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WHY CRIME DOES NOT PAY- No. 5 of a Series of Extraordinary Revelations Written by SOPHIE LYONS Ht The Most Famous and Successful Criminal of Modern Times, Who Made a Million Dollars In Her Early Criminal Career and Lost It at Monte Carlo, and ^ Has Now Accumulated Half a Million Dollars in Honorable Business Enterprises O / Written by Sophie Lyons Copyright, 1913, by the Star Company. ROM the moment when he commits his first crime the professional crim inal never hnows what it is to enjoy real peace of mind. Hla crimes hang over him like the sword of Damocles, and un less be reforms he can never be free from Ihe fear of some day being found out and •ent away to prison for a long terra. And arrest is not the only thing he has !| to fear—he is continually face to face ! With the danger of serious Injury or death. ! Whatever the crime he undertakes he muBt run the most desperate risks—he has to stake not only his liberty hut life itself on the narrowest of margins. The powerful explosive he is liking to blow open 8 safe may go off prematurely, as W did one night when George Mason and I were robbing a bank in Illinois, and leave the robber half dead. Perhaps an indignant mob may decide to take Justice into its own hands by lynching the criminal. This is what hap pened to one of my comrades in Kentucky. They had the noose around his neck and Were alt ready to string htm up when I arrived in the nick of time to save his life. Perhaps he will be caught in the act at one of his crimes and shol down like a dog, as my husband, Ned Lyons, was In Connecticut one night. That was the nar rowest escape my husband ever had—I saw it with my own eyes, and if I live to be a hundred f shall never forget the agony of it all At the time of this Ihrllling adventure the police wanted us so badly for our share In Reveral famous robberfes that Ned and I did not dare to undertake any operations In the large cities whicli usually formed our most profitable fields. So. being In need or ready money, we had decided to take a little trip through come of the smaller towns of New England. The amount of cash to he had from the banks, stores and poslolTices in these places waa not large, but, on Ihe other hand, tt wan not hard to get and we thought we ought to be able to spend two or three weeks quite profitably in the nearby towns of Connecticut and Massachusetts. As my health that Summer was not very good and Ned did not want me to take any very active part in the robberies, we In vited George Mason to go along with us. Prom the start we seemed to be ill-fated. Ned and George succeeded in getting into a bank in Fitchburg, Mass., but were frightened away by a watchman before they had time to open the safe. From the postofficc in a little village just outside Fitchburg we secured only eight or ten dollars to pay us for our trouble. Quite discouraged and desperately (n need of money we went on to Palmer, Mass. There I scouted around and discovered that the most likely place for us to rob was G. L. Hitchcock’s drug store, which was also the village postofTice. A storm came up to hide the full moon, and this enabled us (o make the attempt that very night. Tt was not the easiest job in the world, for Mr. Hitchcock and his family lived directly above the store and the least noise was sure to rouse them. How We Robbed a Store Shortly after midnight I took up my position in an alley in the rear of the store to stand guard while Ned and George removed a pane of glass from a cellar window. Through this opening the men squeezed, and presently the dim reflection of their dark lanterns showed me that they had safely reached the store above. 1 had been standing (here in the rain for nearly twenty minutes when a low, rumble from Inside the store made me prick up my oars. Just as I was puckering my lips to whistle a shrill warning to my comrades I saw them appear at the back door of the store carrying between them s small iron sarfo It was this safe rolling over the floor which I had heard The safe was a small affair, hut so well made that it had successfully resisted all their efforts to drill it open. Finding it was not too heavy to be carried they had derldod to take It outside the town, where they could blow it open without fear of arousing the sleepihg village. 'Vc must have made a strange proees non as we trudged along through the dark ness—the two men partly carrying and partly roiling the safe along, and all of us wading through mud half way to our knees. At last we reached a meadow far enough removed from any houses for our purpose. George Mason filled one of the holes he had drilled with black powder and wrapped the safe with some old sacks to protect the fuse from the wet and also to muffle the noise of the explosion. Ned touched a match to the fuse and we scurried to a safe distance. The charge went off with a dull boom—the shattered door of the safe flew high Inlo the air and landed several yards away. Waiting a few minutes to make sure that no one in the village had been awak ened. we hurried back to get our plunder. There were $350 In cash, a diamond ring, some gold pen's and fifteen or twenty dol lars' worth of postage stamps. With the tew dollars the boys had taken from the till tlfis made a trifle more than four hun dred dollars for oUr night’s work—a piti fully small sum compared with wbat some of our bank robberies brought us, hut enough to support us until we could plan some more ambitious undertaking. Just as we were dividing our plunder into three equal shares a freight train whistled in the distance. "George and I will Jump on this train, ’ said my husband, giving me a hurried kiss. "It's safer than for the three of us to stick together. Good-bye—and take care of yourBelf. We'll meet, you in South Wind ham, Conn., late tonight or early to morrow." Wet, bedraggled and so tired that I could have fallen asleep standing up, i groped my way to the railroad station and curled myself up on a bench to snatch what rest I could. Just before daybreak a milk train came along. I boarded this and (ravelled by a roundabout route to South Windham. My Husband Is Shot I reached there late in the afternoon and went straight to the postoffice. This was always the accepted rendezvous for pro fessional criminals when no other place had been agreed upon. Detectives in every city might very profitably spend more of their time watching the postoffice, for wherever the criminal is he makes a point of calling there at least once every twenty- four hours to keep appointments with his friends or in the hope of running across soene acquaintance. iNed and George wore there waiting for me. and mighty glad they were to see me, for they had heard vague rumors of a woman having been arrested on suspicion that she knew something about the Palmer robbery. The best opportunity the sleepy little town afforded seemed to be a general store run by n man named Johnson. 1 dropped in there late one evening and, on the pre text of buying a crochet hook, saw the old proprietor locking the day's receipts - quite a respectable bundle of money—in a ramshackle safe which offered about as much security as a cheese box. We got everything in readiness to break into the store the following night. It was a foolhardy time for such a job. as there was a bright moon—but we were hungry for money, and one more good haul would supply enough to keep us in comfort until we could lay our plans for some robbery really worthy of our skill. There was really little 1 could do to help the men, but I could not bear to be left behind. Just after midnight l stole out of the railroad station, where I had been waiting ostensibly for the night train to New York, and hid myself in the doorway of a livery stable, where I had a good view of the store we were going to rob. Pretty soon I saw my two comrades come cautiously down the main street from opposite directions. They met underneath a window of the store on the side which was in the dark shadow of a tree. The window was so high above the ground that my husband had to climb up on George Mason's shoulders to feach it. 1 could hear the gentle rasp of his jimmy as it worked against the fastenings. At last he raised the sash gently and stepped into the store. Then he leaned far out across the sill and stretched his brawny arms down toward his companion. Mason gave a leap, caught hold of Ned's wrists and. with the agility of a circus per former. swung himself up into the window. All was as silent as the grave. The only sign of life 1 could see in the peaceful street were two eats enjoying a nocturnal gambol on a nearby piazza roof. I shivered for fear they might start yowling and awaken somebody to spoil our plans. Just at that instant one of the cats upset a flower pot which stood at a window opening on the porch roof. To my horror, that pot went rolling down the roof with a tremendous clatter, hung suspended for a second on the eaves, then fell to the stone steps with a crash that woke the echoes. At once the whole town awoke. In every direction I could hear windows being thrown open, children crying and sleepy voices asking what the trouble was. At a window directly over the store where my two Iriends were a night-capped head appeared and a frightened woman screamed, "Help! Burglars!" at the top of her lungs. That completed the havoc which the playful cats and the flower pot had begun. From every house halt dressed men armed with rifles, shotguns and all sorts of weap ons poured into the street. All this racket had started too suddenly for -me to give Ned and George any warn ing. I could only crouch farther back in the shadow of my doorway and trust to Providence that the villagers would over look me in their excitement "There goes the burglar now!” some one shouted, and Just then I saw my husband dash past my hiding place so close that I could have touched him He was headed for the open country 'beyond the railroad tracks and was running faster than I had ever supposed a man of his weight could. "Stop, or I'll shoot!” yelled an old white- whiskered farmer who stood, rifle in hand, not a dozen yards away. But Ned. if he heard the command, made no move to obey. Instead, he only ran all the faster, hunching his head down be tween it is shoulders and zigzagging back and forth across the road as if to make his bulky form a less favorable target. The old farmer raised his rifle as delib erately as if lie had been aiming at a squirrel instead of a fellow man. Three shots blazed out in rapid succession. The first shot went wild. At the second my husband stumbled. At the third he threw up his hands and pitched forward headlong in the road. "We've got him!" the crowd shouted with what seemed to me fiendish glee and rushed up to where Ned's body lay in a quivering, bloody heap. I supposed he was dead, but whether dead or alive I knew there was nothing I could do to aid him. Nervous and trem bling at the awful sight I had seen, I slipped out of town unnoticed. What Came of Our Crimes I saw nothing of George Mason and for months afterward did not know how he had escaped. With better judgment than my husband showed, he had remained quietly in the store after the outcry started. He saw the shooting, and in'the confusion which followed he found little difficulty in getting out of town Friends of mine in New Ixmdon aided me to return to the hospital in Hartford, where Ned had been taken after the shoot ing. His recovery was slow, for there was a bullet imbedded nine inches deep in ms back which the surgeons were unable to remove. As soon as he was able to stand trial, he was sentenced to three years in State prison, and when he had completed this term he was given three years in Massachusetts for the robbery at Palmer. This was the result of our crimes in New England—my husband nearly killed and sentenced to six long years in prison. Can you wonder why 1 have learned the lesson that crime does not pay? But k to nty sorrow; 1 did not learn the lesson then—no, not for many years after that. With my husband in prison the sup port of my little ones fell wholly on my • shoulders, and I promptly turned to bank robbing as the easiest way I knew of making a living. My early training under such expert bank robbers as Ned Lyons, Mark Shin- burtt and Harry Raymond made me ex traordinarily successful in this variety of crime. The cleverest men in the busi ness began to have respect for my judg ment and were continually inviting me to take an important part in their risky but very profitable ventures. Soon, as I am going to tell you. my reputation for skill in organizing the most daring robberies and carrying them through without detec tion had spread even beyond the limits of the underworld. One day, when' I was trying to enjoy the novel experience of living honestly for a few weeks, a distinguished looking gentle man called at my home. He saw my look of incredulity when he announced himself as a bank president and promptly pro duced a heavy engraved card which con firmed the truth of his statement. Instantly I was on my guard. In those days my house was the headquarters for all sorts of strange persons—receivers of stolen goods, professional bondsmen, crim inal lawyers, escaped prisoners—but I had never before been honored by a visit from a hank president What ori earth could the president of a bank want of a bank robber? "I understand that you are one of the most successful hank robbers in America," he said without any delay in coming to the point. "! tvanl your advice in a little undertaking I have in mind, and. If pos sible, your help.” “My advice and help!" i exclaimed, thinking the man must be out of his head. “That's exactly what I want,” he re plied coolly. “I want you to~tell me how ! can have my bank robbed, and, if pos sible, I want you to take charge of the robbery yourself." As lie explained, he was more than $150,000 short in his accounts. He had taken this amount from the bank within the past year and lost every dollar of it in speculation. He could not return this money and it was only a matter of a few weeks before his embezzlement would be discovered. Being a man of prominence in his com munity—a deacon in the church, his wife a society leader, his children in college— running away was out of the question. For months he'had been racking his brain for some way of averting the ruin which he had brought upon himself. The plan he had finally devised for re taining his good name and keeping out of prison was to have his bank robbed. On the night of the robbery he would leave $50,000 in the vault to pay the robbers for their trouble, but when he came to an nounce the robbery to the police and the newspapers he would declare that $200,000 had been taken. In this way his thefts would be covered up and he could continue to enjoy the respect and confidence of the community where he had always lived. A Banker Hires Us to Rob I whs amazed at the bold ingenuity of this plan and the matter-of-fact way in which he presented it to me. This was the first 1 had eve r heard of a bank being robbed by request of one of its officials. Later I came to know that It is not an uncommon thing for dishonest presidents and cashiers to conceal their thefts by hiring robbers to break into their banks. The difference between what is actually taken in one of these robberies by request and what the police and the newspapers say Is taken covers the amount which the embezzling official has lost in Wall Street or some other speculation. At that time such an idea wag so new to me that all sorts of suspicions crowded into my mind. Probably it was trap for me, I thought, and I positively declined to have anything to do with it. But the old banker would not take no for an answer. He urged me to think it over, and a week later he called again. By this time the fear of the disgrace which threatened him and his family had made him a nervous wreck. He begged so piteously for me to help him save his good name that my womanly sympathies got the better of me, and 1 finally con sented. All my feeling for him, however, did not quite free my mind of the fear that the whole affair might be a trick, and 1 deter mined to protect myself and ttie robbers who would assist me with all the shrewd ness I could, “We must have a written agreement,” I said at the very start. The banker objected to this, fearing, I suppose, that I might use the paper against him later for blackmail. But 1 insisted that I would not do a thing until I had it. "If cou can’t trust me to that extent, I can’t trust you," I said firmly—and at last he told me to draw up the paper and he would sign it. According to the contract which I pre pared, the banker paid five thousand dol lars down and was to pay me an equal amount as soon as 1 had completed my arrangements and set the date for the rob bery. He further agreed that there should be at least $50,000 in cash in the bank vault on the night of our visit. It was further provided that the banker should co-operate with me and my fellow robbers In every possible way. and that he should do nothing to aid in our arrest or conviction for the crime, which, as was expressly stated, was committed at his suggestion and not ours. In case the rob bery was interrupted before we could get inside the vault the banker was to pay us $25,000 in cash In addition to the $10,000 already advanced. I agreed to leave no stone unturned to carry out the robbery and promised to re turn the agreement to the banker as soon as all its provisions had been fulfilled. All this I set down on paper in as 'busi nesslike way as I knew how. It was a document which would have made the poor old banker’s ruin even greater than his thievings had done if I had been the sort of woman to break faith with him. With trembling fingers he signed it and counted out $5,h00 in bills. From the banker 1 had gained a good idea of the bank aud the sort of vault we would have to enter. Now to get some good, reliable men to help me do the job. Of all the bank burglars in my acquaint ance George Mason seemed best fitted for this particular crime. He was a cool, resourceful fellow and had had wide expe rience in blowing open bank vaults. George readily agreed to join me. and for the rest of the party he recommended two younger men—Tom Smith and Frank Jones. I wilt call them, although those were not their names. I do not like to reveal their identity here because they later reformed and led honest lives. Right here let me say that T never told these three men of my arrangements with the banker or that I was to receive from him $10,000 in addition to what we ex pected to find in the vault. If they are alive to-day and read these lines they will learn here for the first time that the bank in Quincy, III., which they helped Sophie Lyons rob was robbed by request of its president. Boring Into the Bank Vault I sent word to the hanker that we were ready and he came to my house and paid me $5,000 more. Then, by different routes, George Mason, the other two robbers and I proceeded to Quincy. I was the first to arrive. I went to the leading hotel, announced my plan to add a patent medicine laboratory to the town’s industries and began to look around for a suitable location for my enterprise. As 1 believe I mentioned in a previous chapter, this ruse of the patent medicine laboratory was one I had borrowed from my friend, Harry Raymond—he had used it to splen did advantage in his robbery of the Boyl- ston Bank in Boston. Of course, it was a part of my pre arranged plan with the banker that the quarters I should finally find best suited for my purpose would be a room on the second floor of the bank building, directly over the vault we were going to rob. I made several visits to the bank before 1 completed my arrangements with the president—partly to carry out my role of the cautious business woman and partly to study the construction of the vault and see where we could best bore our way into it. By the time the lease was signed the three men who were to be associated with me in the new business arrived. With their help 1 secured a quantity of bottles, labels, jars of chemicals, chairs, desks, fables and other things we would need if we were really making patent medicine. Among the articles of furniture we moved in was an unusually large oak ward robe. We removed the bottom from this and placed it over the exact spot in the floor where we planned to dig our opening into the bank vault. Then, while one of the men and I osten tatiously pasted labels on endless 1)011168 of ‘Golden Bitters,” the other two men crawled into the wardrobe where no chance visitor could see them and day after day continued the work of removing the layers of brick and timber which sepa rated us from the vault. We stored the debris as it accumulated in bags and car ried it away every night. It was a long job and a hard one. The floor timbers were seasoned oak and be neath Rhem were two layers of brick. In fche cramped space Inside the ward robe it was hard to work to the best ad vantage and, besides, the men never knew Just how far they had progressed and were in constant fear that an extra vig orous blow would loosen a big strip of plaster in the ceiling of the bank. To our disgust we found after we had passed through the floor itself that the vault had a sort of false roof composed of short lengths of railroad iron placed ir regularly In a setting of mortar and brick. This made our task three days longer than we had expected. Late, one afternoon George mason cleared away a space which left only a thin layer of lath and plaster between us and the inside of the vault. There was too mifeh danger of the gap ing hole we had dug under the wardrobe being discovered to admit of any further delay. We made our arrangements tr rob the bank that very night. While the rest of the town was going to bed we waited impatiently for it to get late enough for us to lay our lands on the $50,000 which I had every reason to believe was watting below that! thin layer of lath and plaster. Luckily enough the bank’s watchman was at a christen ing party that evening and was not likely to return until the wee small hours. This prevented the necessity of my remaining on guard outside. Shortly after midnight we turned out our lamps and lighted our dark lanterns I peered out of the window—the streets were deserted. George Mason took a small sledgeham mer and with one or two well dimeted blows opened up the hole in the .floor wide enough to admit his body. Thin he tied one end of a long rope under his arms and we lowered him down intp the vault. My Comrade’s Narrow Estjape To the best of my knowledge and be lief the cash which had been profiled would be found right on the shelvls of the vault, and all George would hale to do would be to stuff it into his p4ket3 and climb back up the way . he hjS| But, whether through Intent or t! sight on the president’s part, that sf liot the case. For several minutes we v* ted breathlessly listening to George as Mpum- bled around the vault by the light df his dark lantern. Then we heard him call in a hoarse whisper: ( “Sophie, it’s just as I was afraid >.t jioiUd be. Every cent of the money is idjckid pp in the small steel safe. I’ll have to come back up and get my tools.” It is the custom in big bank vaults to have a small and separate steel safe to put -the actual cash into. Leases, docu ments, account books and sometimes ttonds and stock certificates are kept in the big vault, but money and things of special value are usually locked up in the inside steel compartment. With same difficulty we hauled .him back up. From his bag he selected the drills he thought he would need and from a bottle poured out what seemed to me an extra generous quantity of Mack powder. “Be careful and not use too much of that stuff," I called as he disappeared again through the hole. “Ned always said that was your worst tailing.” “Don’t you worry, Sophie," he replied; ing to the i the door of t tug on the r haul him ui lighted mate the fuse. We pulled worth but within two t there came a an explosion Although c 'blinded by tt ous fumes wl hole, we mai the rape and out of the dea ture explosio “George!” 1 from under t swered and I that we laid g and eyebrow off, his face i ‘ coal and he wound in the We forgot we forgot the our anxiety fc of the men 1 to force a. d throat. It set to his senses, and roughly ] "It went off “but don’t be i minute. Look roused the to I looked ou sight. The t fact that it si any other bi vented the ex] We Get tl Although su insisted on g<j It was no eas full of suffoca time to lose, : turn at any n After a few for the third I “That charge ters, but here's he said, bandii bills. I counted t work to cone found there w Mason thought with his life a seemed well sa said nothing. We started a a few days la ! As I had expe placed by the r large reward w of the robbers, that the presidi taken and of "it will take a good big dose to open this w t,i ch the affait safe. be generally ac For several minutes we sat there listen- After the exci Our Exciting Adventure A« I entered the aquare I could aee Tom’* fami form looming above the head* of the yelling mob wl surrounded him. He was mounted on a soap box un an oak tree, which stood in front of the court hous< I shall never forget how he looked—pale ac a sh< his feet tied with rope, his am* securely bound beh him. He was bareheaded, aid they had removed coat and collar in order to adjust the noose which hi around his neck. I shuddered to think that enless I could devise so plan of action Tom Bigelow’s lifeless body would sc be dangling before my eyes. Summoning every oujice «f nyvout energy I p sessed. I pressed my way through the crAwd scream! frantically: "That man is my sweethes-t! Don’t lynch him—« please don’t lynch him!" :