I was not quite six years old when I stole my first pocketbook. I was very happy because I was petted and rewarded; my wretched stepmother patted my curly head, gave me a bag of candy, and said I was a "good girl."
My stepmother was a thief. My good father never knew this. He went to the war at President Lincoln's call for troops and left me with his second wife, my stepmother.
Scarcely had my father's regiment left New York than my stepmother began to busy herself with my education—not for a useful career, but for a career of crime. Patiently she instructed me, beginning with the very rudiments of thieving—how to help myself to things that lay unprotected in candy shops, drug stores and grocery stores. I was made to practice at home until my childish fingers had acquired considerable dexterity.
Finally, I was told that money was the really [Pg 12]valuable thing to possess, and that the successful men and women were those who could take pocketbooks. With my stepmother as the model to practice on I was taught how to open shopping bags, feel out the loose money or the pocketbook and get it into my little hands without attracting the attention of my victims. In those days leather bags were not common—most women carried cloth or knitted shopping bags. I was provided with a very sharp little knife and was carefully instructed how to slit open the bags so that I could get my fingers in.
And at last, when I had arrived at a sufficient degree of proficiency, I was taken out by my stepmother and we traveled over into New York's shopping district. I was sent into a store and soon came out with a pocketbook—my stepmother petted me and rewarded me.
ARRESTED FOR PICKING POCKETS
That was the beginning of my career as a professional criminal. I did not know it was wrong to steal; nobody ever taught me that. What I was told was wrong, and what I was punished for was when I came home with only one pocketbook instead of many.
All during my early childhood I did little but steal, and was never sent to school. I did not learn to read or write until I was twenty-five years old. If my stepmother brought me to a place where many persons congregated and I was slow in getting [Pg 13]pocketbooks and other articles, she would stick a pin into my arm to remind me that I must be more industrious. If a pin was not convenient she would step on my toes or pinch me when occasion made her think I was in need of some such stimulant.
One time we went over to Hoboken to a place where a merry-go-round was operating, and my stepmother sent me into the crowds to take pocketbooks and anything else I could put my hands on. A detective saw me take a woman's pocketbook and he carried me off to jail in his arms, my stepmother disappearing in the crowd. I remained in the Hoboken jail several days and was very happy there, for the policemen used to give me candy and let me play around the place, and did not beat me, as my stepmother used to do. A strange woman came and took me home, for my absence was felt because of the loss of the money I used to bring home every night. I was arrested very often when a small girl, but usually got out after a few days, as my stepmother knew how to bring influence to bear in my favor. One time I was sent to Randall's Island and used to play with the daughters of the assistant superintendent, whose name was Jones. The little girls learned from their father that I was a thief, and they used to sympathize with me and make things pleasant, knowing that it was not my fault, but the fault of my stepmother, who forced me to do wrong.
[Pg 14]
A THIEF FROM THE CRADLE
I did most of my stealing when a little girl by putting my hands into men's and women's pockets, but I also used to cut a hole in the bags carried by women—and then insert my fingers and take out the money or other things I found there, as I have already mentioned. Hardly a day passed when I did not steal a considerable sum of money, and many days I would take home more than a hundred dollars. Sometimes I would forget my work and be attracted to a store window and buy a doll for myself to pet. When I went home to my house and sat down on the steps to cuddle my doll my stepmother or my brother would come out and catch me up and give me a good many hard knocks for neglecting my duty—and the only duty I knew in those days was to steal, and never stop stealing.
More than once when I would dread going home I would have myself arrested by stealing so a policeman could see me do it. But it didn't help me much, for my stepmother never failed to get me out of jail within a few days after my arrest. It seemed so natural for me to steal that one time when I was arrested the policeman asked me what I was doing, and I said frankly, "Picking pockets." He asked me how many I got, and I said, "I don't know; I gave them all to my mama."
Every day I would wear a different kind of dress so as not to attract attention, in case anybody who saw me steal something the day before happened to[Pg 15] be around. My stepmother was wise enough to disguise me in this way, and it enabled me to keep working for a long time in the same place. My stepmother would take me into the department stores and wait outside for me. If I came out with enough money to satisfy her she would say nothing, but march me off home or to another store for more money, but if I came out with less than she expected, then I would get the pin pricks or pinches, and be made to feel that I had done something wrong in not working harder and stealing more.
I was, indeed, as one chief of police once said, "A thief from the cradle." Surrounding my childhood and youth there was not one wholesome or worthy influence. My friends and companions were always criminals, and it is not surprising that in my early womanhood I should have fallen in love with a bank burglar—Ned Lyons.
Following this romance came motherhood and an awakening within me of at least one worthy resolve—that, whatever had been my career, I certainly would see that my children were given the benefit of a tender mother love, which I had never had, and that my little ones should be surrounded with every pure and wholesome influence.
The first few years of my married life were divided between my little ones and the necessary exactions which my career imposed on me. Ned Lyons, my husband, was a member of the boldest and busiest group of bank robbers in the world. Here and there, all over the Eastern States, we went on[Pg 16] expeditions, forcing the vaults of the biggest and richest banks in the country. We had money in plenty, but we spent money foolishly. When we crept out of the vaults of the great Manhattan Bank in the early morning hours of the night of that famous robbery, we had nearly $3,000,000 in money, bonds and securities. And from the Northampton Bank we took $200,000, if I remember correctly.
But we had our troubles. My husband, Ned Lyons, was a desperate scoundrel, and was constantly in difficulties. My desire was to be with my little ones, but the gang of burglars with whom I was associated had learned to make me useful, and they insisted on my accompanying them on their expeditions. I will explain fully in following chapters just what my part was in many of their various exploits.
Ned Lyons was hungry for money—money, more money—and the desperate risks he took and his continual activity took me away from the children much of the time.
MY ESCAPE FROM SING SING
Always there was something going on, and I had very little peace. Early one winter Ned Lyons, in connection with Jimmy Hope, George Bliss, Ira Kingsland and others, blew open the safe of the Waterford, New York, Bank, and secured $150,000. Lyons and two others were caught, convicted and sent to Sing Sing Prison.
It was not long before I myself was captured, [Pg 17]convicted and also sent to Sing Sing for five years. But my husband managed to escape from the prison one December afternoon, and he lost no time in arranging for my escape from the women's section of the prison, which was a separate building just across the road from the main prison.
I was all ready, of course, and when my husband drove up in a sleigh, wonderfully well disguised, wearing a handsome fur coat, and carrying a woman's fur coat on his arm, I made my escape and joined him. I will tell the details of how my husband and I got out of Sing Sing in a subsequent article.
We both went into hiding and made our way to Canada, where Ned, being short of funds, broke into a pawnbroker's safe and helped himself to $20,000 in money and diamonds. With these funds in our pockets we returned to New York, and I kept in hiding as well as I could until my husband, with George Mason and others, robbed the bank at Wellsboro, Pennsylvania. Shortly afterward my husband was arrested while engaged on a job at Riverhead, L. I., and $13,000 worth of railroad bonds were taken from his pockets.
My husband could not let drink alone, and one day he had a street fight with the notorious Jimmy Haggerty, a burglar, who was afterward killed by "Reddy the Blacksmith" in a saloon fight on Houston Street and Broadway. During the fight between Haggerty and Ned Lyons Haggerty managed to bite off the greater portion of my husband's left[Pg 18] ear. This was a great misfortune to him as it served as a means of identification ever after. On another occasion, in a drunken dispute, Ned Lyons was shot at the Star and Garter saloon on Sixth Avenue by "Ham" Brock, a Boston character, who fired two shots, one striking Lyons in the jaw and the other in the body.
My husband soon had the bad luck to be caught in the act of breaking into a jewelry store in South Windham, Conn. As soon as he knew he was discovered, my husband tried to make his escape, and the police shot him as he ran, putting one bullet hole through his body and imbedding another ball in his back.
He was also caught in the burglary of a post-office at Palmer, Massachusetts, where they took the safe out of the store, carried it a short distance out of the village, broke it open, and took the valuables. As I have already said, the men had found me very helpful and insisted on my accompanying them on most of their expeditions. Always, if an arrest was made, I was relied upon to get them out of trouble. This took time, money, and resourcefulness, and kept me away from my little ones against my will.
During this time my children were approaching an age when it would no longer do to have them in our home. Our unexplained absences, our midnight departures, our hurried return in the early morning hours with masks, burglars' tools, and satchels full of stolen valuables would arouse curiosity in their little minds. One thing I had sworn to[Pg 19] do—to safeguard my little ones from such wretched influences as had surrounded my childhood. With this in view I sent my little boy and my little girl to schools where I felt sure of kind treatment and a religious atmosphere. And I paid handsomely to make sure that they would receive every care and consideration.
I SEE WHY CRIME DOES NOT PAY
I had scarcely gotten the children well placed in excellent schools in Canada when my husband was caught in one of his robberies. I busied myself with lawyers and spent all the money we had on hand, to no avail, and he was given a long prison sentence. Just at this unfortunate moment I was myself arrested in New York and given a six months' term of imprisonment.
On my account I did not care—but what would become of my children? My sources of income had been brought to a sudden stop. I had no money to send to pay my children's expenses. Then, for the first time, I felt the full horror of a criminal's life. I resolved for my children's sake to find a way to support them honestly. I realized the full truth that crime does not pay.
As I went on day after day serving my term in prison my thoughts were always about my little ones. The frightful recollections of my own childhood had developed in me an abnormal mother love. At last I resolved to write to the institutions where my boy and girl were located and explain that I[Pg 20] was unavoidably detained and out of funds, but promising to generously repay them for continuing to care for my children.
But I was too late. The newspapers had printed an account of my arrest, and when it reached the ears of the convent and college authorities where my boy and girl were stopping it filled them with indignation to think that a professional thief had the audacity to place her children under their care. So they immediately took steps to get rid of the innocent youngsters, in spite of the fact that I had paid far in advance for their board and tuition. The boy was shipped off in haste to the poorhouse, and my dear little girl was sent to a public orphanage, from which she was adopted by a man named Doyle, who was a customs inspector in Canada at the time.
When my six months were up my first thoughts were of my children, and I started off to visit them, thinking, of course, that they were still in the institutions where I had placed them. I called at the convent, and when they saw me coming one of the sisters locked the door in my face. I was astounded at this, but determined to know what it meant. As my repeated knocks did not open the door, I resorted to a more drastic method and began to kick on the panels quite vigorously. The inmates of the convent became alarmed at my persistence and feared that the door would be broken open, so they thought it best to open and let me in. I then demanded to[Pg 21] know the cause of their peculiar conduct, and one of them spoke up, saying:
"You are a thief, and we do not want you here."
"Oh, is that it?" I replied. "Well, where is my little girl? I want to see her."
"Your child has been placed in a respectable family, and you will not be permitted to see her," answered the sister.
Then my blood began to boil with fury, and I demanded to know why they had sent my girl away without letting me know, especially as I had given them considerable money, and they knew all her expenses would be paid. But she refused to give me any satisfaction. In desperation I sprang at her. She screamed and called for help. The mother superior then made her appearance and, dismayed at the sight of the determination I had displayed, she reluctantly gave me the address of the man who had my little girl.
I did not have a dollar with me at the time, but started off to walk to Mr. Doyle's house, which was some distance in the country. After a few hours' walking I met a man driving by in a buggy, and he stopped and offered me a ride. I, of course, accepted his invitation and got into the buggy. He asked me where I was going, and I said I was searching for a man named Doyle. He wanted my name and the nature of my business, but I said that information would be given to Mr. Doyle himself, and nobody else. He then said his name was Doyle, and asked me my name, and I told him I was Sophie[Pg 22] Lyons. As soon as he heard this he stopped the horse and ordered me out of the buggy, and shouted:
"You are a very bad woman. I have your little girl. I'm going to keep her. You are not a fit mother, and should be kept in jail, where you belong."
FOR MY CHILDREN'S SAKE
"We will not discuss that here," I replied. "What I want now is to see my little girl, and I wish you would drive me to your house."
"You shall never see your child, and you had better not come near my house," he cried as he whipped up his horse and was soon out of sight, leaving me alone on the road.
I continued my walk, however, and shortly afterward reached the Doyle house and stood outside the gate, while Doyle, with his two sons and two hired men and a dog, watched me from the piazza. I stood there a few moments, and then Doyle came out and asked me what I was doing there, and demanded that I leave the neighborhood at once. He said: "This is my home, and you must go away."
"It may be your home, Mr. Doyle," I answered, "but my child is in there, and I am going to wait here until I see her."
"I have adopted your girl," he said, "and she will be better off here than with you."
"It takes two to make a bargain," I said, "and you did not get my consent when you adopted the girl."
[Pg 23]
Realizing that it was useless to try to persuade me, he went inside and left me at the gate, where I stood waiting developments. After another long wait Doyle came out again and said:
"Are you still there? What do you want? You know very well it is better for the girl that she remain with us, and not with a thief like you. I will take good care of her, but you shall not see her."
"I know my rights," I replied, "and I will hire a lawyer and compel the convent authorities to show me their books and explain what they have done with the thousands of dollars I left with them to care for my girl. I will make it hot for you and for them before I finish."
This threat must have frightened him a little, for he then asked me if I had had anything to eat that day, and I told him I had not. Then he invited me into the house to get some food, and said he would hitch up the buggy and drive me back to town. I said:
A MOTHER'S LOVE WINS AT LAST
"No, you will not drive me back to town. I will not go back without my girl."
"Now, be reasonable, Mrs. Lyons," he said. "Your little girl is happy here, and she does not like you because you are a bad woman."
"Well," I answered, "if she does not like her mother then you have made her feel that way; you have taught her to dislike me."
[Pg 24]
After a little more parleying he went into the house and sent out my little girl to talk to me.
"My darling," I said, "don't you want to kiss your own mother?"
"No," she said; "I do not like you, because you are a thief. You are not my mother at all."
My eyes filled with tears at this, and with sobs in my voice I asked her if she did not remember the little prayers I had taught her and the many happy hours we had spent together. The little dear said:
"Yes, I remember the prayers, but I do not want to see you. You are a thief! Go away, please!"
Those words cut me to the heart—from my own precious daughter. And again I was made to realize that crime does not pay!
I lost no time in setting matters in motion which very soon brought back to my arms my daughter. Meanwhile I hastened to the academy where my little boy had been left and demanded to see him. When my boy was brought out to me he was in a disgraceful condition, he seemed to have been utterly neglected, his clothing was ragged and his face as dirty as a chimney sweep's. I was shocked at this and demanded an explanation from the professor who had charge of the institution. He turned on me angrily, and said:
"You have an amazing assurance to place your good-for-nothing brat among honest children. How dare you give us an assumed name and impose on us in this manner? Get your brat out of here at once, for if honest parents knew your character[Pg 25] they would take their children out of the school without delay."
"A false name, is it?" I said to the proud professor. "What name did you give when you were caught in a disreputable house?"
This remark startled him. He changed his manner at once and implored me to speak lower and not let anybody know what I said. I had recognized this professor as a man who had visited Detroit a year or so before and had been caught in a disreputable resort by the police on one of their raids. The professor, of course, did not imagine that anybody in Detroit had known him, and so he thought it perfectly safe to assume the r?le of superior virtue. He apologized for his neglect of my child and begged me to forget the abuse he had heaped upon me. I congratulated myself that the child had not heard his remarks to me, and I departed with my boy.
But my joy over the fact that my little one had not had his mother's wickedness revealed to him was of short duration. I had brought the child to Detroit, where I had begun preparations to make a permanent home, honestly, I hoped. Several persons there owed me money, and among them a barber I had befriended. I tried persistently to get from him what he owed me, but without success.
When I returned home after a little trip I was compelled to make to New York, my boy came up to me, crying, and said:
[Pg 26]
"Mamma, I don't want to live around here any more."
I wondered what could have caused the poor boy to speak that way, so I patted him on the back and said:
"Why, what is the matter, dearie? Don't you like this street any more?"
"Mamma," he sobbed, "I heard something about you which makes me feel awful bad, but I know it isn't true, is it, mamma?"
"Tell me, child, what is it?"
"Well," he answered, "Mr. Wilson, the barber, asked me the day after you left to go downtown on a trip with him, and I went along. He took me into a large building which I heard was the police station. He asked a man to let him see some pictures, and when he got the pictures he showed me one of them which he said was you; and he said you were a thief and the police had to keep your picture so they could find you when you stole things," and then the boy began to sob as if his poor heart would break.
The man had taken my boy down to the police station and had shown him my picture in the rogues' gallery. And again the realization was forced in on me by the reproachful gaze of my boy that crime does not pay.
For a time I managed to get along fairly well and was able by honest efforts to have a little home and to have my children with me. But my old career came up to haunt me and many refused to[Pg 27] have business dealings with me when they were informed of my earlier life. At last I was at the end of my resources—should I lose my little home and my children, or should I go back once more, just once more to my old life?
The struggle between my two impulses was finally settled by a visit from two of my old acquaintances of the underworld—Tom Bigelow and Johnny Meaney. They came to ask my help in a promising job which they felt sure would be a success if they could enlist my services—there would be at least $50,000 for me, they said.
"Big Tom" Bigelow was an old-time professional bank burglar, who had learned his business under such leaders as Jimmy Hope and Langdon W. Moore—men who had never found any bank or any vault too much for their skill. Little Johnny Meaney was one of the cleverest "bank sneaks" that ever lived. He would perform the most amazing feats in getting behind bank counters and walking off with large bundles of money. He was so quick and noiseless in his work that he would never have been arrested but for his fondness for women and drink. When under the influence of champagne he would confide in some strange woman he had met only a few days before, and in order to get the reward some of the women would tell the police where to find Johnny.
He had granulated eyelids, and his inflamed eyes were so conspicuous that he could always be recognized easily. He was married and had several [Pg 28]children. His wife never knew the kind of work he did. He had a quarrelsome temper, and always got into some dispute with every woman he met, and usually left them feeling unfavorably disposed toward him. Many of the girls who betrayed him did so more through resentment than anything else. I mention these things to show how personal peculiarities and temperament are often serious menaces to criminals.
Meaney's specialty was day work. He would walk into a bank during business hours and sneak behind the counter and pick up everything he could lay his hands on. He never did any night work, and knew nothing about safe blowing. As a rule, a man who makes a specialty of night work, with dark lantern, mask, and jimmy, will not attempt any sneak work, and the first-class sneak will not undertake night work. The night robber is guided by the moon, and oftentimes a job will be called off because the cracksmen think the moon is not right for the work. The darker the night the better. But the bank sneak prefers daylight of the brightest kind. He often works right under the eyes of a room full of clerks, and the bigger the crowd in the streets the easier for him to make his escape and lose himself among them.
HOW I PLANNED A BANK ROBBERY
It was a "bank sneak" job they had in mind. The bank was in a small New Jersey city, near enough to New York so that we could lose ourselves[Pg 29] in our old haunts on the East Side before the detectives should get hot on our trail.
I went to the town in advance of the other members of the party and rented a small cottage, posing as a widow who planned to settle down there and live on the income of her husband's insurance money.
Soon after settling in my new quarters, I visited the bank and opened a small account. I found the cashier a man who fitted in perfectly with our dishonest designs. He must have been nearly seventy years old and he could not hear or see so well as he should for the security of the funds in his charge.
I saw right away that he was very susceptible to pretty women and was quite willing to drop his work at any time for a half hour's chat with such a comely widow as I looked to be. My task was to look the ground over, find out where the cash was kept, and how and when access to it could best be secured. It was the simplest thing in the world to get these facts after I had worked my way into the cashier's good graces.
I quickly saw that the most favorable time for the robbery was between the hours of 12 and 1 o'clock, when the other two men in the bank went to their homes for lunch, leaving the institution in the charge of the old cashier. At that time the door of the vault was open, and the bundles of currency and securities lay there in full view, ready for us to take away.
It would be an easy matter for Johnny Meaney,[Pg 30] who was a small, wiry fellow, light and quiet on his feet as a cat, to slip in through a side entrance while I held the cashier's attention with one of my harmless flirtations and gain access to the vault through the door in the wire cage, which was almost invariably left unlocked. Even if it should be locked on the day we set for the robbery, it would be a simple matter for Johnny to get inside with the aid of one of his skeleton keys.
Accordingly I sent word to my two comrades that the coast was clear and to come on at once. They arrived in due time and, after looking the ground over, confirmed my own judgment that the robbery was an easy one and could be carried out with little risk according to the plan I had made.
The following Tuesday was the day set, because on that day, as I had found out, the bank generally had a large amount of cash on hand. The time fixed was between 12 and 12:30 o'clock, when the assistant cashier, the bookkeeper, and practically all the rest of the town were at their noonday meal.
Everything was definitely settled unless my visit to the bank on Monday should reveal some unlooked-for hitch.
The cashier had become thoroughly accustomed to the "pretty widow's" habit of dropping in on him every day at the noon hour, and he was exceedingly glad to see me when I entered as usual, Monday, and began a series of questions about some fictitious investments of mine in the West. Alas! how well I remember how that vain old man [Pg 31]enjoyed his innocent flirtation, little suspecting that the object of his regard was there only to make sure that nothing had happened to disarrange the plans for to-morrow's robbery.
WHAT DELAYED OUR PLANS
Luckily for me the bookkeeper was just starting for lunch when I took my accustomed place outside the cashier's window. I had seen the door through which he had to pass to get from inside the wire cage to the outer part of the bank opened and shut a hundred times; and I had always noted with satisfaction not only that it was seldom locked but also that its hinges never gave even the slightest squeak.
But at this moment a most unexpected thing happened.
As the bookkeeper turned the knob of the wire-screen door and opened it a most unearthly scream came from the iron hinges.
The clerk passed on, and the door lazily swung back behind him with another piercing screech that filled me with dismay.
No watch-dog could have sounded a more certain alarm than those hinges. My heart sank as I realized how impossible it would be for Johnny Meaney to pass in and out of that creaking door without detection. Bringing my conversation to a hurried close, I went to tell my comrades how our hopes had been dashed by the unexpected development of a squeak in those bothersome hinges.
[Pg 32]
The difficulty seemed insurmountable until Johnny Meaney, always a quick-witted, resourceful thief, showed us a way out. His suggestion was that the robbery be postponed for a week and that in the meantime we call in the aid of another well-known bank sneak named Bill Taylor, to fix those refractory hinges.
This seemed the only possible solution of the problem, as that squeaking had to be stopped, and it was not safe for either of my companions to attempt it. Accordingly, Meaney went back to New York to make the necessary arrangements, and a few days later Taylor appeared on the scene as the suave, well dressed representative of the company which had built the vault for this bank.
On presentation of his neatly engraved card, Taylor was readily given permission to inspect the vault. During the afternoon he spent in the bank he called attention to the squeaky hinges and suggested that he apply to them some very excellent machine oil he had with him. This he did and the door moved as noiselessly as before.
And incidentally, while Taylor was masquerading as the traveling agent of the safe company and had the freedom of the bank that afternoon he took occasion to fit a key to the wire door. Not that Johnny Meaney could not attend to this himself in case he found the door locked, but Taylor thought he might as well make everything as smooth as possible for Meaney.
Everything was now in shape, and we decided to[Pg 33] rob the bank next day. Just at noon, as the big clock on the Municipal Building was striking 12, I came up the steps of the bank and greeted the old cashier with my customary smile. The bookkeeper and the four other clerks were passing out of the side door to their lunch. Suddenly I spilled out of my hand right in front of the cashier a handful of large coins in such a way that two silver dollars rolled past him and dropped on the floor inside the wire cage. As he laboriously stooped to pick them up I strained my neck and eyes to examine quickly everything inside the cage to make sure that all the bank clerks had gone out—that nobody remained behind the wire railing except the aged cashier.
Moving over as far as possible to one side of the cashier's window, I drew the old cashier's attention to a photograph of a little child in a locket. This brought the back of his head toward the side door of the bank. As he leaned his face down to see it more closely I caught a glimpse out of the corner of my eye of the shadow-like form of Johnny Meaney.
Noiselessly he had come in through the side door. Like a cat he crept to the wire door. With my ears strained for the faintest alarm from those treacherous hinges, I listened as I kept up a rapid fire conversation to hold the attention of the aged cashier.
The wire door swung open noiselessly; Meaney was crouching low; I had lost my view of him as he crept toward the big open door of the bank vault.
On the sidewalk, pacing slowly up and down in[Pg 34] front of the side door, was "Big Tom" Bigelow. He was the "outside man" of the job and, although I could not see him, I knew he was on the alert to intercept anybody who might happen in. With some excuse he must stop any clerk who tried to enter through the side door—I myself must intercept any clerk who might chance to return from lunch and enter by the front entrance.
WE GET OUR PLUNDER
With increasing vivaciousness, I rattled along entertaining the cashier. In a few moments I saw the wire door gently open as if by a spirit hand. Creeping low along the floor, a shadow crossed the little corridor to the outside door; noiselessly it opened and closed—the work was done!
And thus this job, which had taken us weeks to plan, was done in less than five minutes from the time I entered the bank until Meaney stole out of a back door with his satchel full of bank notes and securities. Then the three of us quickly made our way by separate routes to New York.
The loss was not discovered until it came time to close the vault for the day, and we thus had nearly three hours' start of the police. A large reward was offered and numerous detectives engaged, but no one was ever arrested for this crime. I am just vain enough to think that the old cashier was probably very reluctant to believe his pretty widow had a share in the robbery, in spite of her[Pg 35] mysterious disappearance on the very day it occurred.
Our plunder amounted to $150,000, of which $20,000 was cash and the rest good negotiable bonds. The money was divided and I undertook the marketing of the securities, which were finally disposed of through various channels for $78,000, or about 60 per cent. of their value.
Those squeaky door hinges cost Meaney, Bigelow, and myself about $6,000 apiece, for through the addition of Taylor to our party we had to divide the spoils among four persons instead of three. After paying my expenses, my share of these ill-gotten gains amounted to about $20,000. This I thought ample to provide for the wants of my children until I could establish myself in some honorable business, and I returned to Detroit fully determined never again to risk, as I had, a long prison term.
But my good resolutions were short lived. Two weeks later word came that my husband was in jail for complicity in an attempted bank robbery which had been nipped in the bud and urgently needed my assistance. It took several thousand dollars of the money for which I had paid so dear to secure his liberty, and the remainder soon melted away before the numerous needs of my little brood and my husband's unfortunate gambling propensities.
Here I was again just where I was before the robbery of that New Jersey bank. My money was gone, my old reputation still pursued me, nobody[Pg 36] would trust me; "once a thief, always a thief," they said; nobody believed in my sincere desire to abandon my early career and lead an honest life.
I did not feel vindictive at the sneers at my protestations of a desire to earn an honest living—I could not blame anybody for doubting my sincerity. But my home and my little ones, dearer to me than life, what was to become of them? Was there no way to escape from my wretched career? If ever a woman and a mother realized that crime does not pay, I was made to learn that truth.
It is a long and difficult road—the narrow path that leads from crime to honest living. I have traveled it, thank heaven! but it was hard, it was slow—and many times I strayed from the path.
Some of my companions of the old days traveled that road with me. A few, a very few, succeeded as I did at last. Many gave it up, turned back. A thousand episodes of my career and of their misguided lives all illuminate the one great inevitable fact that crime does not pay!