Yes, Bunny, it's been more of a costume
piece than I intended, and we've come out of it with a good deal less
credit. But, by Jove, we're jolly lucky to have come out of it at all!"

GENTLEMEN AND PLAYERS

Old Raffles may or may not have been an exceptional criminal, but as a
cricketer I dare swear he was unique. Himself a dangerous bat, a
brilliant field, and perhaps the very finest slow bowler of his decade,
he took incredibly little interest in the game at large. He never went
up to Lord's without his cricket-bag, or showed the slightest interest
in the result of a match in which he was not himself engaged. Nor was
this mere hateful egotism on his part. He professed to have lost all
enthusiasm for the game, and to keep it up only from the very lowest
motives.

"Cricket," said Raffles, "like everything else, is good enough sport
until you discover a better. As a source of excitement it isn't in it
with other things you wot of, Bunny, and the involuntary comparison
becomes a bore. What's the satisfaction of taking a man's wicket when
you want his spoons? Still, if you can bowl a bit your low cunning
won't get rusty, and always looking for the weak spot's just the kind
of mental exercise one wants. Yes, perhaps there's some affinity
between the two things after all. But I'd chuck up cricket to-morrow,
Bunny, if it wasn't for the glorious protection it affords a person of
my proclivities."

"How so?" said I. "It brings you before the public, I should have
thought, far more than is either safe or wise."

"My dear Bunny, that's exactly where you make a mistake. To follow
Crime with reasonable impunity you simply MUST have a parallel,
ostensible career--the more public the better. The principle is
obvious. Mr. Peace, of pious memory, disarmed suspicion by acquiring a
local reputation for playing the fiddle and taming animals, and it's my
profound conviction that Jack the Ripper was a really eminent public
man, whose speeches were very likely reported alongside his atrocities.
Fill the bill in some prominent part, and you'll never be suspected of
doubling it with another of equal prominence. That's why I want you to
cultivate journalism, my boy, and sign all you can. And it's the one
and only reason why I don't burn my bats for firewood."

Nevertheless, when he did play there was no keener performer on the
field, nor one more anxious to do well for his side. I remember how he
went to the nets, bef