Hot Springs weekly star. (Hot Springs, S.D.) 1892-1917, 1897-12-31
NO USE FOR LADDERS.

NO OOly IOl LAUUInS.
THE RETIRED BURGLAR TELLS OF
TWO UNFORTUNATE EXPERIENCES.
He Got Into and Out Of the Houses With
Ease, but That Wasn't All-How a De-
tective Got u Clew and Worked It-Es-
aped Once With q Broken Arm,
Ladders, when you find them han
dy," said the retired burglar, "may
seem like a very convenient way of get
ting into open second story windows,
but after two experiences that 1 had
with them I gave them up and stuck to
the old fashioned way of doors and eel.
lar windows.
I'm q suburban town that I visited
once l found' em painting n Queen Anne
house in the rainbow style that they
used to paint houses i'll, and that, I sup
pose, they paint ZEN i'll still to some en-
tent. The men had ladders up, no stage,
and / noticed that at the close OF the
day IL of them was painting near a
window, and I wondered if he'd leave
his ladder there when he stopped work
at night. l sauntered around that way
after dark, and there it was, and it was
summer, and the window was wide
open. Most folks i'll the country, when
their houses are being painted, are apt
to be q little skittish about the ladders,
and if one should be left like this one
they'd be pretty sure to close the Will
dow near it and lock it, but these folks
didn't appear to he disturbed, and as far
as my getting into the house was con.
cerned it was just about us easy for me
to walk up that ladder and step off
through the window as it would have
been to walk in at the front door with
it unlocked.
"Later, about 9 O'Clock the next
morning, I went up that ladder and in
at the window without the slightest
trouble, and there was nobody sleeping
in that 10 1t was all just as easy us
it could be. I poked around the house
and gathered up what stuff there was
worth carrying, off and went back to
that room and the open window and
down the ladder and off.
"a month after that, as / was walk
ing across the platform of a station on
the same road that the other town was
on to take q train, there was a man
laid his hand OF my arm and says,
Now, don't make a fuss about it, and
it'll be a good deal easier all around
And I recognized in him the detective
Of the road, a man that / knew meant
business. and I went along with him.
"Being q man of brains, he had gone
up to the house where the robbery. was
as soon as he had heard of it, which
was the day after. There he had put
himself in the burglars place and fol-
lowed in his footsteps as near as he
could. He had had the ladder placed in
just the same position, and he had gone
up that and stepped off into the win
dow and followed over his track inside
the house as close as he could guess at
it, and then he'd come back to the VIM
dow and got out on to the ladder, and SO
down to the ground.
"The ladder went up on the right
hand side Of this window, and while it
was easy enough to reach it, still it
was quite a little step from the sill to
the ladder, and he noticed that when
he had got his foot on the ladder he
swung back a little toward the house,
SO that his elbow just touched it i'll the
angle between the window frame and
the %clapboards. He gave a little push
on that elbow naturally and threw him
he stopped and looked at the spot where
his elbow had touched. The paint was
dry and there was no mark, but he call
ed up the painters and learned that on
the morning before-that was the morn
ing after the house had becn robbed
the paint at that place, OIL the cupboard
by the window frame, and Oh the frame
itself had been smudged q little, and
they'd touched it over. That was all
the detective wanted to know. From
that time en- he had been looking for a
man with two paint spots of different
colors on the LETT elbow of his coat, and
l was the man.
"lt may seem amazing to you that 1
hadn't rubbed the paint OF. 1 had rub
bed some of it off, and l was going to
rub the rest off the next day, and then
L kept setting that hex day ahead, as
we are apt to do, and 1 finally wound
up by letting it go altogether, the rest
Of it. There wasn't one chance i'll q
thousand of its leading to anything, and
even as it was / might have talked my
self out of the paint, but l had a watch
that I'd got in the house in my pocket,
and that settled it.
"Ihat was one ladder. This was the
other:
"Looking around the outside of u
house i'll the country one night, l found
Il ladder lying on the ground against
the rear of the house. They had some
fruit trees in the garden. and / suppose
they'd been working over them, or on
the grape arbor maybe. and were going
on with the work hex day and had left
the Ladder u instead of taking it down
cellar for the night. 1t was summer,
and Oh the side of the house there were
two windows open in one room. l
thought I'd set the ladder I'M the,, and