"`It's a right-of-way,' declared my indefensible informant.
`It's closed to traffic once in a hundred years.'
"`Mr. Percy, Mr. Percy!' I called out; `you are not going
on with this blackguard?'
"`Why, I think so,' answered my unhappy colleague flippantly.
`I think you and I are bigger blackguards than he is,
whatever he is.'
"`I am a burglar,' explained the big creature quite calmly.
`I am a member of the Fabian Society. I take back the wealth stolen
by the capitalist, not by sweeping civil war and revolution, but by reform
fitted to the special occasion--here a little and there a little.
Do you see that fifth house along the terrace with the flat roof?
I'm permeating that one to-night.'
"`Whether this is a crime or a joke,' I cried, `I desire to be quit of it.'
"`The ladder is just behind you,' answered the creature
with horrible courtesy; `and, before you go, do let me give
you my card.'
"If I had had the presence of mind to show any proper spirit I
should have flung it away, though any adequate gesture of the kind
would have gravely affected my equilibrium upon the wall.
As it was, in the wildness of the moment, I put it in my
waistcoat pocket, and, picking my way back by wall and ladder,
landed in the respectable streets once more.
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