and my teeth were
set, and my nerve strung ready, as I wrung that strong and cunning hand
for the last time in my life.

How that last scene stays with me, and will stay to my death! How I
see every detail, every shadow on the sunlit deck! We were among the
islands that dot the course from Genoa to Naples; that was Elba falling
back on our starboard quarter, that purple patch with the hot sun
setting over it. The captain's cabin opened to starboard, and the
starboard promenade deck, sheeted with sunshine and scored with shadow,
was deserted, but for the group of which I was one, and for the pale,
slim, brown figure further aft with Raffles. Engaged? I could not
believe it, cannot to this day. Yet there they stood together, and we
did not hear a word; there they stood out against the sunset, and the
long, dazzling highway of sunlit sea that sparkled from Elba to the
Uhlan's plates; and their shadows reached almost to our feet.

Suddenly--an instant--and the thing was done--a thing I have never
known whether to admire or to detest. He caught her--he kissed her
before us all--then flung her from him so that she almost fell. It was
that action which foretold the next. The mate sprang after him, and I
sprang after the mate.

Raffles was on the rail, but only just.

"Hold him, Bunny!" he cried. "Hold him tight!"

And, as I obeyed that last behest with all my might, without a thought
of what I was doing, save that he bade me do it, I saw his hands shoot
up and his head bob down, and his lithe, spare body cut the sunset as
cleanly and precisely as though he had plunged at his leisure from a
diver's board!

* * * * *

Of what followed on deck I can tell you nothing, for I was not there.
Nor can my final punishment, my long imprisonment, my everlasting
disgrace, concern or profit you, beyond the interest and advantage to
be gleaned from the knowledge that I at least had my deserts. But one
thing I must set down, believe it who will--one more thing only and I
am done.

It was into a second-class cabin, on the starboard side, that I was
promptly thrust in irons, and the door locked upon me as though I were
another Raffles. Meanwhile a boat was lowered, and the sea scoured to
no purpose, as is doubtless on record elsewhere. But either the
setting sun, flashing over the waves, must have blinded all eyes, or
else mine were victims of a strange illusion.

For the boat was back, the sc