from his eternal cigarette, and the punctuation was often in the
nature of a line of asterisks, while he took a silent turn up and
down his room. Nor was he ever more deliberate than when he seemed
most nonchalant and spontaneous. I came to see it in the end. But
these were early days, in which he was more plausible to me than I
can hope to render him to another human being.

And I saw a good deal of Raffles just then; it was, in fact, the one
period at which I can remember his coming round to see me more
frequently than I went round to him. Of course he would come at his
own odd hours, often just as one was dressing to go out and dine,
and I can even remember finding him there when I returned, for I had
long since given him a key of the flat. It was the inhospitable
month of February, and I can recall more than one cosy evening when
we discussed anything and everything but our own malpractices;
indeed, there were none to discuss just then. Raffles, on the
contrary, was showing himself with some industry in the most
respectable society, and by his advice I used the club more than
ever.

"There is nothing like it at this time of year," said he. "In the
summer I have my cricket to provide me with decent employment in
the sight of men. Keep yourself before the public from morning to
night, and they'll never think of you in the still small hours."

Our behavior, in fine, had so long been irreproachable that I rose
without misgiving on the morning of Lord Thornaby's dinner to the
other Criminologists and guests. My chief anxiety was to arrive
under the aegis of my brilliant friend, and I had begged him to pick
me up on his way; but at five minutes to the appointed hour there