"Manders?"

I had to look twice, but there was no mistaking it. Standing before me, blinking sheepishly in the sudden light, was Bunny Manders! I have to say, he was the last person I had been expecting!

"Mr Manders, a pleasure to renew our acquaintance," said Holmes cheerfully. "Can we offer you anything? A tiara, perhaps?"

"Oh, very funny," frowned the unfortunate cove.

"What have you got to say for yourself?" I demanded, pushing the fellow down onto my chair.

"Absolutely nothing," he said, affecting a petulant defiance that had not been present before.

"I imagine the police will have a few things to ask you," I said.

"I imagine they will."

"A brilliant plan, Mr Manders, quite brilliant. And it nearly succeeded." Manders looked sullenly back at Holmes and stayed silent.

"What are we to do with him, Holmes?"

"It is perhaps a touch early to be bothering those tireless bastions of law enforcement. For now, we should restrain Mr Manders until such time as we can avail ourselves of the services of the nearest police station." Holmes moved to light another gaslamp. "There are handcuffs on the window ledge, Watson, if you would be so good?"

"With pleasure." As Holmes watched our guest, I moved quickly to the window to retrieve the shackles. A movement outside caught my eye and I glanced out onto the darkened Baker Street to see a uniformed police constable perambulating his way along the road. A beat bobby walking fearlessly through the night, lamp held aloft to light his way.

"Holmes, there's a bobby out there. That's a stroke of luck."

"Indeed it is. Quickly, Watson, before they have pa.s.sed from sight."

I positively ran from the room and charged down the staircase, safe in the knowledge that Mrs Hudson was so acclimatised to the comings and goings of her gentleman charges that she could have slept through the Boer War. I unlocked the door and stepped out onto the street.

"Constable," I called out, jogging towards his receding form. The cloaked officer turned at my voice, pointing the glow of his lamp in my direction and peering at me as I approached.

"Is there a problem, sir?" he asked, the guttural voice matching the heavily whiskered features and corpulent frame.

"Yes, Officer, if you can come please, there has been a break-in at 221b Baker Street."

"Very well, sir," he said, scratching at an impressive sideburn, "lead on."

The officer didn't seem in much of a hurry as I led the way back to 221b. I desperately wanted to urge him along, but sometimes you just couldn't hurry the law. Eventually we emerged back into the now fully lit sitting room, the heavy breathing of the officer marking his progress up the stairs.

"Officer, and just in the nick of time," declared Holmes enthusiastically on our arrival.

"Indeed, sir," responded the officer. "Mr Holmes, is it?" Holmes nodded. "Pleasure, sir. Dr Watson 'ere has just been explaining what has occurred." He turned to Manders, still seated, but now cuffed. "This the intruder?"

"Indeed it is, Constable," I confirmed.

"Oh dear, oh dear, we are in trouble, aren't we, sir?" said the constable, looking down at Manders disapprovingly.

"Yes," replied the villain quietly. "I suppose I am."

The officer pursed chapped lips. "If it's all the same to you, I think I should take this gentleman off your hands and get him safely locked up in the nearest station."

Holmes nodded in ready agreement. "I do think that would be wise, Constable."

"I'd be grateful if you two gentlemen could come along to the station first thing in the morning, and we can take down particulars at the appropriate hour."

"Of course, anything we can do to help."

"Right you, on yer feet," the officer said to Manders, who, with his hands cuffed, was forced to wriggle this way and that until he eventually struggled to his feet. It would have been comical in different circ.u.mstances.

"You should be ashamed of yourself," I felt compelled to say as the officer placed a firm hand on Manders' shoulder and led him towards the door. He looked at me with sad, weary eyes as he pa.s.sed.

"Watson, could you get the door?" asked Holmes.

Happy to oblige, I stepped ahead of the officer and opened the sitting-room door.

"Much appreciated, sir," said the constable.

"Oh, Officer?" Holmes called out just before he reached the door. The constable turned to Holmes.

"Sir?"

"I do think it would be safer if you took the tiara," said Holmes, picking it up from the table and holding it out to the policeman. "For safe keeping until it can be returned to its owners. I'm sure it will be more secure in a police station than in my sitting room."

The officer paused, looking at the tiara as it glinted in the light of the lamps, before taking it from Holmes. "Right you are, sir."

The matter seemingly concluded until morning, the constable began to push Manders towards the door once more.

"Tell me, Officer," said Holmes airily, "how is Inspector Leach?"

"Inspector Leach, sir?" the officer replied, still moving towards the door. "Very well, as I understand it. Very well."

"I am glad. Do pa.s.s on the regards of Sherlock Holmes."

"Of course, sir."

The officer was almost at the door, the silent Manders ahead of him, when I saw Sherlock Holmes' posture change, his whole body tensing for action. "Watson, quickly, the door!"

I had learnt over the years to seldom question the requests of Sherlock Holmes, and as the constable shoved Manders ahead of him as he himself leapt for the door, I slammed it in their faces and stood firmly in their way.

Manders turned to the constable. "What are we going to do?" he demanded.

The officer looked left and right, his cape flapping; then, with an exhaled breath, he stopped and smiled through his whiskers. He turned to face Holmes. As he did, he seemed to grow by two feet. "When did you know?" he asked in a smooth voice, devoid of the guttural London tone of the bobby.

"Almost as soon as I arrived in Kent," conceded Holmes, which did nothing to alleviate this confusing turn of events.

"There is no Inspector Leach, is there?"

"Only up here." Holmes smiled, tapping his temple.

"Will somebody please explain what is going on!" I demanded with raised voice.

"Apologies, Dr Watson," said the policeman amiably. "The last thing I'd want to do is cause you any further distress."

The constable removed his helmet and placed it, along with the tiara, on the table. "Stole this from a policeman up in Cambridge years ago," he went on, "back when those kinds of j.a.pes were all the rage."

The policeman began to pull at the whiskers on his face. Astoundingly, they came away in his hands, and seconds later I was astonished to find myself standing before AJ. Raffles. "I told you we'd be renewing our acquaintance very soon." He smiled.

"You blackguard!" I said. "You thief and blackguard!"

"Guilty as charged," said Raffles as, without invitation, he dropped down into an armchair. Manders remained standing, a sheen of sweat glistening on his forehead.

"I must congratulate you, Mr Raffles. An audacious scheme. Doomed to failure, but audacious all the same."

"From you, Mr Holmes, I take that as a compliment."

"Not a compliment. Just facts."

Raffles nodded graciously to this.

"How could you?" I asked, my rage threatening to bubble over. "Poor James and Elizabeth. You were their guest!"

"Elizabeth will have her trinket back, no real harm done. And you must admit, it livened up a rather tedious weekend."

The impudence of the miscreant quite stunned me into silence.

"Besides," continued Raffles, sitting forward and eyeing the tiara, "this was not the prize."

"Then what was?" I demanded, as confusion continued to reign in the sitting room.

"I was," said Holmes, who seemed to be enjoying himself immensely as he sat opposite Raffles in his own armchair.

"I suppose my scheme was somewhat transparent."

"Yes. But most amusing."

"Aren't you interested in how I did it?"

"I fear an honest answer to that question may cause offence," said Holmes. At a look from Raffles, he waved a hand dismissively. "A fragment of ivy leaf cut by the heel of a boot below Watson's window was as a flaming beacon. I have little interest in the sordid creeping around of a country house at night, but I'm sure your Mr Manders could turn the events into some form of entertaining prose."

I glanced over at Manders, who was still cuffed. He gave me a wan smile, and I couldn't help but hold some kindred feeling for him as Holmes and Raffles continued their conversation.

"One question," began Holmes.

"Anything."

"If you were so desperate to make my acquaintance, why not just make an appointment?"

Raffles smiled that easy, relaxed smile. "Where would the fun be in that?"

Holmes sat back, considering, as if the notion of doing something for fun had rarely occurred to him. "Hmm," he mused. "And now you have engineered a meeting, what, may I ask, are your conclusions?"

"It's been most illuminating. You do not disappoint."

Holmes rose. "Cigarette?" he asked, but Raffles declined. "Forgive me if I indulge, won't you?"

"Go ahead," said Raffles amiably. I couldn't credit this. They were talking like two fellows in a gentlemen's club. "What happens now?"

"Now?" countered Holmes. He considered, then shrugged. "You are free to go."

"What?" I exploded.

"What?" exclaimed Manders.

"To mirror the sentiments of our a.s.sociates," said Raffles, "do explain. Please."

"I know of you, Mr Raffles. You are a thief, but you have a reputation. A reputation that interests me. You do not always steal for personal gain."

"But Holmes, you can't!" I was on the verge of apoplexy.

"In this case," Holmes continued, "I do not see that much harm has been done. Certainly no more a misdemeanour than stealing a policeman's helmet." At this I snorted. Manders stood with mouth agape as he listened to the conversation.

"This is unexpected," said Raffles, rising to his feet. "You are a fascinating and complex individual, Mr Holmes." Mr AJ. Raffles faced my friend Sherlock Holmes. "Tell me, are you a Gentleman or a Player?"

"Neither. I find subscribing to forced metaphors a tedious pursuit. Especially when they relate to cricket."

"Just the answer I was expecting."

"Holmes, I beg you..." I blurted. "He is a criminal."

"Yes I am, Dr Watson. And one day I shall be brought to book. But for now, I sincerely apologise for any inconvenience and distress I have caused you. I do hope we will meet again."

Raffles turned, this strange contradiction in a policeman's uniform, and made once more for the door, and, on this occasion, freedom. I felt quite powerless to prevent his departure, as if in the grip of some wider narrative of which I was but a small part.

"Come along, Bunny," he said to his a.s.sociate as he opened the door. "We'll see ourselves out." With a brief nod to Holmes, he vanished.

Manders held out his still-cuffed hands in supplication to Holmes. "Could you..."

"I do apologise," said Holmes dismissively, "I appear to have mislaid the keys."

I almost laughed out loud as the poor fellow's face fell yet again. "Bunny!" Raffles shouted from the stairway. Manders shrugged apologetically, then shuffled out through the door after his companion.

A minute of silence pa.s.sed in the sitting room, neither Holmes nor myself speaking. I wandered over and closed the door, standing with my back to my friend. I could stand it no longer. "Holmes, you are quite impossible," I shouted, wheeling round to find him looking expectantly at me. "Tonight, you have let a common criminal and his accomplice go. They have committed a crime!"

"Sometimes a crime goes unpunished for good reason, Watson."

"What does that even mean?"

"It means," said Holmes, after some consideration, "that there is more to Mr Raffles than a mere common burglar. There are, I feel, further games to be played."