And you would only rob rich people, and be very generous to the poor and needy, like Claude Duval.' Dora said, 'It is wrong to be a robber.' 'Yes,' said Alice, 'you would never know a happy hour.

Think of trying to sleep with the stolen jewels under your bed, and remembering all the quantities of policemen and detectives that there are in the world!' 'There are ways of being robbers that are not wrong,' said Noel; 'if you can rob a robber it is a right act.' 'But you can't,' said Dora; 'he is too clever, and besides, it's wrong anyway.' 'Yes you can, and it isn't; and murdering him with boiling oil is a right act, too, so there!' said Noel.

'What about Ali Baba?
Now then!' And we felt it was a score for Noel.
'What would you do if there _was_ a robber ?' said Alice.
H.O.said he would kill him with boiling oil; but Alice explained that she meant a real robber--now--this minute--in the house.
Oswald and Dicky did not say; but Noel said he thought it would only be fair to ask the robber quite politely and quietly to go away, and then if he didn't you could deal with him.
Now what I am going to tell you is a very strange and wonderful thing, and I hope you will be able to believe it.

I should not, if a boy told me, unless I knew him to be a man of honour, and perhaps not then unless he gave his sacred word.

But it is true, all the same, and it only shows that the days of romance and daring deeds are not yet at an end.
Alice was just asking Noel _how_ he would deal with the robber who wouldn't go if he was asked politely and quietly, when we heard a noise downstairs--quite a plain noise, not the kind of noise you fancy you hear.