Democratic Sentinel, Volume 19, Number 18, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 May 1895 — A Handy Man’s Queer Jobs. [ARTICLE]

A Handy Man’s Queer Jobs.

We handy men who can do carpentering, painting and all manner of work are often asked to take suspicious and unpleasant jobs, said a handy man. I believe that shady people think wo live from hand to mouth, and are ready for any queer job. Not long since a very gentlemanly sort of man called on me with drawings and asked me to make a sort of telescopic ladder, which he said was for a fire-escape. I happened to mention the matter to an expert t,hief-catcher, a detective of Bow street, and sure enough, my customer was a burglar and ex-conviet. He was arrested on another charge. As for the tradesmen who wanted to steal from the gas companies, they have often offered me jobs in a careful sort of way. I have made several secret panels in offices; and I made one not a year ago for an employer of labor who can now both hear all the words and see all the actions of a dozen clerks. One of the last jobs I had was to knock a door out from one house into another, and then to cover over with very dark' paper the door on both sides so that the pattern exactly fitted. I did not ask questions—l had no grounds for doing so—but I am pretty certain that one of the houses was a gambling place, and that some article of furniture would be placed against the door on each side. You see, we get a lot of our business by mixing about at public

bouses, and so on—and that is why we meet strange customers.