"I'll come at once. Are you there, Raffles?"
"You never said so. And where's Maguire?"
"I know that. Is he there now?"
"No - not come in yet - and I'm caught."
"In that trap he bragged about. It serves me right. I didn't believe in it. But I'm caught at last ... caught ... at last!"
"When he told us he set it every night! Oh, Raffles, what sort of a trap is it? What shall I do? What shall I bring?"
But his voice had grown fainter and wearier with every answer, and now there was no answer at all. Again and again I asked Raffles if he was there; the only sound to reach me in reply was the low metallic hum of the live wire between his ear and mine. And then, as I sat gazing distractedly at my four safe walls, with the receiver still pressed to my head, there came a single groan, followed by the dull and dreadful crash of a human body falling in a heap.
In utter panic I rushed back into my bedroom, and flung myself into the crumpled shirt and evening clothes that lay where I had cast them off. But I knew no more what I was doing than what to do next I afterward found that I had taken out a fresh tie, and tied it rather better than usual; but I can remember thinking of nothing but Raffles in some diabolical man-trap, and of a grinning monster stealing in to strike him senseless with one murderous blow. I must have looked in the glass to array myself as I did; but the mind's eye was the seeing eye, and it was filled with this frightful vision of the notorious pugilist known to fame and infamy as Barney Maguire.
