Four steps more, and we were on another and a
longer landing, and suddenly a match blazed from the black. I
never heard it struck. Its flash was blinding. When my eyes
became accustomed to the light, there was Raffles holding up the
match with one hand, and shading it with the other, between bare
boards, stripped walls, and the open doors of empty rooms.
"Where have you brought me?" I cried. "The house is unoccupied!"
"Hush! Wait!" he whispered, and he led the way into one of the
empty rooms. His match went out as we crossed the threshold, and
he struck another without the slightest noise. Then he stood
with his back to me, fumbling with something that I could not
see. But, when he threw the second match away, there was some
other light in its stead, and a slight smell of oil. I stepped
forward to look over his shoulder, but before I could do so he
had turned and flashed a tiny lantern in my face.
"What's this?" I gasped. "What rotten trick are you going to
play?"
"It's played," he answered, with his quiet laugh.
"On me?"
"I am afraid so, Bunny."
"Is there no one in the house, then?"
"No one but ourselves."
"So it was mere chaff about your friend in Bond Street, who could
let us have that money?"
"Not altogether. It's quite true that Danby is a friend of
mine."
"Danby?"
"The jeweller underneath.
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