Hornung, who happened to be Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's brother-in-law, wrote the Raffles stories as a sort of homage/dark-side version of Sherlock Holmes; Doyle had mixed feelings about this, admiring the writing but worried about making a criminal into the protagonist. Here we first meet Bunny Manders and learn how he encounters Raffles, who'd been a much-admired senior boy when they were at school. Bunny is in dire straits, having bet money he doesn't have, and as Raffles is one of the people he lost to he's gone to ask for - well, he isn't sure; just to explain and confess before he blows his own brains out. But to his surprise Raffles laughs it off, admitting that he's short of cash himself, and suggesting a way to correct the situation. To Bunny's shock, Raffles sketches a plan for a robbery, but such is his desperation - and his unwillingness to be seen as less than "game" by Raffles - he goes along. And thus begins their partnership, and the saga of Raffles the "gentleman thief". [Raffles' own rationale: "Of course, it's very wrong, but we can't all be moralists, and the distribution of wealth is very wrong to begin with."] - from Amzon