en found duly barred and bolted in the
morning, and yet we let them assume that we came out that way. Nab
would have pounced on the point, and by this time we might have been
nabbed ourselves."

It was but a little over a hundred sovereigns that Raffles had taken,
and, of course, he had resolutely eschewed any and every form of paper
money. He posted his own first contribution of twenty-five pounds to
the Founder's Fund immediately on our return to town, before rushing
off to more first-class cricket, and I gathered that the rest would
follow piecemeal as he deemed it safe. By an odd coincidence, however,
a mysterious but magnificent donation of a hundred guineas was almost
simultaneously received in notes by the treasurer of the Founder's
Fund, from one who simply signed himself "Old Boy." The treasurer
happened to be our late host, the new man at our old house, and he
wrote to congratulate Raffles on what he was pleased to consider a
direct result of the latter's speech. I did not see the letter that
Raffles wrote in reply, but in due course I heard the name of the
mysterious contributor. He was said to be no other than Nipper Nasmyth
himself. I asked Raffles if it was true. He replied that he would ask
old Nipper point-blank if he came up as usual to the Varsity match, and
if they had the luck to meet. And not only did this happen, but I had
the greater luck to be walking round the ground with Raffles when we
encountered our shabby friend in front of the pavilion.

"My dear fellow," cried Raffles, "I hear it was you who gave that
hundred guineas by stealth to the very movement you denounced. Don't
deny it, and don't blush to find it fame. Listen to me. There was a
great lot in what you said; but it's the kind of thing we ought all to
back, whether we strictly approve of it in our hearts or not."

"Exactly, Raffles, but the fact is--"

"I know what you're going to say. Don't say it. There's not one in a
thousand who would do as you've done, and not one in a million who
would do it anonymously."

"But what makes you think I did it, Raffles?"

"Everybody is saying so. You will find it all over the place when you
get back. You will find yourself the most popular man down there,
Nasmyth!"

I never saw a nobler embarrassment than that of this awkward, ungainly,
cantankerous man: all his angles seemed to have been smoothed away:
there was something quite human in the flushed, undecided, wistful face.