"Forgotten, Leggett! Forgotten what, may I ask?"

"Locking your lordship's dressing-room door behind your lordship, my
lord," stuttered the unfortunate Leggett, in the short spurts of a
winded man, a few stertorous syllables at a time. "Been up myself, my
lord. Bedroom door--dressing-room door--both locked inside!"

But by this time the noble master was in worse case than the man. His
fine forehead was a tangle of livid cords; his baggy jowl filled out
like a balloon. In another second he had abandoned his place as our
host and fled the room; and in yet another we had forgotten ours as his
guests and rushed headlong at his heels.

Raffles was as excited as any of us now: he outstripped us all. The
cherubic little lawyer and I had a fine race for the last place but
one, which I secured, while the panting butler and his satellites
brought up a respectful rear. It was our unconventional author,
however, who was the first to volunteer his assistance and advice.

"No use pushing, Thornaby!" cried he. "If it's been done with a wedge
and gimlet, you may smash the door, but you'll never force it. Is there
a ladder in the place?"

"There's a rope-ladder somewhere, in case of fire, I believe," said my
lord vaguely, as he rolled a critical eye over our faces. "Where is it
kept, Leggett?"

"'William will fetch it, my lord."

And a pair of noble calves went flashing to the upper regions.

"What's the good of bringing it down," cried Parrington, who had thrown
back to the wilds in his excitement. "Let him hang it out of the
window above your own, and let me climb down and do the rest! I'll
undertake to have one or other of these doors open in two twos!"

The fastened doors were at right angles on the landing which we filled
between us. Lord Thornaby smiled grimly on the rest of us, when he had
nodded and dismissed the author like a hound from the leash.

"It's a good thing we know something about our friend Parrington," said
my lord. "He takes more kindly to all this than I do, I can tell you."

"It's grist to his mill," said Raffles charitably.

"Exactly! We shall have the whole thing in his next book."

"I hope to have it at the Old Bailey first," remarked Kingsmill, Q.C.

"Refreshing to find a man of letters such a man of action too!"

It was Raffles who said this, and the remark seemed rather trite for
him, but in the tone there was a something that just caught my private
ear. And for once I underst