Mr. Justice Raffles

But the youth of limited articulation was not allowed to finish his explanation; he was grasped by the scruff of the neck and kicked and shaken out of the room, and his collar flung after him. I heard him blubbering on the stairs as Levy locked the door and put the key in his pocket. But I did not hear Raffles slip into the swivel chair behind the desk, or know that he had done so until the usurer and I turned round together.

"Out of that!" blustered Levy.

But Raffles tilted the chair back on its spring and laughed softly in his face.

"Not if I know it," said he. "If you don't open the door in about one minute I shall require this telephone of yours to ring up the police."

"The police, eh?" said Levy, with a sinister recovery of self-control.

"You'd better leave that to me, you precious pair of swindlers!"

"Besides," continued Raffles, "of course you keep an argumentum ad hominem in one of these drawers. Ah, here it is, and just as well in my hands as in yours!"

He had opened the top drawer in the right-hand pedestal, and taken therefrom a big bulldog revolver; it was the work of few moments to empty its five chambers, and hand the pistol by its barrel to the owner.

"Curse you!" hissed the latter, hurling it into the fender with a fearful clatter. "But you'll pay for this, my fine gentlemen; this isn't sharp practice, but criminal fraud."

"The burden of proof," said Raffles, "lies with you. Meanwhile, will you be good enough to open that door instead of looking as sick as a cold mud-poultice?"

The money-lender had, indeed, turned as grey as his hair; and his eyebrows, which were black and looked dyed, stood out like smears of ink. Nevertheless, the simile which Raffles had employed with his own unfortunate facility was more picturesque than discreet. I saw it set Mr. Shylock thinking. Luckily, the evil of the day was sufficient for it and him; but so far from complying, he set his back to the locked door and swore a sweet oath never to budge.

"Oh, very well!" resumed Raffles, and the receiver was at his ear without more ado. "Is that the Exchange? Give me nine-two-double-three Gerrard, will you?"

"It's fraud," reiterated Levy. "And you know it."

"It's nothing of the sort, and you know it," murmured Raffles, with the proper pre-occupation of the man at the telephone.

"You lent the money," I added. "That's your business. It's nothing to do with you what he chooses to do with it."

"He's a cursed swindler," hissed Levy. "And you're his damned decoy!"

I was not sorry to see Raffles's face light up across the desk.

"Is that Howson, Anstruther and Martin?—they're only my solicitors, Mr.

Levy…. Put me through to Mr. Martin, please…. That you, Charlie? …

You might come in a cab to Jermyn Street—I forget the number—Dan

Levy's, the money-lender's—thanks, old chap! … Wait a bit, Charlie—a

constable…."

But Dan Levy had unlocked his door and flung it open.

"There you are, you scoundrels! But we'll meet again, my fine swell-mobsmen!"

Raffles was frowning at the telephone.

"I've been cut off," said he. "Wait a bit! Clear call for you, Mr. Levy,

I believe!"

And they changed places, without exchanging another word until Raffles and I were on the stairs.

"Why, the 'phone's not even through!" yelled the money-lender, rushing out.

"But we are, Mr. Levy!" cried Raffles. And down we ran into the street.

CHAPTER V

Thin Air

Raffles hailed a passing hansom, and had bundled me in before I realised that he was not coming with me.

"Drive down to the club for Teddy's cricket-bag," said he; "we'll make him get straight into flannels to save time. Order breakfast for three in half-an-hour precisely, and I'll tell him everything before you're back."

His eyes were shining with the prospect as I drove away, not sorry to escape the scene of that young man's awakening to better fortune than he deserved. For in my heart I could not quite forgive the act in which Raffles and I had caught him overnight. Raffles might make as light of it as he pleased; it was impossible for another to take his affectionately lenient view, not of the moral question involved, but of the breach of faith between friend and friend. My own feeling in the matter, however, if a little jaundiced, was not so strong as to prevent me from gloating over the victory in which I had just assisted. I thought of the notorious extortioner who had fallen to our unscrupulous but not indictable wiles; and my heart tinkled with the hansom bell. I thought of the good that we had done for once, of the undoubted wrong we had contrived to right by a species of justifiable chicanery. And I forgot all about the youth whose battle we had fought and won, until I found myself ordering his breakfast, and having his cricket-bag taken out to my cab.

Raffles was waiting for me in the Albany courtyard. I thought he was frowning at the sky, which was not what it had been earlier in the morning, until I remembered how little time there was to lose.