I drew myself up against the door of the cupboard and placed my eye to
the opening in the panel. I had oiled the key of the door, and kept my
fingers upon it in readiness to spring upon the burglar at the proper
moment. After what seemed some time I saw the gleam of light through the
keyhole of the door opening into the pantry. Then it opened, and a man
carrying a small lantern came gently into the room. At first I could see
nothing of his face; but when my eyes grew accustomed to the hazy light
I saw that I had been rightly informed, and that the burglar was indeed
no other than the famous Light Toed Jim. As I stood there watching him I could not help admiring the cool fashion
in which he went to work. He went over to the window and examined it. He
tried the door of the cupboard in which I stood concealed. Then he
locked the door of the pantry and turned his attention to the safe. He
set his lamp on a chair before the lock and took from his pocket as neat
and pretty a collection of tools as ever I saw. With these he went
quietly and swiftly to work. Light Toed Jim was a somewhat slimly built fellow, with little muscular
development about him, while I am a big man with plenty of bone and
sinew. If matters had come to a fight between us I could have done what
I pleased with him; but I knew that Jim would not chance a fight. Somewhere about him I felt sure there was a revolver, which he would use
on the least provocation. My plan, therefore, was to wait until his back
was bent over the lock of the safe, then to open the cupboard door
noiselessly and fall bodily upon him, pinning him to the ground beneath
me. Before long the moment came. He was working steadily away at the lock,
his whole attention concentrated on the job. The slight noise of his
drill was sufficient to drown the faint click of the key in the cupboard
door. I turned it quickly and tumbled right upon him, driving the tool
out of his hands and tumbling him into a heap at the foot of the safe. He uttered an exclamation of rage and astonishment as he went down, and
immediately began to wriggle under me like an eel. As I kept him down
with one hand I tried to pull out the handcuffs with the other. This
somewhat embarrassed me, and the burglar profited by it to pull out a
sharp knife. He had worked himself round on his back, and before I
realized what he was after he was hacking furiously at me with his keen,
dagger-like blade. Then I realized that we were going to have a fight
for it, and prepared myself. He tried to run the knife into my side. I
warded it off, but the blade caught the fleshy part of my left arm and I
felt a warm stream of blood spurt out. That maddened me, and I seized one of the steel drills lying near at
hand, and hit my man such a blow over the temple that he collapsed at
once, and lay as if dead. I put the handcuffs on him instantly, and, to
make matters still more certain, I secured his ankles. Then I rose and
looked at my arm. The knife had made a nasty gash, and the blood was
flowing freely, but it was not serious; and when the housekeeper, who
had just then appeared on the scene, had bandaged it, I went out and
secured the help of the first policeman I met in conveying Light Toed
Jim to the office. I felt a proud man when I made my report to the inspector. “Light Toed Jim?” said he. “What, James Bland? Nonsense, Parker.” But I
took him to the cells where Jim was being attended to by the doctor. “You’re right, Parker,” he said. “That’s the man. Well, this will be a
fine thing for you.”

After a time, feeling a little exhausted, I went home to try and get
some sleep. The surgeon had attended to my arm, and told me it was but a
superficial wound. It felt sore enough in spite of that. I had no sooner reached my lodgings than I saw sitting in my easy-chair
the strange man who had called upon me earlier in the evening. He rose
to his feet when I entered. I stared at him in utter astonishment. “Well, guv’nor,” said he, “I see you’ve done it. You’ve got him square
and fair, I reckon?”

“Yes,” I said. “Ah!” he said, with a sigh of complete satisfaction. “Then I’m
satisfied. Yes, I don’t know as how there’s aught more I could say. I
reckon as how Light Toed Jim an’ me is quits.”

I was determined to find out who this man was this time. “Sit down,” I
said. “There’s a question or two I must ask you. Just let me get my coat
off and I’ll talk to you.” I took my coat off and went over to the bed
to lay it down. “Now then,” I began, and looked around at him. I said no
more, being literally struck dumb. The man was gone! I began to feel uncomfortable. I ran hastily downstairs, only to find
the outer door locked and bolted, as I had left it a few minutes
before. I went back, utterly nonplussed. For an hour I pondered the
matter over, but could neither make head nor tail of it. When I went down to the office next morning I was informed that the
burglar wanted to see me. I went to his cell, where he was lying in bed
with his head bandaged. I had hit him pretty hard, as it turned out, and
it was probable he would have to lie on the sick list for some days. “Well, guv’nor,” said he, “you’d the best of me last night. You hit me
rather hard that time.”

“I was sorry to have to do it, my man,” I answered. “You would have
stabbed me if you could.”

“Yes,” he said, “I should. But I say, guv’nor, come a bit closer; I want
to ask you a question. How did you know I was on that little job last
night? For, s’elp me, there wasn’t a soul knew a breath about it but
myself. I hadn’t no pals, never talked to anybody about it, never
thought aloud about it, as I knows on. How came you to spot it,
guv’nor?”

There was no one else in the cell with us, and I thought I might find
out something about my mysterious visitor of the night before. “It was a
pal of yours who gave me the information,” I said. “Can’t be, guv’nor. No use telling me that. I ain’t got no
pals--leastways not in this job.”

“Did you ever know a man like this?” I described my visitor. As I
proceeded, Light Toed Jim’s face assumed an expression of real terror. Whatever color there was in it faded away. I never saw a man look more
thoroughly frightened. “Yes, yes,” he said, eagerly. “In course I know
who it is. Why, it’s Barksea Bill, as I pal’d with at one time--and what
did he say, guv’nor--that he owed me a grudge? That we was quits at
last? Right you are, ’cos he did owe me a grudge. I treated Bill very
shabby--very shabby, indeed, and he swore solemn he’d have his revenge. On’y, guv’nor, what you see wasn’t Barksea Bill at all, but his ghost,
’cos Barksea Bill’s been dead and buried this three year.”

I was naturally very much exercised in my mind over this weird
development of the affair, and I used to think about it long after Light
Toed Jim had once more retired to the seclusion of Portland. While he
was in charge at Westford I tried more than once to worm some more
information out of him about the defunct Barksea Bill, but with no
success.