to draw the cover in front here. It's all right, officer - only
another gentleman from the Empress Rooms."

And we made a brave show of assisting in the futile search, until
the arrival of more police, and a broad hint from an irritable
sergeant, gave us an excellent excuse for going off arm-in-arm.
But it was Raffles who had thrust his arm through mine. I shook him
off as we left the scene of shame behind.

"My dear Bunny!" he exclaimed. "Do you know what brought me back?"

I answered savagely that I neither knew nor cared.

"I had the very devil of a squeak for it," he went on. "I did the
hurdles over two or three garden-walls, but so did the flyer who
was on my tracks, and he drove me back into the straight and down to
High Street like any lamplighter. If he had only had the breath to
sing out it would have been all up with me then; as it was I pulled
off my coat the moment I was round the corner, and took a ticket for
it at the Empress Rooms."

"I suppose you had one for the dance that was going on," I growled.
Nor would it have been a coincidence for Raffles to have had a
ticket for that or any other entertainment of the London season.

"I never asked what the dance was," he returned. "I merely took the
opportunity of revising my toilet, and getting rid of that rather
distinctive overcoat, which I shall call for now. They're not too
particular at such stages of such proceedings, but I've no doubt I
should have seen someone I knew if I had none right in. I might