that service had been well
and truly performed.

But if Parrington was exonerated in my mind, so also was Raffles
reinstated in the regard of those who had entertained a far graver and
more dangerous hypothesis. It was a miracle of good luck, a
coincidence among coincidences, which had white-washed him in their
sight at the very moment when they were straining the expert eye to
sift him through and through. But the miracle had been performed, and
its effect was visible in every face and audible in every voice. I
except Ernest, who could never have been in the secret; moreover, that
gay Criminologist had been palpably shaken by his first little
experience of crime. But the other three vied among themselves to do
honor where they had done injustice. I heard Kingsmill, Q.C., telling
Raffles the best time to catch him at chambers, and promising a seat
in court for any trial he might ever like to hear. Parrington spoke of
a presentation set of his books, and in doing homage to Raffles made
his peace with our host. As for Lord Thornaby, I did overhear the name
of the Athenaeum Club, a reference to his friends on the committee, and
a whisper (as I thought) of Rule II.

The police were still in possession when we went our several ways, and
it was all that I could do to drag Raffles up to my rooms, though, as
I have said, they were just round the corner. He consented at last as
a lesser evil than talking of the burglary in the street; and in my
rooms I told him of his late danger and my own dilemma, of the few
words I had overheard in the beginning, of the thin ice on which he
had cut fancy figures without a crack. It was all very well for him.
He had never realized his peril. But let him think of me--listening,
watching, yet unable to lift a finger--unable to say one warning word.

Raffles suffered me to finish, but a weary sigh followed the last
symmetrical whiff of a Sullivan which he flung into my fire before he
spoke.

"No, I won't have another, thank you. I'm going to talk to you, Bunny.
Do you really suppose I didn't see through these wiseacres from the
first?"

I flatly refused to believe he had done so before that evening. Why
had he never mentioned his idea to me? It had been quite the other
way, as I indignantly reminded Raffles. Did he mean me to believe he
was the man to thrust his head into the lion's mouth for fun? And what
point would there be in dragging me there to see the fun?

"I might have wanted yo