h, and natural enough for that matter. I would do the same in his
place. We had the bulge before; he has it now; it's perfectly fair. We
must take on this job; we aren't in a position to refuse it; even if we
were, I should take it on! Our friend is a great sportsman; he has got
clear away from Dartmoor; it would be a thousand pities to let him go
back. Nor shall he; not if I can think of a way of getting him abroad."

"Any way you like," murmured Crawshay, with his eyes shut. "I leaves
the 'ole thing to you."

"But you'll have to wake up and tell us things."

"All right, mister; but I'm fair on the rocks for a sleep!"

And he stood up, blinking.

"Think you were traced to town?"

"Must have been."

"And here?"

"Not in this fog--not with any luck."

Raffles went into the bedroom, lit the gas there, and returned next
minute.

"So you got in by the window?"

"That's about it."

"It was devilish smart of you to know which one; it beats me how you
brought it off in daylight, fog or no fog! But let that pass. You
don't think you were seen?"

"I don't think it, sir."

"Well, let's hope you are right. I shall reconnoitre and soon find
out. And you'd better come too, Bunny, and have something to eat and
talk it over."

As Raffles looked at me, I looked at Crawshay, anticipating trouble;
and trouble brewed in his blank, fierce face, in the glitter of his
startled eyes, in the sudden closing of his fists.

"And what's to become o' me?" he cried out with an oath.

"You wait here."

"No, you don't," he roared, and at a bound had his back to the door.
"You don't get round me like that, you cuckoos!"

Raffles turned to me with a twitch of the shoulders. "That's the worst
of these professors," said he; "they never will use their heads. They
see the pegs, and they mean to hit 'em; but that's all they do see and
mean, and they think we're the same. No wonder we licked them last
time!"

"Don't talk through yer neck," snarled the convict. "Talk out
straight, curse you!"

"Right," said Raffles. "I'll talk as straight as you like. You say
you put yourself in my hands--you leave it all to me--yet you don't
trust me an inch! I know what's to happen if I fail. I accept the
risk. I take this thing on. Yet you think I'm going straight out to
give you away and make you give me away in my turn. You're a fool, Mr.
Crawshay, though you have broken Dartmoor; you've got to listen to a
better man, and