POS. Of course, it was! would you allow a fellow to walk off with your property without making a fight of it, not you, my trojan--I mean your worship! but I'll tell you all about it. I had just arrived from London, and finding that cousin Somerton had that instant returned home from a ball, I determined to give her an agreeable surprise, and for that purpose I was walking on tiptoe along that passage, when I was almost knocked off my legs by a piercing shriek. "My cousin in danger," said I, "then Postlethwaite to the rescue," said I, and with an unfaltering grasp I seized the handle of the door--it was locked, upon which with one blow of this fist--you know my muscular power--I knocked the door clean off its hinges. RAT. (_smiling_) You don't say so? POS. Well, in I rushed, and the first thing I saw was---- RAT. What? POS. Nothing; the room was in total darkness, and the next instant I found myself face to face with a gigantic housebreaker about seven foot high, with two pair of pistols in each hand, and there, extended upon the hearth rug, with her head on the fender lay my poor cousin in a dead faint, and as pale as a sheet. RAT. (_smiling_) But how the deuce did you manage to see all this when the room was in total darkness? POS. What of that? everybody knows that housebreakers are always as pale as a sheet when they faint away; I mean women are always seven feet high--no, housebreakers--really you interrupt me so I don't know what I'm talking about. RAT. (_smiling_) Well? POS. Well, though I was unarmed, I instantly rushed upon the two ruffians. RAT. Two ruffians? POS. Yes. I said there were two, who instantly made for the door, which luckily I had taken the precaution of locking. RAT. Locking! What the door you had just knocked clean off its hinges? POS. Yes. I forgot to mention that in the meantime I had picked the door up and hung it on again. Well, finding they couldn't escape, they both sprang upon me at the same time! The fearful struggle then began afresh, till exhausted nature could do no more, and the whole three of us rolled out of the window together. But here comes my cousin! (_running to door, L._) RAT. Then, as I said before, impudence befriend me. POS. (_handing in MRS. SOMERTON_) Come along, cousin, I told you I'd soon have my friend the superintendent here. Captain Ratcliffe, my cousin. My cousin, Captain Ratcliffe. (_introducing them. MRS. SOMERTON curtseys to RATCLIFFE, and on looking at him gives a very slight start, while RATCLIFFE continues to show the utmost sang froid_) And now, cousin, the sooner you give him all the particulars. Why, what's the matter with you? (_observing how MRS. SOMERTON is examining RATCLIFFE_) MRS. S. Nothing. Doubtless I am mistaken. Yet, I am under the impression that this is not the first time---- RAT. That we have met? madam, if so, I am ashamed to say that I have forgotten the circumstance. (_crosses to C._) MRS. S. (_aside_) The voice too--pshaw--impossible!