“Well, that’s what I would have thought if I had been in your place. You see, I saw the party coming toward the door just as you were dropping off the porch roof. I was afraid if I started anything then you would go back up and get trapped inside the house. So I let things go along naturally till I thought they had gone far enough.”

“You did the right thing,” I said gratefully, “but why did you tell them they might get us tomorrow?”

“Ha, that’s the psychology of the situation, Kid. I mentioned also that he was insured. That reminds him that he is not losing anything, and it also saves his face with the family. He went inside and said to them and the other chap, after they had looked about the house and phoned the police, ‘Oh, well, we’re insured. Of course if we hadn’t been I would have given that other burglar a battle, tough as he was.’ Then the other chap cuts in and says, ‘You did the sensible thing, Tom. The police will pick them up tomorrow at some pawnshop.’

“You see, kid,” Sanc continued, “those people are excited and frightened. You have to think for them and for yourself, too. When I told them they might get us tomorrow I gave them another out; they say to themselves, ‘Why, of course the police will get them. How foolish of us to endanger ourselves and family over a few things that are insured and will be recovered in the pawnshops when the burglars are arrested.’

“Then I send them to the phone, and we depart.”

I listened, spellbound. “You did something to your voice. I hardly recognized it.”