IS a successful burglary — like a successful real estate deal or a successful horse sale — the result of mature deliberation and planning? Or is it as much the result of chance as cunning? We have come to regard burglary as a trade or a profession, depending on whether it was a Raffles or an unknown "sneak" who gathered the loot. True. But is the education of the burglar responsible for most of our daring crimes, or is it just blind luck — good or bad, depending on the viewpoint?

       All of which is preamble to the curious story of the burglar who set out to rob one house, after days of careful planning, and ended by robbing its neighbor on the impulse of the moment.

       I had just been finishing a case in a leading city of the Central West at the time and was already planning my departure when I received a hurried summons from the chiefs office. It was a much disturbed official that I found.

       "Have you made a study of modern ideas in burglary?" he demanded briskly.

       "To a certain extent yes."

       "You will need your knowledge if you put your finger on our latest house-breaker!"

       "Raffles come to life, eh?"

       The chief answered the telephone before he replied. "From long distance information, the job has even Raffles stumped." he said as he turned. "Our burglar entered from nowhere, vanished as mysteriously as he came, and took with him the biggest bag of jewelry that has been missing in this city for five years!"

       This was the chief's summary. The newspapers said the same thing, expanded with adjectives and photographs. The rifled house was that of George R. Stevenson, a leading merchant, whose reputation was more than local. His home was located in one of the fashionable suburbs, which had not been mentioned in the police annals for years. The very air of the neighborhood suggested a quiet, subdued respectability in keeping with the sober brown-stone fronts of most of the residences.

       Dick Mulford, my colleague from headquarters, entered the Stevenson home perhaps a quarter of an hour before my arrival. The merchant was awaiting him and the two ascended to the upper floor, the scene of the robbery, talking in an interested tone of a number of suggested improvements which the Stevensons had been planning in their interior decorations.

       Mrs. Stevenson had been warned of my coming and when I rang the bell, the white-capped maid who opened the door, conducted me at once to the morning room, where she arose to greet me. In the first consideration of a burglary, the hand of suspicion points at once to the servants. The Stevensons had protested that they placed the utmost confidence in their entire household staff, but we were determined to proceed with the greatest caution before adopting their belief. Therefore, the hostess and I carried on a desultory conversation in the matter of an imaginary musical until the servant had left the room and the door had closed behind her.

       "Now give me the facts in the case — the big facts," I cried abruptly as I took the vacant chair by her side.

       "You have given me a light task, I fear," was the response. "The burglar had come and fone before seven o'clock of last evening. I doubt

"Do You Believe in Ghosts?"

if he were in the house ten minutes in all. I had left the things upstairs in 'the guest room,' where we had been discussing them during the latter part of the afternoon. When I returned shortly after seven, they were gone."

       "What was their value?"

       "I should say $5,000 — perhaps more."

       "The jewels were in a case?"

       Mrs. Stevenson nodded. "Yes, but as a matter of fact, I was somewhat careless. I placed the box on one of the stands when I was called out, and nurse fearing it was not safe, removed it to the top drawer of the dresser."

       "The nurse removed it, you say? How long has she been with you?"

       "Oh, Miss Howe? So long that I can hardly tell you. She is almost one of the family."

       "Wasn't it rather unusual that you should have the jewels in 'the guest room?'"

       "Well, yes. It happened in this way. We were discussing family heirlooms and my mother brought from her trunk a number of things she had worn when she was a girl — old fashioned ornaments, such as hair bracelets, cameos, amethysts. I noticed that they were reviving old and sad memories, and to change the conversation, I ran out of the room for my jewels, offering to compare the new with the old. It was nearly dark, I recall, when my mother left and I saw that it was time to dress for the evening. In the hurry, the question of my rings and bracelets completely slipped my mind."

Directly at My left Was the Scratched Drain Pipe.

       "This was just before dinner?"

       "Yes. My husband arrived in his automobile perhaps half an hour later. He entered the house and the chauffeur took the machine back to the garage. We don't keep it here, and I heard the man turning around when I went down to the hall."

       We both walked toward the door at the sound of voices in the corridor.

       "I doubt if the jewels were alone more than an hour and a half in all," Mrs. Stevenson continued. "We chatted for perhaps a quarter of an hour after dinner and then I started back upstairs. It was then that the thought of my carelessness came to me and I hurried to the dresser. But the suggestion of danger was so far from my mind that when I put my hand into the drawer and found the jewels gone, I was perhaps the most surprised person in the house — and I am afraid I haven't quite recovered from my bewilderment yet."

       The last words were spoken as the door opened and Mr. Stevenson entered. A moment's survey showed him to be a portly, white-vested man, with thinning hair and nervous eyes behind a pair of gold-rimmed spectacles.

       "Would you like to take a look at our second floor?" he asked courteously.

       I bowed, and he led the way toward the circular stairs, winding their way upward from the end of the hall. As I passed my colleague, he whispered hurriedly, "Look at the windows. I can't find the sign of a clue from the inside!"

       The room of the robbery was finished and furnished with the simplicity which gives a veiled hint of heavy financial outlay, and I paused for a moment in the door-way in the effort to gain a general view of the apartment. Unless the robber had entered from the door, his route must have led him through one of the windows — and at my first glance this seemed, utterly out of the question. The room opened into the side yard, a great velvet expanse of green sod stretching as smooth as a carpet to the fence of the neighboring house, perhaps a dozen yards away. The windows were all of fifteen feet above the ground and as I darted a curious glance beyond the sills, I saw nothing on either side except blank, brick walls. An active man might have crept up a ladder, but the street was less than twenty feet away and the sight of a ladder against the side of an aristocratic mansion, with a nervous man climbing its rounds toward an opened window, is calculated to arouse suspicion in the most indifferent. I shook my head. The purloiner of the Stevenson jewels was too clever to run the risk.

       As I gazed back into the room and the wide hallway into which it led, my frown deepened. If the robber had not come from the outside of the house, it seemed equally impossible that he could have come from the inside.

       The corridor extended directly through the center of the building and with a large staff of servants in addition to the three members of the family, it was literally out of the question for a stranger to enter and remain long enough to seek and find the jewel case. The suggestion, however, started a lively train of thoughts in my mind as I stepped back. A bureau drawer in an unoccupied room is not a likely repository for a set of valuable gems. A burglar, exploring a strange house would hardly direct his search in such a quarter, unless —

       I gave a low exclamation. I was beginning to entertain a distinct belief that the burglar knew just when to come and just where to search. How?

       At the question, I walked to the door and asked if the nurse could be sent to me. It was a white-faced woman, with tears still in her eyes, that stepped into the room a moment later.

       "I am Miss Howe," she announced in a voice reduced almost to a whisper.

       "Nurse," I began briskly, "what is your theory of this affair?"

       The woman hesitated nervously, with her eyes on the. floor.

       "Come," I said impatiently. "You have an explanation of how Mrs. Stevenson's jewels vanished. Surely you can't object to sharing it with me?"

       "Yes, I have a theory, but I am afraid you will laugh at it." The woman's eyes were abruptly raised and lowered. "Do you believe in ghosts?"

       "Ghosts?"

       "I knew you would sneer." The nurse raised her handkerchief to her face. "But I can't help it. Nothing but a bird could have come through the window, and unless every one of the servants is telling a deliberate falsehood, nobody could have entered through the door-way. And yet the jewels are gone. If spirits —"

       "Bosh! The idea of a woman of your age and experience suggesting ghosts!" I placed a stern hand on her shoulder. "Come now. We are not dealing with the other world. We are dealing with this — and a very bad part of it, too. I am going to be practical. Did any person — I don't except either the family or the servants — see you when you put the jewels away?"

       "Not a person!" was the swift answer. "It was still light, and I had just come from the hall. I glanced at the door again as I pulled open the drawer. I was absolutely alone."

       At the bureau I again surveyed the room. If the; nurse were speaking the truth, the door-way seemed the only possible point from which she could have been watched. I glanced carelessly out of the window. Across the lawn, the neighboring house met my wandering eyes, corresponding almost exactly with the Stevenson home.

       If no one had followed Miss Howe's movements, the burglar, was either the luckiest or the shrewdest gentleman of his profession I had ever encountered. When I dismissed the nurse, I walked slowly across to the row of windows again. As I have said, the grass was perhaps fifteen feet below. At my first hurried glance there had appeared to be absolutely no break in the smooth, brick wall and the careful scrutiny which I now bestowed showed no detail to conflict with this belief. The sod was as smooth as a piece of silk, and even at that distance I was convinced that had a ladder been used, the marks would have shown unmistakably in the short, green grass. The blades, however, were undisturbed.

       I was baffled and discouraged. In my despondent mood, I continued to the last of the windows and again thrust my head far out, endeavoring to scrutinize every brick and crevice. But in vain. It seemed almost impossible for a fly to ascend the wall, unaided, much less a man.

       I was turning away with a puzzled shake of my head when my eyes caught the long, green drain pipe perhaps three feet distant, and projecting outward possibly an inch or more from the bricks. From the eaves above, it ran down to the grass plot at my feet, its circumference measuring perhaps twelve inches. Could an active man have scaled it? Even as I asked the question, I realized that it led to another even more puzzling. Could any man have reached the ledge of the window from the insecure support of the pipe even if he did ascend?

       It would be the feat of an acrobat or a person who should have been one. Even as I suggested the possibility, I was eliminating it when a sudden discovery caught and held my attention.

       On the green surface of the pipe, I was positive I had caught sight of a series of short, ragged scratches. In my excitement, I leaned still farther out, hardly daring to breathe as I studied the sudden clue. Yes, there could be no doubt about it. The pipe was badly scratched, and the marks were those which a pair of heavy boots might have made in the frantic efforts of the owner to maintain his balance.

       I had found a clue, but it was so slight and unpromising that I shook my head when the family below asked me eagerly what progress I had made. The scratches on the drain pipe might have been made a week, a month ago. To determine the fact, a close, minute examination was absolutely necessary. I commented on the point and its possibilities to Mulford on our way back to the station.

       "A second story case, eh?" muttered my companion thoughtfully.

       "If it is, it is a record-breaker!" I responded warmly. "The man who engineered it is a genius — if my theory is correct. Remember, he had neither a porch nor a ladder to assist him. Fifteen feet above was a window, and the brick wall of a three-story house. If a rope had been dangled to him, the ascent would have been a simple question of muscle. But there was no rope. At his left was a drain pipe, over three feet, however, from his goal. It was a pipe that an ordinary man could not have climbed under any condition."

       After a brief consultation we decided to postpone further investigation until after dark.

       As it developed, the rain fell in torrents that evening. An ink-black sky and a nasty, biting wind met us when we sallied again toward the Stevenson residence, muffled to the chin. Mulford had arranged for a ladder, which had been deposited in the shadow of a long row of bushes, and as we neared our destination we resembled nothing so much as a party of skulking marauders, seeking plunder 'ourselves, rather than plunderers.

       "Of course, you're not going up," Mulford remarked carelessly as he reached for and found the hidden ladder.

       "Of course, I am going up!" I responded swiftly. "Why not?"

       The detective dropped the ladder and swung toward me with a stare of incredulity. "But this is no work for a woman. It is a task that would bother a fireman in this wind. What if you or the ladder should slip, what —"

       "There is no use of discussing the question," I put in stubbornly, "catch hold here if we are going to get through tonight!" The ladder was soon up.

       I pressed the lever of my electric searchlight, gathered my skirts tightly about me, and the next instant was creeping slowly along the wet, sticky rounds. Above and around me was a thick darkness, through which heavy gusts of rain swept with a numbing force. Once I lost my hold and gave myself up for lost when my groping fingers caught the ladder again. The climb could not have occupied more than two minutes, but it seemed an eternity to me. Even, when Mulford's cheery voice sounded in low-toned encouragement from below, I could not shake off the impression that I was alone in the night.

       A sudden glance upward showed me that I had reached my journey's end before I was aware of it. Directly at my left, was the scratched drain pipe, with its green surface glistening from the rain. At once, my calmness returned. I do not believe that in the next three minutes I thought of the ladder or the wind.

       Mrs. Stevenson had assured me that no workmen had been employed on the pipe for months. If the scratches had been made recently, it could mean but one thing. In my excitement I bent my body still farther to the left and stooped down until my light was hardly an inch from the pipe.

       There was not one row of scratches, but half a dozen, some deep and long, others hardly visible — and there was no question as to their recent origin. Also the man who had made them had been engaged in a desperate struggle. I gazed at the window ledge above, and found no difficulty in accounting for the fact. Many hardened athletes could not have made that swing.

       "Are you coming down tonight?"

       It was the voice of Mulford, crisp with impatience.

       "Right away. Hold the ladder!" I responded. "I'll be with you in a minute." And I was.

       "Well?" my companion demanded as we fared each other again on the glistening walk.

       "Do you know a 'second story' man who has long limbs and who should have been an acrobat in a circus?" I responded.

       "What are you driving at?"

       "Merely this. If you find such a man, the chances are ten to one that we will have the Stevenson case solved."

       But a police dragnet can not produce criminals to order. We were to have this fact emphasized vividly during the next few hours. And a man with the skill to attempt and accomplish the feat I had outlined would have sufficient intelligence to keep away from his accustomed haunts and companions — if he had any. When morning came, with our long limbed "suspect" still at large, I returned again to the Stevenson neighborhood with another suggestion shaping itself in my mind. I decided to sound neighborhood gossip, often a great help to detectives.

       However, I tried three houses before my questionings produced even the ghost of a clue. It was at the last door — the left hand neighbor of the Stevensons, that I found my first reward.

       "Have you seen any strangers lately — tramps, peddlers, agents, collectors?" I asked the woman who answered the bell. She shook her head with a puzzled smile. "Why?"

       "No book agents nor gas inspectors?" I continued eagerly.

       "Gas inspectors?" she repeated, "no, I don't think that I have," and then she broke off with a sudden start, "why, yes, now that you call it to mind, I will take my words back. He was such a funny man that I spoke to my maid about him at the time."

       "When was this?"

       "Let me see. Why It was day before yesterday — the day of the Stevenson burglary, you know."

       I followed her into the house without a word. "Tell me all about it," I said as I took the offered chair.

       "There isn't much to relate. Our meter was read about three days before, but this man told us that he was an inspector, that he was to examine the pipes and connections for leakages and things. He went through the first floor and then asked to be taken upstairs. I imagine he was here half an hour, perhaps longer. When I went into the room where he was working, he was testing the chandeliers. I thought it rather funny, and I spoke to the servant about it when I went down."

       I stepped to the telephone in the hall and called for the main office of the local gas company.

       "Did you send an inspector to No. 228 Forest Avenue, Wednesday afternoon?" I asked crisply.

       The man at the other end responded promptly, "No, ma'am. We haven't sent an inspector to that part of town for six weeks. Why do you ask?" But I had some puzzling queries of my own to answer just then and I hung up the receiver.

       "Will you please take me to the rooms where the man worked," I said, turning to the woman at my side.

       "Certainly," was the somewhat dubious response. When I reached the second floor, I quickened my steps. At the door of a corner bed-room my guide said over her shoulder, "This is where the chandelier was tested."

       I stepped forward, and then gazed over my shoulder through the half-opened window. I was on an almost direct line with the "guests' chamber" of the Stevensons! I whirled sharply.

       "What time was your inspector here?"

       "It was the latter part of the afternoon, I think. Perhaps half past five, or thereabouts."

       I glanced a second time through the window toward the adjoining house. It was just at this hour that Mrs. Stevenson had left the room opposite, with her jewels, remaining, unprotected, on the stand.

       I walked to the curtain and drew them back. Yes, a man standing here could command an almost uninterrupted view of the room next door. I had found the spy who had seen the hiding place of the Stevenson jewels.

       "Will you kindly describe your visitor?" I said, stepping back.

       "He was a man who walked as though most of his strength was in his shoulders and arms. In fact, I rather imagined he was something in the way of an athlete. He was tall, perhaps six feet, with dark, curly hair and a smooth face that showed an ugly brown scar on the left cheek. Also, he spoke as though he had been troubled with catarrh."

       Trust a woman for a man's description, every time! I have always found that feminine penetration finds points which the average man stumbles past blindly — little points, which go farther in the question of identification than the more prominent details.

       "Thank you," I said to my accommodating companion, but she little knew how deep my thanks were as I swung myself onto the nearest down-town car. Given the description I had jotted down, I felt that any local detective of five years' experience could identify the man behind it. True, there was that embarrassing question, how did the burglar happen to be in the house at the psychological moment which showed him his loot — and his chance next door? But I resolutely put it from me as I silently handed my written description to the chief of the detective bureau and watched his wrinkled face as he read it.

       "Is this your man?" he asked bluntly.

       "Do you know him?" I responded.

       "I can have him here in the morning, if you want an introduction!"

       He was as good as his word. When I entered his office the following day, a black-haired man, with long limbs and the appearance of an athlete, was awaiting me.

       "Derk Mason, at your service," said the detective good naturedly. "Do you identify him?"

       "I will, if you'll give me an hour." Before the sixty minutes were up, I was back, with the neighbor of the Stevenons and her maid. As the first entered the room, Mason drew back with a low curse.

       "Do you know this man, madam?" the chief queried crisply.

       "He used to be a gas inspector," was the hesitating reply, and Mason swore. When the evidence of the maid followed that of her mistress, and the incident of the drain-pipe was related the prisoner gave in sullenly.

       "What's the use?" he growled. "I thought luck was with me, but I guess a chap never knows his cards until the game is over."

       "Luck?" I repeated curiously.

       Mason grinned. "If you must know, I was not after the Stevenson 'crib' but the one next door. Had the plans down to a carpet tack when I looked through the window and saw that woman putting those 'sparklers' away in a bureau drawer. A bureau drawer! Now what do you think of that? I was after those rings before I was ten minutes older — and I got them, too! But I never worked so hard in my life. I fell off that drain pipe twice before I got to the top!"

       "Say, Mason," I called as he was being led away. "What circus were you with?"

       The prisoner grinned. "Find out for yourself," he answered shortly.

       The Stevenson jewels were recovered before the day was over, and six weeks later Mason was leaving for a long sentence at the state prison.

[THE END.]

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