Well, there is one; there was one soon
after I took the chest back from your rooms to mine, in the good
old days. You push one of the handles down - which no one ever
does - and the whole of that end opens like the front of a doll's
house. I saw that was what I ought to have done at first: it's
so much simpler than the trap at the top; and one likes to get a
thing perfect for its own sake. Besides, the trick had not been
spotted at the bank, and I thought I might bring it off again
some day; meanwhile, in one's bedroom, with lots of things on top,
what a port in a sudden squall!"
I asked why I had never heard of the improvement before, not so
much at the time it was made, but in these later days, when there
were fewer secrets between us, and this one could avail him no more.
But I did not put the question out of pique. I put it out of sheer
obstinate incredulity. And Raffles looked at me without replying,
until I read the explanation in his look.
"I see," I said. "You used to get into it to hide from me!"
"My dear Bunny, I am not always a very genial man," he answered;
"but when you let me have a key of your rooms I could not very
well refuse you one of mine, although I picked your pocket of it
in the end.
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