Raffles: The Amateur Cracksman | Page 5

carelessly on the curly head he shook with a smile as I
passed him the decanter.
"When we come back," said he. "Work first, play afterward. Do you
see what day it is?" he added, tearing a leaflet from a Shakespearian

calendar, as I drained my glass. "March 15th. 'The Ides of March, the
Ides of March, remember.' Eh, Bunny, my boy? You won't forget them,
will you?"
And, with a laugh, he threw some coals on the fire before turning down
the gas like a careful householder. So we went out together as the clock
on the chimney-piece was striking two.
II
Piccadilly was a trench of raw white fog, rimmed with blurred
street-lamps, and lined with a thin coating of adhesive mud. We met no
other wayfarers on the deserted flagstones, and were ourselves favored
with a very hard stare from the constable of the beat, who, however,
touched his helmet on recognizing my companion.
"You see, I'm known to the police," laughed Raffles as we passed on.
"Poor devils, they've got to keep their weather eye open on a night like
this! A fog may be a bore to you and me, Bunny, but it's a perfect
godsend to the criminal classes, especially so late in their season. Here
we are, though--and I'm hanged if the beggar isn't in bed and asleep
after all!"
We had turned into Bond Street, and had halted on the curb a few yards
down on the right. Raffles was gazing up at some windows across the
road, windows barely discernible through the mist, and without the
glimmer of a light to throw them out. They were over a jeweller's shop,
as I could see by the peep-hole in the shop door, and the bright light
burning within. But the entire "upper part," with the private street-door
next the shop, was black and blank as the sky itself.
"Better give it up for to-night," I urged. "Surely the morning will be
time enough!"
"Not a bit of it," said Raffles. "I have his key. We'll surprise him. Come
along."
And seizing my right arm, he hurried me across the road, opened the

door with his latch-key, and in another moment had shut it swiftly but
softly behind us. We stood together in the dark. Outside, a measured
step was approaching; we had heard it through the fog as we crossed
the street; now, as it drew nearer, my companion's fingers tightened on
my arm.
"It may be the chap himself," he whispered. "He's the devil of a
night-bird. Not a sound, Bunny! We'll startle the life out of him. Ah!"
The measured step had passed without a pause. Raffles drew a deep
breath, and his singular grip of me slowly relaxed.
"But still, not a sound," he continued in the same whisper; "we'll take a
rise out of him, wherever he is! Slip off your shoes and follow me."
Well, you may wonder at my doing so; but you can never have met A. J.
Raffles. Half his power lay in a conciliating trick of sinking the
commander in the leader. And it was impossible not to follow one who
led with such a zest. You might question, but you followed first. So
now, when I heard him kick off his own shoes, I did the same, and was
on the stairs at his heels before I realized what an extraordinary way
was this of approaching a stranger for money in the dead of night. But
obviously Raffles and he were on exceptional terms of intimacy, and I
could not but infer that they were in the habit of playing practical jokes
upon each other.
We groped our way so slowly upstairs that I had time to make more
than one note before we reached the top. The stair was uncarpeted. The
spread fingers of my right hand encountered nothing on the damp wall;
those of my left trailed through a dust that could be felt on the banisters.
An eerie sensation had been upon me since we entered the house. It
increased with every step we climbed. What hermit were we going to
startle in his cell?
We came to a landing. The banisters led us to the left, and to the left
again. Four steps more, and we were on another and a longer landing,
and suddenly a match blazed from the black. I never heard it struck. Its
flash was blinding. When my eyes became accustomed to the light,

there was Raffles holding up the match with one hand, and shading it
with the other, between bare boards, stripped walls, and the open doors
of empty rooms.
"Where have you brought me?" I cried. "The house is unoccupied!"
"Hush! Wait!" he whispered, and he led the way into one of the empty