I proposed iron bars, to which he objected that iron bars would make his room look like a prison.

And then I had a happy thought.
"Let us fix a strong brass rod right across the window-frame," I said, "in such a way that nobody can get in without laying hold of it, and by connecting it with a strong dynamo-battery inside, make sure that the man who does lay hold of it will not be able to let go." The idea pleased Mr.Fortescue, and he told me to carry it out, which I did promptly and effectively, taking care to make the battery so powerful that, if Mr.Griscelli should try to effect an entrance by the window, he would be disagreeably surprised.

The circuit was, of course, broken by dividing the rod in two parts and interposing a non-conductor between them.
To prevent any of the maids being "shocked," I told Ramon (who acted as his master's body servant) to connect the battery every night and disconnect it every morning.

From time to time, moreover, I overhauled the apparatus to see that it was in good working order, and kept up its strength by occasionally recharging the cells.
Once, when I was doing this, Mr.Fortescue said, laughingly: "I don't think it is any use, Bacon; Griscelli won't come in that way.

If, as some people say, it is the unexpected that happens, it is the expected that does not happen." But in this instance both happened--the expected and the unexpected.
As I mentioned at the outset of my story, the habits of the Kingscote household were of an exemplary regularity.