E. W. Hornung_A J Raffles 03 Read Free Page A

angles to the lowest flight, and just
to the right of one alighting in the hall. It was thus impossible
for us to see who it was until the person was close abreast of us;
but by the rustle of the gown we knew that it was one of the ladies,
and dressed just as she had come from theatre or ball. Insensibly
I drew back as the candle swam into our field of vision: it had not
traversed many inches when a hand was clapped firmly but silently
across my mouth.
    I could forgive Raffles for that, at any rate! In another breath
I should have cried aloud: for the girl with the candle, the girl
in her ball-dress, at dead of night, the girl with the letter for
the post, was the last girl on God's wide earth whom I should have
chosen thus to encounter - a midnight intruder in the very house
where I had been reluctantly received on her account!
    I forgot Raffles. I forgot the new and unforgivable grudge I had
against him now. I forgot his very hand across my mouth, even
before he paid me the compliment of removing it. There was the only
girl in all the world: I had eyes and brains for no one and for
nothing else. She had neither seen nor heard us, had looked neither
to the right hand nor the left. But a small oak table stood on the
opposite side of the hall; it was to this table that she went. On
it was one of those boxes in which one puts one's letters for the
post; and she stooped to read by her candle the times at which this
box was cleared.
    The loud clock ticked and ticked. She was standing at her full
height now, her candle on the table, her letter in both hands, and
in her downcast face a sweet and pitiful perplexity that drew the
tears to my eyes. Through a film I saw her open the envelope so
lately sealed and read her letter once more, as though she would
have altered it a little at the last. It was too late for that;
but of a sudden she plucked a rose from her bosom, and was pressing
it in with her letter when I groaned aloud.
    How could I help it? The letter was for me: of that I was as sure
as though I had been looking over her shoulder. She was as true as
tempered steel; there were not two of us to whom she wrote and sent
roses at dead of night. It was her one chance of writing to me.
None would know that she had written. And she cared enough to soften
the reproaches I had richly earned, with a red rose warm from her own
warm heart. And there, and there was I, a common thief who had broken
in to steal! Yet I was unaware that I had uttered a sound until she
looked up, startled, and the hands behind me pinned me where I stood.
    I think she must have seen us, even in the dim light of the solitary
candle. Yet not a sound escaped her as she peered courageously in
our direction; neither did one of us move; but the hall clock went
on and on, every tick like the beat of a drum to bring the house
about our ears, until a minute must have passed as in some breathless
dream. And then came the awakening - with such a knocking and a
ringing at the front door as brought all three of us to our senses
on the spot.
    "The son of the house!" whispered Raffles in my ear, as he dragged
me back to the window he had left open for our escape. But as he
leaped out first a sharp cry stopped me at the sill. "Get back!
Get back! We're trapped!" he cried; and in the single second that
I stood there, I saw him fell one officer to the ground, and dart
across the lawn with another at his heels. A third came running up
to the window. What could I do but double back into the house? And
there in the hall I met my lost love face to face.
    Till that moment she had not recognized me. I ran to catch her as
she all but fell. And my touch repelled her into life, so that she
shook me off, and stood gasping: "You, of all men! You, of all men!"
until I could bear it no more, but broke again for the study-window.
"Not that way - not that way!" she cried in an agony at that. Her
hands were upon me now. "In there, in there," she whispered,
pointing and pulling me to a mere