Evening Republican, Volume 19, Number 181, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 August 1915 — The Strange Adventures of Christopher Poe [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

The Strange Adventures of Christopher Poe

Jforfa* of Strange Cases Solved in Secret by a Banker-Detective

By ROBERT CARLTON BROWN

(Copyright, 1915, by W. G. Chapman.)

IN SIMMY’S CELLAR

John Beggs, for fifteen years watchman at the big Merchants’ National of Boston, locked the massive door to the bank behind the last clerk, at about five o’clock on Tuesday afternoon. He 'glanced idly at the two old women who had begun scrubbing at the middle of the big banking room, half an hour before, and called them to hurry, as they must leave before five-fifteen, at which minute Beggs had to signal daily to the central station of the Burglar Insurance company, thus informing them that the bank was closed for the night and it was time to set the automatic electric alarm, protecting the door, windows and safe.

As the clock struck five, he made his customary round of the big cage-divid-ed room. Having finished, he leaned lazily against a paying teller’s window in the corridor, for he bad missed his usual amount of sleep that day. Then his elbow slipped oft the support, he said something uncomplimentary concerning the ledge, jammed his elbow back into place, and yawned again. His mouth never closed. At that instant a gag was thrust between his weary jaws from behind, a hand clutched his throat, he grew giddy and reeled. A moment later, when his eyes popped open, he found himself flat on the floor, staring into the deadwhite, ghoulish face of a man with close-cropped light hair and hungry, watery, hollow eyes, the pupils greatly dilated. The man was dexterously trussing him up with all the skill of a champion English rope-wrestler. Its had happened in half a minute; Beggs had gone down without a cry. Out of the tail of his eye he suddenly saw the scrub-w.oman who had been working near him stagger to her feet, a soapy hand clutching at her heart, and her eyes fixed in horror. She had no more than risen, when the dead-faced man whirled and caught her a staggering blow full in the face, which sent her spinning over her pail of water; she struck with a clap on her head, hitting a marble corner. Vith a sudden, frightened start the man rushed to the rear of the bank, where Beggs knew the other scrub-woman was working. He had passed out of Begg’s scope, for the watchman had been placed face down, against the wall.

A shrill feminine shriek came from the rear; a stool was kicked over. There was the splash of water and the hollow plop of a pail, as though the second scrub-woman had thrown /the thihg nearest at hand at her assailant. Then came a blow, a scream, a moan, and all was silent in the big Merchants’ National of Boston. John Beggs stared at the floor and his legs, which were all he could see, except the motionless body of the old woman near him. And while he was wondering, the dead-faced man suddenly appeared behind him in thickstockinged feet and forced a moist sponge beneath Begg’s attenuated nose.

In two minutes’ time, John Beggs was dreaming that he lay in a large bed of beautiful roses. Then somebody suddenly turned Niagara loose upon him, and stuck a red-hot iron down his sizzling throat.

Then he opened* his eyes for the first time, muttered, “Remember, she is still your mother,” and looked into the wondering blue eyes of a policeman, who was forcing brandy down his throat, and mopping his brow with the scrub-woman’s cloth. The cashier of the bank, routed from bed, came hurrying in, dismissed the group of watchmen, detectives, and stragglers, who had wandered in at the open door of the bank, and asked abruptly for. the policeman’s tale, while John Beggs was trying to get his. swollen tongue back to speaking size.

"I was walkin’ the beat at threethirty this mornin’,” replied the officer who had revived Beggs. “When I come in front of the bank, I couldn t believe my eyes. The door was open, an’ there was a black body lyin’ through it, holdin' it open—there was a hole in the head—it was dead—it’s down there by the stairs now, sir. I came in, and found the watchman chloroformed, and I was afraid he was dead too." “And who looked at the safe?” cried Cribben, the cashier, turning to a represenative of the Burglar Insurance company, who had taken charge of affairs before his arrival. “I did. It’s gutted," was the significant reply. “We got an alarm automatically at the main office about three-fifteen; the signal came from opening the door, I suppose. Then I 'phoned you, and came over here at once, but the policeman was already working over the watchman.” There was considerable consternation and confusion, during which the cashier found his safe utterly empty, and secured John Begg’s account of all that had happened, to his knowledge. „ _ “You say both scrub-women were killed queried Cribben sharply. "Where’s the other body?” “There weren’t no other body!” put in the policeman, evidently astounded by Begg’s account of the crime.

The cashier frowned, then looked up with an illuminating flash. .“Can’t you see?” he cried. “Whoever did it tried to get away with both the murdered bodies, to place suspicion on the scrub-women. He got out with one, and was evidently scared oft while dragging the other over the sill.” '

"But liow could the man himself have got in?” cried John Beggs. The cashier’s ardor abated. He made no reply, but went again to the safe, set in the wall at the .rear of the room in a prominent position. His inspection produced the astonishing facts that the outer door had been drilled through, evidently by hand, in just the spot where the tumblers could be thrown; but the metal of the inner door, by far the more important of the two, had been melted by a powerful electric current. It was a curious combination, wholly unprecedented. Why the same process had not been used on both doors was a mystery. Why the automatic signal had not worked when the safe was broken, was another; for there was a metallic casing in the outer door which could not have been broken through after five-fifteen, when the burglar alarm was mechanically set by the Burglar Insurance company.

“That outer door is twelve inches thick,’’ declared the insurance man. “Nothing but a diamond drill could touch that chrome steel. I doubt if a man could drill through it in ten days. The whole thing seems impossible. The minute the drill touched the electric sheathing the signal would have been sounded at our office. It registered all right, when the front door was opened at three-fifteen. The signal hasn’t been meddled with, either.’’ “Well, I give it up,’’ groaned the cashier.

“It must be one man’s work. He couldn’t have let any confederates in,” declared the other. “The alarm would have been given at our office on the opening of a window or door, and there’s been no tampering with the circuit.’’ • “Maybe the second scrub-woman was a confederate!” suggested Cribben suddenly. “She can’t be found. Beggs didn’t see her killed. She must have helped the thief. He couldn’t have done all this without an accomplice.” “But, sir,” exclaimed John Beggs, who was listening to the theory, “that woman’s scrubbed here for two years. She’s all right. I’m sure she was killed. I heard her scream and moan. I know her voice.”

Again the nervous cashier was forced to give up his clue. “Well, what’s to be done?" he asked hopelessly. “We’d better wire the Bankers’ Protective association,” suggested the insurance man. “You’re-members, and Mitchell, the president, has a great way of getting to the bottom of these things. I’ve sent the news out through our regular channels, our detectives, and the papers.” "Then telegraph Mitchell. We’ll leave things just as they are.” “There isn’t much to leave, but the safe itself,” answered the other. “The devil couldn’t have done a neater job. Not a clue. Not a thing!” At two o’clock that afternoon a short-waisted man, of medium height and athletic build, dressed in a simple Oxford suit, stepped into the Merchants’ National, and was shown in to the despairing cashier. “My name is Hardy; Mr. Mitchell has asked me to come down and see what I can do,” he said simply, taking off his hat and running a thin hand through his brown brush of upstanding hair, a patch of white tufting out near the middle. Cribben glanced grumpily at the newcomer’s eyes; they were violet, and he seemed more like a dapper society butterfly than a world-hardened man sent out on .criminal investigation. The cashier went into details in a desultory manner. It was evident he had little hope. Having told Hardy all that had been learned, he summed up in a weary, disheartened tone: “You see, it’s something extraordinary. A crime greater than the Manhattan robbery, in ’7B; greater than the Kensington job."

Christopher Poe, otherwise “Mr. Hardy,” leaned back, thoughtfully knitting his slender fingers together, and two lines deepened into a cynical set, one at each side of his mouth, drawing the ends of the sensitive nose to the corners of his twitching lips. He did not speak for a full minute; then looked up with those intense violet eyes that puzzled all mankind, and remarked:

“You say the man your watchman saw had a dead-white face?" Cribben looked up at him with a mixture of doubt and disappointment.

“What possible difference can that make? He doesn't answer the description of any known criminal." -• Poe caught the irritation in his tone, and the lines deepened around his mouth. He answered in a musing tone, almost as though talking to himself:

1 thought maybe he took burnese or the white stuff. If that’s the case, we may hear some hoptalk somewhere. Those gervers often let something slip in brassing up the bundle of swag.” “What kind of a lingo is that?” cried the cashier irascibly. “Are you an insane man or a detective?” Poe straightened up, threw out his square chest, and took a deep respiration; his mouth, which had suddenly tightened, relaxed, and the wrinkles in his cheeks grew deeper, as he re plied in a pleasant tone: “Neither. You’ll pardon me for talking shop. The jargon is so fascinating, you know. It’s comfort to the mouth, like those exquisite preserved rose-ieaves one gets in Turkey.” Cribben’s eyes widened, as though he had suddenly encountered a forged check. He scanned Poe with an inclusive frown, and then sank back in his chair, his manner more hopeless than before;, for time had graved the one word “Business” on his brow; trifling naturalness had been stamped out of his character by the little punch with which he had canceled checks for years. “I merely borrowed from the thief s own language,” Poe went on, “to infer that, as the man had a fixed pale face and watery eyes he might be an opium fiend, and possibly could be found in some New York den, where the ‘bundle,' or swag, is often divided, and that he might let out something while under the Influence of the drug.” “Oh, I see; jumping at conclusions!” Cribben seemed relieved by the explanation. “But let’s stick to facts. The safe’s back there, and over two million dollars is somewhere else. I’d like to have them connected.” “By all means; let’s look at it,” replied Poe, following the cashier to the temporary barricade about the safe. Poe crouched down and swung the big outer door open, so that the small drilled hole could be seen in a better light. "Clever!” he exclaimed to the cashier. “The fellow studied this lock a long time. He’s made the hole in

the single vulnerable spot, and lined up the tumblers so they dropped when he punched through. Think of boring a hole fbr a year,!” He looked up and held out on his palm a perfectly rounded bit of wood, the size of a pencil, two inches long, and enameled a glistening black at one end. “What’s that thing?” cried Cribben. “Where’d you get it? What do you mean by working at the hole for over a year?” He bent closer, and fingered the round, smooth piece blankly. "You can see here, at the mouth of the hole,” answered Poe, indicating with his slim finger. “It’s more than a year old, I should say, from the number of rings which show where he left off drilling each time. This stick fits exactly in the hole. I found it on the floor here. Evidently overlooked. You notice the end is enameled?” “Yes. But what’s the connection?” gasped the other. j “Why, it’s evident! The fellow had access to the safe in some manner for over a year, and managed, bit,by bit, to drill through the steel. At first he probably puttied and painted over the small hole. Then, as it became deeper, he made this stick to’plug it with, and enameled the end to match the safe door, the spot being so small as to escape notice. He did his stint of work every so often, and replaced that plug each time to conceal all traces. Then, when he calculated to within an eighth of an inch of the spot where he could get the tumblers into alignment, he simply waited for a chance, and turned the trick.” “But no one could do this. John Beggs is the only man ever left alone with the safe; he couldn’t play a part. I told you he is above suspicion." ‘Tm quite sure of it. I just had a look at him. He hasn’t enough brains," was the reply, as Poe turned to an mramtnattnn of the inner door. •

• "Well, the electrical work was neatly done,” he remarked. “The burglar cleaned up after himself like an old maid, leaving no clues.” The electric signal service was next discussed. “The thief himself must have sent in the signal at exactly the minute the bank door was usually closed,” said Poe, “for Beggs was bound and gagged at five-five. As the electric signal sheet composed the last eighth of an inch through which he drilled, it seems quite plausible that the alarm did not work because he drilled through that plate before five-fifteen, before the alarm was set. All of which proves that some one connected with the bank did the work. Could a clerk have secreted himself anywhere?”

“No, sir. I can take my oath on that”, answered John Beggs, who had been summoned. “Besides, I never saws the thief’s face before. I made my round at five; nobody here then.” Poe requested two clerks to take the positions of the scrub-women, and had Beggs stand on the spot where he had been attacked. After that Poe walked back and forth, twisting his lips with tense fingers, and glancing up sharply from beneath his heavy brown brows, sensing the situation. Finally, giving a satisfied little grunt, he asked to have Beggs tied as he had been when found. The policeman who liberated Beggs was at hand, and proceeded to imitate the manner of tying. Poe picked up an end of the rope idly, and made a casual examination; then he drew out his knife and snipped off a bit of it, which he placed carefully in his vest-pocket, as ne turned to view the officer’s clumsy work at duplicating the thief’s ropetying method. “It was a funny way he was tied up,” said the policeman, stopping with a puzzled frown. “This rope ran in a loop over Begg’s neck, came down between his legs, and tied in the back. There seemed to be some system to it”

“Like this, was it?” asked Poe, catching up the rope, throwing a loop

of it over the trembling watchman’s neck, drawing the ends up between his legs, and tying them behind in a series of peculiar knots. The officer’s eyes went wide with surprise. “That’s it, exactly!” he exclaimed. “I never saw anything like it before. I noticed it particular.” Poe volunteered no explanation to the awed group around him; but he did smile to himself as he glimpsed the cashier’s interest. . He took the broken bucket used by the woman whose body had disappeared, wrapped it into a neat parcel, turned to the cashier, and extended his hand in good-by. “But you couldn’t have formed any theory in such short time,” exclaimed Cribben. "Why, you haven’t any clue outside of the scrub-wo man’s., disappearance. She was probably killed and carried away, to shift suspicion.” "Probably,” answered Poe, the strange wrinkles flickering for a moment in his cheeks. "But I’m taking a bit of that rope with me, and the pieces of that bucket. I may be able to gather something from them.” Without further comment, he bowed and walked out. On his way to the South station he sent the following wire in cipher to Burns, the millionaire banker, wh° shared with Mitchell and Poe their secret works in the interests of justice: "Canvass opium dives catering to foreign criminals. Watch for tall, white-faced Englishman with closecropped hair, tenor, decided stoop. Send Volume H and suit of slops by my man to Grand Central at 11:12. I’ll run across you.” Chrostopher Poe took an afternobn train for New York, secured an enclosed section, locked the door, carefully untied the bundle containing the broken bucket, and examined it, first roughly and then minutely. At a quarter past 11 the train

glided into New Tork and Poe slipped along the platform to meet his man, receiving from him a shabby suit of clothing, and a thin little book lettered “H.” Dismissing the man, he crossed quickly to a hotel, secured a room in a moment’s time, and changed to the disguise. Very soon he had finished transforming himself into an ordinary-look-ing tough down on his luck, and had dropped into a chair, skimming through the book. Suddenly he stopped at' one entry and read it through carefully. “Electrician works alone —formerly actor in Cambridge plays—athletic —rope-wrestler —student —• worked in Liverpool safe company two years—" He paused, and fixed his eyes more soberly on the note which had caught his eye at first, an entry made s6me years after the full account had been written. Then he exclaimed, “Yes! Opium! Opium! Imagination! Murder! I feared it.” Rising quickly-, he slipped the book into his ragged coat-pocket, and passed out of the hotel without being noticed. At the door he took a taxi as far as Grand street, and walked down Allen for several blocks, slipping along as one accustomed to the haunts of harrowed souls, dodging in and out, shying at the street lights. At length Poe shuffled down the moldering steps to an apparently deserted cellar on Rivington street, gave a double rap on the door, and waited till a panel glided noiselessly back, and a rat-eyed oriental peeped out, jangling, not unmusically: “Yen she qua?” It was a threadbare password to Poe, merely meaning, “Do you smoke opium?” He answered mechanically, “Sui gow!” the name for the little sponge with which the bowl of the opium pipe is cleaned. k "Fifi!” cried the Chinese watchman, and Poe, responding to the command to hurry in, slipped through the door as it slid open on well-oiled hinges. On his way to the general room he had passed the open door to several smaller compartments, accommodating only two or three smokers. In passing each he had given furtive, uneasy glances at the occupant, his manner that of the harrowed habitue, seeking some “pal.” No flicker of feature betrayed him, when he suddenly saw in one of the small rooms his friend Burns, curled up with a pipe, while on the bunk opposite stretched a long, English looking man, with closecropped hair, watery, hollow eyes, and a dead-white face.

Though his mind was quickened by the discovery, Poe lounged on, and with dull eyes asked “Simmy,” the squint-featured Chinaman in charge, for a “layout.” In a short time Burns entered from his smaller compartment, pushed Poe aside with the rudeness characteristic of the place, and, dropping down beside him, managed to whisper unnoticed: “Did you see him? He comes close to your description, stoop and all. I spotted him at five this evening; his mouth and eyes watered for a pipe. Nobody knows him. He’s got a steamship ticket to Liverpool.” “Good! I’ll try him. He looks the part. Do you think we could get him out of here?” “Not till he sails. Says he hasn’t had a pipe for a week —usually smokes in Boston. Seems suspicious. Hasn’t been here in a year.” “You stay here,” directed Poe, drawing his cheeks as though puffing deeply, Simmy having looked toward the pair sharply. When he got another chance to whisper, Poe finished: “If you hear two knocks on my pipe, start for the door, get your gun ready, and block the passage if necessary.” With that he rose, stretched, and loafed into the one where the suspect lay alone. The latter hardly looked at him, and Poe began toying aimlessly with a long cord which he tore loose from the matting cover to his couch. His companion watched him with heavy, idly-moving eyes. Suddenly the pale man reached out a moist, trembling hand, and took hold of the cord.

"Let me tie you a knot,” he said in a pleased, sleepy tone, for he had just reached the blissful stage. Toying with the string for a moment, he managed to twist it into an intricate stopper-knot, and then jerked an end of it into a “Matthew Walker.” “I’ll bet you a layout I can tie a better Walker,” answered Poe. “That’s too easy,” grinned the other, his face becoming ghoulish in the effort. “Get something more like a rope, and I'll show you a few things. I used to be, why, I was champion ropetier and wrestler of —” He curbed his wandering tongue, looked sharply at Poe, and then dropped back into the same listless, languid flow of speech. “I say, get something like a rope and I’ll give you a tie, a good British tie, like they do at the fairs in merrie England, and if I was to tie you up proper you wouldn’t roll out of it in a fortnight, either.” Poe called Simmy, and managed to procure a piece of clothes-line for a consideration, and, with the explanation that it is common sport in England to tie up a wrestler and see if he can wriggle out of it, the Chinaman was satisfied.

Poe admitted that the other’s knots were better than his, though they were clumsily made, the effects of the drug beginning to show. Poe ordered the lost layout, and his companion smoked eagerly. Having finished, he dropped back, and began talking idly, boasting vain-

ly. His eyes gradually closed, and bls lower jaw dropped down. In an instant Poe was all action. He stuffed a handkerchief into the open mouth, and securely tied his man, arm and leg. The stupor’s strength held, the man did not awaken. Going to the opening in the room and making sure the coast was clear, except for the guard, Poe caught up the insensible man, paused to give two staccato taps bn the bamboo pipe, and rushed through the damp, dimly lighted passage-way, half carrying, naif dragging the limp body. At the door the wiry little Chinaman sprang from his post, and took in the strange spectacle with wide, wild. eyes. “No gio out!” he squealed, as Pod silently twisted the yellow hand from the door-knob, giving the man a shoulder shove and trying to force the door. It was locked! A terrorized, shrill jabber of Chinese burst from the guard; there was a slight commotion in the large smoking room, and Poe glanced over his shoulder just in time to see Burns backing out, blocking the passage to Simmy, who rushed at him, until stopped at the point of his gun, cowering and screaming in sheer devil-terror. The surprised guard made a sudden feint, grasped a twist-tongued dirk, and, with a leap and a howl, drove it full force for Poe. At that instant Poe managed to wrench back the heavy bar blocking the door, and staggered through, the knife slashing across the shoulder of his insensible burden. “Make a run for it!” he yelled back to Burns, who was already dashing down the passage to the open door, Poe having rushed on up the cellar stairs. Burns leaped through, slammed the door behind him, caught up half of Poe’s burden, and together they dashed into an alley. “They won’t follow!” breathed Poe. “They’re afraid to peep their noses outside. I’ll phone for a taxi. You stay here, and fix the cut this poor devil got in his shoulder.” Half an hour later the pair of bankers carried their insensible bundle into Poe’s apartment up-town. With deft fingers Poe searched him thoroughly, and finally held up a thick belt he had taken from the man’s waist.

It was padded. With a pair of pocket scissors Poe ripped out the stitches, and drew forth the amazing contents —a handful of SI,OOO bills. Taking from his pocket a memorandum Cribben had given him, describing the missing money, Poe compared the numbers on the notes with the list. Suddenly grasping Burns’ hand, he cried: “You picked the right man.” During the succeeding hours a full confession was wrenched from the poor wretch, who had revived to face the proof of his guilt. Two years before he had conceived the scheme, and, calling on his experience as an amateur actor at Cambridge, had disguised himself as a scrub-woman, his tenor voice helping the deceit, and managed to secure the position at the bank through forged references. He explained in detail how on Saturday afternoons, when the clerks had all left and when the watchman was sometimes reading his paper at the door, he had managed to work at the safe, little by little, with a diamond drill, concealed in his scrub pail, carrying off the shavings in his mopping-rag. He kept at the thing doggedly and secured, through small crimes, the money to buy and perfect a powerful and compact electrical drill, which he had attached to an electric power trunk in the bank, and with it melted the inner safe door. He told how he had bored to the right depth in the outer door, having a complete knowledge of the safe, acquired in his work at Liverpool., On the fatal day he had slipped off his wig, skirt, and waist, when Begg’s back was turned, and appeared before him in the man’s . clothes he had on beneath, knowing that he would not be recognized. The killing of the scrub-woman, he declared was accidental, and explained that he had rushed to the rear of the bank directly, kicked over a stool, broken the bucket, and screamed in the voice he had assumed as scrubwoman, to fool the watchman. Then he had chloroformed Beggs, cut through the alarm plate in the outer door of the safe, and sent in the proper signal to the insurance company at 5:15. In penetrating that plate before signaling the insurance company to set the alarm, he knew the opening of the safe could not be registered. He had then gone to work on the inner door with his electric drill, which he had concealed in his pail. The powerful current had melted through the lock and exposed the treasure. Tying up the money and bonds, he stole the watchman’s keys, opened the front door to the bank, and dragged through it the dead body of the scrub-woman, leaving the door open in a spirit of bravado, knowing that the sight would horrify and mystify the police. He had then packed up the swag in a false-dapped suit-case, and skipped to New York, having sewed $50,000 in his belt in case of emergency. On leaving the bank he had resumed his wig and skirts, thus leaving no possible trace. These he changed at his lodging house before leaving Boston, as a man. He had gone to Simmy’s cellar, after purchasing passage to England, feeling certain that he would be safe in the den until the day of sailing. It was morning before the whole story was finally dragged from him. Then Poe called up the police and delivered his prisoner.