Mr. Justice RafflesHornung, E. W. (Ernest William)
General
Mr. Justice Raffles
Hornung, E. W. (Ernest William)
Criminals -- England -- Fiction; Raffles (Fictitious character) -- Fiction
"What could I do? Should I do anything at all? Was it any business of
mine? You may imagine the way I cross-questioned myself, and you may
imagine the crooked answers I got! I won't bore you with the psychology
of the thing; it's pretty obvious after all. It was not so much a case
of doing the best as of knowing the worst. All day yesterday there were
no developments of any sort, and there was no sign of Mr. Raffles;
nothing had happened in the night, or we should have heard of it; but
that made me all the more certain that something or other would happen
last night. The week's grace was nearly up--you know what I mean--their
last week at their own house. If anything was to be done, it was about
time, and I knew Mr. Raffles was going to do something. I wanted to know
what--that was all."
"Quite right, too!" I murmured. But I doubt if Miss Belsize heard me; she
was in no need of my encouragement or my approval. The old light--her own
light--the reckless light--was burning away in her brilliant eyes!
"The night before," she went on, "I hardly slept a wink; last night I
preferred not to go to bed at all. I told you I sometimes did weird
things that astonished the natives of these suburban shores. Well, last
night, if it wasn't early this morning, I made my weirdest effort yet. I
have a canoe, you know; just now I almost live in it. Last night I went
out unbeknowns after midnight, partly to reassure myself, partly--I beg
your pardon, Mr. Manders?"
"I didn't speak."
"Your face shouted!"
"I'd rather you went on."
"But if you know what I'm going to say?"
Of course I knew, but I dragged it from her none the less. The nebulous
white-shirted figure in the canoe, that had skimmed past Dan Levy's
frontage as we were trying to get him aboard his own pleasure-boat, and
again past the empty house when we were in the act of disembarking him
there, that figure was the trim and slim one now at my side. She had seen
us--searched for us--each time. Our voices she had heard and recognised;
only our actions, or rather that midnight deed of ours, had she
misinterpreted. She would not admit it to me, but I still believe she
feared it was a dead body that we had shipped at dead of night to hide
away in that desolate tower.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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