The Amateur Cracksman E. W. Hornung (desktop ebook reader txt) 📖

“Hold this man!” he cried, as I appeared. “Hold the rascal!”

But I stood like a fool until the pair of them backed into me, when, with a deep breath I flung myself on the fellow, whose face I had seen at last. He was one of the footmen who waited at table; and no sooner had I pinned him than the detective loosed his hold.

“Hang on to him,” he cried. “There’s more of ’em below.”

And he went leaping down the stairs, as other doors opened and Lord Amersteth and his son appeared simultaneously in their pyjamas. At that my man ceased struggling; but I was still holding him when Crowley turned up the gas.

“What the devil’s all this?” asked Lord Amersteth, blinking. “Who was that ran downstairs?”

“Mac⁠—Clephane!” said I hastily.

“Aha!” said he, turning to the footman. “So you’re the scoundrel, are you? Well done! Well done! Where was he caught?”

I had no idea.

“Here’s Lady Melrose’s door open,” said Crowley. “Lady Melrose! Lady Melrose!”

“You forget she’s deaf,” said Lord Amersteth. “Ah! that’ll be her maid.”

An inner door had opened; next instant there was a little shriek, and a white figure gesticulated on the threshold.

“Où donc est l’écrin de Madame la Marquise? La fenêtre est ouverte. Il a disparu!”

“Window open and jewel-case gone, by Jove!” exclaimed Lord Amersteth. “Mais comment est Madame la Marquise? Est elle bien?”

“Oui, milor. Elle dort.”

“Sleeps through it all,” said my lord. “She’s the only one, then!”

“What made Mackenzie⁠—Clephane⁠—bolt?” young Crowley asked me.

“Said there were more of them below.”

“Why the devil couldn’t you tell us so before?” he cried, and went leaping downstairs in his turn.

He was followed by nearly all the cricketers, who now burst upon the scene in a body, only to desert it for the chase. Raffles was one of them, and I would gladly have been another, had not the footman chosen this moment to hurl me from him, and to make a dash in the direction from which they had come. Lord Amersteth had him in an instant; but the fellow fought desperately, and it took the two of us to drag him downstairs, amid a terrified chorus from half-open doors. Eventually we handed him over to two other footmen who appeared with their nightshirts tucked into their trousers, and my host was good enough to compliment me as he led the way outside.

“I thought I heard a shot,” he added. “Didn’t you?”

“I thought I heard three.”

And out we dashed into the darkness.

I remember how the gravel pricked my feet, how the wet grass numbed them as we made for the sound of voices on an outlying lawn. So dark was the night that we were in the cricketers’ midst before we saw the shimmer of their pyjamas; and then Lord Amersteth almost trod on Mackenzie as he lay prostrate in the dew.

“Who’s this?” he cried. “What on earth’s happened?”

“It’s Clephane,” said a man who knelt over him. “He’s got a bullet in him somewhere.”

“Is he alive?”

“Barely.”

“Good God! Where’s Crowley?”

“Here I am,” called a breathless voice. “It’s no good, you fellows. There’s nothing to show which way they’ve gone. Here’s Raffles; he’s chucked it, too.” And they ran up panting.

“Well, we’ve got one of them, at all events,” muttered Lord Amersteth. “The next thing is to get this poor fellow indoors. Take his shoulders, somebody. Now his middle. Join hands under him. All together, now; that’s the way. Poor fellow! Poor fellow! His name isn’t Clephane at all. He’s a Scotland Yard detective, down here for these very villains!”

Raffles was the first to express surprise; but he had also been the first to raise the wounded man. Nor had any of them a stronger or more tender hand in the slow procession to the house.

In a little we had the senseless man stretched on a sofa in the library. And there, with ice on his wound and brandy in his throat, his eyes opened and his lips moved.

Lord Amersteth bent down to catch the words.

“Yes, yes,” said he; “we’ve got one of them safe and sound. The brute you collared upstairs.” Lord Amersteth bent lower. “By Jove! Lowered the jewel-case out of the window, did he? And they’ve got clean away with it! Well, well! I only hope we’ll be able to pull this good fellow through. He’s off again.”

An hour passed: the sun was rising.

It found a dozen young fellows on the settees in the billiard-room, drinking whiskey and soda-water in their overcoats and pyjamas, and still talking excitedly in one breath. A timetable was being passed from hand to hand: the doctor was still in the library. At last the door opened, and Lord Amersteth put in his head.

“It isn’t hopeless,” said he, “but it’s bad enough. There’ll be no cricket today.”

Another hour, and most of us were on our way to catch the early train; between us we filled a compartment almost to suffocation. And still we talked all together of the night’s event; and still I was a little hero in my way, for having kept my hold of the one ruffian who had been taken; and my gratification was subtle and intense. Raffles watched me under lowered lids. Not a word had we had together; not a word did we have until we had left the others at Paddington, and were skimming through the streets in a hansom with noiseless tires and a tinkling bell.

“Well, Bunny,” said Raffles, “so the professors have it, eh?”

“Yes,” said I. “And I’m jolly glad!”

“That poor Mackenzie has a ball in his chest?”

“That you and I have been on the decent side for once.”

He shrugged his shoulders.

“You’re hopeless, Bunny, quite hopeless! I take it you wouldn’t have refused your share if the boodle had fallen to us? Yet you positively enjoy coming off second best⁠—for the second time running! I confess, however, that the professors’ methods were full of interest to