STARTLING SURPRISES THAT CONFRONT CRIMINALS—HOW UNEXPECTED HAPPENINGS SUDDENLY DEVELOP AND UPSET CAREFULLY LAID PLANS AND CAUSE THE BURGLARS ARREST OR PREVENT HIS GETTING EXPECTED PLUNDER
Only one who has been, as I have, for years behind the scenes at all sorts of crimes can appreciate how often every criminal is brought face to face with the most startling surprises.
No matter how clever a robber is he can never tell when arrest, serious injury, or death will bring his dishonest career to a sudden end. And, even if he escapes these fatal disasters, there are always a thousand and one chances which may develop at any moment to spoil his carefully laid plans and prevent his getting his plunder. Most of these are things which it is absolutely impossible to foresee and guard against. This is why only a small percentage of the crimes which are attempted ever succeed and why their success hangs trembling in the balance until the very last minute.
The brains we criminals expended in saving some robbery from failure or in escaping the consequences of our deeds would have won us lasting success and happiness in any honorable pursuit—used, as they were, for crime, they brought us in the end only [Pg 226]disgrace and remorse. That is the lesson which these experiences have taught me and which I hope every reader of this page will learn.
If there was ever a thief who planned his crimes with greater attention to the smallest details than Harry Raymond, the man who stole the famous Gainsborough, I never knew him.
But even Raymond's painstaking care was not proof against all the startling surprises which confronted him and his plans were often completely ruined by one of these unexpected happenings.
Raymond was always a restless man—never content to remain long in one place. When stories of the rich gold and diamond mines in South Africa reached his ears he began to cast longing eyes in that direction. Where there was so much treasure he thought there surely ought to be an opportunity to get his hands on a share of it.
He tried to induce Mark Shinburn to go with him, but Shinburn had his eye on several big robberies nearer home, and so Raymond set out alone. On the way he met Charley King, a noted English thief, and the two joined forces.
Raymond hadn't been in South Africa twenty-four hours before he learned that a steamer left Cape Town for England every week with a heavy shipment of gold and diamonds on board. His next step was to find out just how this treasure was brought down from the mines.
As he soon learned, it came by stage each week, the day before the steamer sailed. The bags of gold[Pg 227] dust and uncut diamonds were locked in a strong box which was carried under the driver's seat. There was only one other man on the coach besides the driver—a big, powerful Boer, who carried a brace of revolvers and a repeating rifle and had the reputation of being a dead shot.
There was just one difficulty in the way—Raymond really needed a third man to assist King and him. Among all the criminals in Cape Town whom he knew there was none he could trust, and so he at last decided to ask a wholly inexperienced man to join the party. The man he selected was an American sea captain who had been obliged to flee from his native land after setting fire to his ship for the insurance. He was desperately in need of money and was, therefore, only too glad of the opportunity to share in the fortune Raymond proposed to steal.
Raymond, with his customary caution, studied the proposition from every angle. At last he was convinced that he had provided for every contingency which could possibly arise to prevent his robbery of the coach.
This was his plan—to stretch a rope across some lonely spot in the road and trip the horses. Before the driver and the guard could recover from their astonishment and extricate themselves from the overturned coach, Raymond and his companions would leap from their ambush and overpower them.
Half way up a long hill, down which the coach [Pg 228]would come, the three men concealed themselves—Raymond and the captain on one side of the road, King on the other.
Around a tree on either side of the road they fastened the rope with a slip noose, letting its length lie loose on the ground directly in the path of the coach. Carefully loading their revolvers they settled down to wait for its approach.
At last their ears caught the rumble of its wheels and presently the four horses which drew the heavy vehicle and its precious contents appeared above the crest of the hill. They were making good time on the last lap of their long journey from the mines.
On they came, until the hoofs of the leaders were within a foot of the rope. Raymond gave a shrill whistle and his companions stretched the rope tight across the road at a distance of about two feet above the ground.
As the forward horses struck the barrier they fell in a heap and the ones behind came tumbling on top of them. The wagon pole snapped like a pipe stem.
The heavy coach stopped short, reeled uncertainly for a second, then keeled over on its side, hurling both the driver and the guard several feet away.
The three robbers sprang from their hiding place and covered the prostrate men with their revolvers.
As they did so one of the fallen horses scrambled to his feet, broke the remnants of the harness that clung to him and dashed down the hill, furious with pain and fear.
Not one of the robbers paid any heed to this [Pg 229]incident—for who would have suspected that a frightened stage horse could interfere with their carefully laid plans?
The driver was easily disposed of, but the guard showed fight and it required the combined efforts of the three men to bind and gag him so that he could do no harm.
They were just knotting a piece of rope around his struggling legs when a shot rang out and a rifle bullet whizzed by their heads—followed by another and another.
An instant before the moon had broken through the clouds. By its light they saw six sturdy Boer farmers advancing up the hill, firing their repeating rifles as they came.
Resistance was useless—they were outnumbered two to one and they had all been in South Africa long enough to have a wholesome respect for a Boer's marksmanship.
Covering their retreat with a few shots from their revolvers, they took to their heels. In the rain of bullets which was falling around them it was suicide to think of trying to take the heavy strong box with them, and they had to leave it there in the coach with all its treasure untouched.
Raymond was completely mystified. He and his companions had not fired a shot in their struggle with the men on the coach. How had those Boer farmers, who lived in a house at the foot of the hill nearly half a mile away, happened to be aroused just in time to spoil the robbery?
[Pg 230]
The account the newspapers gave of the robbery cleared up the mystery. It seemed that the frightened horse which had dashed down the hill had plunged through the lattice gate in the front of the Boer's house.
The crash of the woodwork and the wounded animal's cries of pain as he struggled to free himself had awakened the farmers. As they rushed out half dressed to see what the trouble was the moon shone out and revealed to them the overturned coach on the hillside above and the robbers struggling with the guard and driver.
You see what a surprising thing it all was and how impossible it was for Raymond to have foreseen that anything like this would happen. But these two little incidents—the runaway horse and the moon's sudden appearance—were all that was needed to snatch away $250,000 in gold and diamonds just as Raymond thought he had it safely in his hands.
Even more surprising was what happened when Tom Smith and I, with Dan Nugent and George Mason, were trying to rob a little bank down in Virginia.
The fact that the cashier and his family lived on the floor above this bank made it a rather ticklish undertaking.
There was, however, no vault to enter, and the safe was such a ramshackle affair that the men felt sure they could open it without the use of a charge of powder. So we decided to make the attempt.
As Tom Smith had sprained his wrist in escaping[Pg 231] from a Pennsylvania sheriff a few nights before he was to remain on guard outside the bank, while I entered with Dan and George and rendered what assistance I could in opening the safe. This was the first time I had ever been on the "inside" of a bank burglary and I was quite puffed up with my own importance.
Dan opened one of the bank windows with his jimmy and held his hands for me to step on as I drew myself up over the high sill. Then he handed the tools to me and he and George climbed up.
The bank in which we found ourselves was one ............