Charlotte messenger. [volume] (Charlotte, Mecklenburg Co., N.C.) 1882-18??, 1888-03-24
AN EXPRESS AGENTS CONFESSION.
His Scheme for Making Himself Solid with
the Communicating Incidents.

His Scheme for Making Himself Solid with
the COmpany--Funny Incidents.
IF you won't give me away" said a
middle aged man whom we will call
Brown, because Brown is not his name,
Il will tell youa little trick once played
on an express company, for which l was
running as messenger on train not far
from here. TWAS in the days when they
never thought of sending out more than
one man with an express car, and it was
not deemed necessary to arm him, as
they now do their messengers. l had
thought this schemeall out carefully and
tried to lool. at it in all its phases, SO that
no unexpected evil result would come of
it. One night we were running along at
rafting speed, by which mean speed
thatmade everything about the old shack
ling cars rattle till you couldn't hear
yourself think. The wind was blowing
very hard outside, and everybody on the
train was hugging about as tight as he
could to a stove. / had things all my
own away. First took a big coupling
pin and struck my end door in such a
manner with it as to show several large
dents in it. Then 1 stepped outside,
locked the door, and with a tremendous
blow broke the loci.
81 waited awhile, intending that if
anybody was attracted by the noise to
say l had locked myself out and had
dropped my key off the train. But no
body came. Then closed the door and
quickly fired several shots from an old
pepper box pistol which had loaded not
very heavily. One Of these l fired
through the rim Of my hat In another
moment | was back in the passenger
coach, excited and calling for help. The
conductor, brakeman and several of
the passengers followed me. 1 was SO
excited l could hardly speak, you know,
but when they saw the broken and bat
tered door they OWNED what l did not
tell them. When my excitement had
subdued managed to explain how two
masked men had broken in the door;
how l had called for help in vain; how 1
had fought them both off with the stove
poker; how they had shot at me several
times-I couldn't tell how many times
and how, after 1 had miracuiously es-
capped their bullets and fought them off,
calling for help as loudly as l could. they
had rushed to the platform and probably
jumped of. OF course l let somebody
else find the bullet hole in my hat, and
then expressed surprise about it.
"Well, sir, it worked like a charm.
The next morning the papers had long
accounts of it, and they all praised me
highly for keeping the robbers away from
the money chest. was the lion of the
hour. The president of the company,
too, wrote Tong personal letter to me,
and inclosed check for $500. Here
made another point by sending the
check back, and saying that l could not
accept such check for having done
merely my plain duty. From that time
on l was very solid with the company,
and soon had one of the best runs and
the best pay they could give me.
There were two funny things about
that case. One was that the agent at the
station we had last passed said. he saw
two hard looking characters around
the station just before the train
came in and never saw them
again, while the conductor said no
such persons boarded the train
as legitimate passengers. Another fun
ny thing was that gentleman who oc-
casionally sent large sums of money to
his agent at the other end of the road,
said lie had telegraphed on that day that
he would send $4,000 that night. It SO
happened, however, that he did not send
it till the next night. He always thought
it was his money the robbers were
after. Chicago Times.