Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1886-06-04
SMART CITY THIEVES.
Genteel "House-Hunters" With an
Eye for Jeweiry.
A Detective Tells of Various Schemes BY
Which Clever SwindIers Rob Unsus.
pecting People in Their Houses
Some Late Devices.
IN. I. Mall AID Expres,.I


"Now that the season of houss-hunting
has come," said an old police detective the
other day, "it will be just as well for own
ers and tenants of houses that are to let to
have an eye to strangers whose actions
are suspicious. And yet don't know that
it will do any good to tell them so; for the
real thief is about the last one they would
suspect. Perhaps you don't know it, so
let me tell you that there is a class of
thieves who make the house hunting sea-
son their harvest-time. 1t is a part of
their business.to be very geRtlemanly and
neat. and to be pleased with what they
see. When, after the inspection is over,
the plausible visitor suddenly remembers
that he left his glove up stairs, he would
be very unobliging host who would not
60 to look for it without urging. He
doesn't find 1t, but while he hunts it high
and low, impatient at keeping his
caller waiting, the latter has
the desired opportunity to plunder
the house. He has laid out his work
carefully for himself while his host showed
him around, and after the latter comes
down to apologize he has time to think by
degrees, as he mis- es lots of other things
haps the thief comes disguised as a roofer,
painter or carpenter, sent by the owner
to make repairs. That is favorite way
of getting the free run of the house, and
just about as profitable to-day as it was
when the first thief knocked at door with
roofer's furnace in his hand. long before
the flood. To live by your wits, you've
got to have wits for capital. Therefore
the ways Of thieves are as countless as
their victims in city like New Y ork. The
deserving man with a family who will call
upon you before you have been many DAYS
in your new hou e, with story of a long
stay in some hospital and a request for a
cash subscription, is as old as the hills and
veritable gold mine to its inventor. Then
there is the fellow who sends a badly
scribbled pencil note by messenger to your
house in business hours, running some-
| thing after this fashion:
DEAR WIFE-sen1 my Sunday 20 to meet
| ing suit round to the store by bearer. Had
a fire there and got wet through. Liable
| to catch a bad cold. Your own
| JOHN.
"What wife would be hard hearted
| enough not to respond az once as desired?
| That, then. is the last she sees of Johns
| Sunday suit; but not the last she hears of
| it, by a good deal. John will have his
| opinion of wife with no better sense
than hen.' and won't be at all backward
about expressing it on occasion. But the
chances are ten to one he won't as
much as mention it when some day he gets
taken in by message, written by an un
steady hand, of which the following is the
! burden:
IL FRIESp- --Jo9S--I-Am-sllurt bit. Please
cash enclos ed check and PIl fix 1t all right
| Monday. Am on n little drunk uptown.
| Keep mum and obliGe. DICK.
"If John has leen there himself-and
| the chances are that he has-he will cash
the check without a word and give the
messenger the money. When Dick turns
up sober to repudiate the loan, there is
an explanation, and, though Mrs. John
is not made party to it, the subject of the
Sunday suit is likely to be thereafter
dropped in the house.
"Thieving, as a trade, Is not restricted
to any particular season. 1t adapts it.
self to all times and all places. Wher-
ever honest men go, and for whatever
purpose, the thief is sure to follow. He
can not live without them. He drifts al
ways with the crowd.
"Whatever, therefore, happens to be
| "the co. it finds him on hand. He at
tends fashionable weddings end funerals
with the same heroic impartiality with
which he goes to the circus parade, always
gotten up to befit the occasion. In the ex-
cursion season he is a regular customer
On the river and Sound boats, and a great
companion of unsuspecting travellers on
the ocean, full of valuable information
about the things worth seeing ashore. Be-
| fore the tourist crowd returns he is busy
at this end discounting the expectations of
waiting friends. In August and Septem-
ber he makes the rounds of the avenue ia
the guise of a Custom house messenger.
with bills for packages from the other
side that await claimants in the public
stores. The money is nearly always
promptly paid, for this Custom house man
is n most plausible fellow and full OF
charming ways. In a certain house VI
town where he called last fall and collect.
ed S9.98 on one of his bogus bills, finding
the piano open he sat down and played
Nearer Ny God, to Thee,' while the lady
was upstairs getting the money with Sc
much feeling that the listeners were
believe him thief when nc
package turned up. They insisted
and probably till this day believe, thai
there was some mistake, though their call.
rgoes around in Sing Sing now in striped
suit. There is a meaner development oi
this kind that wears a jumper and pokes
his head in at the door the minute an ex.
press package has been delivered, and be.
fore the servant has had time to examine
1t, with Beg pardon, ma'ami The driver
left the wrong package. ] will take it and
bring the right one back The unsuspect.
ing driver is half block away by tha-
time, but his bogus helper is much further
away before the fraud is discovered and
vain pursuit is made. Perhaps the cheeki,
est thief is the one who makes busines:
OF following coal-carts to their destination
restaurants or saloons by preference, as
suming an air of authority there and boss.
ing the driver around until thelatter think,
him connected with the store, the store.
Keeper with the coal business Then b,
collects the drivers receipts, talks Goa
with the store-keeper, gets them cashed
and lights out in time.