out upon him would make him prepare his revolver, and his
nervousness might make him shoot me, which would quite upset
Sarah's nerves. I told Sarah so, but she had a hereditary
instinct for bringing the silver to the bedroom, and insisted. I
saw that in the suburban house this, would be continued as
"bringing the silver upstairs," and a trial of my carpet-saving
stairs suggested to me my burglar-defeating plan. I had the
apparatus built into the house, and I had the house planned to
agree with the apparatus.

For several months after we moved into the house I had no
burglars, but I felt no fear of them in any event. I was prepared
for them.

In order not to make Sarah nervous, I explained to her that my
invention of a silver-elevator was merely a time-saving device.
From the top of the dining-room sideboard I ran upright tracks
through the ceiling to the back of the hall above, and in these I
placed a glass case, which could be run up and down the tracks
like a dumbwaiter. All our servant had to do when she had washed
the silver was to put it in the glass case, and I had attached to
the top of the case a stout steel cable which ran to the ceiling
of the hall above, over a pulley, and so to our bedroom, which
was at the front of the hall upstairs. By this means I could,
when I was in bed, pull the cable, and the glass case of silver
would rise to the second floor. Our bedroom door opened upon the
hall, and from the bed I could see the glass case; but in order
that I might be sure that the silver was there I put a small
electric light in the case and kept it burning all night. Sarah
was delighted with this arrangement, for in the morning all I had