zeal and savagery, he should outwit him yet by catching this other
train while he was searching this one! All the gameness of his youth
and profession rose up in him. Without stopping to thank his informer,
he leaped like a hare along the little path which cut diagonally across
this lone field and which was evidently well worn by human feet. As he
ran he wondered whether the genial conductor could possibly have lied
to him to throw him off the track, and also if his enemy, seeing him
running, had discovered his error by now and was following, granting
that the conductor had told him the truth. He looked back occasionally,
taking off his coat and glasses as he ran, and even throwing away
his cane. Apparently Collins was still searching the other train.
And now Binns at the same time, looking eagerly forward toward the
other station, saw a semaphore arm which stood at right angles to the
station lower itself for a clear track for some train. At the same time
he also spied a mail-bag hanging out on a take-post arm, indicating
that whatever this train was and whichever way it might be going, it
was not going to stop here. He turned, still uncertain as to whether
he had made a mistake in not searching the other train. Supposing
the conductor had deliberately fooled him! Suppose Collins had made
some preliminary arrangements of which he knew nothing? Suppose he
had! Supposing the burglar were really on there, and even now Collins
was busy with the opening questions of his interview, while he was
here, behind! Oh Lord, what a beat! And he would have no reasonable
explanation to offer except that he had been outwitted. What would
happen to him? He slowed up in his running, chill beads of sweat
bursting out on his face as he did so, but then, looking backward, he
saw the train begin to move and from it, as if shot out of a gun, the
significant form of Collins leap down and begin to run along this
same path. Then, by George, the robber was not on it, after all! The
conductor had told him the truth! Ha! Collins would now attempt to make
this other train. He had been told that the bandit was coming in on
this. Binns could see him speeding along the path at top speed, his hat
off, his hands waving nervously about. But by now Binns had reached the
station a good three minutes ahead of his rival.
Desperately he ran into it, a tiny thing, sticking his eager perspiring
face in at the open office window, and calling to the stout, truculent
little occupant of it:
“When is the East-bound M.P. express due here?”
“Now,” replied the agent surlily.
“Does it stop?”
“No, it don’t stop.”
“Can it be stopped?”
“No, it _cannot_!”
“You mean to say you have no right to stop it?”
“I mean I won’t stop it.”
As they spoke there came the ominous shriek of the express’s whistle
tearing on toward them. For the moment he was almost willing that
Collins should join him if only he could make the train and gain this
interview. He must have it. Waxby expected him to get it. Think of what
a beat he would have if he won--what Waxby would think if he failed!
“Would five dollars stop it?” he asked desperately, diving into his
pocket.
“No.”
“Will ten?”
“It might,” the agent replied crustily, and rose to his feet.
“Stop it,” urged Binns feverishly, handing over the bill.
The agent took it, and grabbing a tablet of yellow order blanks which
lay before him, scribbled something on the face of one and ran outside,
holding it up at arm’s length as he did so. At the same time he called
to Binns:
“Run on down the track! Run after it. She won’t stop here--she can’t.
She’ll go a thousand feet before she can slow up. Get on down there,
and after you’re on I’ll let ’er go.”
He waved the yellow paper desperately, while Binns, all tense with
excitement and desire, began running as fast as he could in the
direction indicated. Now, if he were lucky, he would make it, and
Collins would be left behind--think of it! He could get them to go
ahead, maybe, before Collins could get aboard. Oh, my! As he ran and
thought, he heard the grinding wheels of the express rushing up behind
him. In a thought, as it were, it was alongside and past, its wheels
shrieking and emitting sparks. True enough, it was stopping! He would
be able to get on! Oh, glory! And maybe Collins wouldn’t be able to!
Wouldn’t that be wonderful? It was far ahead of him now, but almost
stock-still, and he was running like mad. As he ran he could hear the
final gritty screech of the wheels against the brakes as the train came
to a full stop farther on, and then coming up and climbing aboard,
breathless and gasping painfully, he looked back, only to see that his
rival had taken a diagonal course across the common, and was now not
more than a hundred feet behind. He would make the train if he kept
this up. It could scarcely be started quickly enough to leave him
behind, even if Binns paid for it. Instead of setting himself to the
stern task of keeping Mr. Collins off the train, however, as assuredly
Mr. Collins would have done--with his fists or his feet, if necessary,
or his money--Mr. Binns now hesitated, uncertain what to do. On the
rear platform with him was a brakeman newly stepped forth and, coming
out of the door, the conductor.
“Let her go!” he cried to the conductor. “Let her go! It’s all right!
Go on!”
“Don’t that other fellow want to get on?” asked the latter curiously.
“No, no, no!” Binns exclaimed irritably and yet pleading. “Don’t let
him on! He hasn’t any right on here. I arranged to stop this train. I’m
from the _Star_. I’ll pay you if you don’t let him on. It’s the train
robber I want. Go ahead,” but even as he spoke Mr. Collins came up,
panting and wet, but with a leer of triumph and joy over his rival’s
discomfiture written all over his face as he pulled himself up the
steps.
“You thought you’d leave me behind, didn’t you?” he sneered as he
pushed his way upward. “Well, I fooled you this time, didn’t I?”
Now was the crucial moment of Mr. Binns’s career had his courage been
equal to it, but it was not. He had the opportunity to do the one
thing which might have wrested victory from defeat--that is, push Mr.
Collins off and keep him off. The train was beginning to move. But
instead of employing this raw force which Mr. Collins would assuredly
have employed, he hesitated and debated, unable in his super-refinement
to make up his mind, while Mr. Collins, not to be daunted or parleyed
with, dashed into the car in search of the robber. In the sudden
immensity of his discomfiture, Binns now followed him with scarcely
a thought for the moment, only to see Collins bustling up to the
bandit in the third car ahead who, handcuffed to a country sheriff and
surrounded by several detectives, was staring idly at the passengers.
“Gee, sport,” the latter was saying as Mr. Binns sat down, patting
the burglar familiarly on the knee and fixing him with that basilisk
gaze of his which was intended to soothe and flatter the victim, “that
was a great trick you pulled off. The paper’ll be crazy to find out
how you did it. My paper, the _News_, wants a whole page of it. It
wants your picture, too. Say, you didn’t really do it all alone, did
you? Well, that’s what I call swell work, eh, Cap?” and now he turned
his ingratiating leer on the country sheriff and the detectives. In
a moment or two more he was telling them all what an intimate friend
he was of “Billy” Desmond, the chief of detectives of O---- and Mr.
So-and-So, the chief of police, as well as various other dignitaries of
that world.
Plainly, admitted Binns to himself, he was beaten now, as much so
as this burglar, he thought. His great opportunity was gone. What a
victory this might have been, and now look at it! Disgruntled, he
sat down beside his enemy, beginning to think what to ask, the while
the latter, preening himself in his raw way on his success, began
congratulating the prisoner on his great feat.
“The dull stuff!” thought Mr. Binns. “To think that I should have
to contend with a creature like this! And these are the people he
considers something! And he wants a whole page for the _News_! My
word! He’d do well if he wrote a half-column alone.”
Still, to his intense chagrin, he could not fail to see that Mr.
Collins was making excellent headway, not only with the country
sheriff, who was a big bland creature, but the detectives and even
the burglar himself. The latter was a most unpromising specimen for
so unique a deed--short, broad-shouldered, heavy-limbed, with a
squarish, inexpressive, even dull-looking face, blue-gray eyes, dark
brown hair, big, lumpy, rough hands, and a tanned and seamed skin. He
wore the cheap, nondescript clothes of a laborer, a blue “hickory”
shirt, blackish-gray trousers, brownish-maroon coat, and a red bandana
handkerchief in lieu of a collar. On his head was a small round brown
hat pulled down over his eyes after the manner of a cap. He had the
still, indifferent expression of a captive bird, and when Binns finally
faced him and sat down, he seemed scarcely to notice either him or
Collins, or if so with eyes that told nothing. Binns often wondered
afterward what he really did think. At the same time he was so incensed
at the mere presence of Collins that he could scarcely speak.
The latter had the average detective-politician-gambler’s habit of
simulating an intense interest and an enthusiasm which he did not
feel, his face wreathing itself in a cheery smile, the while his eyes
followed one like those of a hawk, attempting all the while to discover
whether his assumed enthusiasm or friendship was being accepted at its
face value or not. The only time Binns seemed to obtain the least grip
on this situation, or to impress himself on the minds of the detectives
and prisoner, was when it came to those finer shades of questioning
which concerned just why, for what ulterior reasons, the burglar had
attempted this deed alone. But even here, Binns noticed that his
confrère was all ears, and making copious notes.
But always, to Binns’s astonishment and chagrin, the prisoner as well
as his captors paid more attention to Collins than they did to himself.
They turned to him as to a lamp, and seemed to be really immensely more
impressed with him than with himself, although the principal lines of
questioning fell to him. After a time he became so dour and enraged
that he could think of but one thing that would really have satisfied
him, and that was to attack Collins physically and give him a good
beating.
However, by degrees and between them, the story was finally extracted,
and a fine tale it made. It appeared that up to seven or eight months
preceding the robbery, possibly a year, Rollins had never thought of
being a train robber but had been only a freight brakeman or yard-hand
on this same road at one of its division points. Latterly he had even
been promoted to be a sort of superior switchman and assistant freight
handler at some station where there was considerable work of this kind.
Previous to his railroad work he had been a livery stable helper in the
town where he was eventually apprehended, and before that a farm-hand
somewhere near the same place. About a year before the crime, owing to
hard times, this road had laid off a large number of men, including
Rollins, and reduced the wages of all others by as much as ten per
cent. Naturally a great deal of labor discontent ensued, and strikes,
riots, and the like were the order of the day. Again, a certain number
of train robberies which were charged and traced to discharged and
dissatisfied employees now followed. The methods of successful train
robbing were then and there so cleverly set forth by the average
newspaper that nearly any burglar so inclined could follow them. Among
other things, while working as a freight handler, Rollins had heard of
the many money shipments made by express companies in their express
cars, their large amounts, the manner in which they were guarded, and
so on.
The road for which he worked at this time, the M.P., was, as he now
learned, a very popular route for money shipments both East and West.
And although express messengers (as those in charge of the car and
its safe were called) were well and invariably armed owing to the
many train robberies which had been occurring in the West recently,
still these assaults had not been without success. Indeed, the deaths
of various firemen, engineers, messengers, conductors, and even
passengers, and the fact that much money had recently been stolen
and never recovered, had not only encouraged the growth of banditry
everywhere, but had put such an unreasoning fear into most employees
connected with the roads that but few even of those especially picked
guards ventured to give these marauders battle.
But just the same, the psychology which eventually resulted in this
amazing single-handed attempt and its success was not so much that
Rollins was a poor and discharged railroad hand unable to find any
other form of employment, although that was a part of it, or that he
was an amazingly cold, cruel and subtle soul, which he was not by any
means, but that he was really largely unconscious of the tremendous
risks he was taking. He was just mentally “thick”--well insulated,
as it were. This was a fact which Binns had to bring out and which
Collins noted. He had never, as it now developed, figured it out from
the point of danger, being more or less lobster-like in his nervous
organism, but solely from the point of view of success. In sum, in his
idleness, having wandered back to his native region where he had first
started out as a livery hand, he had now fallen in love with a young
girl there, and then realizing, for the first time perhaps, that he was
rather hard pressed for cash and unable to make her such presents as
he desired, he had begun to think seriously of some method of raising
money. Even this had not resulted in anything until latterly, another
ex-railroad hand who had been laid off by this same company arrived
and proposed, in connection with a third man whom he knew, to rob a
train. At this time Rollins had rejected this scheme as not feasible,
not wishing to connect himself with others in any such crime. Later,
however, his own condition becoming more pressing, he had begun to
think of train robbing as a means of setting himself up in life, only,
as he reasoned, it must be alone.
Why alone? queried Binns.
That was the point all were so anxious to discover--why alone, with all
the odds against him?
Well, he couldn’t say exactly. He had just “kind o’ sort o’ thort,” as
he expressed it, that he might frighten them into letting him alone!
Other bandits (so few as three in one case of which he had read) had
held up large trains. Why not one? Revolver shots fired about a train
easily frightened all passengers as well as all trainmen, so the other
robbers had told him, and anyhow it was a life to death job either
way, and it would be better for him, he thought, if he worked it out
alone instead of with others. Often, he said, other men “squealed,” or
they had girls who told on them. He knew that. Binns looked at him,
intensely interested and all but moved by the sheer courage, or “gall,”
or “grit,” imbedded somewhere in this stocky frame.
But how could he hope to overcome the engineer, fireman, baggage man,
express messenger, mailmen, conductor, brakeman and passengers, to
say nothing of the Governor and his staff? How? By the way, did he
know at the time that the Governor and his staff were on board? No,
he hadn’t known that until afterward, and as for the others, well, he
just thought he could overawe them. Collins’s eyes were luminous as
Rollins said this, his face radiant. Far more than Binns, he seemed to
understand and even approve of the raw force of all this.
The manner in which Rollins came to fix on this particular train to rob
was also told. Every Thursday and Friday, or so he had been told while
he was assistant freight handler, a limited which ran West at midnight
past Dolesville carried larger shipments of money than on other nights.
This was due to week-end exchanges between Eastern and Western banks,
although he did not know that. Having decided on the train, although
not on the day, he had proceeded by degrees to secure from one distant
small town and another, and at different times so as to avoid all
chance of detection, first, a small handbag from which he had scraped
all evidence of the maker’s name; six or seven fused sticks of giant
powder such as farmers use to blow up stumps; two revolvers holding
six cartridges each, and some cartridges; and cord and cloth, out of
which he proposed to make bundles of the money if necessary. Placing
all of these in his bag, which he kept always beside him, he next
visited Dolesville, a small town nearest the spot which he had fixed on
in his mind as the place for his crime, and reconnoitering it and its
possibilities, finally arranged all his plans to a nicety.
Just at the outskirts of this hamlet, as he now told Binns and Collins,
which had been selected because of its proximity to a lone wood and
marsh, stood a large water-tank at which this express as well as nearly
all other trains stopped for water. Beyond it, about five miles, was
the wood with its marsh, where he planned to have the train stopped.
The express, as he learned, was regularly due at about one in the
morning. The nearest town beyond the wood was all of five miles away, a
mere hamlet like this one.
On the night in question, between eight and nine, he carried the bag,
minus its revolvers and sticks of giant powder, which were now on his
person, to that exact spot opposite the wood where he wished the train
to stop, and left it there beside the railroad track. He then walked
back the five miles to the water-tank, where he concealed himself and
waited for the train. When it stopped, and just before it started
again, he slipped in between the engine tender and the front baggage
car, which was “blind” at both ends. The train resumed its journey, but
on reaching the spot where he felt sure the bag should be, he could not
make it out. The engine headlight did not seem to reveal it. Fearing
to lose his chance and realizing that he was at about the place where
he had left it, he rose up, and climbing over the coal-box, covered
the two men in the cab, and compelled them to stop the train, dismount
and uncouple the engine. Then, revolver in hand, he drove them before
him to the express car door where, presenting one with a fused stick
of giant powder, he forced him to blow open the door; the messenger
within, still refusing to open it although he would not fire, for fear
of killing either the engineer or fireman. Both engineer and fireman,
at his command, then entered the car and blew open the money safe,
throwing out the packages of bills and coin at his word, the while
Rollins, realizing the danger of either trainmen or passengers coming
forward, had been firing a few shots backward toward the rear coaches
so as to overawe the passengers, and at the same time kept calling to
purely imaginary companions to keep watch there. It was these shots and
calls that had presumably sent the Governor and his staff scurrying
to their berths. They also put the fear of death into the minds of
the engineer and fireman and messenger, who imagined that he had many
confrères on the other side of the express car but for some reason,
because he was the leader, no doubt, preferred to act alone.
“Don’t kill anybody, boys, unless you have to,” is what Rollins said he
called, or “That’s all right, Frank. Stay over there. Watch that side.
I’ll take care of these.” Then he would fire a few more shots, and so
all were deluded.
Once the express car door and safe had been blown open and the money
handed out, he had now compelled the engineer and fireman to come down,
recouple the engine, and pull away. Only after the train had safely
disappeared in the distance did he venture to gather up the various
packages, only since he had lost his bag and had no light, he had
to fumble about and make a bag of his coat for them. With this over
his shoulder, he eventually staggered off into the wood and marsh,
concealing it under muck and stones, and then making for safety himself.
But, as it turned out, two slight errors, one of forgetfulness and
one of eyesight, caused him to finally lose the fruit of his victory.
The loss of the bag, in which he had first placed and then forgotten
an initialed handkerchief belonging to his love, eventually brought
about his capture. It is true that he had gone back to look for the
bag, without, however, remembering that the handkerchief was in it,
but fearing capture if he lingered too long, had made off after a
time without it. Later a posse of detectives and citizens arriving
and finding the bag with the initialed handkerchief inside, they were
eventually able to trace him. For, experts meditating on the crime,
decided that owing to the hard times and the laying-off of employees,
some of the latter might have had a hand in it, and so, in due time,
the whereabouts and movements of each and every one of them was gone
into, resulting in the discovery finally that this particular ex-helper
had returned rather recently to his semi-native town and had there been
going with a certain girl, and that even now he was about to marry her.
Also, it was said that he was possessed of unusual means, for him.
Next, it was discovered that her initials corresponded to those on the
handkerchief. Presto, Mr. Rollins was arrested, a search made of his
room, and nearly all of the money recovered. Then, being “caught with
the goods,” he confessed, and here on this day was he being hurried
to O---- to be jailed and sentenced, while Mr. Binns and Mr. Collins,
like harpies, hovered over him, anxious to make literary capital of his
error.
The only thing that consoled Mr. Binns, now that this story was finally
told, was that although he had failed to make it impossible for Collins
to get it, when it came to the writing of it he would be able to outdo
him, making a better and more connected narrative. Still, even here he
was a little dubious. During this interview Collins had been making
endless notes, putting down each least shade of Binns’s questioning,
and with the aid of one or several of the best men of the _News_ would
probably be able to work it out. Then what would be left?
But as they were nearing O---- a new situation intruded itself which
soon threatened on the face of it to rob Binns of nearly, if not quite,
all his advantage. And this related, primarily, to the matter of a
picture. It was most essential that one should be made, either here or
in the city, only neither Waxby nor himself, nor the city editor of the
_News_ apparently, had thought to include an artist on this expedition.
Now the importance of this became more and more apparent, and Collins,
with that keen sense he had for making tremendous capital of seeming
by-products, suggested, after first remarking that he “guessed” they
would have to send to police headquarters afterward and have one made:
“How would it do, old man, if we took him up to the _News_ office after
we get in, and let your friends Hill and Weaver make a picture of him?”
(These two were intimates of Binns in the art department, as Collins
happened to know.) “Then both of us could get one right away. I’d say
take him to the _Star_, only the _News_ is so much nearer” (which was
true), “and we have that new flash-light machine, you know” (which was
also true, the _Star_ being but poorly equipped in this respect). He
added a friendly aside to the effect that of course this depended on
whether the prisoner and officers in charge were willing.
“No, no, no!” replied Binns irritably and suspiciously. “No, I won’t
do that. You mean you want to get him into the _News_ office first.
Not at all. I’ll never stand for that. Hill and Weaver are my friends,
but I won’t do it. If you want to bring him down to the _Star_, that’s
different. I’ll agree to that. Our art department can make pictures
just as good as yours, and you can have one.”
For a moment Collins’s face fell, but he soon returned to the attack.
From his manner one would have judged that he was actually desirous of
doing Binns a favor.
“But why not the _News_?” he insisted pleasantly. “Those two boys are
your friends. They wouldn’t do anything to hurt you. Think of the
difference in the distance, the time we’ll save. We want to save time,
don’t we? Here it is nearly six-thirty, and by the time we get back to
the office it’ll be half-past seven or eight. It’s all right for you,
because you can write faster, but look at me. I’d just as lief go down
there as not, but what’s the difference? Besides the _News_ has got a
better plant, and you know it. Either Hill or Weaver’ll make a fine
picture, and they’ll give you one. Ain’t that all right?”