The Idiot at Home Part 19

"Well, I won't say mor'n two or three words about it, anyhow," put in Mollie, not anxious to commit herself to perpetual silence on the subject.

"It is the most beautiful clock I ever saw," said the Idiot, quickly, realizing the possibilities of Mollie's two or three words.

"That's what I fink," said Mollie, "and I'm goin' to tell mamma that you said so."

"All right," said the Idiot. "Suppose you and Tommy run right up and tell her now."

"I'd rather hear you talk, pa," said Tommy.

"He does take after you, doesn't he?" said Mr. Pedagog.

"Yes," said the Idiot, "he does. He likes to hear me talk as much as I do, bless him!"

"It is a commendable sign in a son," observed Mr. Pedagog. "But tell about the two professionals. Did they get anything?"

"They did," said the Idiot. "And at the same time I lost nothing. The first chap came on the scene, along about two o'clock in the morning. He was a very industrious mechanic, and I regret to say he was not adequately paid for his services. He tackled the safe." At this point the Idiot threw back his head and laughed heartily.

"I have seen the safe," said Mr. Pedagog, "and to tell you the truth, my dear Idiot, I have wondered at your choosing so obvious a receptacle for your valuables. It does not, to my mind, deny itself as a safe should.

It advertises the fact that your silver, your wife's jewels perhaps, are within. I have spoken once or twice to our friend Mr. Brief about it."

"No doubt," replied the Idiot. "However, I can't see why a safe has any disadvantages."

"It lies in this," said Mr. Pedagog, impressively. "You confess at once to the burglar the exact location of the things he's after. Without a safe your silver, or Mrs. Idiot's jewels, such as they are, might be found anywhere in the house. But when you take the trouble to buy a safe, any burglar in creation who has ordinary common-sense must know that your valuables are concentrated in that one spot."

"That, I rejoice to say," said the Idiot, "is the burglar's view."

"You should not rejoice," said Mr. Pedagog, with some of his old-time severity. "You make his work so comparatively easy that he is content to follow a base profession, as you have termed it. Truly, I wonder at you.

You place on your first floor a bald safe--"

"I haven't seen any advertised as having a full head of hair," observed the Idiot, complacently.

"You misunderstand me," said Mr. Pedagog. "When I say bald I mean evident, plain, obvious. You practically say: Here are the things which I value. What is to be found within this safe, Mr. Burglar, _are the very things you are after_. Therefore, say you to the burglar: Attack this safe. Break it open, rifle it of its contents; in other words, here is the swag, as I believe it is called."

"You are wholly right," said the Idiot. "I bought that safe for that precise reason, and I bought a big one and a strong one. But you don't know the story of that safe, do you, Mr. Pedagog?"

"I do not," said the Schoolmaster.

"Then let me tell you," said the Idiot. "That safe has been broken open, and by a professional burglar. The burglar had his tools, and he had his expert knowledge of their use. He arrived at my house, as I recall the situation, somewhere about--ah--two o'clock at night. He bored at the lock until three. He fooled about the combination. He did everything that a respectable burglar might be expected to do, and--"

"He failed, of course, since you say you have lost nothing," said Mr.

Pedagog.

"Not at all," said the Idiot. "After two hours and fifty-five minutes'

work on that safe he got it open. And--"

"And?" queried Mr. Pedagog.

"He found it empty," said the Idiot; "absolutely empty. There was not a spoon, a fork, a tea-pot, or a diamond necklace, or even a sc.r.a.p of paper in it."

"Then why do you have it," said Mr. Pedagog.

"Merely to keep the burglar busy while he is in my house, and to make him expert in honest work. An ordinary mechanic, intelligent enough to get that safe open by night or by day, would be ent.i.tled to at least two dollars for his services. The individual involved got it open; and when he opened it--"

"Found nothing!" cried Mr. Pedagog.

"Exactly," said the Idiot, pulling away on his cigar. "I suppose I should have left a check inside payable to bearer for a dollar and a half to compensate him for his trouble, but I am so neglectful that I really didn't."

"And you bought a safe--"

"Merely to provide employment for the unemployed burglar," said the Idiot. "That is all a safe is good for, Mr. Pedagog. Experience has shown that the house-safe isn't worth the paint it is covered with in the matter of protection. But as a decoy it works to a charm. A safe, in other words, is a splendid thing to keep things out of, as well as to keep the burglar busy while he is your guest. If our particular visitor had not spent all his time breaking the safe open he might have been able to locate our spoons."

"It is a pity," said Mr. Pedagog, dryly, "that you did not add to the impression the futility of his work made upon his mind a short note of admonition indicating to him that he might be in better business."

"My dear Mr. Pedagog," said the Idiot, "that would have been rude.

Invited or otherwise, the man was a guest in my house, and a note of that kind would have savored of sarcasm, or, if not, would have placed me in the position of having taken advantage of my guest's weakness to be facetious at his expense."

"You take an original view of it," said Mr. Pedagog.

"Not a bit of it," returned the Idiot. "I got the idea from a Boston girl. Once when she and her sister-in-law found themselves alone at night in a huge country-house they were suddenly overcome with fear of burglars, and rather than run any personal risk from the midnight marauder they left a big card on top of the safe inscribed with these words: 'Dear Sir,--The combination of this safe is 11-16-91. There is nothing in it. If you must have our silver, call at the Shawmut Safe Deposit Company, where it is now stored.' The two girls were cousins of mine."

The Schoolmaster smiled again. "There must be a streak of your particular kind of genius running all through your family," said he.

"True--there is," said the Idiot. "I'm not the only Idiot in my tribe."

"And the second burglar. How about him?" asked Mr. Pedagog.

"Oh, he was easy," said the Idiot. "I compromised with him. You see, I met him on his way out. I was coming home late, and just as I arrived he was leaving. I invited him back, lit the gas in the dining-room, and asked him to join me in a bit of cold tongue and a bottle of beer. He tried to shuffle out of it, but when I said I preferred to reason with him rather than have him arrested he sat down, and we talked the situation over. I discovered that for about three hundred dollars' worth of my stuff that he had in a bag slung over his shoulder he might get as much as fifty dollars, and at great risk. I showed him how foolish that was, and offered to give him forty dollars if he'd leave the stuff, so saving me two hundred and sixty dollars, and avoiding all trouble for himself. He didn't like it at first, but under the genial influence of the beer and the cold tongue and my conversation he finally yielded, and walked out of my house with a check drawn to bearer for forty dollars in his pocket."

"I am astonished at you!" cried Mr. Pedagog. "You compounded a felony."

"Not exactly," said the Idiot. "I should have done so if I hadn't stopped payment on the check the next day."

"Oh," said Mr. Pedagog, "I see!"

"All I lost was the revenue-stamp on the check," said the Idiot.

"And did you ever hear from the man again?"

"Yes," observed the Idiot. "I met him on the train a day or two later--sat next to him in the smoking-car, in fact."

"And did he know you?"

"Yes. We had a very pleasant chat going to town. He said he was moving away from here. He couldn't stand it, he said. He was going to work in some new field where a man could get living pay for his work. Said he'd been robbed by some of our best people; what's the use of working for nothing? he asked. The poor man was kept down, and all that sort of talk."

"And you parted friends?"

"Yes," said the Idiot. "I felt rather sorry for him, and when he said good-bye I gave him a cigar and a five-dollar bill, and that was the end of him. I have since received a letter from him in which he said that my kindness was appreciated, and that I could leave my valuables out on the lawn all night hereafter with perfect impunity. 'There isn't a thief in our whole suburban gang would be mean enough to touch it after your kindness to me,' he wrote."

"Extraordinary!" said Mr. Pedagog.