ibbled line by special messenger; and overnight,
evidently in the train, he had scribbled this one to post in the small
hours at Crewe:

"'Ware Prince of Professors! _He was in the offing when I
left._ If slightest cause for uneasiness about bank, withdraw
at once and keep in own rooms like good chap.

"A. J. R.

"_P. S._--Other reasons, as you shall hear."

There was a nice nightcap for a puzzled head! I had made rather an
evening of it, what with increase of funds and decrease of anxiety,
but this cryptic admonition spoiled the remainder of my night. It had
arrived by a late post, and I only wished that I had left it all night
in my letter-box.

What exactly did it mean? And what exactly must I do? These were
questions that confronted me with fresh force in the morning.

The news of Crawshay did not surprise me. I was quite sure that Raffles
had been given good reason to bear him in mind before his journey, even if
he had not again beheld the ruffian in the flesh. That ruffian and that
journey might be more intimately connected than I had yet supposed.
Raffles never told me all. Yet the solid fact held good--held better than
ever--that I had seen his plunder safely planted in my bank. Crawshay
himself could not follow it _there_. I was certain he had not followed my
cab: in the acute self-consciousness induced by that abominable drive, I
should have known it in my bones if he had. I thought of the porter's
friend who had helped me with the chest. No, I remember him as well as I
remembered Crawshay; they were quite different types.

To remove that vile box from the bank, on top of another cab, with no
stronger pretext and no further instructions, was not to be thought of
for a moment. Yet I did think of it, for hours. I was always anxious
to do my part by Raffles; he had done more than his by me, not once or
twice, to-day or yesterday, but again and again from the very first. I
need not state the obvious reasons I had for fighting shy of the
personal custody of his accursed chest. Yet he had run worse risks for
me, and I wanted him to learn that he, too, could depend on a devotion
not unworthy of his own.

In my dilemma I did what I have often done when at a loss for light
and leading. I took hardly any lunch, but went to Northumberland
Avenue and had a Turkish bath instead. I know nothing so cleansing to
mind as well as body, nothing better calcul