods. To shoot
me is not necessarily to do so; to bring either one of us to a
violent end is only to court a yet more violent and infinitely
more disgraceful one for yourself. Family considerations alone
should rule that risk out of your game. Now, an hour or two ago,
when the exact opposite—"

The remainder of Raffles's speech was drowned from my ears by the
belated crash of thunder which the lightning had foretold. So
loud, however, was the crash when it came, that the storm was
evidently approaching us at a high velocity; yet as the last
echo rumbled away, I heard Raffles talking as though he had never
stopped.

"You offered us a share," he was saying; "unless you mean to
murder us both in cold blood, it will be worth your while to
repeat that offer. We should be dangerous enemies; you had far
better make the best of us as friends."

"Lead the way down to your flat," said Lord Ernest, with a
flourish of his service revolver, "and perhaps we may talk about
it. It is for me to make the terms, I imagine, and in the first
place I am not going to get wet to the skin up here."

The rain was beginning in great drops, even as he spoke, and by a
second flash of lightning I saw Raffles pointing to me.

"But what about my friend?" said he.

And then came the second peal.

"Oh, HE'S all right," the great brute replied; "do him good!
You don't catch me letting myself in for two to one!"

"You will find it equally difficult," rejoined Raffles, "to
induce me to leave my friend to the mercy of a night like this.
He has not recovered from the blow you struck him in your own
rooms. I am not such a fool as to blame you for that, but you
are a worse sportsman than I take you for if you think of leaving
him where he is. If he stays, however, so do I."

And, just as it ceased, Raffles's voice seemed distinctly nearer
to me; but in the darkness and the rain, which was now as heavy
as hail, I could see nothing clearly. The rain had already
extinguished the candle. I heard an oath from Belville, a laugh
from Raffles, and for a second that was all. Raffles was coming
to me, and the other could not even see to fire; that was all I
knew in the pitchy interval of invisible rain before the next
crash and the next flash.

And then!

This time they came together, and not till my dying hour shall I
forget the sight that the lightning lit and the thunder
applauded. Raffles was on one of the parapets of the gulf that
my foot-bridge spanned, and in the sudden illumination he
stepped across it as one might across a garden path. The width
was scarcely greater, but the depth! In the sudden flare I saw
to the concrete bottom of the well, and it looked no larger than
the hollow of my hand. Raffles was laughing in my ear; he had
the iron railing fast; it was between us, but his foothold was as
secure as mine. Lord Ernest Belville, on the contrary, was the
fifth of a second late for the light, and half a foot short in
his spring. Something struck our plank bridge so hard as to set
it quivering like a harp-string; there was half a gasp and half a
sob in mid-air beneath our feet; and then a sound far below that
I prefer not to describe. I am not sure that I could hit upon
the perfect simile; it is more than enough for me that I can hear
it still. And with that sickening sound came the loudest clap
of thunder yet, and a great white glare that showed us our
enemy's body far below, with one white hand spread like a
starfish, but the head of him mercifully twisted underneath.

"It was all his own fault, Bunny. Poor devil! May he and all of
us be forgiven; but pull yourself together for your own sake.
Well, you can't fall; stay where you are a minute."

I remember the uproar of the elements while Raffles was gone; no
other sound mingled with it; not the opening of a single window,
not the uplifting of a single voice. Then came Raffles with
soap and water, and the gyve was wheedled from one wrist, as you
withdraw a ring for which the finger has grown too large. Of the
rest, I only remember shivering till morning in a pitch-dark
flat, whose invalid occupier was for once the nurse, and I his
patient.

And that is the true ending of the episode in which we two set
ourselves to catch one of our own kidney, albeit in another place
I have shirked the whole truth. It is not a grateful task to
show Raffles as completely at fault as he really was on that
occasion; nor do I derive any subtle satisfaction from recounting
my own twofold humiliation, or from having assisted never so
indirectly in the death of a not uncongenial sinner. The truth,
however, has after all a merit of its own, and the great
kinsfolk of poor Lord Ernest have but little to lose by its
divulgence. It would seem that they knew more of the real
character of the apostle of Rational Drink than was known at
Exeter Hall. The tragedy was indeed hushed up, as tragedies
only are when they occur in such circles. But the rumor that did
get abroad, as to the class of enterprise which the poor scamp
was pursuing when he met his death, cannot be too soon exploded,
since it breathed upon the fair fame of some of the most
respectable flats in Kensington.

The square shall be nameless, but if you drive due west from
Piccadilly the cab-man will eventually find it on his left, and
he ought to thank you for two shillings. It is not a
fashionable square, but there are few with a finer garden, while
the studios on the south side lend distinction of another sort.
The houses, however, are small and dingy, and about the last to
attract the expert practitioner in search of a crib. Heaven
knows it was with no such thought I trailed Raffles thither, one
unlucky evening at the latter end of that same season, when Dr.
Theobald had at last insisted upon the bath-chair which I had
foreseen in the beginning. Trees whispered in the green garden
aforesaid, and the cool, smooth lawns looked so inviting that I
wondered whether some philanthropic resident could not be induced
to lend us the key. But Raffles would not listen to the
suggestion, when I stopped to make it, and what was worse, I
found him looking wistfully at the little houses instead.

"Such balconies, Bunny! A leg up, and there you would be!"

I expressed a conviction that there would be nothing worth taking
in the square, but took care to have him under way again as I
spoke.

"I daresay you're right," sighed Raffles. "Rings and watches, I
suppose, but it would be hard luck to take them from people who
live in houses like these. I don't know, though. Here's one
with an extra story. Stop, Bunny; if you don't stop I'll hold on
to the railings! This is a good house; look at the knocker and
the electric bell. They've had that put in. There's some money
here, my rabbit! I dare bet there's a silver-table in the
drawing-room; and the windows are wide open. Electric light,
too, by Jove!"

Since stop I must, I had done so on the other side of the road,
in the shadow of the leafy palings, and as Raffles spoke the
ground floor windows opposite had flown alight, showing as pretty
a little dinner-table as one could wish to see, with a man at his
wine at the far end, and the back of a lady in evening dress
toward us. It was like a lantern-picture thrown upon a screen.
There were only the pair of them, but the table was brilliant
with silver and gay with flowers, and the maid waited with the
indefinable air of a good servant. It certainly seemed a good
house.

"She's going to let down the blind!" whispered Raffles, in high
excitement. "No, confound them, they've told her not to. Mark
down her necklace, Bunny, and invoice his stud. What a brute he
looks! But I like the table, and that's her show. She has the
taste; but he must have money. See the festive picture over the
sideboard? Looks to me like a Jacques Saillard. But that
silver-table would be good enough for me."

"Get on," said I. "You're in a bath-chair."

"But the whole square's at dinner! We should have the ball at
our feet. It wouldn't take two twos!"

"With those blinds up, and the cook in the kitchen underneath?"

He nodded, leaning forward in the chair, his hands upon the wraps
about his legs.

"You must be mad," said I, and got back to my handles with the
word, but when I tugged the chair ran light.

"Keep an eye on the rug," came in a whisper from the middle of
the road; and there stood my invalid, his pale face in a quiver
of pure mischief, yet set with his insane resolve. "I'm only
going to see whether that woman has a silver-table—"

"We don't want it—"

"It won't take a minute—"

"It's madness, madness—"

"Then don't you wait!"

It was like him to leave me with that, and this time I had taken
him at his last word had not my own given me an idea. Mad I had
called him, and mad I could declare him upon oath if necessary.
It was not as though the thing had happened far from home. They
could learn all about us at the nearest mansions. I referred
them to Dr. Theobald; this was a Mr. Maturin, one of his
patients, and I was his keeper, and he had never given me the
slip before. I heard myself making these explanations on the
doorstep, and pointing to the deserted bath-chair as the proof,
while the pretty parlor maid ran for the police. It would be a
more serious matter for me than for my charge. I should lose my
place. No, he had never done such a thing before, and I would
answer for it that he never should again.

I saw myself conducting Raffles back to his chair, with a firm
hand and a stern tongue. I heard him thanking me in whispers on
the way home. It would be the first tight place I had ever got
him out of, and I was quite anxious for him to get into it, so
sure was I of every move. My whole position had altered in the
few seconds that it took me to follow this illuminating train of
ideas; it was now so strong that I could watch Raffles without
much anxiety. And he was worth watching.

He had stepped boldly but softly to the front door, and there he
was still waiting, ready to ring if the door opened or a face
appeared in the area, and doubtless to pretend that he had rung
already. But he had not to ring at all; and suddenly I saw his
foot in the letter-box, his left hand on the lintel overhead. It
was thrilling, even to a hardened accomplice with an explanation
up his sleeve! A tight grip with that left hand of his, as he
leant backward with all his weight upon those five fingers; a
right arm stretched outward and upward to its last inch; and the
base of the low, projecting balcony was safely caught.

I looked down and took breath. The maid was removing the crumbs
in the lighted room, and the square was empty as before. What a
blessing it was the end of the season! Many of the houses
remained in darkness. I looked up again, and Raffles was drawing
his left leg over the balcony railing. In another moment he had
disappeared through one of the French windows which opened upon
the balcony, and in yet another he had switched on the electric
light within. This was bad enough, for now I, at least, could
see everything he did; but the crowning folly was still to come.
There was no point in it; the mad thing was done for my benefit,
as I knew at once and he afterward confessed; but the lunatic
reappeared on the balcony, bowing like a mountebank—in his
crape mask!

I set off with the empty chair, but I came back. I could not
desert old Raffles, even when I would, but must try to explain
away his mask as well, if he had not the sense to take it off in
time. It would be difficult, but burglaries are not usually
committed from a bath-chair, and for the rest I put my faith in
Dr. Theobald. Meanwhile Raffles had at least withdrawn from the
balcony, and now I could only see his head as he peered into a
cabinet at the other side of the room. It was like the opera of
Aida, in which two scenes are enacted simultaneously, one in the
dungeon below, the other in the temple above. In the same
fashion my attention now became divided between the picture of
Raffles moving stealthily about the upper room, and that of the
husband and wife at table underneath. And all at once, as the
man replenished his glass with a shrug of the shoulders, the
woman pushed back her chair and sailed to the door.

Raffles was standing before the fireplace upstairs. He had
taken one of the framed photographs from the chimney-piece, and
was scanning it at suicidal length through the eye-holes in the
hideous mask which he still wore. He would need it after all.
The lady had left the room below, opening and shutting the door
for herself; the man was filling his glass once more. I would
have shrieked my warning to Raffles, so fatally engrossed
overhead, but at this moment (of all others) a constable (of all
men) was marching sedately down our side of the square. There
was nothing for it but to turn a melancholy eye upon the
bath-chair, and to ask the constable the time. I was evidently
to be kept there all night, I remarked, and only realized with
the words that they disposed of my other explanations before they