Omaha daily bee., 1905-07-30
Twelfth RaffIes Story---An Old Flame

nantly. And he has been dead for years"
My captor simply chuckled.
He's at the bottom OF the sea, / say"
But / do not know why l should have
told him with such spirit for what could
it matter to Ratiies now? l did not think;
instinct was still stronger than reason,
and, fresh from his funeral l had taken
up the cudgels for my dead friend as
though he were still alive. Next moment
/ saw this for myself, and my tears came
nearer the surface than they had been yet;
but the fellow at my side laughed out
right
Shall I tell you something else2"
LAS you like"
He's not even at the bottom of that
gravel He's no more dead than you or 1,
and a sham burial is his latest piece of
villainy!"
doubt II 1 could have spoken II had
tried. l did not try. 1 had no use for
speech i did not even ask him IL he was,
sure. was so sure myself. 1t was all as
plain to me as riddles usually are when
one has the answer. The doctors alarms,
the stimulated illness, my own dismissal,
each fitted in its obvious place. and not
even the last had power as yet to mar my
JOY in the one central fact to which all
the rest were as tapers to the sun.
He is aliyer l cried Nothing else
matters-he is aliveg'
At last l did ask whether they had got
him too; but thankful as l was for the
greater knowledge, l confess that did not
much care what answer l had received.
Already 1 was figuring out how much we
might each get, and how old we should be
when we came out. But my companion
tilted his hat to the back of his head, at
the same time putting his face closer to
mine and compelling my scrutiny. And my
answer, as you have already guessed,
was the face of Raffles himself, superbly
disguised (but less superbly than his
voice), and yet so thlnly that 1 should have
known him in a trice had not been too
miserable in the beginning to give him a
second glance.
Jacques Saillard had made his life i'm
possible, and this was the one escape.
Raffles had bought the doctor for a thou
sand pounds, and the doctor had bought a
nurse" of his own kidney, on his account;
me, for same reason, he would not trust;
he had insisted on my dismissal as an
essential preliminary to his part in the
conspiracy. Here the details were half
humorous, half gruesome, each in turn as
Raffles told me the story. At one period he
had been very daringly drugged indeed,
and, in his own words, ''as dead as a man
need be-" but he had left strict instructions
that nobody but the nurse and my devoted
physician" should lay a finger on me-
afterwards, and by virtue of this proviso a
library of books largely acquired for the
occasion) had been impiously Inferred at
Kensal Green. Raffles had definitely under
taken not to trust me with the secret, and
but for my own untoward appearance al
the funeral (Which he had attended for his
own final satisfaction, was assured and
am convinced that he would have. kept
his promise to the letter. In explaining
this he gave me the one explanation / de-
sired, and in another moment we turned
into Praed street, Paddington. e
"And I thought you said Bow street"
said I. Are you coming straight down tC
Richmond with me?"
1T may as WELL" said Rafles, Though
did mean to get my kit first, so as t
start in fair and square as the long-los
brother from the BUSH That's why
hadn't written. The function was a day
later than 1 calculated. 1 was going t
write tonight"
But what are we to DOR said hesita
ting when he had paid the cab. IT hav,
been playing the colonies for all they ar
worth!
"Oh I've lost my luggage" said he, 20
wave came into my cabin and spoiled
every stitch, or I had nothing fit to brinl
ashore. Wen settle that in the train"
(End of Twelfth Story0