A Thief in the Night - E. W. Hornung (phonics reader .TXT) 📗

all his agony; my mind would only leave him for that gallows of which Raffles had said true things in jest. No, I could not face so vile a death lightly, but I could meet it, somehow, better than I could endure a guilty suspense. In the watches of the second night I made up my mind to meet it halfway, that very morning, while still there might be time to save the life that we had left in jeopardy. And I got up early to tell Raffles of my resolve.

His room in the hotel where we were staying was littered with clothes and luggage new enough for any bridegroom; I lifted the locked cricket-bag, and found it heavier than a cricket-bag has any right to be. But in the bed Raffles was sleeping like an infant, his shaven self once more. And when I shook him he awoke with a smile.

“Going to confess, eh, Bunny? Well, wait a bit; the local police won’t thank you for knocking them up at this hour. And I bought a late edition which you ought to see; that must be it on the floor. You have a look in the stop-press column, Bunny.”

I found the place with a sunken heart, and this is what I read:

West-End Outrage

Colonel Crutchley, R.E., V.C., has been the victim of a dastardly outrage at his residence, Peter Street, Campden Hill. Returning unexpectedly to the house, which had been left untenanted during the absence of the family abroad, it was found occupied by two ruffians, who overcame and secured the distinguished officer by the exercise of considerable violence. When discovered through the intelligence of the Kensington police, the gallant victim was gagged and bound hand and foot, and in an advanced stage of exhaustion.

“Thanks to the Kensington police,” observed Raffles, as I read the last words aloud in my horror. “They can’t have gone when they got my letter.”

“Your letter?”

“I printed them a line while we were waiting for our train at Euston. They must have got it that night, but they can’t have paid any attention to it until yesterday morning. And when they do, they take all the credit and give me no more than you did, Bunny!”

I looked at the curly head upon the pillow, at the smiling, handsome face under the curls. And at last I understood.

“So all the time you never meant it!”

“Slow murder? You should have known me better. A few hours’ enforced Rest Cure was the worst I wished him.”

“You might have told me, Raffles!”

“That may be, Bunny, but you ought certainly to have trusted me!”

The Criminologists’ Club

“But who are they, Raffles, and where’s their house? There’s no such club on the list in Whitaker.”

“The Criminologists, my dear Bunny, are too few for a local habitation, and too select to tell their name in Gath. They are merely so many solemn students of contemporary crime, who meet and dine periodically at each other’s clubs or houses.”

“But why in the world should they ask us to dine with them?”

And I brandished the invitation which had brought me hotfoot to the Albany: it was from the Right Hon. the Earl of Thornaby, K.G.; and it requested the honor of my company at dinner, at Thornaby House, Park Lane, to meet the members of the Criminologists’ Club. That in itself was a disturbing compliment: judge then of my dismay on learning that Raffles had been invited too!

“They have got it into their heads,” said he, “that the gladiatorial element is the curse of most modern sport. They tremble especially for the professional gladiator. And they want to know whether my experience tallies with their theory.”

“So they say!”

“They quote the case of a league player, sus. per coll., and any number of suicides. It really is rather in my public line.”

“In yours, if you like, but not in mine,” said I. “No, Raffles, they’ve got their eye on us both, and mean to put us under the microscope, or they never would have pitched on me.”

Raffles smiled on my perturbation.

“I almost wish you were right, Bunny! It would be even better fun than I mean to make it as it is. But it may console you to hear that it was I who gave them your name. I told them you were a far keener criminologist than myself. I am delighted to hear they have taken my hint, and that we are to meet at their gruesome board.”

“If I accept,” said I, with the austerity he deserved.

“If you don’t,” rejoined Raffles, “you will miss some sport after both our hearts. Think of it, Bunny! These fellows meet to wallow in all the latest crimes; we wallow with them as though we knew more about it than themselves. Perhaps we don’t, for few criminologists have a soul above murder; and I quite expect to have the privilege of lifting the discussion into our own higher walk. They shall give their morbid minds to the fine art of burgling, for a change; and while we’re about it, Bunny, we may as well extract their opinion of our noble selves. As authors, as collaborators, we will sit with the flower of our critics, and find our own level in the expert eye. It will be a piquant experience, if not an invaluable one; if we are sailing too near the wind, we are sure to hear about it, and can trim our yards accordingly. Moreover, we shall get a very good dinner into the bargain, or our noble host will belie a European reputation.”

“Do you know him?” I asked.

“We have a pavilion acquaintance, when it suits my lord,” replied Raffles, chuckling. “But I know all about him. He was president one year of the M.C.C., and we never had a better. He knows the game, though I believe he never played cricket in his life. But then he knows most things, and has never done any of