epidemic of burglaries--ranging from the theft of a brand-new
ash-can from the steps of the Methodist chapel to the ravaging of
Mrs. Blauvelt's whole lineful of clothes, on a washday dusk.

Up the Valley and down it, from Tuxedo to Ridgewood, there had
been a half-score robberies of a very different
order--depredations wrought, manifestly, by professionals;
thieves whose motor cars served the twentieth century purpose of
such historic steeds as Dick Turpin's Black Bess and Jack
Shepard's Ranter. These thefts were in the line of jewelry and
the like; and were as daringly wrought as were the modest local
operators' raids on ash-can and laundry.

It is the easiest thing in the world to stir humankind's ever-
tense burglar-nerves into hysterical jangling. In house after
house, for miles of the peaceful North Jersey region, old pistols
were cleaned and loaded; window fastenings and doorlocks were
inspected and new hiding-places found for portable family
treasures.

Across the lake from the village, and down the Valley from a
dozen country homes, seeped the tide of precautions. And it
swirled at last around the Place,--a thirty-acre homestead,
isolated and sweet, whose grounds ran from highway to lake; and
whose wistaria-clad gray house drowsed among big oaks midway
between road and water; a furlong or more distant from either.

The Place's family dog,--a pointer,--had died, rich in years and
honor. And the new peril of burglary made it highly needful to
choose a successor for him.